Table Of ContentTranscultural Identities
in Contemporary Literature
CROSS
Readings in Post/Colonial
ULTURES Literatures and Cultures in English
167
SERIES EDITORS
Gordon Collier Bénédicte Ledent Geoffrey Davis
(Giessen) (Liège) (Aachen)
CO-FOUNDING EDITOR
Hena Maes–Jelinek
Transcultural Identities
in Contemporary Literature
Edited by
Irene Gilsenan Nordin, Julie Hansen,
and Carmen Zamorano Llena
Amsterdam - New York, NY 2013
Cover Image
Ilia Rogatchevski, Prosopagnosia (2013;
digitally manipulated collage, 21 x 29 cm)
The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of “ISO
9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for
documents - Requirements for permanence”.
ISBN: 978-90-420-3735-9
E-Book ISBN: 978-94-012-0987-8
© Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam – New York, NY 2013
Printed in The Netherlands
Table of Contents
________________________ ________________________
(cid:97)
Acknowledgements vii
Introduction: Conceptualizing Transculturality in Literature
IRENE GILSENAN NORDIN, JULIE HANSEN,
AND CARMEN ZAMORANO LLENA ix
A NEW KIND OF MIGRATION
Transnational Movements and the Limits of Citizenship:
Redefinitions of National Belonging in Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland
CARMEN ZAMORANO LLENA 3
Forging a Transcultural Identity as a Russian-American
Writer: Lara Vapnyar and Cultural Adaptation
KAREN L. RYAN 27
Childhood, Migration, and Identity in Chris Cleave’s The Other Hand
CARLY MCLAUGHLIN 47
TRANSCENDING THE NATION
Cosmopolitanism and Citizenship: Identities
and Affiliations in Monica Ali’s In the Kitchen
CHRISTOPH HOUSWITSCHKA 71
Constructions of Transcultural Subjectivity: Going Beyond
Nationalism and Ethnicity in A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
MATS TEGMARK 93
Cosmopolitan Perspectives: Globalization and
Transnationalization in Contemporary German Literature
KRISTIN REBIEN 113
CRITIQUES OF MULTICULTURALISM
Beyond the Multicultural Fairytale: Insider–Outsiders, the Politics
of Violence, and the Transnational Turn in Canadian Literature
PILAR CUDER–DOMÍNGUEZ 137
Beyond Multiculturalism: Invisible Men and
Transculturality in The Human Stain andErasure
MALIN LIDSTRÖM BROCK 159
America After 9/11: Ethnic Diversity and
Patriotism in John Updike’s Terrorist
KATHERINA DODOU 177
THE INTERACTION OF LANGUAGES IN TRANSLINGUAL TEXTS
Literary Language and the Translated Self of Assia Djebar
STEFAN HELGESSON 203
Translingual and Transcultural Patterns
in Francophone Literature of the Maghreb
ERIC SELLIN 223
Hsia Yü’s Translingual Transculturalism
from Memoranda to Pink Noise
J.B. ROLLINS 245
Notes on Contributors 267
Index 273
Acknowledgements
________________________ ________________________
(cid:97)
T
HE IDEA FOR THIS BOOK arose from discussions within an interdis-
ciplinary research group focusing on transculturality at Dalarna Uni-
versity in Falun, Sweden. The editors and some of the contributors
are active within this group, while other contributors are based at universities
in Asia, Europe, and North America. The editors are grateful to members of
the research group who have not contributed to this volume, but nonetheless
enriched it through their insightful comments and ideas. The research area on
Culture, Identity, and Representation at Dalarna University granted funding
which made the realization of this volume possible. We also wish to express
our thanks to Gordon Collier, co-editor and technical editor of the Cross/
Cultures series.
