In Critical Practice, Catherine Belsey states how traditionally, classic realism is interpreted as a genre that"presents individuals whose traits of character, understood as essential and predominantly given, constrain the choices they make" (Belsey 74). Belsey's claim is significant in that it articulates what is often the locus of tension and conflict in the genre: rigid, essentialist identitary discourse.In summarizing and considering the various identitary discourses at play within Mordecai Richler's The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz and The Street and Gérard Bessette's La bagarre and Les pédagogues, the purpose of this thesis is to analyse how issues surrounding constructions of identity are dramatized in these classic realist, satirical texts in order to show how their cultural work in terms of identity can be understood as being more ambivalent than has heretofore often been thought. The thesis' theoretical focus is rooted primarily in post-colonial theory, especially the ways it interrogates representations of cultural and ethnic struggles for recognition and power that are a result of colonial and/or cultural hegemonic domination. More specifically, the thesis discusses and appropriates the theory and concepts of the post-colonial critic Homi K. Bhabha, particularly in terms of how the selected primary texts can be said to exemplify Bhabha's notions of ambivalence, hybridity and a Third Space of identity; how the narratives' main conflicts and tensions around identity can be better understood by looking at how some of the characters can be said to inhabit a Third Space. However, the thesis will also show that while Bhabha's claim that instances of ambivalence, hybridity and the Third Space in the selected texts can be said to represent" neither the one [...], nor the Other [...] but something else besides which contests the terms and the territories of both [i.e. of competing identities]," (Bhabha 41) their concomitant essentialist discourses can be said to trouble the idealism of Bhabha's faith in such notions.In short, this thesis posits that though the selected texts perform important cultural work via their complex problematizations of the ambivalence of said discourses, they also satirize and critique essentialist and ethnocentric discourses.

This thesis maps Takashi Murakami's Theory of Superflat Art and his associated artistic practices and works. The study situates Murakami and Superflat within the context of globalising culture. The thesis interrogates Murakami's art and the theory of superflat within the historical, social, and cultural contexts of their production-consumption in Japan, the United States, and Europe. The thesis identifies Superflat art and Murakami's work as actively participating in, and expressing, the cultural conditions associated with the 'global postmodern' and globalisation processes. The thesis employs a Cultural Studies theoretical and heuristic framework, utilising a range of contemporary critical theorisations on postmodern art, Japanese cultural identity and globalisation. This framework and approach are adopted in order to draw attention to ways in which Murakami and Superflat articulate and represent the fundamental contentions and dialogues that characterise contem porary globalisation processes. The tensions that are articulated in relation to the discursive construction of the concepts of art/commodity, modern/postmodern and global/local cultural identities. Importantly, this research demonstrates the ways in which Murakami both participates in, and challenges, the conceptual distinctions indexed within the concepts of 'art' as an aesthetic expression and 'commodity' as an object of symbolic exchange in the global marketplace. It interprets Superflat as an 'expressivity' that challenges binary demarcations being constructed between art and commercial culture, and between the aesthetic-cultural identities of Japan and the West. This thesis problematises the meaning of Murakami's concept and aesthetic of Superflat art by drawing attention to these contestations within Murakami's works and Superflat which are generated as they circulate globally. The thesis argues that Murakami strategically presents his work and Superflat art as an expression of Japanese identity which paradoxically also expresses the fluid imaginings of cultural identity available through contemporary global exchanges. This deliberate territorialising and deterritorialising impulse does not resolve the contentions emerging in globalisation, but rather amplifies them, exposing the key debates on the formation of cultural identity as an oppositional expression and as a commodity in global markets. The concept of 'strategic essentialism' is used as a theoretical lens in order to understand Murakami and Superflat's activation of these global processes. This research contributes a valuable case study to the understanding of cultural production as a strategic negotiation and expression of the flows of capital and culture in globalisation.

This thesis, consisting of four chapters, explores female alienation and subjectivity as described by post-war French women writers. The first chapter will focus on critical and theoretical approaches to female alienation. Through feminist and Marxist criticism, I explore the condition of women as a dominated class. The second chapter examines literary strategies such as irony, humor, parody and satire used by the authors of my corpus to undermine and question gender stereotypes which they inherited from the tradition of the French novel. The third chapter is devoted to the issue of women novelists' uses of the figure of the naive female narrator. Through their reworking of this stereotype, they perform a political act of providing agency to a figure who was traditionally deprived of all agency. The fourth chapter analyzes the question of the female body. By playing with the concept of the grotesque female body and its representation, the novelists whom I study, attempt to liberate their female narrators from the status of an object and the influence of the beauty myth. What interests me most is the potential of feminist literature to create alternative representations of women in French literature. In the novels studied here, narrators move from a position of naivety and alienation to an unexpected sense of agency and subjectivity. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This thesis examines the evolution of the representation of female alienation and female identity in the postwar French novel, as well as the textual strategies of resistance used by three postwar French women novelists to subvert and rework the trope of the naive female narrator. My research project highlights the emergence of female agency in the French novel in recent decades through the examples of novels by Christiane Rochefort, Marie Redonnet and Marie Darrieussecq. The novels studied in this dissertation feature the point of view of female narrators who move beyond their initial naivety and passivity to discover unexpected forms of agency.

