Place and displacement

01/10/2012 02:41
HOMELAND - A conversation between Salman Rushdie and Orhan Pamuk, with The New Yorker’s fiction editor, Deborah Treisman. From the 2007 New Yorker Festival (video)

definitions of the term

Louise Bennett - Colonization in Reverse (full text)

official website of the author

reading of the poem in Jamaican patois

1. Who is the speaker of the poem? Who is the listener?
2. What is the atmosphere?
3. What are the main subject matters of the poem?
4. To what events does the poem refer to?
5.What is the speaker's stance towards the emigration of Jamaicans to Britain?
6. What is the tone?
7. Comment on the language of the poem.
8. What is the form of the poem?

 

Jhumpa Lahiri - Mrs. Sen's (Interpreter of Maladies)

interview with the author

some essays on Lahiri's work

1. Briefly summarize the story.
2. Characterize Mrs. Sen. How old is she? Does her portrayal correspond with her age?
3. Comment on Mrs. Sen's cultural background? How is it reflected in her new home?
4. Comment on the causes and symptoms of Mrs. Sen's identity crisis.
5. What is the function of Eliot's perceptions and his comparing Mrs. Sen to his mother?
6. Comment on the relationship between Mrs. Sen and her husband. Does he struggle with similar identity crisis?
7. How does Mrs. Sen maintain the ties to her homeland? Does she try to assimilate into American culture?
8. Explain Mrs. Sen's statement: "Everything is [in India]."
9. What is the symbolical meaning of the blade ritual Mrs. Sen performs every day?
10. What is the main difference between Eliot and his mother in terms of their perception of Mrs. Sen?
11. What does the driving represent to Mrs. Sen? Why is it so difficult for her?
12. Comment on the significance of the car accident at the end of the story.

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