(cid:97)
Introduction
Conceptualizing Transculturality in Literature
IRENE GILSENAN NORDIN, JULIE HANSEN,
AND CARMEN ZAMORANO LLENA
________________________ ________________________
(cid:97)
Globalization and the Redefinition of Culture
G
LOBALIZING PROCESSES have led, in recent decades, to critical re-
evaluations of the ways in which ‘culture’ has traditionally been
understood. Global capitalism, worldwide diffusion and populariza-
tion of communication technologies, as well as increased mobility of people,
information, and consumer goods, are some of the forces that account for a
widespread intensification of cultural exchanges. In this context, past defini-
tions of collective and individual identities as essentially monocultural are in-
creasingly viewed as inadequate to describe the way people perceive them-
selves and the world they live in. Instead, the concept of transculturality has
often been adopted to describe the diverse and productive reality of processes
of identity-formation that take place at cultural interfaces.
The phenomenon of transculturality is understood here as the formation of
multifaceted, fluid identities resulting from diverse cultural encounters. This
idea is not new, of course.1 As Wolfgang Welsch, a leading theoretician of
transculturality, remarks, Montaigne, Novalis, Whitman, and Nietzsche all
serve as examples of individuals whose transcultural experiences shaped their
individual identities. There is a significant difference, however, between earlier
manifestations of transculturality and the contemporary situation. Whereas
1 Wolfgang Welsch, “Transculturality: The Puzzling Form of Cultures Today,” in
Spaces of Culture: City, Nation, World, ed. Mike Featherstone & Scott Lash (Thou-
sand Oaks CA & London: Sage, 1999):198.
x TRANSCULTURAL IDENTITIES (cid:97)
transcultural experiences used to be the privilege of an elite, they are now a
reality for a significant part of the world’s population, due to the intensified
volume and frequency of migration, information exchange through new chan-
nels of communication technology, and global economic interdependencies.
The concept of transculturality initially developed within anthropological,
sociological, and philosophical discourses in relation to these macrolevel
changes.2 In these fields, transculturality is used to describe the complex con-
figuration of modern cultures. Former monological identifications of a single
culture with a specific nation-state have been overridden by enmeshed webs
of intercultural relations, developing both within and beyond the borders of
the nation-state. The concept of transculturality has also emerged as an alter-
native to the limitations of multiculturality and interculturality. These latter
concepts have been used to describe the multiplicity of forms of cultural life
that coexist within a specific society. However, as Welsch argues, both fail to
overcome a Herderian understanding of culture as a unified entity and are
therefore unable to address problems and challenges that arise in pluricultural
societies. By contrast, the concept of transculturality fosters an inclusive,
rather than exclusive, understanding of culture as characterized by diffe-
rences; it emphasizes the need for groups to identify common ground among
cultures, and the need for the individual to acknowledge the foreign within
oneself in order to be able to comprehend others. According to Welsch, “it is
precisely when we no longer deny, but rather perceive, our inner trans-
culturality, that we will become capable of dealing with outer transcul-
turality.”3
Imaginative literature offers a powerful means of exploring transcultural
experience and grappling with the challenges it poses to individuals and soci-
eties alike. The very act of reading literary texts is potentially a transcultural
experience, in that it invites the reader to identify with the perspectives of fic-
tional characters from unfamiliar geographical locations, as well as from a
2 Some relevant texts in these fields are: Wolfgang Welsch, “Transkulturalität:
Lebensformen nach der Auflösung der Kulturen,” Information Philosophie 2 (1992):
5–20;Transcultural Realities: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Cross-Cultural Rela-
tions, ed. Virginia H. Milhouse, Molefi Kete Asante & Peter Nwosu (Thousand Oaks
CA & London: Sage, 2001); Hans Jörg Sandkühler, Transculturality: Epistemology,
Ethics, and Politics (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2006); and Transcultural Americas/Amé-
riques Transculturelles, ed. Afef Benessaieh (Ottawa: U of Ottawa P,2010).
3 Welsch, “Transculturality: The Puzzling Form of Cultures Today,” 201.
