在過去的二十年中，隨著1989 年的革命（以及之後突進的新自由主義經濟政策），信息和通信技術（ICT）的擴散，世界經歷了急劇變化。但高等教育，尤其是英文文學研究有没有根據這一時期的文化、經濟、社會和政治的情況來修正呢？本論文探討從現代主義美學和片面國家論述的小說（英文書寫的），過渡到一個文化和政治驅動並行的後現代形式，及反映一個日益全球化和全球意識的二十一世紀引人注目的問題。通過當代小說的新自由主義全球化的測試 ──或者也被稱為後現代的情况和晚期資本主義的文化邏輯──我們了解世界據稱走向非殖民化只不過掩飾另一種殖民方式，導致葛蘭西的霸權理論效果，使馬克思主義理論的社會力量轉變成促使不同階級的政治權力形式，取決於一個非常關鍵的因素- 共識。 / The world has experienced rapid changes in the last twenty years concomitant of the Revolutions of 1989 (and the subsequent onrush of neoliberal economic policies) and the proliferation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), but has higher ed,and particularly, the study of English literature modified in accordance to the cultural, economic, social, and political circumstances of the period? This thesis explores the compelling question by illustrating the transition of contemporary literary fiction (written in English) from modernist aesthetics and one-sided national discourse into a culturally and politically driven postmodern form to parallel and reflect an increasingly global and globally aware 21st century. Through contemporary fiction’s examination of neoliberal globalization - or perhaps what is also known as the postmodern condition and cultural logic of late capitalism - we come to understand a return of colonization in a world allegedly moving towards decolonization. What results is the Gramscian theory of hegemony, which gives rise to a Marxist theory of the transformation of social forces into forms of political power adequate to different class projects that depends on a very crucial factor - consensus. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Tchan, Chrystal Ching. / "December 2012." / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 105-110). / Abstracts also in Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Table of Contents --- p.ii / Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter Chapter One: --- Nationalism and the Decline of Empire --- p.15 / Chapter Chapter Two: --- The Reflexive Resurgence of Local and National Formations in Hari Kunzru’s Transmission --- p.42 / Chapter Chapter Three: --- Technocapitalizing Spooks in William Gibson’s Spook Country --- p.66 / Conclusion --- p.103 / Bibliography --- p.105

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Melbourne, School of Culture and Communication, 2010. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (p. 202-242)

Cette thèse propose une lecture croisée des épopées traditionnelles et postcoloniales dans un cadre transculturel. Une analyse comparée de Moby Dick de Herman Melville, Omeros de Derek Walcott et la trilogie de l’Ibis d’Amitav Ghosh nous permet de cerner spécificités de l’épopée moderne postcoloniale. Celle-ci s’inscrit dans la lignée des épopées traditionnelles d’Homère, Virgile, Arioste, Camões et Milton, tout en rivalisant avec elles. Les épopées traditionnelles et modernes ont recours à des conventions qui esthétisent l’expérience collective comme les comparaisons épiques, la généalogie présentée sous forme de prophétie et la mise en abyme ekphrastique. L’épopée traditionnelle met en avant la vision d’une société unifiée grâce à des conjonctions harmonieuses entre le trope et la diégèse, des continuités généalogiques entre l’ancêtre et le descendant ainsi que des associations autoréflexives ekphrastiques entre l’histoire impériale et le texte qui la glorifie. Dans cette perspective, la spécificité de l’épopée postcoloniale semble résider dans l’articulation ambivalente de la condition postcoloniale. Ainsi, chez Melville, Walcott et Ghosh, le style héroï-comique contrebalance les comparaisons épiques opérant des transfigurations héroïques. De même, de nouvelles affiliations hybrides forgées par les personnages coexistent avec des généalogies discontinues, sans en combler toutes les lacunes créées par le déracinement et la violence coloniale. Cette vision équivoque trouve son expression la plus franche dans les séquences ekphrastiques où les textes sont confrontés au choix impossible entre commémoration de l’expérience et regard critique vis-à-vis d’elle. / This thesis offers collocational readings of traditional and postcolonial epics in transcultural frameworks. It investigates the specificities of modern postcolonial epic through a comparative analysis of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, Derek Walcott’s Omeros, and Amitav Ghosh’s Ibis trilogy. It explores how these works emulate, but also rival, the traditional epics of Homer, Virgil, Ariosto, Camões, and Milton. Both traditional and postcolonial epic rely on generic conventions in order to aestheticize collective experience, setting it against the natural world (via epic similes), against history and imperial destiny (via genealogy and prophecy), and against the epic work itself (via ekphrasis). However, traditional epic emphasizes a unified worldview, characterized by harmonious conjunctions between trope and diegesis, genealogical continuities between ancestor and descendant, and self-reflexive ekphrastic associations between imperial history and the epic text commissioned to glorify it. From this perspective, the specificity of postcolonial epic can be formulated in terms of its ambivalent articulation of the postcolonial condition. In the works of Melville, Walcott, and Ghosh, tropes of heroic transfiguration are held in check by the mock-heroic, while empowering self-adopted hybrid affiliations co-exist, but cannot entirely compensate for, discontinuous genealogies marked by displacement, deracination, and colonial violence. This ambivalence finds its most powerful expression in the ekphrastic sequences where the postcolonial texts are most directly confronted with the impossible choice between commemorating experience and being critical of such commemoration.