Hanay Geiogamah’s Body Indian and Foghorn as “Plays with a Purpose”

In her article, “Hanay Geiogamah’s Body Indian and Foghorn as ‘Plays with a Purpose,’” written against the backdrop of critical whiteness studies, Danica Čerče discusses how Geiogamah’s theatrical rhetoric intervenes in the assumptions about whiteness as a static, privilege-granting category and system of dominance. By focusing on various techniques and strategies mobilized to define and affirm Native Americans’ authentic rather than imposed identities, the article shows that humor is one of the prime textual devices in Geiogamah’s plays to renegotiate what Walter Mignolo calls “the racist structure of power.

Literature as Protest and Solace: the Verse of Alf Taylor

Although Australian indigenous poetry is often overtly polemical and politically committed, any reading which analyzes it as mere propaganda is too narrow to do it justice. By presenting the verse of Alf Taylor collected in Singer Songwriter (1992) and Winds (1994) and discussing it in the context of the wider social and cultural milieu of the author, my essay aims to show the thematic richness of indigenous poetic expression. Indigenous poets have, on the one hand, undertaken the responsibility to strive for social and political equality and foster within their communities the very important concept that indigenous peoples can survive only as a community and a nation (McGuiness). On the other hand, they have produced powerful self-revelatory accounts of their own mental and emotional interior, which urges us to see their careers in a perspective much wider than that of social chroniclers and rebels

Where Is 'East of Eden’? The Politics of Steinbeck’s Literary Reputation in Slovenia

Katherine Arens maintains that literary texts or authors can function as prototypes for their speech genres within literary history and in a cultural community. Until very recently, in Slovenia, John Steinbeck has been regarded primarily as an objective social chronicler of the Great Depression. This popular critical view, earned with his “labor trilogy,” The Grapes of Wrath, In Dubious Battle, and Of Mice and Men, is needlessly limiting, given that Steinbeck’s literary achivements extend well beyond the modes and methods of traditional realism or documentary representation. Written against the background of the critical discourse regarding the political implications of literary works and the ways in which readers are involved in creating the texts they read, this essay analyzes the indicators of and the plausible reasons for the unprecedented popularity of Steinbeck’s novel East of Eden. It shows that in past decades, when Slovenia was in the grip of communist rule, even this book, concerned with moral dilemmas and personal traumas, rather than dealing with the workers’ struggle for social change, could not escape a political reading and served to promote an ideology it does not formally articulate

Black Australia ‘Writes Back’ to the Literary Traditions of Empire

I In her article Black Australia \u27Writes Back\u27 to the Literary Traditions of Empire Danica Čerče discusses the verse of Australian Indigenous authors Romaine Moreton and Alf Taylor, notable for the overt objection to the institutional and historical processes. These have enabled and maintained the dominant position of those identified as white on the one hand, and the concomitant political, economic, and cultural subordination of Indigenous Australians on the other. Focused on strategies and poetic devices used by the two poets to engage non-Indigenous readers in the experience of their writing, the article examines how the rhetoric of their critique and personal address solicit affective and political responses. In particular, it aims to show that, by challenging the public dynamics of racial separation, their poetry performs an ongoing role in destabilizing the assumptions of white privilege and entitlement

Unsettling the Binarisms of Dominant Discourse in Hanay Geiogamah’s Plays Body Indian and Foghorn

This essay deals with two plays by the contemporary Native American author Hanay Geiogamah, Body Indian and Foghorn. Based on the premise that literature plays an important role in disrupting the exercise of power and written against the backdrop of critical whiteness studies, it investigates how the playwright intervenes in the assumptions about whiteness as a static privilege-granting category and system of dominance

