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Arabic literature in Israel has evaded critical attention, or has been treated as an uncomplicated part of Palestinian national culture, on a quest for unification and an identity that was devastated in 1948. This dissertation complicates that narrative through close readings of short stories by five Arab citizens of Israel—Imil Habibi, Muhammad ‘Ali Taha, Muhammad Naffa‘, Hanna Ibrahim, and Zaki Darwish—between 1967 and 1983. Focusing on the relationship between geography and fiction, I suggest that literary constructions of “place” and “space” by these authors reveal a range of cultural negotiations that break down entrenched dyads: Palestinian yet Israeli; Palestinian on the one hand, Israeli on the other; spared exile, but suffering occupation. Instead, these writers evoke the hybrid and ambivalent experiences produced in the paradoxical spaces of Israeli-Palestinian life. I develop an analytical framework that incorporates geographic and literary theory. I use the work of humanists such as Gaston Bachelard, Yi-Fu Tuan, and Edward Casey to suggest that literature mediates geography in a way that communicates belonging, alienation, or personal and collective meaning. The framework is bolstered with the work of postcolonial theorists such as Homi Bhabha, along with historical and political sources, to capture the contextual resonance of the texts. After laying out these theoretical guidelines, I offer a historical account of Arabic literature in Israel and embark on four analytical chapters. Chapter Two explores Imil Habibi’s portrayals of anxiety around post-1967 Palestinian reunions. Chapter Three focuses on the themes of Muhammad ‘Ali Taha’s Palestinian collective identity in Israel. Chapter Four takes up the theme of “the land” in the works of Muhammad Naffa‘ and Hanna Ibrahim, in the context of 1970s land expropriations. Chapter Five explores a long story by Zaki Darwish and its depiction of the body’s phenomenological relation to the homeland. Rather than portraying counter-narratives that suggest a binary of “Israeli” and “Palestinian” always at odds, these authors portray the spaces and characters in between. They disclose the anxieties of finding a sense of place in the context of a dispersed Palestinian nation, geopolitical uncertainty, social marginalization within the state, and the subtle geographies of a historic homeland that both is—and is not—one’s own.

Questa tesi esamina il significato e il ruolo che lo spazio ha assunto nella vita e nell’opera di Harriet Martineau. Nella prima parte della tesi l’attaccamento al – o il rifiuto del – luogo, i.e., la casa, è stato ritenuto significativo per lo sviluppo identitario e il senso di benessere esperiti da Martineau. Il racconto economico di Martineau datato 1834 e intitolato The Land’s End è stato scelto invece quale focus nella seconda parte della tesi – scelta basata sulla possibilità di illustrare una strategia narrativa che si avvale dell’utilizzo concreto e simbolico di immagini spaziali da parte della scrittrice. / This dissertation examines the meaning and the role of place in Harriet Martineau’s life and work. In the first part of the dissertation, the attachment to – or rejection of – place, i.e. home, has been acknowledged as significant in Martineau’s development of self-identity and feeling of well-being. Moreover, Martineau’s 1834 economic tale entitled The Land’s End has been chosen as the focus for the second part of the dissertation – a choice based on the possibility of showing the woman writer’s narrative strategy and use of space images in both a concrete and symbolic way.

