Strategic hybridity: some pacific takes on postcolonial theory
RIS ID
16085
Abstract
Debates around postcolonial theory often arise from misunderstandings owing to translation from one disciplinary context to another. This article acknowledges real material limits to text-centred theory and critiques the uninspected use of hybridity as a concept/textual practice of subversion. Ther term has a range of meanings and does different work in different situations. Using examples from modern writing in the Pacific region, a situated dynamic of juxtaposed elements defined as 'syncretic counterpoint' is argues for. This conflictual mix resists both hybrid amalgamation and irony, permitting an assertion of indigenous difference that simultaneously allows for modern globalised complexity.
COinS
Publication Details
Sharrad, P. (2007). Strategic hybridity: some pacific takes on postcolonial theory. In J. Kuortti & J. Nyman (Eds.), Reconstructing Hybridity: Post-Colonial Studies in Transition (pp. 99-120). Amsterdam: Rodopi.