Critique Of A Postcolonial Theory In Literature

Postcolonial theory is a literary theory or critical approach that deals with literature produced in countries that were once, or are now, colonies of other countries. It may also deals with literature written in or by citizens of colonizing countries that takes colonies or their peoples as its subject matter. The theory is based around concepts of otherness and resistance. It concentrates particularly on the way in which literature by the colonizing culture fabricate the experience and realities, and imprint the inferiority. As a matter of fact colonized people attempts to articulate their identity and reclaim their past in the face of that past 's inevitable otherness. It can also deal with the way in which literature in colonizing countries appropriates the language, images, scenes, traditions and so forth of colonized countries. (Slemon, S 1995: 99-116) Typically, the proponents of the theory examine the ways in which writers from colonized countries attempt to articulate and even celebrate their cultural identities and reconstruct them from the colonizers. They also examine ways in which the literature of the colonial powers is used to justify colonialism through the perpetuation of images of the colonized as inferior. However, attempts at coming up with a single definition of postcolonial theory have proved controversial, and some writers have strongly critiqued the whole concept. For the past two decades, both the term and the field of postcolonialism have