Thesis (MA (English))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis interrogates the relationship between body, subjectivity and space in three antipastoral novels. The texts which I will be discussing, Karel Schoeman’s This Life, Anne Landsman’s The Devil’s Chimney and J.M. Coetzee’s In the Heart of the Country, all foreground the female protagonist’s relationship to a specifically South African landscape in a colonial time-frame. The inter-relatedness between the body, subjectivity and space is explored in order to show that there is a shifting interaction between these registers in the novels. Arising from this interaction, the importance of perspective as a way of being in the world is foregrounded. The approach adopted in this study is based on the assumption that our experience depends upon how we make meaning of the world through our bodies as we encounter people, places and objects. The lived, embodied experience is always a subjective experience. The conceptual framework is derived broadly from psychoanalysis and phenomenology. My primary concern in this study is how marginal subject positions are explored in the space of the South African farm, which, traditionally, is an ideologically fraught locus of Afrikaner patriarchy and oppression. The novels are narrated by distinctive female voices, each speaking differently, but all having the effect of undermining and exposing the hegemony of the patriarchal farm space. In all three novels the question of genre is involved as forming the space of the text itself. The novels speak to the tradition of the plaasroman and the pastoral and, in doing so, open up a conversation with the past. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: In hierdie tesis word die verhouding tussen die liggaam, subjektiwiteit en ruimte ondersoek in drie romans wat teen die pastorale literêre tradisie spreek. Die betrokke romans is This Life deur Karel Schoeman, The Devil’s Chimney deur Anne Landsman en In the Heart of the Country deur J.M. Coetzee. Die romans speel af in ‘n koloniale tydperk waar die vroulike protagonis se verhouding met die Suid-Afrikaanse landskap op die voorgrond gestel word. Die verwantskap tussen die liggaam, subjektiwiteit en ruimte word ondersoek om die interaksie tussen hierdie drie konsepte ten toon te stel. Wat vanuit hierdie interaksie voortspruit is die ontologiese rol wat perspektief speel as wyse om met die wêreld te verkeer. Hierdie studie benader die romans vanuit die siening dat die mens se ervaring afhang van hoe hy/sy die wêreld verstaan deur die interaksie tussen die liggaam en ander mense, ruimtes en objekte. Die beliggaamde ervaring is dus ‘n subjektiewe ervaring. Die konsepsuele raamwerk van hierdie ondersoek is afgelei van psigoanalise en fenomenologie. Die kern van hierdie studie is om te ondersoek hoe die posisie van die randfiguur in die ruimte van die Suid-Afrikaanse plaas ten toon gestel word. Die plaas is tradisioneel ‘n ideologiese bestrede ruimte van Afrikaner patriargie en onderdrukking. Die romans word verhaal deur drie kenmerkende en verskillende vroulike stemme wat dien om die hegemonie van die patriargale opset op die plase te ondermyn en ontbloot. Die vraagstuk van genre is in al drie romans betrokke aangesien genre die ruimte van die teks self uitmaak. Die romans spreek teen die tradisie van die plaasroman en die pastorale roman en tree sodoende in gesprek met die verlede.

This thesis provides a theory of exceptional sex through close readings of contemporary novels by male British and American writers. I take as my overriding methodological approach Giorgio Agamben’s theory of the state of exception, which is a juridico-political state in which the law has been suspended and the difference between rule and transgression is indistinguishable. Within this state, the spatiotemporal markers inside and outside also become indeterminable, making it impossible to tell whether one is inside or outside time and space. Using this framework, I work through narratives of sexual interaction – On Chesil Beach, Gertrude and Claudius, Sabbath’s Theater, and The Act of Love – to conceptualise categories of sexual exceptionality. My study is not a survey, and the texts have been chosen as they focus on different sexual behaviours, thereby opening up a variety of sexual exceptionalities. I concentrate on male writers and narratives of heterosexual sex as most work on sex, time and space is comprised of feminist readings of literature by women and queer work on gay, lesbian or trans writers and narratives. However, in the Coda I expand my argument by turning to Emma Donoghue’s Room, which, as the protagonist has been trapped for the first five years of his life, provides a tabula rasa’s perspective of exceptionality. Through my analysis of exceptionality, I provide spatiotemporal readings of the hymen, incest, adultery, sexual listening and the arranged affair. I also conceptualise textual exceptionalities – the incestuous prequel, auricular reading and the positionality of the narrator, the reader and literary characters. Exceptional sex challenges the assumption in recent queer theory that to be out of time is ‘queer’ and to be in time is ‘straight’. Furthermore, exceptionality complicates the concepts of perversion and transgression as the norm and its transgression become indistinct in the state of exception. In contrast, exceptionality offers a new, more determinate way to analyse narratives of sex.

