Contemporary British Fiction and Minority Discourse

Spring 2002	Peter Kalliney
English 356 MWF 2:30-3:20, King 323	Rice 28, (440) 775-8918 Office hours: Wednesday & Friday, 1:00-2:00, E-mail: Peter.Kalliney@oberlin.edu

Contemporary British Fiction and Minority Discourse

We will read a group of texts that market themselves as oppositional or minority literature. By reading a selection of working class, feminist, queer, gaelic, and postcolonial novels, we will try to examine the ways in which contemporary fiction both relies upon and challenges its marginal status. We will examine the kinds of rhetorical positions and narrative strategies shared by this very diverse group of writers in order to think about “minorityness” as a trend in and function of postwar British cultural production. All of these novels inscribe difference and interrogate systems of exclusion, and we will think about whether or not that creates a coherent discursive space for the articulation of a minority politics. Furthermore, we will think about the stakes and implications of such a position: does marking oneself as an outsider announce an oppositional politics? Finally, what happens when minority literature becomes canonized—does its privileged status jeopardize its ability to explore systems of exclusion?

Texts

Banville, John. The Untouchable. (370 pp.)

Fitzgerald, Penelope. Offshore. (140 pp.)

Ishiguro, Kazuo. The Remains of the Day. (250 pp.)

Kelman, James. How Late it Was, How Late. (370 pp.)

Rhys, Jean. Wide Sargasso Sea. (190 pp.)

Rushdie, Salman. The Satanic Verses. (550 pp.)

Salih, Tayeb. A Season of Migration to the North. (170 pp.)

Selvon, Samuel. Lonely Londoners. (140 pp.)

Sillitoe, Alan. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. (230 pp.)

Coursepack.

Course Objectives

This course has two primary goals: 1—to study the dominant themes and techniques of contemporary British fiction; 2—to develop students’ research skills and familiarize them with some of the important theorists in the field. I also hope students will build upon the close reading skills they already possess. With this in mind, I would like this to become a text-centered course: I expect us to base our class discussions on textual exegesis, and I hope that students will learn to speak, argue, and ultimately analyze by using textual evidence. Students should bring their texts to class every day, and I hope to see them dog-eared and annotated extensively. I want this to be a discussion-based course, which requires a significant contribution from each student. This will work well only if students come prepared to class; I would like each of you to mark important passages in the reading and think about their significance. In order to practice these skills, student will do group project work on particular theoretical problems relevant to this field.

Assignments

Eight (8) short papers—essentially one per novel. These will be no longer than one-and-a-half pages in length and will be due before class discussions on the text (35%).
One ten-to-twelve (10-12) page paper due at the end of the semester (25%). Students will begin the process by writing a paper proposal and then a draft. This will help students develop ideas with the assistance and participation of the instructor.
Class participation and attendance. I will give real grades for this. Please don’t expect much if you have contributed little; conversely, don’t rely on this to make up for deficiencies in your written work (30%).
Small-group project (10%). An annotated bibliography and group presentation on a special topic. Special topics may include feminism, queer theory, postcolonial studies, the booker prize, and the so-called “Rushdie affair.”

Policies

Absences: students may miss three classes (unexcused) during the term. Religious holidays (please give advance notice) and illness (with doctor’s note) count as excused absences; students will not be penalized under such circumstances. Each subsequent absence will result in a substantial penalty (1/3 of a letter grade) against final course grades (ie., overall grade of B would be lowered to a B-). This penalty is very severe and is not negotiable: please do not force me to invoke it.

Grading: I will use a numerical system for grading. There are two hundred (200) points for the semester. In essence, letter grades will be calculated with a declining ten percent (10%) scale: over 90% will translate to a grade in the “A” range, between 80-89% in the “B” range, and so forth. Here is the exact formula: 183 total points or more: A; 180-182: A-; 176-179: B+; 164-175: B; 160-163: B-; 156-159: C+; 144-155: C; 140-143: C-; fewer than 140: No credit. Here is a breakdown of individual assignments:

Each short paper is worth ten (10) points; cumulatively, they are worth seventy (70) points or thirty-five percent (35%) of the final grade.

