ENG 225-01 - Introduction to Postcolonial Literatures

4 credits (Fall)

“The Sea is History”: Walcott’s famous poem was ahead of its time in recognizing that oceans, sea-voyages, colonial trade, the histories of indenture and slavery, ideas about ‘discovery,’ maritime conflicts, privateering and smuggling connect different parts of the world and are a rich repository of stories. Much of what lay outside the boundaries of empires and nations was also the site of challenges to literary, historical, and political understandings of the world in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Our postcolonial approaches to literature and theory will be framed by critical essays by among others, Ngugi wa Thiongo and Ella Shohat. Literary texts for the course will include Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Aime Cesaire’s A Tempest, Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea, selections from Derek Walcott’s Omeros, and Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh.

Prerequisite: ENG 120 or ENG 121 for majors; for non-majors, ENG 120 or ENG 121 or third-year standing.
Instructor: Kapila