Name Naeem Akram

Roll no 19011517-026

Course code TRAN-312

Course Name 20th Century Literary/ Critical Theory

Assignment Topic Summary

Submitted to Ms Faria Shaheen

Department CeLTS
Post colonialism
Postcolonial theory is about colonialism, emphasizing the effects of colonialism on both the
colonized and the colonizer. This means postcolonial theory provides a point of view that
responds to colonialism and the complicated power dynamic that occurs both during the colonial
experience and in the aftermath.
The roots of postcolonial theory as a hybrid of postmodernism and classical Marxism has led in
many ways to a tension within the postcolonial perspective that is highly critical of theory and
simultaneously self-theorizing. This tension has also contributed to a degree of self-distrust that
has made postcolonial theory ever-changing and particularly malleable.
While postcolonial theory has taken many forms, there are basic ideas that have guided the
theory since its major development in the 1970s. This section will explore some of the key
concepts of postcolonial theory and some of the major works that comprise the common canon,
or at least major theoretical reference points.

Orientalism & the Other

In what is widely accepted as the seminal work of postcolonial thought, Orientalism (1978),
Edward Said argues that beyond the physical and economic aspects of colonialism, there was
another aspect present: the defining of the "Other." The Other, Said contends, is the result of a
binary worldview, in which the world was divided into an us-and-them structure. Said uses the
term Orientalism to describe the process of "Othering" of the Eastern colonies by the Western
metropole, the European colonizers' home nation. Orientalism is the European definition of all
things related to the colonies as wild, emotional, backward, powerless, and fundamentally
different from the (purported) Occidental qualities of civilized behavior, rational thought,
modernism, and (justifiably) powerful. Through a conscious production of knowledge, the West
defined the East as inferior and, in doing so, also defined itself as superior. However, and
perhaps more importantly, Said argues, the West cannot exist without the East, as it is a mutually
dependent definition (there can be no West without an East) and it illustrates the interconnected
relationship of the colonized and colonizer. According to Said, the long-lasting effects of
Orientalism remain and represent an aspect of colonialism that never ended. The viewing of
modernity, progress, civilization, and power in Eurocentric terms is a legacy of colonialism with
which we continue to live and which postcolonial theory seeks to illustrate and destabilize.
The Subaltern Subject
In the 1980s, another major defining move was made in postcolonial theory. The work of the
Subaltern Studies Collective and the set of edited volumes it produced, alongside the responses
to them, firmly established the notion of the subaltern in postcolonial theory. The subaltern,
according to a founder of the idea, Ranajit Guha, was the colonized subject who was not only
completely absent from colonial-produced accounts of the colonized period, but in fact operated
on a completely different and often utterly separate level from the colonizer and the elite
indigenous class. The concept of the subaltern is further laid out in the introduction to the first
volume of collected essays in Subaltern Studies I and then elaborated on in Guha's monograph,
Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency. He claims that, parallel to the domain of elite
politics, there existed… another domain…in which the principal actors were not the dominant
groups of the indigenous society or the colonial authorities, but the subaltern classes and groups
constituting the mass of the laboring population… — that is, the people. Guha builds on the
methodology of prior social historians and theorists, such as E. P. Thompson and Antonio
Gramsci, to try and point out an arena of non-elite activity in the history of colonialism in South
Asia. In terms of theory, Guha argues that this is different from prior approaches of social history
because the idea of the subaltern was not just filling in the perspective of overlooked people
(such as the working class). Instead, Guha took it a step further by demonstrating that the domain
of the Indian peasant constituted a discrete arena from the elite domain. In other words, the
peasants were not just reacting to the colonial government or elite rulers; the subalterns were
actively involved in making their own history. Since its early manifestations, the subaltern
studies are seen as a subset of postcolonial theory, despite never claiming to be part of the
postcolonial project. The notion of the subaltern, while fundamental to postcolonial theory has
been contentious. Gayatri Spivak famously pointed out that the subaltern subjectivity, or
individual perspective, may indeed not be recoverable as it is too far removed, too nebulous, and