The final paper is worth fifty (50) points or twenty-five percent (25%) of the final grade.

The group project is worth twenty (20) points or ten percent (10%) of the final grade.

Class participation is worth sixty (60) points or thirty percent (30%) of the final grade. Be advised that participation carries much weight in this class. I will give real grades for this. Be advised that I look for thoughtful contributions to the class rather than frequent but insubstantial comments.

Office hours: I will hold office hours twice a week (Wed. & Fri. 1-2PM). I realize that this may not be convenient for everyone so I am also available by appointment. My office is located at 28 Rice Hall. You will have to meet me in office hours at least once at the beginning of the semester to discuss your interest in the course and once to discuss your paper proposal; after that, the opportunity (or onus) is yours. I strongly urge you to take advantage of my office hours; don’t come only when you have serious problems.

Syllabus

Date	Class	Assignments
Feb 4	Introduction
Feb 6	Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
Feb 8	Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
Feb 11	Saturday Night and Sunday Morning	Short paper #1
Feb 13	Saturday Night and Sunday Morning; Klaus
Feb 15	Saturday Night and Sunday Morning; Klaus
Feb 18	Lonely Londoners	Short paper #2
Feb 20	Lonely Londoners; Lamming
Feb 22	Lonely Londoners; Lamming
Feb 25	The Untouchable	Short paper #3
Feb 27	The Untouchable
Mar 1	The Untouchable
Mar 4	The Untouchable; Sinfield and McKibbin	Group project presentation on queer theory
Mar 6	The Untouchable; Sinfield and McKibbin
Mar 8	The Untouchable; Sinfield and McKibbin
Mar 11	Season of Migration to the North	Short paper #4
Mar 13	Season of Migration to the North; Said	Group project presentation on postcolonial theory
Mar 15	Season of Migration to the North; Said
Mar 18	Wide Sargasso Sea	Short paper #5
Mar 20	Wide Sargasso Sea; Spivak	Group project presentation on feminism
Mar 22	Wide Sargasso Sea; Spivak

Mar 25	No class (Spring break)
Mar 27	No class (Spring break)
Mar 29	No class (Spring break)
Apr 1	How Late it Was, How Late	Short paper #6
Apr 3	How Late it Was, How Late
Apr 5	How Late it Was, How Late
Apr 8	How Late it Was, How Late; Booker Prize readings
Apr 10	How Late it Was, How Late; Booker Prize readings	Group project presentation on the Booker Prize
Apr 12	How Late it Was, How Late; Booker Prize readings	Final paper proposal due
Apr 15	Offshore	Short paper #7
Apr 17	Offshore
Apr 19	Offshore
Apr 22	Remains of the Day	Short paper #8
Apr 24	Remains of the Day	Final paper due (first draft)
Apr 26	Remains of the Day
Apr 29	The Satanic Verses	Short paper #9
May 1	The Satanic Verses
May 3	The Satanic Verses	Group project presentation on the “Rushdie Affair”
May 6	The Satanic Verses; Bhabha
May 8	The Satanic Verses; Bhabha
May 10	The Satanic Verses; Bhabha
?	Final papers due	Final papers due

