Post-colonialism

The aim of this article is to study selected poems of Oodgeroo Noonuccal, the national poet of the Australian Aborigines, in the light of Homi K. Bhabha’s postcolonial theories. Using a descriptive research methodology, the present study examines the way Noonuccal’s poetry fashions resisting discourse in contemporary Australia. First of all, introductory notes on postcolonial movement, colonial history of Australia and Noonuccal are presented and then postcolonial key terms such as hybridity, third space and otherization are applied to selected poems with the purpose of highlighting the anticolonial inclinations in them. Throughout the study, third space which comes as a result of hybrid cultures is emphasized as a background for reflecting and reinforcing Aboriginal tendency in Australia. Finally, issues such as expounding a view of history from the perspective of the colonized, pointing to the disappearance of Aboriginal culture and tradition and their revival, protesting against the states’ unjust policies regarding the Aborigines, putting an end to otherization and issuing a call for a just integration of blacks and whites are all considered as valiant attempts waging the anticolonial struggles in Oodgeroo Noonuccal’s poetry.

The present paper examines Elif Shafak’s 2011 novel Honour based on Bhabhaian concepts of hybridity and unhomeliness. Bhabha broached the idea of hybridity in order to address the social dimensions of postcolonial analyses. 4 Hybridity occurs when the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized blurs various boundaries. Bhabha explores the possibility of a hybrid space to elucidate the recollections of migrants and their unhomeliness. He defines hybrid identity as one constructed through relocation and separation in the contact zone. In fact, it is in a third space of enunciation in which every thought by both the colonizer and the colonized finds a means of expression or exchange. Using concepts of hybridity and unhomeliness to delve into Shafak's Honour , this research concludes that within the social and cultural structures and discourse of their ‘new’ country, diasporic characters feel unhomed and struggle to fill gaps and redefine their identities. The paper argues that characters in the novel seek refuge in diasporic communities to counter stereotypes. Their attempts, however, result in new experiences and feelings of isolation, nostalgia, insecurity, split self, and a sense of being out of place.