too different for the non-subaltern to grasp. Indeed, she asks, is it any better for modern theorists
to attempt to speak for them by flattening them into an essentialist category? Essentialism refers
to the flattening of a diverse group of people (Indian peasants) into a group based on a few
shared qualities (in this case, poverty and relative geography). Spivak acknowledges, however,
that "strategic essentialism" can help to clarify certain aspects of colonialism but that it must be
deployed consciously, carefully, and critically.
Agency & Resistance
Within the same vein of locating the subaltern, many postcolonial theorists have endeavored to
locate their own perspectives on colonialism. Postcolonial theorists have been careful to point to
instances in which the colonized subject was able to exert power over his or her own life. This
ability to exercise power is referred to as ―agency‖ and is a critically important aspect of
postcolonial theory. Agency is often conflated with resistance, but it is important to note a clear
distinction between the two. Agency can manifest in acts of resistance to colonialism, in big
actions such as a massive worker strike or in small actions such as the conscious refusal to adapt
to the colonizers’ mode of fashion. However, agency can also manifest in acts that are explicitly
nonresistance oriented, such as collaborating with the colonizer to root out agitators among the
workers or consciously deciding to master and embrace the colonizers' philosophy and
education. It is further important to note, that in all four examples of agency, the resistance (or
nonresistance) could even be misleading, and each scenario could be reversed into resistance or
acquiescence. Thus, when we think of agency as it relates to postcolonial theory, it is referring
only to the ability to exercise power over one's individual, or subjective, situation. Collective
agency, which refers to a group of people having agency, is arguably more difficult to
distinguish from resistance. Still, resistance must not be overemphasized as the only way power
functions. Resistance is one important way agency functions, and frequently it is a point of focus
for postcolonial theory. Guha's early work defining the subaltern was also concerned with
locating his or her resistance to colonialism. Postcolonial theory has retrospectively incorporated
many of the texts written by colonial subjects (and former colonial subjects) as works of
resistance. Among the most cited writers of postcolonial theory is Franz Fanon, particularly his
work, The Wretched of the Earth (Omar, 2009; Fanon, 1968). Although all of Fanon's work deals
distinctly with the experience of colonialism and the effects of the colonial encounter, The
Wretched of the Earth most clearly engages with the issue of resistance. Fanon was himself
actively involved in the struggle for Algerian independence, and his theories on the violence of
colonialism justifying (indeed mandating) a violent resistance in response have been explored
and theorized heavily in later postcolonial work. It is also important to note that for Fanon, and
for postcolonial theory generally, resistance occurs not only in a mass uprising, but in the
individual mind because, argues Fanon, colonialism projected power in the form of physical and
emotional oppression. The individual submission to be considered a colonized/inferior subject
occurs in the mind, and thus, resistance to it also begins in the mind. For postcolonial theorists
this has meant that understanding this aspect of the colonial experience requires more
individually-focused sources and different forms of expression such as art and literature as
modes of resistance.

Literature as Resistance
Literature as resistance is a particularly large field within postcolonial theory, and it comprises
both reading resistance in texts and reading texts as resistance. Fanon's work is about resistance,
and therefore it is easy to see; but other work is more subtle in the way resistance works. While
the examples are many, one particularly good example of resistance in literature can be seen in
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart. Within this text, Achebe fiercely counters the colonially-
informed stereotypes of "primitive" Africa by depicting the complex life of an African village.
He also writes the dialogue in a high register of the native language Igbo, which not only
illustrates the beauty of the language, but also positions the Western English-speaking reader as
the outsider to a complexity of African life. Indeed, this approach of recreating dialects spoken
by the colonized is a form of resistance that occurs throughout much postcolonial literature.
Achebe's work is an excellent example of a postcolonial text challenging colonial knowledge
production and has provided rich material for postcolonial theory in its production, content, and
reception (Ashcroft et al., 1998).