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

Fiction

Amis, Kingsley. 1954. Lucky Jim. New York: Penguin, 1992.
Banville, John. The Untouchable. New York: Vintage, 1997.
Braine, John. Room at the Top. 1957. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1959.
Cooper, William. Scenes from Provincial Life. 1950. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1961.
Desai, Anita. Baumgartner’s Bombay. London: Heinemann, 1988.
Fitzgerald, Penelope. Offshore. London : Collins, 1979.
Gray, Alisdair. Lanark: A Life in Four Books. 1981. New York : G. Braziller, 1985.
Ishiguro, Kazuo. The Remains of the Day. 1989. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993.
Kelman, James. How Late it Was, How Late. 1994. New York: Vintage, 1998.
Kureishi, Hanif. The Buddha of Suburbia. New York: Penguin 1990.
Larkin, Philip. Jill. 1946. London: Faber, 1964.
Lamming, George. The Emigrants. London: Joseph, 1954.
Lessing, Doris. The Golden Notebook. 1962. New York: Bantam, 1981.
Lodge, David. Nice Work. New York: Penguin, 1988.
Rhys, Jean. Wide Sargasso Sea. New York & London: Norton, 1966.
Rushdie, Salman. The Satanic Verses. 1988. Dover, DE: The Consortium, 1992.
Salih, Tayeb. A Season of Migration to the North. Tr. Denys Johnson-Davies. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1969.
Selvon, Sam. The Lonely Londoners. White Plains, NY: Longman, 1956.
Sillitoe, Alan. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. New York: Plume, 1958.
Storey, David. This Sporting Life. 1960. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1962.
Wain, John. Hurry on Down. 1953. London: Harmondsworth, 1960.
Welch, Irvine. Trainspotting. London: Minerva, 1993
Winterson, Jeanette. Oranges Are not the Only Fruit. New York: Grove, 1985.

