Post-colonial discourse in world literature (Discourse Analysis of Roots)

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Associate Professor and Research Director, Faculty of Communication, Tehran University of Science and Research, Azad University

2 Ph.D. student of Social Communication Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Tehran North Branch, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Discourse analysis uses discriminative techniques to examine the concepts of power and ideology inherent in different texts. One of the most important approaches of discourse, is Laclau and Mouffe’s which adopts the concepts such as the separation of fixed and floating signifier, articulation, moments and elements, opposition and otherness to explore the implicit purposes in the texts. In this study, by using Laclau and Mouffe’s, we tried to analyze the “roots” novel discourse to indentify the approaches in the postcolonial literature. The views of people like Edward Said, Frantz Fanon and Homi Bhabha explain and interpret the post-colonial discourse analysis that would help us in this article. The main goal of this research is to identify the effective signifiers of the conflict between colonialist discourse and slavery, which forms the central ideology of the novel of the roots. Racism and slavery were among the important concepts in the discourse of colonialism, which contributed to the hegemonic process of discourse. On the other hand, concepts such as submission, retardation, violence and lack of accountability are also found in the discursive circle of African slavery. The dominance of colonial discourse in the roots of the novel is formed by the rejection of indigenous African concepts and culture and consolidating their western and American meanings in American dominant discourse.

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