The Characteristics of Postcolonial Criticism Key Points in Postcolonial Criticism

14 193. Barry also emphasizes on what Frantz Fanon remarked on what he called as ‘cultural resistance’ in his book, The Wretched of the Earth published in France in 1961. Fanon argued that the first step for colonialized people in finding a voice and an identity is to reclaim their own past, and continued to erode the colonialist ideology by which that past had been devalued 193; emphasis added. A major book which inaugurates postcolonial criticism is written by Edward Said, entitled Orientalism published in 1978, which is a specific expose of the Eurocentric universalism which takes for granted both the superiority of what is European or Western, and the inferiority of what is not 193. Said identifies a European cultural tradition of Orientalism, which is a particular and long-standing way of identifying the East as Other and inferior to the West. The Orient, he says, features in the Western mind as a sort of surrogate and even underground self’. This means that the East becomes the repository or projection of those aspects of themselves which Westerners do not choose to acknowledge cruelty, sensuality, decadence, laziness, and so on. At the same time, and paradoxically, the East is seen as a fascinating realm of the exotic, the mystical and the seductive. It also tends to be seen as homogenous, the people there being anonymous masses, rather than individuals, their actions determined by instinctive emotions lust, terror, fury, etc. rather than by conscious choices or decisions. Their emotions and reactions are always determined by racial considerations they are like this because they are asiatics or blacks or orientals rather than by aspects of individual status or circumstance 193- 194; emphasis added.

2. The Characteristics of Postcolonial Criticism

The writer finds four characteristics of postcolonial criticism in Barry’s book. The first characteristic of postcolonial criticism is an awareness of representations of the non-European as exotic or immoral Other. It evokes or PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 15 creates a pre-colonial version of their own nation, rejecting the modern and the contemporary, which is tainted with the colonial status of their countries 194. Language is a second area of concern in postcolonial criticism 195, while the third characteristic is the emphasis on identity as doubled, or hybrid, or unstable 196. The fourth characteristic is the stress on ‘cross-cultural’ interactions 196 characterized by the three stages in seeing postcolonial criticism called Adopt, Adapt, and Adept.

3. The Stages in Seeing Postcolonial Criticism

There was a shifting attitude towards postcolonial writers in 1980s and 1990s which seeing themselves as using primarily African or Asian forms, supplemented with European-derived influences, rather than as working primarily within European genres like the novel and merely adding to them a degree of exotic Africanisation. All postcolonial literatures seem to make this transition 196. Therefore, there are three stages in seeing postcolonial criticism. They are called Adopt, Adapt, and Adept.

a. Adopt

The postcolonial literatures begin with an unquestioning acceptance of the authority of European models especially in the novel and with the ambition of writing works that will be masterpieces entirely in this tradition. This can be called the ‘Adopt’ phase of colonial literature, since the writer’s ambition is to adopt the form as it stands, the assumption being that it has universal validity 196. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 16

b. Adapt

The second stage can be called the ‘Adapt’ phase, since it aims to adapt the European form to African or Asian subject matter, thus assuming partial rights of intervention in the genre 196.

c. Adept

In the final phase, there is a declaration of cultural independence whereby African or Asian writers remake the form to their own specification, without reference to European norms. This is called the ‘Adept’ phase, since its characteristic is the assumption that the colonial writer is an independent ‘adept’ in the form, as in the first phase, or as in the second 196.

4. Key Points in Postcolonial Criticism

To sum up the postcolonial approach and its criticism, there are six key points in postcolonial criticism as stated in Beginning Theory, 1 They reject the claims to universalism made on behalf of canonical Western literature and seek to show its limitations of outlook, especially its general inability to empathize across boundaries of cultural and ethnic difference; 2 They examine the representation of other cultures in literature as a way of achieving this end; 3 They show how such literature is often evasively and crucially silent on matters concerned with colonization and imperialism; 4 They foreground questions of cultural difference and diversity and examine their treatment in relevant literary works; 5 They celebrate hybridity and cultural poly valency, that is, the situation whereby individuals and groups belong simultaneously to more than one culture for instance, that of the colonizer, through a colonial school system, and that of the colonized, through local and oral traditions; 6 They develop a perspective, not just applicable to postcolonial literatures, whereby states of marginality, plurality and perceived Otherness are seen as sources of energy and potential change 199. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 17

C. Theoretical Framework

This part explains briefly the contribution of the theories in analyzing and solving the problems of the study. This study involves the explanation on Postcolonial Literature, theory of Place and Displacement and theory of Cultural Identity to answer both the first and second research questions. Using these theories, the writer will be able to describe the main characters’ portrayed in those three short stories the first research question and to analyze the experience in exile, experienced by the main characters in those three short stories the second research question. The explanation on Postcolonial Literature provides important background to comprehend the text, while the theory of Place and Displacement offers great help to identify the ‘exile’ experiences, experienced by those main characters since it tells about the reason why the ‘dislocation’ feeling appears in those main characters in three short stories analyzed. In addition, the theory of Cultural Identity presents the way to analyze the main characters’ difficulties in facing the new environments and their struggle whether to maintain their cultural identity, or even resist against it. The Postcolonial Approach then is used as a tool to analyze the text since it relates much on the postcolonial reading.

D. Criticism

Once a literary work published for public, it may generate compliments, comments, suggestion or even critics from the readers. Like what was written in PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI