Research Articles (English)

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Browsing Research Articles (English) by Author "Gagiano, Annie"

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    Ice-Candy-Man and In the Country of Men : the politics of cruelty and the witnessing child
    (Stellenbosch University, Department of Linguistics, 2010) Gagiano, Annie
    Using two novels employing child narrators as observers of atrocities by which they are not only profoundly affected, but in which they become implicated (respectively by a Pakistani and a Libyan author), the article sets out to try and discover how the technique of mediation by a child witness and commentator affects the reader's perception of the Partition of Pakistan from India and the early rule of Gen. Quaddafi [or Gaddafi] in Libya, North Africa. The children are pre-pubescent, but intensely aware of sexual politics and emotional cross-currents in their familial, domestic, neighbourly and social contexts as the harsh and terrible political realities of their time and setting either filter into or impact violently upon their own lives. The offered reading is contextualized by considerations of postcolonial texts (as both Sidhwa's Ice-Candy-Man [also known by the American title of Cracking India] and Matar's In the Country of Men are, broadly speaking) as writings that can serve inter-cultural and trans-modern 'translation' purposes –  not only by their publication in English (neither author's first language), but by using each of their child narrators to make cultural 'differences' (inter-)accessible to their readers. The emphasis in both texts on non-Western cultures nevertheless does not (in either case) allow stereotypical concepts concerning members of those cultures (e.g. as being inexplicably inclined to cruelty or violence) to prevail. The profoundly affective power of the descriptions of atrocities in both books (intensified by being observed in relatively unideological and unfiltered ways) become ethical challenges to the reader. The comparative reading techniques employed in the essay are used to sharpen the focus on how each of the children is ineluctably affected by what she or he witnesses and to indicate how both of them are 'betrayed into betrayal'.
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    Male 'Somaliness' in diasporic contexts : Somali authors' evaluative evocations
    (Department of Afrikaans, University of Pretoria, 2020-04-28) Gagiano, Annie
    Addressing five texts by four Somali authors—Nuruddin Farah’s Yesterday, Tomorrow: Voices from the Somali Diaspora (2000) and North of Dawn (2018) in juxtaposition with three novels by female Somali authors, i.e. Safi Abdi’s Offspring of Paradise (2003), Cristina Ali Farah’s Little Mother (201; Italian original 2007) and Igiaba Scego’s Adua (English translation 2017, Italian original 2015)—this article assesses the work these texts do to enhance contemporary understanding of the complex, evolving phenomenon that is the diasporic Somali presence in Western Europe, focusing on Somali men. How do the authors portray and (implicitly or overtly) evaluate how diasporic male Somalis cope in foreign, non-Muslim and culturally Western environments—against the backdrop of Somalia’s state collapse and social disintegration? Somali men’s experiences have generally been given less attention than those of their female counterparts, hence the focus here on male-gendered characters. This focus serves to link the two Nuruddin Farah texts and the three novels by Somali women—a textual grouping and focus not previously attempted in critical studies of Farah’s work. This brief essay assesses the five texts’ respective combinations of evaluative evocation, affective intensity and epistemological detail, approaching these works as complementing social science researchers’ efforts in depicting diasporic Somali men’s lives. By deepening understanding of the impact of the diaspora on individual Somali men, the five texts convey significant psychological, social and moral insights into lives of Somali men in foreign contexts.