Review Of Research

Vol.2, Issue.4, Jan. 2013

ISSN:-2249-894X Available online at www.reviewofresearch.net

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

IDENTITY CRISES IN POST COLONIAL LITERATURE

VISHNU SHELKE

Abstract:

Defination of literature-Literature may consist of texts based on factual information

(journalistic or non-fiction), as well as on original imagination, such as polemical works
as well as autobiography, and reflective essays as well as belles-lettres. Literature can be
classified according to historical periods, genres, and political influences. The concept
of genre, which earlier was limited, has broadened over the centuries. A genre consists of
artistic works which fall within a certain central theme, and examples of genre include
romance, mystery, crime, fantasy, erotica, and adventure, among others. writings in
prose or verse; especially : writings having excellence of form or expression and
expressing ideas of permanent or universal interes

IDENTITY CRISES-

1. A psychosocial state or condition of disorientation and role confusion occurring especially in adolescents
as a result of conflicting internal and external experiences, pressures, and expectations and often producing
acute anxiety.
2. An analogus state of confusion occurring in a social structure, such as an institution or a corporation.

Identity crisis, according to psychologist Erik Erikson, is the failure to achieve ego identity during
adolescence Erikson coined the term. Those who emerge from the adolescent stage of personality
development with a strong sense of identity are well equipped to face adulthood with confidence and
certainty. This sort of unresolved crisis leaves individuals struggling to “find themselves.” They may go on
to seek a negative identity, which may involve crime or drugs or the inability to make defining choices
about the future. “The basic strength that should develop during adolescence is fidelity, which emerges
from a cohesive ego identity”.
Erikson's own interest in identity began in childhood. Raised Jewish, Erikson appeared very
Scandinavian, and felt that he was an outsider of both groups. His later studies of cultural life among the
Yurok of northern California and the Sioux of South Dakota helped formalize Erikson's ideas about identity
development and identity crisis. Erikson described those going through an identity crisis as exhibiting
confusion.
They often seem to have no idea who or what they are, where they belong or where they want to go.
They may withdraw from normal life, not taking action or acting as they usually would at work, in their
marriage or at school. They may even turn to negative activities, such as crime or drugs, as a way of dealing
with identity crisis. To someone having an identity crisis, it is more acceptable to them to have a negative
identity than none at all.
Erikson felt that peers have a strong impact on the development of ego identity during
adolescence. He believed that association with negative groups such as cults or fanatics could actually
redistrict the developing ego during this fragile time. The basic strength that Erikson found should develop
during adolescence is fidelity, which only emerges from a cohesive ego identity. Fidelity is known to
Title : IDENTITY CRISES IN POST COLONIAL LITERATURE
Source:Review of Research [2249-894X] VISHNU SHELKE yr:2013 vol:2 iss:4
 IDENTITY CRISES IN POST COLONIAL LITERATURE

encompass sincerity, genuineness and a sense of duty in our relationships with other people .
Erikson described identity as "a subjective sense as well as an observable quality of personal
sameness and continuity, paired with some belief in the sameness and continuity of some shared world
image. As a quality of unself-conscious living, this can be gloriously obvious in a young person who has
found himself as he has found his communality. In him we see emerge a unique unification of what is
irreversibly given—that is, body type and temperament, giftedness and vulnerability, infantile models and
acquired ideals—with the open choices provided in available roles, occupational possibilities, values
offered, mentors met, friendships made, and first sexual encounters."

