This work develops an opportunity for transgressive resistance to discursively formed structures of material and theoretical power and closure, based on a methodology of amateurism. The concept of amateurism draws heavily on the writing of Edward Said. This work synthesises Said with a broader corpus of postcolonial theory, following a theoretically postcolonial trajectory which applies the lessons from that referent to an engagement with traditional theoretical and cultural closure. The central thesis of the engagement follows a critique of strong ontology and vertical epistemology, or of expertise. Through an examination of health policy around birth, and sociological approaches to health, that critique is deployed to invigorate a new critical direction for the Left with a focus on subjectivity, social policy, social democracy and substantive citizenship. / Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Adelaide, School of History and Politics, 2008

This work develops an opportunity for transgressive resistance to discursively formed structures of material and theoretical power and closure, based on a methodology of amateurism. The concept of amateurism draws heavily on the writing of Edward Said. This work synthesises Said with a broader corpus of postcolonial theory, following a theoretically postcolonial trajectory which applies the lessons from that referent to an engagement with traditional theoretical and cultural closure. The central thesis of the engagement follows a critique of strong ontology and vertical epistemology, or of expertise. Through an examination of health policy around birth, and sociological approaches to health, that critique is deployed to invigorate a new critical direction for the Left with a focus on subjectivity, social policy, social democracy and substantive citizenship. / Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Adelaide, School of History and Politics, 2008

This thesis investigates the ways in which higher education in Africa has been construing its mission for Africa’s development and how such constructions are shaped by particular global regimes of knowledge on development. The thesis unpacks the ways in which such regimes are deployed using specific technologies: neo-liberal precepts on economic development. To that end, I pose a set of questions which can be summarized in these two: How has higher education in Africa discursively construed Africa’s experiences? Second, in which terms such constructions have helped responding to Africa’s problems of development? Taking Mozambican higher education as a unit of analysis, I used postcolonial theory to unsettle neo-liberal regimes of development and to show how contingent they are. Methodologically, a historical critique was carried out to historize neo-liberal globalization as a contingent process and to understand multiple possibilities of construing Africa’s experiences. My data consisted of texts discussing ways in which Africa is discursively understood by both, African and Western scholarship, higher education policy in Mozambique, interviews with senior administrators of some Mozambican higher education institutions and text materials from higher education institutions’ websites in Mozambique. The findings suggest that, on the one hand, constructions of Africa as being in crisis are not new. In fact, for centuries Africa has always been a subject of knowledge from which the West constructs its differences. It is from such differences that the West assumed a civilizing mission in order to integrate African peoples in the world order. On the other hand, African scholars’ responses to Western constructions of Africa’s experiences end up building another crisis at the theoretical level: the difficulties of thinking effectively on Africa so as to solve its problems. The second finding is that Mozambican higher education’s responses to the crisis have been marked by a development agenda within the broader context of Mozambique’s history from late the 1970s onwards: first, within the socialist model of central planning economy and, second, within the international agenda of global neo-liberal market economy. My analysis suggests that both development practices reflect, to some extent, continuities of colonial regimes of development which did not take into account the contextualities of the colonized. Finally, my investigation found that higher education institutions in Mozambique are responding to development challenges based on very technological conceptions of development following global trends. The thesis contends that an engagement with the ethics of knowledge and development would lead to a development model more preoccupied with the social contexts beyond market rationalities.

