Empire and After Englishness in Postcolonial Perspective [Paperback]

The growing debate over British national identity, and the place of Englishness within it, raises crucial questions about multiculturalism, postimperial culture and identity, and the past and future histories of globalization. However, discussions of Englishness have too often been limited by insular conceptions of national literature, culture, and history, which serve to erase or marginalize the colonial and postcolonial locations in which British national identity has been articulated. This volume breaks new ground by drawing together a range of disciplinary approaches in order to resituate the relationship between British national identity and Englishness within a global framework. Ranging from the literature and history of empire to analyses of contemporary culture, postcolonial writing, political rhetoric, and postimperial memory after 9/11, this collection demonstrates that far from being parochial or self-involved, the question of Englishness offers an important avenue for thinking about the politics of national identity in our postcolonial and globalized world.

Prem Poddaris Associate Professor of English at Aarhus University. He is the author ofViolent Civilities(Aarhus UP, 2003) and the co-editor ofA Historical Companion to Postcolonial Literatures in English(Edinburgh UP/ Columbia UP, 2005).

Dedication
Acknowledgements

Introduction:Nationalism Beyond the Nation-State
Graham MacPhee&Prem Poddar

PART I: NATION AND EMPIRE

Chapter 1. As White As Ours : Africa, Ireland, Imperial Panic, and the Effects of British Race Discourse
Enda Duffy

Chapter 2.Writing About Englishness: South Africas Forgotten Nationalism
Vivian Bickford-Smith

Chapter 3.Passports, Empire, Subjecthood
Prem Poddar

Chapter 4.Friends Across the Water: British Orientalists and Middle Eastern Nationalisms
Geoffreyl#%