the unexplored richness of human literary expression
The universalist claim of the discipline called Comparative Literature (that supposedly died and was reborn in a new, less Eurocentric incarnation) has been criticised on countless occasions, most famously by Gayatri Spivak. This is why I feel the need of opening a new chapter in literary studies, dedicated specifically to verbal expression that is so dissimilar from our own genres that it hardly enters the focus of what is called Comparative Literature, a hegemonic discipline having its name written in capital letters.
Global literary studies is not exactly a discipline: rather an interdisciplinary field of study that focuses on the examination and analysis of literature from around the world. It should explore literary texts in their cultural, historical, social, and political context, overcoming the cultural blindness of plain World Literature translated into English.
Global perspective permits to study the cantigas chanted by women in Guinea Bissau side by side with Occitan tenso. As well as the systems of versification in Mongolian poetry. It also studies the tales on sexual intercourse of humans and djinns told in Socotra, treating them as literature in its full right, not just as an ethnographic curiosity.
The question to be answered is how diverse, rather than how similar, are the forms of human literary expression, how many ways of playing with words actually exist, what is the extent of their richness and diversity. How translatable and how expressive they might be beyond the range of cultures in which they were born.
Global literary studies is not exactly a discipline: rather an interdisciplinary field of study that focuses on the examination and analysis of literature from around the world. It should explore literary texts in their cultural, historical, social, and political context, overcoming the cultural blindness of plain World Literature translated into English.
Global perspective permits to study the cantigas chanted by women in Guinea Bissau side by side with Occitan tenso. As well as the systems of versification in Mongolian poetry. It also studies the tales on sexual intercourse of humans and djinns told in Socotra, treating them as literature in its full right, not just as an ethnographic curiosity.
The question to be answered is how diverse, rather than how similar, are the forms of human literary expression, how many ways of playing with words actually exist, what is the extent of their richness and diversity. How translatable and how expressive they might be beyond the range of cultures in which they were born.
how is World Literature even possible?
The advent of global literary studies made some people feel lost, causing an incredulity how a simple, limited person like me could even pretend to cope with all those texts coming from unknown cultures, traditions, countries of which they know nothing (and rarely wish to know anything whatsoever). Such a property as transferability of texts seems to be a mere convention adopted essentially because of the fame of their defenders. The skeptics are happy to claim there must also exist untransferable texts, so strongly reduced to their original meaning that they cannot be decontextualised, read away from the circumstances of their primal composition. Here there might be an example of such a text:
Qu’aissí s’emprén e s’enongla
Mos còrs en lei com l’escòrç’ en la verga ;
Qu’ilh m’es de jòi tors e palatz e cambra,
E non am tant fraire, parent ni oncle :
Qu’en paradís n’aurà doble jòi m’arma,
Si ja nulhs òm per ben amar lai intra.
As I believe, this is little more than an encripted message whose exact meaning could be understood only by a narrow circle of people who shared some sort of mundane or intimate situation to which the text refers. This proper sense is long forgotten. Nonetheless, a thousand years passed by and Arnautz still tramet sa chançon d’ongl’ e d’oncle:
A grat de lieis que de sa verg’ a l’arma,
Son Desirat, cui prètz en cambra intra...
Even if we do not have access to the original meaning, the text testifies of its power of resonance - the property of evoking new assotiations, even embodying intimate senses related to our own, unshared circumstances. This is how literature comes from places and times, and ends up building privatised, strongly individualised worlds readers live in.
Qu’aissí s’emprén e s’enongla
Mos còrs en lei com l’escòrç’ en la verga ;
Qu’ilh m’es de jòi tors e palatz e cambra,
E non am tant fraire, parent ni oncle :
Qu’en paradís n’aurà doble jòi m’arma,
Si ja nulhs òm per ben amar lai intra.
As I believe, this is little more than an encripted message whose exact meaning could be understood only by a narrow circle of people who shared some sort of mundane or intimate situation to which the text refers. This proper sense is long forgotten. Nonetheless, a thousand years passed by and Arnautz still tramet sa chançon d’ongl’ e d’oncle:
A grat de lieis que de sa verg’ a l’arma,
Son Desirat, cui prètz en cambra intra...
