Reclaiming Narratives in Postcolonial Literature: The Role of Black Writers in Challenging Colonial Myths and Constructing New Histories

• Author(s): Dr. Rashmi G H
• Paper ID: 1707270
• Page: 420-433
• Published Date: 31-03-2024
• Published In: Iconic Research And Engineering Journals
• Publisher: IRE Journals
• e-ISSN: 2456-8880
• Volume/Issue: Volume 7 Issue 9 March-2024

Abstract

This article critically analyzes the function of Black authors in postcolonial literature as challengers of colonial myths and reconstructors of historical narratives, arguing that rediscovery in the literary field serves both as a political and cultural resistance to hegemonic discourse, focusing on major figures such as Chinua Achebe, Toni Morrison, and Ng?g? wa Thiong'o, as writers use their progressive novels and stories to dismantle, through the deconstruction of Eurocentric historiographies and replace with native points of view, through a process of decolonization of literature, in line with the theoretical framework of Frantz Fanon, whose colonial and postcolonial critiques are manifested in Achebe's Things Fall Apart (1958), dismantling Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1899) in order to depict societies from Africa as societies that are both complex and autonomous, as opposed to primitive and vulnerable, as well as Morrison's Beloved (1987) which rediscovers the African American historical experience by reclaiming enslaved voices in dominant historical discourses, similarly echoed in Wa Thiong'o's Decolonising the Mind (1986), wherein the writer argues the importance of the verbal rediscovery as a form of opposition against cultural imperialism, reinforcing the contemporary postcolonial studies that bring their views increasingly on how Black authors implement counter-narrations, oral traditions, and hybrid linguistic structures countering colonial epistemologies as manifested in Caribbean literature through authors, such as Derek Walcott, who invokes the African, European, and indigenous influences within his poem to unveil the violence consequences of succeeding colonialism, confirming Homi Bhabha's concept of hybridity as a resistance act, while more recent scholarship presents the digital space as one new space of the de-colonial literary activism, expressing that movements for #BlackLivesMatter has an effect on Afro-diasporic storytelling and consistent with Toni Cade Bambara's concept of writer-activist, further complicates the intersections of the areas literature, race, and historical memory, as studies indicate how these postcolonial Black writers no longer observe the boundary that separates fiction and historiography, just as illustrated in Saidiya Hartman's Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments (2019), which uses speculative narrative approach to recover agency of marginalized historical figures, of method annual tradition that parallels Aimé Césaire's Discourse on Colonialism (1950), as the writer critiques the moral contradictions of European colonialism, while encouraging cultural self-determination, illustrating that the contemporary Black authors keep many continuing?and building blocks fundamental to postcolonial identification, in order to combat some epistemic violence forces reclaiming historical agency, and redefining self-position after colonial disruption.

Keywords

Postcolonial Literature, Colonial Myths, Black Writers, Historical Reclamation, Decolonization, Counter-Narratives

Citations

IRE Journals:
Dr. Rashmi G H "Reclaiming Narratives in Postcolonial Literature: The Role of Black Writers in Challenging Colonial Myths and Constructing New Histories" Iconic Research And Engineering Journals Volume 7 Issue 9 2024 Page 420-433

IEEE:
Dr. Rashmi G H "Reclaiming Narratives in Postcolonial Literature: The Role of Black Writers in Challenging Colonial Myths and Constructing New Histories" Iconic Research And Engineering Journals, 7(9)