For the past two decades, scholars have been reassessing the
ways in which Western writers and intellectuals have traditionally
misrepresented the non-white world for their own ideological
purposes. Orientalism, Edward Said's ground-breaking study of the
ways in which Europeans projected their own social problems onto
the nations of the Near East in an attempt to take their minds off
the same phenomena as they occurred closer to home, was largely
responsible for this shift in emphasis. Fantasy America: The United
States as Seen Through French and Italian Eyes is an exploration of a
parallel occurrence that could easily be dubbed "Occidentalism."
More specifically, it is a study of the ways in which French and
Italian writers and filmmakers have sought to situate the New World
within an Old World context.
"Among the (More Advanced) Barbarians" (a.k.a. Chapter One)
examines the continuities and discontinuities of French travel
writing in America from the days of the Jesuits to the heyday of the
existentialists. Certain motifs and idees fixes—the uniqueness of
American racism; the "magic" of New York—are first identified and
then examined. "A Meeting of the Mafias" (Chapter Two) is more
cosmopolitan in scope, tracing the ways in which French, American,
and Italian crime fiction have historically influenced each other, as
well as the relationship of the policier to differing notions of the
nation-state. "The Ruins of Rome" (Chapter Three) demonstrates
how Italian intellectuals have looked to the United States for new
World Solutions to Old World problems. This chapter encompasses
two major sub-themes: the positive possibilities for Italy of
"Fordismo" (the American industrial model) and American literature
(which was believed to promote political, as well as cultural,
liberty). "Lurching Towards the Millennium" picks up the threads of
the first three chapters and places them in the contemporary
context of globalization, a process which threatens to replace the
hegemony of the nation state with the omnipresence of corporate
power. The cultural model of Quebec is introduced at this point as a
New World/Old World paradigm that embodies the chimerical
contradictions of a globe on the brink of a new millennium.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:BVAU.2429/8576 |
| Date | 05 1900 |
| Creators | Harries, Mark |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Relation | UBC Retrospective Theses Digitization Project [http://www.library.ubc.ca/archives/retro_theses/] |
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