Assimilation & Hybridity

Another major component of postcolonial theory deals with the issues of cultural subjectivity
and the intersections of colonized and colonizer. Arguing against the binary categories that
colonized/colonizer accepts, postcolonial theorists such as Homi Bhabha and Ann Laura Stoler
have argued that the spaces of "mixing" offer the greatest challenge to colonialism by destroying
the very definitions on which it was based (Bhabha, 1994). The colonial preoccupation with
keeping the relationships distinctly clear between the two categories through vast amounts of
colonial policy regarding the intermixing of the racialized categories of colonized/colonizer
points to a clear concern on the part of the imperial authority to keep it straight which is the
Other (Stoler, 2001). The physical creation of hybrid persons, biologically the product of a
colonizer and a colonized, is one type of hybridity, but another hybridity occurs on a cultural
level. Postcolonial theorists (including Bhabha) have also explored the cultural blurring of the
two binaries. The notion of assimilation, or ways in which aspects of the colonizers' culture were
adapted into a local manifestation (accepting some aspects while likely rejecting others), has
provided interesting insight into forms of agency, resistance, and the effect of the colonial
encounter on larger social structures such as religion, gender, race, and class. Hybridity refers to
the new culture that colonialism produces — a culture distinct from both the colonizer and
colonized prior to encounter. While some postcolonial theorists valorize this space, others see it
as problematic. Fanon refers to the hybrid man as having a schizophrenic mindset and equates
the assimilation of Western habits to mimicry and a loss of identity that is another example of
colonial destruction
Psychoanalytic therapy is the re-narratization of a person’s life. It has given much importance on
the significance between the unconscious and thought processes. They believed that an
awareness of this is therapeutic and vital to a healthy mind. Psychoanalysis emphasized on
motives, it focused on hidden or disguised motives which helps to clarify literature on two levels,
the level of writing itself and the level of character action within the text. Psychoanalysis gives
emphasis on the subject and tries to explain what are the relationship of meaning and identity are
to the psychic and cultural forces. Psychoanalysis has a great importance in contemporary
understandings of reading, meaning and the relation of literature to culture.

The Basis of Freudian Psychoanalysis

The modern theory that is used in literature has two accepted meanings. Firstly, it means a
method of treating mentally disordered people. Secondly, it also goes to mean the theories on
human mind and its various complexities. Psychoanalytic theory was propounded by Sigmund
Freud. Freud was originally a medical man who was engaged in the study and treatment of
patients in his clinic. His long devotion to this sector makes him realize and he observed mental
disease of his patients. Gradually he was more interested in the study of psychology and more
particularly psychology of the unconscious mind.

Freudian Theory
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by
Austrian Neurologist Sigmund Freud and others. Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, coming as it at
the turn of the century, provided a radically new approach to the analysis and treatment of
‘abnormal’ adult behavior. Earlier views tended to ignore behavior and look for a physiological
explanation of ‘abnormality’. The novelty of Freud’s approach was in recognizing that
neurotic behavior is not random or meaningless but goal-directed.

The Pre-Oedipal Stage

Freud claimed that all human beings are born with certain instincts, i.e. with a natural
tendency to satisfy their biologically determined needs for food, shelter and warmth. The
satisfaction of these needs is both practical and a source of pleasure which Freud refers to as
‘sexual’.
 Freud divides this stage into three stages: the oral stage, the anal stage and the phallic
stage.

Oral Stage (Birth to 1 year)

In the first stage of psychosexual development, the libido is centered in a baby's
mouth. During the oral stages, the baby gets much satisfaction from putting all
sorts of things in its mouth to satisfy the libido, and thus its id demands.  Which
at this stage in life are oral, or mouth orientated, such as sucking, biting, and
breastfeeding. 
Freud said oral stimulation could lead to an oral fixation in later life.  We see oral
personalities all around us such as smokers, nail-biters, finger-chewers, and
thumb suckers.  Oral personalities engage in such oral behaviors, particularly
when under stress.

