Empire and Poetic Voice : Cognitive and Cultural Studies of Literary Tradition and Colonialism

In "Empire and Poetic Voice Patrick Calm Hogan draws on abroad and detailed knowledge of Indian, African, and European literary cultures to explore the way colonized writers respond to the subtle and contradictory pressures of both metropolitan and indigenous traditions. He examines the work of two Influential theorists of identity, Judith Butler and Homl Elhabiria, and presents a revised evaluation of the important Nigerian critics, Chinweizu, Jemleand Madubulke. In the process, he presents a novel theory of literary identity based equally on recent work in cognition science and culture studies. This theory argues that literary and cultural traditions, like languages, are entirely personal and only appear to be a matter of groups due to our assertions of categorical identity, which are ultimately both false and dangerous.

Patrick Colm Hogan is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Connecticut.