Even if we do not have access to the original meaning, the text testifies of its power of resonance - the property of evoking new assotiations, even embodying intimate senses related to our own, unshared circumstances. This is how literature comes from places and times, and ends up building privatised, strongly individualised worlds readers live in.
ongoing research
Kriol literature in Guinea-Bissau: from early postcolonial nationalistic project to ultraminor literary system in the margin of World Literature
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Guinea-Bissau, a tiny African country with less than two millions inhabitants, possess a dual literary system: the internationally more visibile Lusophone writing coexists with a literature in Kriol, a local Creole language derived from, yet considerably different from the transcontinental Portuguese. The paper examines the origin and the formation of the Kriol literature, the role it played in the decolonial resistence and the value it acquired in the early postcolonial project as a trans-tribal speech of the Guinendadi, fostering the cohesion of the newly invented nation.
Another part of the study will be dedicated to the evolution of Kriol poetry in the conditions of literary diglossia, involving frequent self-translations from Kriol to Portuguese and vice versa, elaborated by the authors themselves. Kriol has a strong presence on stage, both as poetry transformed into songs' lyrics and in the theatre concieved to function as a school of civic values. On the other hand, it appears as a language of intimacy in the poetry refirmulating the local notion of love and eroticism, kerensa. However, the central problem to be discussed is the quest for two values that may appears as mutually exclusive: on the one hand, the afirmation of identity and, on the other, the visibility and resonance that transcontinental Portuguese might grant. Certainly, even the Guinean literature written in Portuguese reinvents this linguistic matrix, incrusting it with picturesque Kriol proverbs and sayings, as well as cultural key-concepts translating the idiosyncratic vision of the world. On the other hand, the plurilingual/translingual poetry writing is attempted by such authors as Odete Costa Semedo, who, after oscolating between Kriol and Portuguese, opted, in ther recent volume (In)confidencias, for a parallel expression switching freely from one global language to another (English, French). This temptation of plurilingualism, contrasting with almost total silencing of the variety of minor Indigenous tongues, may be seen as a sign of attractiveness of the creative horizons of World Literature rather than limited, untransferable writing of the African margin. |
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Deepening the African time:
reinvention of history and memory in Angolan novel
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One of the problems of African postcolonial writing is its immersion in shallow temporality of the colonial-decolonial-postcolonial cycle. Colonization is often believe to have cut the links with pre-colonial past, obliterated the memory of earlier cultural legacies. This is why the reivindication of deeper temporality is an important aspect of the transcolonial project of healing.
This paper focuses on postcolonial Angolan novel as a field of intense exploration and reinvention of temporalities. |
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Scars and Laughter. The worlding of Angolan literature in José Luís Mendonça’s Metamorfoses do elefante
In the transcontinental context of Lusophone literature, one body of writings stands out, gaining a particular consistency and visibility on global book market: the Angolan one. Its transcontinental career is a rather surprising phenomenon, because postcolonial Angolan literature emerged as a response to the particularly tragic history of the country and has been deeply rooted in local social and politic evolution. In this paper, I will reflect on the interplay of local history, creating idiomatic layers of meaning, and the aesthetic elements that prove to be appealing and attractive for the global readers. Is the worlding of Angolan literature a deliberate strategy built up by the writers, or just a collateral phenomenon, resulting from their mastery of literary means that proves to be striking also for the readers unconcerned with Angolan politics? I will search for the answer to this question focusing on a single text: José Luis Mendonça’s Metamorfoses do elefante. Although the writer is not the part of the globally visible group of translated Angolan writers, such as Agualusa, Pepetela, and Ondjaki, his text seems to present several characteristics of the literature destined to go global. Is Metamorhoses do elefante World Literature? Or rather, is it a text belonging to a local literary context that has gone global--thus, it is rather Angolan literature as a whole, and not Metamorfoses… that is World Literature? Hopefully, my analysis of a relatively recent book (2019) will lead to the definition of the circumstances, conditions, and tactics contributing to the phenomenon of worlding of a body of African literary work. It will contribute to answering a puzzling question: how do books speaking about local, often very peculiar problems ever manage to get the attention of readers entirely unconcerned with those problems?
Beyond cultured readings. Radical aesthetic pluralism and critical judgement in World Literature
[in progress]
My reflection, triggered by a call for papers of the journal "Junctures" in New Zealand, revolves around the aporias of critical judgement in World Literature. On the one hand, any aesthetical judgement is rooted in informed, educated, ‘cultured’ horizon. On the other, World Literature is supposed to be a confluence of different cultural traditions and lines of aesthetic development. Does it mean that critical judgement in World Literature is impossible, or possible only as an intuitive appreciation of what resonates with the critical subject beyond the frontiers of his/her own cultured erudition and competence?
