Displacement By Ghassan Kanafani Analysis

Chapter III

The Theme of Displacement in Ghassan Kanafani’s Works

Displacement as a word, a concept or understanding in itself calls for a series of multiple meanings of which Palestine as a territory is linked both in terms of temporality and spatiality. The moment we talk about Palestine, is the moment we talk about displacement. It can be said that Palestine as a territory or a word is synonymous with the word Displacement. What does it mean when we talk about displacement in literary works of an author who himself is displaced as a result of catastrophe which has not been brought by himself or his own society or culture. The words or expressions uttered like catastrophe, destruction, demolition, ethnic cleansing, refugee, return, exile,

These terms when applied in social sciences has to be done with caution. When a being is displaced it might travel a long distance but here also the displacement is very less as the being is never detached from the position it started. It’s the past that determines their present and future. Palestinians have covered lots of distance and they are displaced too but again what is important to them is their displacement and the total area covered in their exile or as a refugee is just measurement and statistics. How can displacement be measured for a human life or subject. A person can be displaced without even travelling an inch of a distance. In Habiby (love in my heart) two political prisoners meet in Haifa Cell. One of them being a woman, says that she feels displaced and like a refugee in her own homeland and then asks where she shall

Literature is followed by colonialism of any form and not the other way round. This can be seen in all the parts of the world which were once colonized by imperial forces. The British Empire, for which it used to be said that the sun never sets on it, was actually using its plethora of literature to maintain this sunshine. The sun of this British Empire was gaining ground due to the literature that was produced systematically for the colonized territory and its people. Colonialism is a process which evolves slowly and gradually to an extent where it begins to be seen by the colonized people as normalized. The authenticity of colonialism is sanctioned by the production of literature about the people colonized and the various aspects of their lives. It can be done by fictional as well as non-fictional writings. The English poet William Blake once wrote “The foundation of empire is arts and science. Remove them or degrade them and the Empire is no more. Empire follows art and not vice versa as English men suppose.” (Said 1994, Orientalism page 65) (Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism) begins from the notion that the institutional, political and economic operations of imperialism are nothing without the power of the culture that maintains them. So it becomes important to constantly reinvest in the field of arts and