This thesis investigates the ways in which higher education in Africa has been construing its mission for Africa’s development and how such constructions are shaped by particular global regimes of knowledge on development. The thesis unpacks the ways in which such regimes are deployed using specific technologies: neo-liberal precepts on economic development. To that end, I pose a set of questions which can be summarized in these two: How has higher education in Africa discursively construed Africa’s experiences? Second, in which terms such constructions have helped responding to Africa’s problems of development? Taking Mozambican higher education as a unit of analysis, I used postcolonial theory to unsettle neo-liberal regimes of development and to show how contingent they are. Methodologically, a historical critique was carried out to historize neo-liberal globalization as a contingent process and to understand multiple possibilities of construing Africa’s experiences. My data consisted of texts discussing ways in which Africa is discursively understood by both, African and Western scholarship, higher education policy in Mozambique, interviews with senior administrators of some Mozambican higher education institutions and text materials from higher education institutions’ websites in Mozambique. The findings suggest that, on the one hand, constructions of Africa as being in crisis are not new. In fact, for centuries Africa has always been a subject of knowledge from which the West constructs its differences. It is from such differences that the West assumed a civilizing mission in order to integrate African peoples in the world order. On the other hand, African scholars’ responses to Western constructions of Africa’s experiences end up building another crisis at the theoretical level: the difficulties of thinking effectively on Africa so as to solve its problems. The second finding is that Mozambican higher education’s responses to the crisis have been marked by a development agenda within the broader context of Mozambique’s history from late the 1970s onwards: first, within the socialist model of central planning economy and, second, within the international agenda of global neo-liberal market economy. My analysis suggests that both development practices reflect, to some extent, continuities of colonial regimes of development which did not take into account the contextualities of the colonized. Finally, my investigation found that higher education institutions in Mozambique are responding to development challenges based on very technological conceptions of development following global trends. The thesis contends that an engagement with the ethics of knowledge and development would lead to a development model more preoccupied with the social contexts beyond market rationalities.

This thesis investigates the ways in which higher education in Africa has been construing its mission for Africa’s development and how such constructions are shaped by particular global regimes of knowledge on development. The thesis unpacks the ways in which such regimes are deployed using specific technologies: neo-liberal precepts on economic development. To that end, I pose a set of questions which can be summarized in these two: How has higher education in Africa discursively construed Africa’s experiences? Second, in which terms such constructions have helped responding to Africa’s problems of development? Taking Mozambican higher education as a unit of analysis, I used postcolonial theory to unsettle neo-liberal regimes of development and to show how contingent they are. Methodologically, a historical critique was carried out to historize neo-liberal globalization as a contingent process and to understand multiple possibilities of construing Africa’s experiences. My data consisted of texts discussing ways in which Africa is discursively understood by both, African and Western scholarship, higher education policy in Mozambique, interviews with senior administrators of some Mozambican higher education institutions and text materials from higher education institutions’ websites in Mozambique. The findings suggest that, on the one hand, constructions of Africa as being in crisis are not new. In fact, for centuries Africa has always been a subject of knowledge from which the West constructs its differences. It is from such differences that the West assumed a civilizing mission in order to integrate African peoples in the world order. On the other hand, African scholars’ responses to Western constructions of Africa’s experiences end up building another crisis at the theoretical level: the difficulties of thinking effectively on Africa so as to solve its problems. The second finding is that Mozambican higher education’s responses to the crisis have been marked by a development agenda within the broader context of Mozambique’s history from late the 1970s onwards: first, within the socialist model of central planning economy and, second, within the international agenda of global neo-liberal market economy. My analysis suggests that both development practices reflect, to some extent, continuities of colonial regimes of development which did not take into account the contextualities of the colonized. Finally, my investigation found that higher education institutions in Mozambique are responding to development challenges based on very technological conceptions of development following global trends. The thesis contends that an engagement with the ethics of knowledge and development would lead to a development model more preoccupied with the social contexts beyond market rationalities.

This thesis takes sexuality as its subject matter and uses a methodology informed by postcolonial studies to explore new possibilities for thinking about the international, its construction, and its contemporary politics. I argue that postcolonial readings of sexuality can impel us to rethink the meanings and politics of international theory and to challenge notions that have come to appear fixed and unchanging. The thesis canvasses how such an intervention might occur – calling especially for a focus on the local and the everyday – and considers both the utility and the limits of the contributions sexuality might make to a rethinking of international theory. My arguments are made with reference to a series of specific examples from contemporary East and Southeast Asia: the nationalistically imbued gendered and sexed figures of the national serviceman and the Singapore Girl in Singapore; the political and social repercussions of the trial of former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim on charges of sodomy; newly emerging homosexual identities in Hong Kong; and the connections between sexuality and disease that inform the Thai response to HIV/AIDS.