My reflection, triggered by a call for papers of the journal "Junctures" in New Zealand, revolves around the aporias of critical judgement in World Literature. On the one hand, any aesthetical judgement is rooted in informed, educated, ‘cultured’ horizon. On the other, World Literature is supposed to be a confluence of different cultural traditions and lines of aesthetic development. Does it mean that critical judgement in World Literature is impossible, or possible only as an intuitive appreciation of what resonates with the critical subject beyond the frontiers of his/her own cultured erudition and competence?
selected essays in global literary studies
(Post)colonial chronopolitics and mapping the depth of local time(s) in global literary studies: an itinerary to Guinea-Bissau
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Metacritic Journal for Comparative Studies and Theory, no 7.2/2021, p. 69-83. ISSN 2457-8827.
https://www.metacriticjournal.com/article/203/postcolonial-chronopolitics-and-mapping-the-depth-of-local-times-in-global-literary-studies-an-itinerary-to-guinea-bissau This article is an attempt at deconstructing the chronopolitics inherent to the (post)colonial way of thinking about the world. As it is argued, what should replace it is a vision of multiple, overlying temporalities and forms of time awareness, reaching deeper than a literary history reduced to the cycle of colonisation – decolonisation – postcolonial becoming, originating from just a single maritime event: the European exploration and conquest of the world. The essay brings forth a choice of interwoven examples illustrating the variability of local time depths, associated with a plurality of origins, narrations, forms of awareness and cultivation of cultural belonging. It shows the lack of coincidence between the dominant and non-dominant perceptions of the past in such places as the archipelagos of São Tomé and Príncipe, Maldives, the Gambia, Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau. Their ways of living the global time, as well as embodying significant texts (rather than simply preserving them) stretch far beyond the frameworks created by competing colonial empires, such as the Portuguese or the British one. |
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A local tongue, a global tongue. On the languages of World Literature
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Mowa lokalna, mowa globalna. O językach literatury świata
Teksty Drugie, no 4/2021, p. 60-78. ISSN 0867-0633 The aim of this article is to reflect on multilingual dimension of literature, its ability of transmitting key meanings across the frontiers of cultures, as well as on the status of languages creating literary systems. What makes the actuality of these questions is the growing pace of language death and the decrease of diversity of oral literatures of humanity. This is why it is necessary to close the gap between global literary studies and the endeavours at archiving the patrimony of traditional cultures, as well as studies on literacy and the phenomena accompanying the passage from locally transmitted oral literature to written literature in global circulation. Key hypothesis of this paper concerns the role of planetary literature and transindigenous studies in the preservation of unique conceptualisations of the world transmitted in traditional contexts - in spite of the death of tribal languages. |
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a subjective bibliography for global literary studies
Apter, Emily. Against World Literature: On the Politics of Untranslatability. New York: Verso, 2013.
Bhattacharya, Baidik. Postcolonial Writing in the Era of World Literature: Texts, Territories, Globalizations. London: Routledge, 2020.
Cheah, Peng. What is a World? Durham: Duke UP, 2016.
Fyfe, Alexander & Madhu Krishnan, eds. African Literatures as World Literature. London: Bloomsbury, 2022.
Garland Mahler, Anne. From the Tricontinental to the Global South: Race, Radicalism, and Transnational Solidarity. Durham: Duke UP, 2018.
Helgesson, Stefan. Decolonisations of Literature: Critical Practice in Africa and Brazil after 1945. Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2022.
Kalliney, Peter J. The Aesthetic Cold War: Decolonization and Global Literature. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2022.
Mufti, Amir. Forget English! Orientalisms and World Literatures. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2016.
Müller, Gesine, Jorge J. Locane & Benjamin Loy, eds. Re-Mapping World Literature: Writing, Book Markets and Epistemologies between Latin America and the Global South. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2018.
Phaf-Rheinberger, Ineke & Koichi Hagimoto, eds. Geografía caleidoscópicas. América Latina y sus imaginarios intercontinentales. Madrid/Frankfurt: Iberoamericana/Vervuert, 2022.
Phạm, Quỳnh N. & Robbie Shilliam, eds. Meanings of Bandung: Postcolonial Orders and Decolonial Visions. London/New York: Rowman & Littlefield International, 2016.
Bhattacharya, Baidik. Postcolonial Writing in the Era of World Literature: Texts, Territories, Globalizations. London: Routledge, 2020.
Cheah, Peng. What is a World? Durham: Duke UP, 2016.