Hierdie proefskrif bied ʼn nie-empiriese ondersoek en ʼn konseptuele analise van die verhouding tussen ruimte en identiteit in Eben Venter (1954-) se oeuvre binne die konteks van ballingskapliteratuur die postkoloniale diskoers. Die manifestasie van die ruimte- identiteitdialektiek, soos wat dit uitgebeeld word in Venter se skryfkuns, word beskryf aan die hand van postkoloniale teorieë en insigte wat verband hou met aspekte soos ruimte, plek, ballingskap, diaspora, ruimtelike verplasing, seksuele migrasie, intra-nasionale migrasie, internasionale migrasie, empiriese en kulturele landskappe, identiteit as sosio-kulturele konstruksie en Suid-Afrikaanse outobiografieë. Vir die doel van hierdie ondersoek is die volgende vertellings geselekteer: Ek stamel ek sterwe (1996), Twaalf (2000), Horrelpoot(2006) en Brouhaha (2010). In ʼn tydsgewrig van grootskaalse migrasie, globale onsekerheid, transnasionale kapitalisme en radikale dekolonisering in die vorm van geweldsmisdaad, gewelddadige betogings by universiteite, plaasmoorde, grondhervorming, haatspraak, arbeidsonrus, xenofobie en die aftakeling van minderheidsregte, sny Venter in sy verhale en outobiografie ʼn verskeidenheid van kwessies aan. Dit sluit in: die naweë van apartheid, die Afrikaner-diaspora, grondeienaarskap, die ideologiese toeëiening van grond, rassisme, homofobie, queer-migrasie, die haalbaarheid van ʼn inklusiewe Afrika-identiteit en die veranderde rol, plek en identiteit van Afrikaners sedert 1994. Die outobiografiese inslag van Venter se skryfkuns is opvallend en word bespreek deur te verwys na die verhouding tussen fiksionele en reële ruimtes en na outobiografie as hibridiese genre en kreatiewe projek. Hierdie studie bied ook ʼn krities-analitiese besinning van Venter se bemoeienis met skryftemas soos selfopgelegde ballingskap, die vervreemding tussen plek en self, globale plekloosheid en “exile as a discontinous state of being” (Said 2000: 177). Een van die belangrikste insigte wat Venter in sy skryfkuns demonstreer, is dat ruimte, soos identiteit, nie ʼn essensialistiese konsep is nie, maar ’n onvoltooide en vloeibare konstruksie wat voortdurend verander na gelang van sosio-politieke ingrepe, internasionale migrasiepatrone en die individu se subjektiewe gewaarwording van plekke, / This dissertation presents a non-empirical and a conceptual analysis of the relationship between space and identity in the works of prose of Eben Venter (1954) within the context of the postcolonial discourse and exile literature. The manifestation of the space-identity dialectic, as portrayed in Venter’s writing, is described on the basis of postcolonial theories and insights related to terms and concepts like space, place, exile, diaspora, spatial displacement, sexual migration, intra-national migration, international migration, empirical and cultural landscapes and identity as a social-cultural construction. For the purpose of this study the following narratives were selected: Ek stamel ek sterwe (1996), Twaalf (2000), Horrelpoot en Brouhaha (2010). At a juncture of mass migration, global uncertainty, transnational capitalism and radical decolonization in the form of violent crime, violent protests at universities, hate speech, farm murders, land reform, labour unrest, xenophobia and the dismantling of minority rights, Venter addresses an assortment of social issues. This include: the aftermath of apartheid, the Afrikaner-diaspora, landownership, the ideological appropriation of land, racism, homophobia, queer-migration, the viability of an inclusive African-identity and the altered role, place and identity of Afrikaners since 1994. The autobiographical element is evident in Venter’s writing and is discussed by referring to the relationship between fictional and real spaces and to autobiography as a hybrid genre and creative project. This study also presents a critical-analytical reflection of Venter’s involvement with writing topics such as self-imposed exile, estrangement between place and self, global displacement/non-belongingness and “exile as a discontinuous state of being” (Said: 2000: 177). One of the key insights Venter demonstrates in his writing, is that space, like identity, is not an essentialist concept, but an incomplete and diffuse construction that is constantly changing depending on socio-political interventions, international migration patterns and the individual's subjective perception of places. / Afrikaans and Theory of Literature / D. Litt. et Phil. (Afrikaans)

My thesis examines the nature of contemporary fictional narration and explores its relations to other types of narration - mainly texts where educational or informative function prevails over the aesthetic one. The whole work is divided into four parts. The first part is theoretical; it sets up basic areas of interest and names methods, tools and models that will be tested on selected examples from Slavonic literatures. The second part analyses spatial and temporal relations of fictional narrative. Chapter 2.1 treats time and space in a novel mostly from the compositional point of view (based on the example of Sasha Sokolov's A School for Fools), while in the next chapter, focusing on ideational interconnections between literary and social- political utopias, both fictionality and temporality are understood more broadly than mere narrative categories: they serve as certain points of connection between the immanent occurrence of meaning in the "world of text" and its historical background. The third part continues in this direction, only what we mean by context here is not the collective historical background, but an individual sphere of everyday life. Our focus switches to two genres standing on the boundary of literary fiction and non-fiction - personal correspondence and a travel journal (travelogue). The...