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The imploded empire: Literature and national identity in post-imperial England
Abstract
In "England, Your England" George Orwell rhapsodized over the ability of the English to know instinctively what it meant to be English. Today, this intrinsic "Englishness" is still assumed, and many barriers continue to exist to an altered understanding of Englishness and Britishness. In the aftermath of the implosion, political and cultural tensions surround the current "production" of a "British" identity, and the prevailing canon and national identity formation continues to be a political activity that seeks to centralize and marginalize, based upon historical thinking about race, Empire, class, and gender. But writings from the margins have shifted and continue to shift what the center itself is. Although we live in an era of increasing transnationalism and multinationality, the study of ideologies behind the formation of national identity remains relevant. Even though possibly imaginary and potentially hegemonic, the identity of a nation continues to involve the inclusion or exclusion of certain groups in response to an idealized image--directly impacting those living within a legally defined country. Some authors have chosen to retain a transnational/global identity, and many critics also argue for this category as a strategy to resist further imperial commodification and objectification. However, I am distrustful of this current critical penchant toward hasty globalization. My concern is that jumping onto the "global village," transnational imaginary land bandwagon has resulted, in Britain, in a convenient mass containment of the post-imperial Other. I argue that the ultimate effect elides many contemporary authors into giant homogenous categories that effaces or erases real concerns regarding how canons and nations get formed and how they can be subverted from the margins. The current situation in Britain is one which institutionalizes, socializes, and approves a unidimensional approach to national identity, thus maintaining and propagating racist, classist, and sexist nationalistic ideology. Admittance into the group has been tightly controlled through a cultural logic of exclusion. I attempt to explore crucial questions of national identity for a modern world in the midst of massive and drastic reconfigurations, particularly those issues relevant to Britain's Imploded Empire.
Subject Area
British and Irish literature|Literature
Recommended Citation
Prince, Tracy J, "The imploded empire: Literature and national identity in post-imperial England" (1997). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9805522.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9805522