Anal Stage (1 to 3 years)

During the anal stage of psychosexual development the libido becomes focused
on the anus, and the child derives great pleasure from defecating.  The child is
now fully aware that they are a person in their own right and that their wishes
can bring them into conflict with the demands of the outside world (i.e., their ego
has developed). 
Freud believed that this type of conflict tends to come to a head in potty training,
in which adults impose restrictions on when and where the child can defecate. 
The nature of this first conflict with authority can determine the child's future
relationship with all forms of authority.
Early or harsh potty training can lead to the child becoming an anal-retentive
personality who hates mess, is obsessively tidy, punctual and respectful of
authority.  They can be stubborn and tight-fisted with their cash and possessions.
This is all related to pleasure got from holding on to their faeces when toddlers,
and their mum's then insisting that they get rid of it by placing them on the potty
until they perform!
Not as daft as it sounds.  The anal expulsive, on the other hand, underwent a
liberal toilet-training regime during the anal stage.
In adulthood, the anal expulsive is the person who wants to share things with
you.  They like giving things away.  In essence, they are 'sharing their s**t'!'  An
anal-expulsive personality is also messy, disorganized and rebellious.

Phallic Stage (3 to 6 years)

The phallic stage is the third stage of psychosexual development, spanning the
ages of three to six years, wherein the infant's libido (desire) centers upon their
genitalia as the erogenous zone.
The child becomes aware of anatomical sex differences, which sets in motion the
conflict between erotic attraction, resentment, rivalry, jealousy and fear which
Freud called the Oedipus complex (in boys) and the Electra complex (in
girls). 
This is resolved through the process of identification, which involves the child
adopting the characteristics of the same sex parent.
Oedipus Complex
The most important aspect of the phallic stage is the Oedipus complex.  This is
one of Freud's most controversial ideas and one that many people reject outright.
The name of the Oedipus complex derives from the Greek myth where Oedipus, a
young man, kills his father and marries his mother. Upon discovering this, he
pokes his eyes out and becomes blind.  This Oedipal is the generic (i.e., general)
term for both Oedipus and Electra complexes.
In the young boy, the Oedipus complex or more correctly, conflict, arises because
the boy develops sexual (pleasurable) desires for his mother.  He wants to possess
his mother exclusively and get rid of his father to enable him to do so.
Irrationally, the boy thinks that if his father were to find out about all this, his
father would take away what he loves the most.  During the phallic stage what the
boy loves most is his penis.  Hence the boy develops castration anxiety.
The little boy then sets out to resolve this problem by imitating, copying and
joining in masculine dad-type behaviors.  This is called identification, and is
how the three-to-five year old boy resolves his Oedipus complex.
Identification means internally adopting the values, attitudes, and behaviors of
another person.  The consequence of this is that the boy takes on the male gender
role, and adopts an ego ideal and values that become the superego.
Freud (1909) offered the Little Hans case study as evidence of the Oedipus
complex.

The Oedipus complex

Sigmund Freud introduced the term ‘Oedipus complex’ in his ‘Interpretation of Dreams’.
According to him, the concept is a desire for sexual involvement with the parent of the
opposite sex, which produces a sense of competition with the parent of the same sex and a
crucial stage in the normal developmental process.
The term Oedipus complex was indeed named after the name of Greek mythical figure.
Oedipus who was the son of king Liaus and queen Jocasta of Thebes, and finally killed his
father and married his mother unconsciously which according to the belief of the writer and
people of that time, was designed by fate. But, according to Sigmund Freud, the accidents or
incidents in the life of Oedipus happened because of sexual complexity between Oedipus and
his mother. And on the basis of this story he invented the concept Oedipus complex which he
attributed to children of about the age of three to five. He views that all human behavior are
motivated by sex or by the instincts, which in his opinion are the neurological representations
of physical needs. He firstly referred to those as the life instincts which perpetuate the life of
the individual, initially by motivating him or her to seek food and water and secondly by
motivating him or her to have sex. Freud’s clinical experience led him to view sex as much
more important in the dynamics of the psyche than other needs.