Criticism

Appignanesi, Lisa and Sara Maitland, eds. The Rushdie File. Syracuse: Syracuse UP and Institute of Contemporary Arts, 1990.
Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin, eds. The Post-Colonial Studies Reader. London & New York: Routledge, 1995.
Barker, Francis, Peter Hulme, and Margaret Iversen, eds. Colonial Discourse/Postcolonial Theory. Manchester & New York: Manchester UP, 1994.
Baucom, Ian. Out of Place: Englishness, Empire, and Locations of Identity. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1999.
Bhabha, Homi. The Location of Culture. London & New York: Routledge, 1994.
¾¾. “The World and the Home.” Social Text 31-2 (1992): 141-153.
Bradbury, Malcolm. The Modern British Novel. London: Secker & Warburg, 1993.
Brennan, Timothy. Salman Rushdie and the Third World: Myths of a Nation. New York: ST. Martin’s, 1989.
¾¾. “Rushdie, Islam, and Postcolonial Criticism.” Social Text 31-2 (1992): 271-76.
Brown, John. The British Welfare State: A Critical History. London & Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1995.
Calder, Angus. The People’s War. St. Albans: Granada, 1969.
Callinicos, Alex. Against Postmodernism: A Marxist Critique. New York: St. Martin’s, 1989.
Cannadine, David. The Rise & Fall of Class in Britain. New York: Columbia UP, 1999.
Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS). The Empire Strikes Back: Race and Racism in 70s Britain. London: Hutchinson, 1982.
Collier, Peter and Helga Geyer-Ryan, eds. Literary Theory Today. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1990.
Dimock, Wai Chee and Michael T. Gilmore, eds. Rethinking Class: Literary Studies and Social Formations. New York: Columbia UP, 1994.
English, James. Comic Transactions: Literature, Humor, and the Politics of Community in Twentieth-Century Britain. Ithaca & London: Cornell UP, 1994.
Fox, Pamela. Class Fictions: Shame and Resistance in the British Working-Class Novel, 1890-1945. Durham: Duke UP, 1994.
George, Rosemary Marangoly. The Politics of Home: Postcolonial Relocations and Twentieth-Century Fiction. 1996. Berkeley, Los Angeles & London: UP of California, 1999.
Gibson, Mark. “Richard Hoggart’s Grandmother’s Ironing: Some Questions about ‘Power’ in International Cultural Studies.” International Journal of Cultural Studies 1 (1998): 25-44.
Gikandi, Simon. Writing in Limbo: Modernism and Caribbean Literature. Ithaca & London: Cornell UP, 1992.
Gilroy, Paul. “There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack”: The Cultural Politics of Race and Nation. Chicago: UP of Chicago, 1991.
Hague, Angela. “Picaresque Structure and the Angry Young Novel.” Twentieth Century Literature 32 (1986): 209-220.
Hall, Stuart. “The Meaning of New Times.” New Times: The Changing Face of Politics in the 1990s. Eds. Hall & Martin Jacques. London: Lawrence, 1989. 116-134.
¾¾. “The Supply of Demand.” Out of Apathy, ed. E.P. Thompson. London: New Left Books, 1960. 56-97.
Hitchcock, Peter. Working-Class Fiction in Theory and Practice: A Reading of Alan Sillitoe. Ann Arbor: UMI, 1989.
Hoggart, Richard. The Uses of Literacy. 1957. New Brunswick and London: Transaction, 1992.
Hutcheon, Linda. A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction. London & New York: Routledge, 1988.
Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism; or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Durham: Duke UP, 1991.
JanMohamed, Abdul and David Lloyd, eds. The Nature and Context of Minority Discourse. New York: Oxford UP, 1990.
Jones, Gareth Stedman. Languages of Class: Studies in English Working Class History 1832-1982. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1983.
Kalliney, Peter. “Cities of Affluence: Masculinity, Class, and the Angry Young Men.” Modern Fiction Studies 47 (2001): 92-117.
Klaus, H. Gustav, ed. The Socialist Novel in Britain: Towards the Recovery of a Tradition. New York: St. Martin’s, 1982.
Laing, Stuart. Representations of Working-Class Life, 1957-1964. London: Macmillan, 1986.
Lamming, George. The Pleasures of Exile. Ann Arbor: UP of Michigan, 1992.
Lloyd, David. “Ethnic Cultures, Minority Discourse and the State.” In Colonial Discourse/Postcolonial Theory, eds. Barker, Hulme, and Iversen. 221-238.
Looker, Mark. Atlantic Passages: History, Community, and Language in the Fiction of Sam Selvon. New York: Peter Lang, 1996.
Lowe, Rodney. The Welfare State in Britain Since 1945. London: Macmillan, 1993.
Maschler, Tom, ed. Declaration. London: MacGibbon and Kee, 1957.
McKibbin, Ross. Classes and Cultures: England 1918-1951. New York: Oxford UP, 1998.
Michael, Magali Cornier. Feminism and the Postmodern Impulse: Post-World War II Fiction. Albany: UP of New York State University, 1996.
Mufti, Amir. “Reading the Rushdie Affair: An Essay on Islam and Politics.” Social Text 29 (1991): 95-116.
Paul, Kathleen. Whitewashing Britain: Race and Citizenship in the Postwar Era. Ithaca & London: Cornell UP, 1997.
Pennycook, Alistair. English and the Discourses of Colonialism. London & New York: Routledge, 1998.
Ramdin, Ron. The Making of the Black Working Class in Britain. London: Gower, 1987.
Rebellato, Dan. 1956 and All That: The Making of Modern British Drama. London & New York: Routledge, 1999.
Sinfield, Alan. Literature, Politics and Culture in Postwar Britain. Berkeley: UP of California, 1989.
¾¾ and Alistair Davies, eds. British Culture of the Postwar: An Introduction to Literature and Society 1945-1999. London & New York: Routledge, 2000.
Spivak, Gayatri. “Reading The Satanic Verses.” What is an Author, eds. Maurice Biriotti and Nicola Miller. Manchester & New York: Manchester UP, 1993. 105-134.
¾¾. “Three Women’s Texts and a Critique of Imperialism.” Critical Inquiry 12 (1985): 243-261.
Steedman, Carolyn. Landscape for a Good Woman. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1987.
Suleri, Sara. The Rhetoric of English India. Chicago & London: UP of Chicago, 1992.
Tabili, Laura. “We Ask for British Justice: Workers and Racial Difference in Late Imperial Britain. Ithaca & London: Cornell UP, 1994.
Thompson, E.P. The Making of the English Working Class. 1963. New York: Vintage, 1966.
¾¾, ed. Out of Apathy. London: New Left Books, 1960.
Timmins, Nicholas. The Five Giants: A Biography of the Welfare State. London: HarperCollins, 1995.
Todd, Richard. Consuming Fictions: The Booker Prize and Fiction in Britain Today. London: Bloomsbury, 1998.
Wambu, Onyekachi, ed. Empire Windrush: Fifty Years of Writing about Black Britain. London: Victor Gollancz, 1998.
Young, Michael, and Peter Willmott. Family and Kinship in East London. London: Routledge, 1957.