İngiliz Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü Koleksiyonu

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12514/72

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A Discourse of ‘Othering’ in E. M. Forster’s "A Passage to India"
(Berikan Yayınevi, 2020) Alkan, Halit
Due to industrialization and mechanization in Europe, there was the need to sell overproduction, find new markets and buy larger amounts of raw materials at cheapest price. For these reasons, in terms of colonialism, most developed European countries occupied territories especially in areas with no political and economic structures from the 16th century to the 20th century. In addition to economic and political reasons for Western colonialism, there was the so-called ‘civilizing mission’ because Western people believed in superiority of their civilization. The Western ideology has produced arbitrary geographic separation through drawing boundaries between itself and ‘other’, and referred to ‘other’s land as the ‘Orient’ and ‘the land of barbarians’. In this sense, a discourse of the ‘othering’ has been produced especially in the colonial period and in literature. In this context, E.M. Forster’s A Passage to India (1924) allows readers to analyse how colonialism impacts on gender, class, culture and race. It concerns the relations between the English and the native population of India during the colonial period in which Britain ruled India. In the novel, A Passage to India, one of the major characters named Dr Aziz, like many of the other Indians, struggles with the problem of the English in India. On the one hand, he appreciates some of the modernizing influences that the West has brought to India; on the other hand, he feels that the presence of the English degrades and oppresses his people. The British Empire is portrayed as a fundamentally racist institution that excludes and subjugates others. There are racial lines, with the white Europeans on one side, and everyone else on the other. Indians are referred to as the ‘Oriental’ and ‘Other’ who are stereotypically considered to be undeveloped, ignorant and wild as opposed to the intellectual, civilized, and progressive Westerner. Indians are considered unable to rule themselves, essentially needing the British Empire to help them toward civilization.
An Existentialist Approach to Jean-Paul Sartre’s "No Exit"
(Mardin Artuklu Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2020) Alkan, Halit
Existentialism that began to be active in the 20th century is the approach to define the human being not only as the thinking being but also as the acting and feeling human individual. This study aims to analyse Jean-Paul Sartre’s "No Exit" (1944) in terms of existentialist approach, namely human’s existence of freedom which depends on the on-going relationships between the aspects of ‘being as a subject’ and ‘being as an object’. The play No Exit depicts the afterlife in which Joseph Garcin, Ines Serrano and Estelle Rigault are brought to the same room in hell. The ‘being as a subject’ of the three characters is judged by people on the earth and is reduced to the state of ‘being as an object’ which gets the unchangeable state by the judgment of others. Joseph will be remembered as a coward and Estelle as a pretty blonde who is the murderer of her child and crazy about money and males while nobody will remember Inez at all. They become the prisoners of each other in hell where the time is stable and where they are completely deprived of the freedom of existence of ‘being as a subject’ because they no longer have the opportunity to act and to change the thoughts about themselves. This imprisonment fixes them in the state of ‘being as an object’. The victim changes every time and there are two tortures against it. Therefore, they are both the torturers and the victims: Hell is other people.
Othering and Cultural Identity in Hanif Kureishi’s “The Black Album”
(Livre De Lyon, 2021) Alkan, Halit
During the colonial period from the 16th century to the 20th century, the Western ideology has created arbitrary boundaries between itself and ‘other’, and labelled ‘other’s land as both the ‘orient’ and ‘the land of barbarians’. Many communities from the former colonial regions have migrated to England during post-colonial period. Nevertheless, the host British society has maintained the discourse of ‘othering’. In this context, Hanif Kureishi’s "The Black Album" (1995) allows readers to analyse the discourse of ‘othering’ in terms of religion, race and culture to establish one’s identity. The novel concerns the quest of Shahid who is torn between a sense of belonging by becoming a member of a fundamentalist group, and liberalism by having an affair with a white postmodernist instructor Deedee Osgood in British society. Leader Riaz and Chad are otherized by portraying binary opposition of different, savage, and fundamentalist because they burn a novel that is considered to be blasphemous and they attach significance to an aubergine. Although Shahid and his elder brother Chili imitate the host culture, they cannot escape being considered as the ‘other’ because of their colour, race, class and culture. Although a Muslim girl Tahira struggles between the host culture and her main culture in a multicultural society, and represents a contemporary woman’s role is also considered as the ‘other’ because of her clothes and religious faith. Shahid’s uncle Asif, representing first-generation immigrants in the multicultural British society, is not only silenced by the ruling British society, which see him as an intruder and dependent, but also considered by representations of the ruling group as suspicious, and the ‘other’. There are racial lines, with the white Europeans on one side, and everyone else on the other. Hanif Kureishi criticizes racism, fundamentalism, Marxism and even liberalism because everybody can become hypocritical to bring forward their thoughts and live on principles they favour. Kureishi does not prefer one side to the other side.