This thesis investigates the ways in which higher education in Africa has been construing its mission for Africa’s development and how such constructions are shaped by particular global regimes of knowledge on development. The thesis unpacks the ways in which such regimes are deployed using specific technologies: neo-liberal precepts on economic development. To that end, I pose a set of questions which can be summarized in these two: How has higher education in Africa discursively construed Africa’s experiences? Second, in which terms such constructions have helped responding to Africa’s problems of development? Taking Mozambican higher education as a unit of analysis, I used postcolonial theory to unsettle neo-liberal regimes of development and to show how contingent they are. Methodologically, a historical critique was carried out to historize neo-liberal globalization as a contingent process and to understand multiple possibilities of construing Africa’s experiences. My data consisted of texts discussing ways in which Africa is discursively understood by both, African and Western scholarship, higher education policy in Mozambique, interviews with senior administrators of some Mozambican higher education institutions and text materials from higher education institutions’ websites in Mozambique. The findings suggest that, on the one hand, constructions of Africa as being in crisis are not new. In fact, for centuries Africa has always been a subject of knowledge from which the West constructs its differences. It is from such differences that the West assumed a civilizing mission in order to integrate African peoples in the world order. On the other hand, African scholars’ responses to Western constructions of Africa’s experiences end up building another crisis at the theoretical level: the difficulties of thinking effectively on Africa so as to solve its problems. The second finding is that Mozambican higher education’s responses to the crisis have been marked by a development agenda within the broader context of Mozambique’s history from late the 1970s onwards: first, within the socialist model of central planning economy and, second, within the international agenda of global neo-liberal market economy. My analysis suggests that both development practices reflect, to some extent, continuities of colonial regimes of development which did not take into account the contextualities of the colonized. Finally, my investigation found that higher education institutions in Mozambique are responding to development challenges based on very technological conceptions of development following global trends. The thesis contends that an engagement with the ethics of knowledge and development would lead to a development model more preoccupied with the social contexts beyond market rationalities.

Ce travail de recherche propose une lecture de l’œuvre littéraire de l’écrivain sarde Sergio Atzeni selon une perspective postcoloniale. Sergio Atzeni étant une personnalité novatrice dans le panorama littéraire de la Sardaigne contemporaine, nous l’avons choisi du fait que sa production – narrative, poétique et critique – se prête bien à une analyse utilisant les critères des études postcoloniales. Nous avons ainsi développé notre discours autour de trois parties : la première est consacrée à repérer, au sein des Postcolonial Studies, une série de concepts-clés qui nous ont paru les plus pertinents pour notre étude. Ces thèmes sont repris et explorés lors de la deuxième partie, qui constitue le centre de notre travail et qui porte sur une étude approfondie de la postcolonialité thématique de notre auteur. Notre but a été de montrer qu’un certain nombre de questions et de motifs qu’Atzeni aborde dans ses textes littéraires et critiques sont éclairés par une lecture de type postcolonial. La troisième et dernière partie porte sur la traduction, Atzeni ayant été également un traducteur. Nous nous sommes penchée sur la conception de l’écriture de l’auteur, avant même d’examiner sa position traductive. Après ces réflexions initiales d’ordre théorique, nous avons analysé un premier cas de traduction : celui du roman Texaco, de Patrick Chamoiseau, qu’Atzeni a traduit en 1994. Notre travail de recherche se termine par une analyse des traductions françaises des ouvrages d’Atzeni. / Our research tries to read the literary work of the Sardinian writer Sergio Atzeni according to a postcolonial perspective. Sergio Atzeni was a pioneer personality in the panorama of Sardinian contemporary literature and we have chosen him because his narrative, poetic and critical work can be analyzed following the approach of the Postcolonial Studies movement. Our study is divided into 3 parts: the first one aims at analysing in the Postcolonial Studies a series of questions appearing relevant for our research. We can mention some topics, such as opposition to dominant power, the concept of Subalternity, Transnationalism, Hybridity, Migration, female representations, and many others. These topics have been examined in the second part, which is the core of our research, dedicated to an extensive study of Atzeni’s thematic Postcoloniality. Our purpose was to show that some questions Atzeni talks about in his literary and critical works lend itself to a Postcolonial reading. The third and last part of our thesis focuses on translation, as Atzeni was also a translator. We looked into his linguistic conceptions, before analyzing his thought concerning his translation activity. After these theoretical considerations, we have analyzed a first translation case, that of Texaco, Patrick Chamoiseau’s novel, translated by Atzeni in 1994. The last part of our research focuses on Atzeni’s French translations.