The unconscious
The unconscious in personality theory of psychoanalytic by Freud is stack of feelings of the
unconscious mind, desires, thoughts and memories that are outside of our conscious awareness.
Most of the matters of the unconscious are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as feelings of
anxiety, pain, or clash. According to Freud, the unconsciousness continues to impact our
behavior and capability; however, we are not aware of the following deep influences:
Repression is root of it. Often parents try to restrict their child which is unconsciously built in
their mind.
Ego, Id and Super-Ego
Freud proposed three structures of the psyche or personality. Id, Ego and Super-Ego. Id
refers a selfish, primitive, childish pleasure –oriented part of the personality with no ability to
delay gratification. SuperEgo refers internalized societal and parental standards of ‘good’ and
‘bad’, ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ behavior’. Ego refers the moderator between the Id and Super-Ego
which seeks compromises to pacify both. It can be viewed as our ‘sense of time and place’.

Problems
Freud’s hypotheses are neither verifiable nor falsifiable. It is not clear what would count as
evidence sufficient to confirm or refute theoretical claims. The theory is based on an
inadequate conceptualization of the experience of woman. The theory overemphasizes the
role of sexuality in human psychological development and experience.

Literature and Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis is not simply a branch of medicine or psychology; it helps understand
philosophy, culture, religion and first and foremost literature. In developing his theory of
psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud has often related it to art in general and to literature in particular.
In ‘The Interpretation of Dreams, Freud analyzed Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex and Shakespeare’s
Hamlet for their Oedipal elements and for the effects the plays had on their audience. In his
‘Creative writers and Day-dreaming,’ Freud further expanded the connection between literature
and psychoanalysis. He compared fantasy, play, dreams and the work of art in order to
understand creativity. In ‘creative writers and Daydreaming’ Freud first presented his theory on
the structure of the literary work and made a psychoanalytic inquiry into the nature of literature.
For Freud, a literary work is analogous to a daydream. Like a daydream, the literary work
contains in its fantasy the fulfillment of an unsatisfied wish and thus improves on an
unsatisfactory reality.
Psychoanalytic literary criticism can focus on one or more of the following:
I. The author: The theory is used to analyze the author and his/her life and the literary
work.
 II. The characters: This theory is used to analyze one or more of the characters, the
psychological theory becomes a tool that to explain the characters’ behavior and
motivations.
III. The audience: The theory is used to explain the appeal of the work for those who read
it.
IV. The text: The theory is used to analyze the role of language and symbolism in the
work.

A Psychoanalysis of Leena Yadav “House of secrets”

In this web series the character Lalit Yadav is perfect example of psychoanalytic study. Lalit
Yadav was successful business man in the show. He lived with his family 11 members in one
house. His brothers were dead. So, he was the head of house. Unconsciously it was built in the
family that he is perfect kind of person because, every decision he made at the time was
successful for family. His nephews were educated and they all respect him and one tragedy
happened to him. Some people beat him and his voice was gone. So, the element of repression
was developed in him. That repressing element changed his psychological state of mind. So the
unconscious state for his family members to accept him as superior was developed and
repressions made him do some believe wrong beliefs. Those beliefs were forwarded to other
family and following those beliefs was one that one day we all will suicide in the certain shape
and the wrongs and mistakes which we had made will be forgiven by the god.

Psychoanalysis of Karan Anshuman “Mirzapur”

In Mirzapur there is character of Guddu Pandit and he was oppressed from respect because he
didn’t study and society considers him failure which caused aggression in him. So, aggression
makes him many things like fighting with most dangerous man in the area etc.
Similarly, the writer Karan Anshuman was oppressed from studying computer science because
due to his father post as film director, he was always on some movie sets etc. which was
luxurious for him but he was oppressed from average life and studying computer science. So,
that element reflects in Guddu character.