ABSTRACT A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SENSE OF BELONGING AS A PART OF IDENTITY OF THE COLONIZER AND THE COLONIZED IN THE GRASS IS SINGING AND MY PLACE Cansu G&ouml / ktan M.A., in English Literature Supervisor: Assist. Prof. Dr. Margaret S&ouml / nmez May 2010, 205 pages This thesis investigates how two loosely autobiographical works unveil the effects of colonization on their major characters in terms of their identities and senses of belonging. The Grass Is Singing by Doris Lessing, a second-generation member of the colonizer, and My Place by Sally Morgan, a third-generation hybrid Australian Aborigine, are selected because both novels essentially deal with colonial issues by depicting their major characters in a process of maturation within a colonial and post-colonial framework, the former using a semi-autobiographical narrative tone and the latter using an Aboriginal version of autobiography, which integrates oral tradition and storytelling. These two books reveal that a sense of identity is closely related to a sense of belonging and that both are fundamentally affected by the colonial situation. The effects of a sense of identity and a sense of belonging, which boil down to the demise or survival of the individual, interacts with family and society, physical environment, and race issues that the thesis investigates by dedicating a chapter to each. The method used in this point-by-point comparative analysis is to approach the issues of sense of belonging and identity in a colonial context with a close reading of the two works, to find out what the texts say for themselves regarding the effect of family and society, environment, and race as depicted in The Grass Is Singing and My Place. The theoretical background that is most relevant to this study is post-colonial literary theory, although here it is taken as secondary to the close reading that is the thesis&rsquo / s primary approach to these works. Keywords: Doris Lessing The Grass Is Singing, Sally Morgan My Place, Colonial and Post-colonial Literature

Ce travail tente d’établir, à partir de la pensée et de la vision que développe Edouard Glissant dans ses essais, une nouvelle approche, ou du moins une approche différente de la littérature comparée. Cette approche a pour fondement les concepts clés tels que le chaos-monde, le tout-monde, la créolisation et l’opacité. La relation surgit de ce que Glissant nomme le chaos-monde, cette rencontre, ce choc de cultures toujours à l’oeuvre dans notre monde. Cette confrontation, ce contact avec l’autre ne peut que produire de la relation. Nous vivons depuis toujours, et aujourd’hui bien plus que jamais, dans un espace pluriel caractérisé par la participation-confrontation, selon des modes variés, hétérogènes, voire conflictuels, de multiples cultures; quand bien même nous n’aurions jamais vu ces autres peuples, le fait d’avoir connaissance de leur existence contraint toujours déjà et nécessairement à l’instauration d’une relation. Cette relation, qui, chez Glissant, est avant tout à l’oeuvre dans le monde des hommes, comporte tous les éléments d’une approche comparatiste en littérature : mettre en relation des ouvrages différents mais néanmoins équivalents, analyser un ouvrage en gardant à l’esprit la multiplicité d’oeuvres existantes, comparer tout en respectant les différences propres à chaque oeuvre, telle est, semble-t-il, la tâche du comparatiste. Il s’agit, à partir du chaos-monde perçu comme confrontation de tous les ouvrages de notre corpus, de révéler une relation au sens glissantien du terme. Les termes de déclinaisons, inclinations et déclins nous engagent dans la description des trajets de lectures en montrant autant les capacités que les limites de cette approche. / Building on the theory developed by Edouard Glissant in his essays, this work attempts to draw up a different approach for the analysis of compared literature. This method is based on the key concepts developed by Glissant. All relationships are the offsprings of what Glissant calls the chaos-world, which is this encounter, this clash of cultures constantly at work in our world. This confrontation with the other cannot but give rise to relationship. Since time immemorial, we’ve been living and today we, more than ever, live in a plural setting, the defining characteristic of which is the cooperation and confrontation of multiple cultures on varied, heterogeneous and even conflictual modes; even if we have not seen these people who are so different and come into direct contact with their cultures as such, the very fact that we know of their existence always compels us to start some kind of relationship. In the works of Glissant, this relationship, which is at work in the world of human beings, comprises all the required elements for a comparative approach in the field of literature. Indeed, it would seem that the task of the comparatist consists in bringing together different but comparable works, in analyzing a piece of work while having in mind the multiplicity of works existing at the same time, and in comparing everything whilst respecting the differences exclusive to each work. Starting from the chaos-world perceived as a confrontation between all the works of our corpus, the whole point for us is to lay bare a relationship the way Glissant understands it. The concepts of declension, inclination and decline commit us to a description of reading journeys during which we show the scope as well as the limitations of this approach.