Fyfe, Alexander & Madhu Krishnan, eds. African Literatures as World Literature. London: Bloomsbury, 2022.
Garland Mahler, Anne. From the Tricontinental to the Global South: Race, Radicalism, and Transnational Solidarity. Durham: Duke UP, 2018.
Helgesson, Stefan. Decolonisations of Literature: Critical Practice in Africa and Brazil after 1945. Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2022.
Kalliney, Peter J. The Aesthetic Cold War: Decolonization and Global Literature. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2022.
Mufti, Amir. Forget English! Orientalisms and World Literatures. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2016.
Müller, Gesine, Jorge J. Locane & Benjamin Loy, eds. Re-Mapping World Literature: Writing, Book Markets and Epistemologies between Latin America and the Global South. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2018.
Phaf-Rheinberger, Ineke & Koichi Hagimoto, eds. Geografía caleidoscópicas. América Latina y sus imaginarios intercontinentales. Madrid/Frankfurt: Iberoamericana/Vervuert, 2022.
Phạm, Quỳnh N. & Robbie Shilliam, eds. Meanings of Bandung: Postcolonial Orders and Decolonial Visions. London/New York: Rowman & Littlefield International, 2016.
international journals in global literary studies
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Caribbean modernities https://read.dukeupress.edu/small-axe
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Translation Spaces is a biannual, peer-reviewed, indexed journal that recognizes the global impact of translation. It envisions translation as multi-dimensional phenomena productively studied (from) within complex spaces of encounter between knowledge, values, beliefs, and practices. These translation spaces -virtual and physical- are multidisciplinary, multimedia, and multilingual. They are the frontiers being explored by scholars investigating where and how translation practice and theory interact most dramatically with the evolving landscape of contemporary globalization.
https://benjamins.com/catalog/ts |
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New Literary History focuses on questions of theory, method, interpretation, and literary history. Rather than espousing a single ideology or intellectual framework, it canvasses a wide range of scholarly concerns. By examining the bases of criticism, the journal provokes debate on the relations between literary and cultural texts and present needs.
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/144 |
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Literator publishes research articles and essays on linguistics and literature in general, but focuses in particular on the (comparative) study of South African languages and literatures and other cultural phenomena across language, media and cultural boundaries (examples of topics would be: different manifestations of Post-Modernism, the interaction between visual arts and literature, the representation of the South African War in literature, language attitudes and language policy).
https://literator.org.za/index.php/literator |
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Shima addresses social, cultural, environmental and conceptual aspects of various types of island, peninsular and otherwise insular coastal and shoreline communities, their relationship to the oceanic, estuarine, deltaic, riverine and/or lacustrine environments that substantially define them and the manner in which various types of engineered waterways and bodies of water constitute cultural landscapes in terrestrial locations.
https://www.shimajournal.org/cfp.php |
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The journal has thus a uniquely broad scope, promoting international research and exchange of ideas on all aspects of ethnicity, nationalism and nation formation, across the globe and both in the past and in the present. It explores the associational, political, legal, cultural, economic, historical, archaeological, psychological, ethnic and anthropological dimensions of the phenomena of nations and nationalism. It deals with inter-ethnic, inter-national and trans-national relations of conflict, accommodation and cooperation, and the various processes and types of nation-state formation. It addresses the diversity of forms that ethnic and national mobilisation movements can take, as well as everyday expressions of national identification. The journal encompasses studies of nations as carriers and agents of cultural value and as sources of cultural creativity, e.g., in literature, music, architecture and the visual arts, and the role of memory and tradition in shaping national identities, communities and states.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/14698129 |
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Íkala, Revista de Lenguaje y Cultura is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published three times a year in January, May, and September. It is sponsored by the School of Languages at Universidad de Antioquia, covering topics such as language, culture, linguistics, literature, translation, and second/foreign language teaching and learning. Íkala’s mission is to offer an international forum for sophisticated, yet grounded academic debates on issues related to languages and cultures through empirical, conceptual and exploratory research, and creative scholarship; a forum that enriches the discipline, as well as the individual members of a worldwide academic community. Íkala’s main sections include Empirical Studies, Literature Reviews, Theoretical and Methodological Articles, Case Studies, and Book Reviews. Íkala accepts original and unpublished articles in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French languages. It offers print and online versions available on the Internet through open access. From its inception in 1996, Íkala has welcomed a diversity of voices and languages, as evidenced by its name, meaning "a topic of great importance" in the indigenous language of Tule.
https://revistas.udea.edu.co/index.php/ikala |