IDENTITY CRISES IN POST COLONIAL LITERATURE-

Colonial Literature: it is written in the colonial countries before they got their independence,
countries of the English Empire that inherited the British language and customs: Australia, New Zealand,
Canada, India, Sub-Saharan Countries and some Caribbean countries. We will consider Africa and the
Caribbean as a region.
Nowadays there are a lot emerging literatures in a lot of Pacific islands that are getting their
independence and as they get their independence they start writing literature. The Asiam Rim are a lot of
colonial countries (islands) in Asia, they are too many and very small. These countries belonged to the
British Empire and in 1930's-60's they got their independence and they got their own identity. Getting
independence means that you are conscious, or have a notion of your own identity, different from that of the
metropoli. That what we see in literature (the process is reflected in and at the same time impulsed by
writing).
The literature written in the colonial period is called Colonial Literature, and when the countries
got the independence it is called Post-Colonial Literature. Post-Colonial Literature reflects a way of life and
talks about customs, attitudes, religion, and legends. So it inscribes a culture in a frame. That is, an
affirmation of their identity. It is called Local Colour; it is mostly a realistic literature that gives an account
of the real country, it is supposed to mimic reality. Colonial Literature is written by natives (people who is
from that country) that is different from Colonialist Literature.
Colonialist Literature: literature written by British people about those countries embodying the
Imperialist point of view. Imperialism is the very root of Colonialism. The assumption of Imperialism, in
the case of England, is mainly based in their Industrial Revolution; ”We are progress”, they said. They
convinced themselves that they had the right and duty to teach others, expanding their industrial revolution.
They meant to civilise the world, they gave civilisation to other countries. Imperialism is “the notion of the
authority assumed by a state over another territory”. Marx said it was the globalisation of capitalism.
Colonialism is putting that idea onto effect, consolidating imperial power by setting on the territory,
exploiting the resources and governing it.
Post-Colonial Literature emerges after independence. We have people who know they are
different to England. They have now a distinctive identity. One way of recognising themselves as
independent is to analyse colonial period (relationship) with their new perspective, analysing it with their
found and independent identity. Also looking at the Empire as a linguistic and literary possibility.
Neo-Colonialism: in spite of independence, post-colonial countries depend, apparently indirectly, on the
metropoli to survive, cause the metropoli still have the money and the power in the important world of
communication, so those countries are economically a colony. G.Ch. Spivak said: “we live in a post-
colonial neo-colonialised world”.Great Britain went to different countries, during the 18th and 19th
centuries, looking for a market. They made different kinds of colonisation:
By settlement. Are settled colonies: Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa.
By invading. Are invaded colonies: Caribbean, African territories and India
In the settled colonies, we have British people looking for new territories, to work there, and later
they take their families there, they live there as British and at the same time they think they belong to that
place.In the invaded colonies British people went there to take advantage of the country and then leave,
after having the place under British role and making it work for British sake and profit.
In both cases the main instrument of colonisation was the language, English. Because with the
language the natives learn not only the language but also the culture it brought. Natives have to learn the
language by choice or by force because it was the only way to communicate with the civilised English; the
colonised were considered savages, inferior, so they have to learn from the English, never the other way
round. Of course, this is not necessary true (India had a much more ancient and wise culture). But England
gave the organisation, according to its own ideas. If you, the colony, wanted to have a place in the new
society, you had to follow the English way and speak English. In the settled colonies, the British didn't care
about natives unless they got on the way. The comers were mainly farmers, they moved inland when more

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people arrived and natives were pushed or killed, it was a slow colonisation, that's why it was a slow
genocide.
In African literature today, including that of Nigeria, there seems to be an identity crisis for women
as we perceive a disjuncture between the typical portrayal of women especially in maleauthored literatures
as weak and inconsequential in the scheme of things and the current emergence of a new breed of women
from all over the continent. The first modern-day woman President in Africa has, for instance, emerged in
Liberia, and for feminists across the continent, this is a great achievement. Scholars, critics, feminist
activists and top-level technocrats in diverse areas of endeavor have also been produced all over this
continent and they are demonstrating individually andcollectively that they are determined to inspire and
create new histories and images for themselves.This is especially remarkable, because African women live
within a dominant male culture that oppresses and devalues them. What then accounts for this apparent
disjuncture between the lived experiences and the oppressive identities foisted upon women by dominant
male cultures? To investigate this problem further it is also needful to ask the following questions: How and
why these dislocations occur. And finally, how do the women as writers themselves interrogate their
perceived oppressive identities?

REFERENCE-

1}Amuta, Chidi.1998. Literature of the Nigerian Civil War. Perspectives on Nigerian Literature 1700
to the Present.vol.1 Ed. Yemi Ogunbiyi. Lagos: Guardian Bks
2}Alamgir Hashmi, Commonwealth Literature: An Essay Towards the Re-definition of a Popular/Counter
Culture, 1983.
3}Elleke Boehmer, Colonial and Postcolonial Literature: Migrant Metaphors
4}Britta Olinde, A Sense of Place: Essays in Post-Colonial Literatures

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