17315

SoSe 16: PS-Surveying English Literatures II: Home and Migration in Recent Fiction

Kai Martin Wiegandt

Kommentar

What are the new forms of migration that have developed over the last twenty-five years? What does ‘home’ mean for these new migrants? The last twenty-five years have seen an increasing acceleration of globalization that has transformed migration and notions of home in ways not yet understood. At the same time, a heightened political concern for the larger economic and social impact of migration has tended to obscure the actual nature of the migratory experience itself. It is in contemporary literature that particularly rich and subtle explorations of emerging forms of migration and their effects on migrants’ identities are to be found.
We will assess ways in which contemporary fiction addresses migration and notions of home and belonging. We will focus on four works: Slow Man by J.M. Coetzee, in which immigration and the question of home are central; Phaswane Mpe’s Welcome to Our Hillbrow about migration within Southern Africa; Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah about a Nigerian women’s migration to the USA and back; and both parts of Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, a graphic novel telling the story of the author’s arrival in Europe after leaving Iran.
Participants will have to read critical essays in addition to the assigned texts (the criticism will be made available on Blackboard). Regular attendance (no more than two missed classes), the writing of weekly response papers and a presentation are obligatory. Credits can be acquired by submitting a paper on a specialised topic. English is spoken in class. Your language skills should be at the C1 level or higher according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.
Students are required to buy the following books: Coetzee, J. M. Slow Man. London: Vintage, 2006. Mpe, Phaswane. Welcome to Our Hillbrow. New York: Picador, 2014. Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. Americanah. New York: Anchor, 2014. Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis I & II New York: Vintage, 2008. Schließen