A Structuralist Analysis of Women’s Position in George Eliot’s "Middlemarch"
(IVPE, 2019) Alkan, Halit
Structuralism that began to be active in the 1950’s is the approach to define the relationship between the part and the whole. This study aims to analyse George Eliot’s "Middlemarch" (1872) in terms of the structuralist approach. This novel is analysed synchronically. In the surface structure of the novel, there is a plot based on the relationships between Dorothea Brooke, Edward Casaubon, Rosamond Vincy and Tertius Lydgate. In terms of syntagmatic relation, while Dorothea marries Casaubon, Rosamond marries Lydgate. Both Dorothea and Rosamond marry their spouses to actualize only their dream goals. In terms of paradigmatic relation, there is also homology of relationships between the two couples because there is an unhappy marriage between Dorothea and Casaubon as well as an unhappy marriage between Rosamond and Lydgate. In terms of syntagmatic relation, Dorothea’s husband dies; Rosamond’s husband dies; Dorothea makes a second marriage; Rosamond makes a second marriage. The novel ends but its melody continues because Dorothea and Rosamond are given no role other than being a wife and mother in the male-dominant society. Education, debt and unhappiness in the surface structure of the novel are closed signs. These signs become explicit signs in the deep structure of the novel in the following sense: While the signifier is education, the signified is enlightenment and self-knowledge; while the signifier is debt, the signified is failure and poverty; while the signifier is unhappiness, the signified is illusion and empathy. As for the deep structure of the novel, its harmony operates on binary opposition between Dorothea and Rosamond as follows: ignorance/knowledge, poverty/wealth, imaginary/reality, selfish/unselfish, love/money. The deep meaning obtained from the deep structure is as follows: There is no innate difference between men and women in terms of mental capacity, but there are prejudices imposed by the male-dominated society on women. This is because the patriarchal society does not allow women to have the same educational opportunities as men. Women who are not allowed an adequate education are left with no choice but to marry and have only the role of a wife and mother in society.
A Stylistic Analysis of “A Painful Case”
(Liberty Academic Publisher, 2023) Alkan, Halit
The style of an author is provided by effective matching between his/her thoughts and selection of linguistic items. Stylistic analyses involve both the study of style and the study of how effects and meanings are produced by a literary text. Stylistics, therefore, relates linguistic facts (linguistic descriptions) to meaning (interpretation) to show evidence for an interpretation of a text. This study analyses James Joyce’s "A Painful Case" in the aspect of stylistic features. The short story is about a platonic affair between a married woman and an isolated man, the breaking off of the affair, and its aftermath. The analysis of the short story begins with a general interpretation. Its significant stylistic features are pointed out in terms of lexis, grammar, figures of speech, cohesion and context. The short story’s title foreshows the cause of the inner conflict of the main character and deals with the theme of isolation. The opening paragraph of the short story consists only of declarative sentences. Joyce uses simple past tense in order to confirm compatibility with the figural narrative situation he used. In terms of the syllable-length of words, the selected passage contains mostly two-syllable words. Lexical repetitions direct one’s attention to the negative feeling such as loneliness. The passage bases upon implicit connections of meaning which are strengthened by repeat of words from the same semantic field. The use of free indirect speech and a detailed description about the room reveals the main character’s state of soul. The domain is indoor surroundings, and the tenor is formal. The 3rd person narrator takes the reader beyond the usual aspects of life through epiphany. Mr Duffy feels remorse about Mrs Sinico’s death and realizes that his pursuit of control and order has caused only to his loneliness. Emotional paralysis of Mr Duffy compels him into a lifelong loneliness. This study shows how the formal stylistic features are used as the basis for inferring the short story’s meaning and effect.

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