Houses, cellars and caves in selected novels from Latin America and South Africa

Marita Wenzel

pp. 143-160

in: Attiede Lange, Gail Fincham, Jeremy Hawthorn, Jakob Lothe, Attie de Lange (eds), Literary landscapes, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2008

Abstract

The historical reality of colonization and the diaspora¹ has resulted in cultural fragmentation, displacement and exile which, at present, is further exacerbated by globalization and a lack of belonging. As a result of this experience of rootlessness and alienation, traditional perceptions of identity as a static concept have been superseded by the postmodern-ist conceptualization of identity as a process of interaction with various geographical, social and cultural contexts over a period of time. DeToro defines the dynamic quality of identity formation by stating that new alignments made across borders, types, nations, and essences are rapidly coming into view, and it is those new alignments that now provoke and challenge the fundamentally static notion of identity that has been the core of cultural thought during the era of imperialism. (1995, p. 39)