The purpose of this study is to create a broader understanding of the concept of afrophobia. The purpose of the study is also to investigate how the term ”afrophobia” is expressed in public documents. The research questions are: When did the concept of afrophobia begin to be used on an international level, but above all in Sweden? How is the term ”afrophobia” defined by different organizations and public bodies? What alternative terms are also used, and how does their meaning differ? What possible effects can different definitions contribute to? The method that will be applied by an idea analysis on my primary material. As an analysis tool, I will use five different dimensions that consist of the following: Historical perspective, Cultural identity, Intercultural perspective with a postcolonial point of departure, Strategic essentialism/cosmopolitism and critical whiteness perspective/color blindness. The result will show the different definitions of the primary material and is analyzed based on my chosen dimensions.

本研究旨在從俄國學者Mikhail Bakhtin（1895-1975）狂歡節語言與身體論述的觀點探討「抵抗如何可能？」的問題，並且以台灣當代女性主義小說家李昂於1999年出版的《自傳の小說》為主要的案例，重新思索和說明語言／意義的民主化（democratization）意涵與可能性。 有別於過去論述分析雖然言明語言／意義與政治社會之間並非單向的因果關係，而是相互影響、建構的辯證關係，但在實際進行案例分析時，卻較少著墨於語言如何「由下而上地」對象徵秩序進行意義的顛覆，本研究以Bakhtin對狂歡節語言與身體論述的說明，依序對抵抗的意涵、抵抗的可能性以及抵抗如何在文本中呈現，提出理論性的再詮釋。本研究發現，Bakhtin對於抵抗的想像，乃是一種在傳播／溝通與對話中，藉由特定語言形式而動員的意識形態鬥爭。積極而言，抵抗旨在透過言說主體的表述建構自己的意義系統；消極而言，抵抗至少具有解構他人意義系統的政治意圖。 然而，由於Bakhtin在狂歡節研究中，並未確實回應他企圖探討的「抵抗如何可能？」的問題。因此，本研究融入Laclau與Mouffe的「接合實踐」、Butler的「論述行動」與「身體展演」，從「形式層面」推敲Bakhtin在「眾聲喧嘩」對話模式中所暗示的政治機會，並對「抵抗如何可能？」提出具體的政治方案，包括：眾聲喧嘩的文本空間、對話與敵對關係中的再意義化、諧擬的身體展演、策略性的本質主義。本研究並且藉由對李昂情慾書寫中的抵抗策略進行「書寫形式的意識形態分析」，具體說明「抵抗如何可能？」的理論／概念架構。 本研究發現，李昂的情慾書寫呈現出「歷史書寫的性別化」與「性別論述的狂歡化」這兩個主要的特性。藉此，李昂一方面揭露了父權意識形態的意義生產邏輯，另一方面也藉由批判父權意識形態建構另類的意義系統或敵對／反對論述。從這點回過頭來再詮釋「抵抗如何可能？」的問題，本研究認為抵抗的可能性可說是在眾聲喧嘩或「弱敘事性」的文本空間中，藉由「接合實踐」動員由下而上的「論述行動」，並以「策略性的本質主義」此一政治方案建構霸權化論述的意識形態鬥爭過程；而「身體論述」所誇大展演出的敵對關係，則是最具渲染力也最為具體的例說。

The following thesis examines the process of identity making in the novels Stolen (2021) by Ann-Helén Laestadius and Polar Fire (2021) by Moa Backe Åstot. By a comparative thematic analysis of the texts, and through concepts from postcolonial and decolonial theory, the thesis investigates the challenges for two Sámi youths in a contemporary Sápmi setting as they try to renew the image of Saminess. The analysis explores how aspects such as indigeneity, strategic essentialism, gender and sexuality influence the young characters Elsa and Ánte in their attempts to become independent reindeer herders. Elsa and Ánte are constantly reminded of the history and traditions of the Sámi people, which is filled with both pride and shame. Indeed, the thesis also takes into account the history of the Swedish church and the Swedish government's involvement in Sámi societies, such as the Sámi boarding schools that resulted in family separations and loss of language, and reindeer herding regulations that still affect the Sámi community today. The analysis concludes that history, government policies and strict interpretations of Sámi traditions are interwoven with contemporary Sámi culture, and thus affects the young protagonists as they try to navigate between the inherited collective struggle of their ancestors and their individual needs when it comes to shaping their own Sámi identity.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak gilt als eine der Gründungsfiguren des postkolonialen Feminismus. Ihr Profil als postkoloniale Theoretikerin gewann sie mit der Veröffentlichung ihres Werkes In Other Worlds – Essays in Cultural Politics. In ihren Texten weist Spivak auf Widersprüche innerhalb der Nationen des Globalen Südens hin. Sie fokussiert, u. a. mit Hilfe der analytischen Konzepte Repräsentation (representation) und Subalternität (subaltern), insbesondere auf die problematische Rolle von Geschlechter- und Klassenverhältnissen in postkolonialen Widerstandsbewegungen, auf den Gegensatz zwischen den indischen Eliten und den unteren Bevölkerungsschichten und auf die gewaltsame Unterdrückung von Frauen des Südens.