Writing the hyphen : Migratory patterns : a work of fiction, and, “Nothing stands by itself”: code-switching in Americanah and Tropical Fish: a critical analysis

Sessa-Hawkins, Margaret (2021) Writing the hyphen : Migratory patterns : a work of fiction, and, “Nothing stands by itself”: code-switching in Americanah and Tropical Fish: a critical analysis. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

The concept of hyphenated identities will not be a new one to most — in today’s world personal descriptors such as “Bangladeshi-American” or “French-Canadian” have become a fairly common component of the current lexicon. Indeed, this portrayal of a compound ethnicity, first introduced as a derogatory description in America in the 1890s, (Higham, 1955) has become so common that the phrase “living in the hyphen” is now frequently used to describe the experience of occupying the interstitial space that is both between and encompassing different cultural identities (Nunan & Choi). This thesis examines the idea of hyphenated identity in two modes. The first is a creative work of experimental fiction that uses a series of vignettes similar in structure to short stories to examine the life of an American girl growing up in Malawi. The second component is a critical study that investigates the function of code-switching in two works of contemporary fictions where the characters are multilingual. In this way, this project aims to be both an example and an examination of the ways in which modern authors are portraying the experience of occupying and expressing multiple identities — the ways in which they are, in other words, “Writing the Hyphen”.

Item Type: Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School: Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Literature and Creative Writing (former - to 2011)
Depositing User: Chris White
Date Deposited: 07 Jul 2022 11:18
Last Modified: 07 Jul 2022 11:18
URI: https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/86009
DOI:

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