Narratives of becoming: hybrid identity and the coming of age genre in Caribbean women’s literature

Vella, Lianne Rose (2014). Narratives of becoming: hybrid identity and the coming of age genre in Caribbean women’s literature. University of Birmingham. Ph.D.

[img]
Preview
Vella14PhD.pdf
PDF

Download (1MB)

Abstract

The coming of age genre is a popular and longstanding one within the Caribbean, particularly with reference to female writers. This thesis considers how women writers from across the Caribbean have reconceptualised and altered the coming of age genre to narrate their female hybrid Caribbean identities. I focus on a close textual analysis of four main novels - Julia Alvarez’s \(How\) \(the\) \(García\) \(Girls\) \(Lost\) \(Their\) \(Accents\), Michelle Cliff’s \(No\) \(Telephone\) \(to\) \(Heaven\), Edwidge Danticat’s \(Breath\), \(Eyes\), \(Memory\) and Cristina García’s \(Dreaming\) \(in\) \(Cuban\) - as well as considering several other secondary coming of age texts from across the Caribbean, all of which emerge from various distinct linguistic and cultural contexts. In doing so this work looks at the links between texts from across the region in order to discuss how the female genre differs from the masculine tradition, how it presents a gendered identity formation and how that process of becoming is marked by the hybrid identities of the authors and their protagonists.

Type of Work: Thesis (Doctorates > Ph.D.)
Award Type: Doctorates > Ph.D.
Supervisor(s):
Supervisor(s)EmailORCID
Brown, StewartUNSPECIFIEDUNSPECIFIED
Licence:
College/Faculty: Colleges (2008 onwards) > College of Arts & Law
School or Department: School of History and Cultures, Department of African Studies and Anthropology
Funders: None/not applicable
Subjects: D History General and Old World > DT Africa
H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman
URI: http://etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/5290

Actions

Request a Correction Request a Correction
View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year