Depuis le début des années 1990, la publication en langue italienne d'oeuvres littéraires d’auteurs aux origines étrangères et aux parcours hétérogènes, a imposé à la critique une réflexion sur de nouveaux enjeux linguistiques, esthétiques et sociaux.Parmi ces écrivains il est possible de recenser un groupe qui présente des caractéristiques particulières, les écrivains originaires de la Corne de l'Afrique. Leur production littéraire a certainement contribué aussi bien à la réouverture du débat sur le colonialisme italien qu’à l’introduction des théories postcoloniales et à la définition de ce qu’on appelle désormais le postcolonial italien. Réciproquement, le développement des études postcoloniales dans l’aire italophone a encouragé ces auteurs à s’exprimer.Longtemps refoulée et occultée, l'expérience historique de la colonisation italienne en Afrique de l'Est peine encore aujourd’hui à trouver place dans une réélaboration culturelle. Comment l'appartenance de ces écrivains à une ancienne colonie peut-elle se manifester dans un pays qui ne s’est jamais vraiment penché sur son passé colonial ? Notre hypothèse est que l’écriture peut devenir un espace dans lequel ils tissent une nouvelle relation, à la fois avec un pays lointain auquel ils se sentent liés et avec le pays où et d’où ils écrivent, l’Italie. Ils mettent ainsi en place une stratégie qui leur permet d’entamer des processus de recomposition identitaire, tant sur le plan individuel que sur le plan collectif.Nous analyserons la production littéraire d'une dizaine d'auteurs. L'étude de leurs thèmes de prédilection et de leurs modalités d'écriture nous permettra de comprendre aussi si cette recomposition véhicule une image inédite des pays de la Corne de l’Afrique, ou bien si la nécessité de trouver un « espace de présence » en Italie l’emporte sur la portée innovatrice de leur imaginaire. / Since the beginning of the 1990’s, Italian literary world and critic have been interested in linguistic, esthetic and social issues generated by Italian immigrant literature, in which we find writers of various backgrounds.Nevertheless, there is a group of authors displaying distinctive features whose members originate from the Horn of Africa. Their literary works participate to a renewal of interest for Italian colonial domination as well as for the debate on the introduction of postcolonial theories and the existence of a so-called Italian postcolonialism. Conversely, the interest and the development of postcolonial studies promote authors’ writings.Italian colonial domination in East Africa was rejected and hidden for a long time and still today it is a difficult issue to deal with. How can authors express their sense of belonging to former colonies in a country that has never looked at its colonial past? Our thesis statement is that writing enables the authors to restore understanding to often contradictory identities and thus rebuild their own space, both with regard to their social and ethnic background and to Italian society where these operations take place.This work aims at exploring how writing stories represents a strategy intended to make identity reorganization possible. The analysis of their favorite subjects will allow us to show whether this reorganization also conveys an unprecedented imaginary world from the Horn of Africa or if the necessity of finding a space to exist prevails over this really innovative storytelling.

This study examined four different settings in Selma Lagerlof’s novel Jerusalem, part I and II. The aim of the study was to analyse the narrative perspective in the four selected scenes of the novel, and also to investigate whether the narrator’s tone in any of the passages could be said to express orientalism. The material consisted of four text passages describing the novel’s two main geographical locations (the district of Dalarna and the Holy Land). Literary theories used for the study were narratology and postcolonial theory. The applied method to analyse the passages was to use the selection of semantic and syntactic markers compiled by Staffan Hellberg (1985) for stylistic analysis of the narrator’s perspective in Swedish narrative texts. The results of the study show that the overall narrative perspective in the scenes are non-focalized, and that the most frequently featured stylistic markers consist of words and phrases expressing value. A summery of the most frequently used stylistic markers show that it is possible to divide the narrative tone into four categories, as the “presenting”, “sympathizing”, “demonstrating” and “educating” narrator. The results also indicate that orientalism is evident in the two analysed passages from Jerusalem, part II.