(Ne)prevedljivost pogovornega jezika v delih Johna Steinbecka

Pričujoči prispevek se ukvarja s predstavitvijo prevajalčevih zagat pri izbiri ustreznega slovenskega ekvivalenta Steinbeckovemu barvitemu pogovornemu jeziku. Razprava se osredotoča na avtoričin nedavni prevod Steinbeckovega romana Of Mice and Men (O miših in ljudeh, 2007) in ob osvetlitvi njenih pristopov k tematiki in prevajalskih izborov ponuja nekaj predlogov, ki bi utegnili koristiti drugim prevajalcem pri soočenju s problemom prenosa govorjenega angleškega jezika v ciljni slovenski jezik in kulturo

The function of female characters in Steinbeck's fiction : the portrait of Curley's wife in Of mice and men

"Preferably a writer should die at about 28. Then he has a chance of being discovered. If he lives much longer he can only be revalued. I prefer discovery." So quipped the Nobel prize-winning American novelist John Steinbeck (1902-1968) to the British journalist Herbert Kretzmer in 1965. Steinbeck died at the age of 66, however, as many critics have noted, there is still a lot about him to be discovered. It must be borne in mind that Steinbeck's reputation as the impersonal, objective reporter of striking farm workers and dispossessed migrants, or as the escapist popularizer of primitive folk, has needlessly obscured his intellectual background, imaginative power and artistic methods. Of course, to think of Steinbeck simply as a naive realist in inspiration and a straightforward journalist while his achievement as a writer extends well beyond the modes and methods of traditional realism or documentary presentation is to disregard the complexities of his art. For this reason, new readings and modern critical approaches constantly shed light on new sources of value in Steinbeck's work

Centennial reflections on Steinbeck's reputation in Slovenia

Since the late 1920s and his first novel, Cup of Gold (1929), there has been little consensus about John Steinbeck's work, and he has often been praised or dismissed for the wrong reasons. In the wake of the novels with the sweeping reach and social consciousness of In Dubious Battle (1936), Of Mice and Men (1937), and The Grapes of Wrath (1939), and despite the prodigious and startlingly diverse output of his career, Steinbeck was generally regarded as one of America's foremost engaged artists. However, the truth is that be was as much a postmodernist and a modernist, as a traditional proletarian writer. And though be made a significant contribution to the perception of the problems of his time by writing with empathy, clarity and a strong sense of justice about the downtrodden, the exploited, and the defenseless, which contributed to his immense public success, Steinbeck's novels lose none of their richness and power when removed from their historical context. With the human dilemmas on many levels of personal, philosophical, and socio-economic existence, and their deep humanistic, philosophical and ecological message, conveyed through numerous Biblical, Arthurian, and literary allusions, his works are as relevant today as they were when they were written. Appropriate enough, and given that this year marks the centennial of John Steinbeck's birth, celebrated with a year-long series of events taking place throughout the United States and paying tribute to the winner of the 0. Henry Short Story Prize, the Pulitzer Prize, and the Nobel Prize for Literature by examining his legacy in American literature, film, theatre and journalism, and providing new information about the enduring value of his writing, this paper aims to capture the writer's reputation in Slovenia. The plan is to briefly analyse the most illustrative examples of Steinbeck criticism accompanying Slovene publications of his works; then to loosen the hold of deeply entrenched positions of Slovene reviewers, and to highlight the importance of considering Steinbeck's texts from new, insightful and politically unbiased perspectives of contemporary critical engagement. And last but not least, this discussion might hopefully induce Slovene publishers to new printings and translations of Steinbeck's works

The function of female characters in Steinbeck's fiction : the portrait of Curley's wife in Of mice and men

"Preferably a writer should die at about 28. Then he has a chance of being discovered. If he lives much longer he can only be revalued. I prefer discovery." So quipped the Nobel prize-winning American novelist John Steinbeck (1902-1968) to the British journalist Herbert Kretzmer in 1965. Steinbeck died at the age of 66, however, as many critics have noted, there is still a lot about him to be discovered. It must be borne in mind that Steinbeck's reputation as the impersonal, objective reporter of striking farm workers and dispossessed migrants, or as the escapist popularizer of primitive folk, has needlessly obscured his intellectual background, imaginative power and artistic methods. Of course, to think of Steinbeck simply as a naive realist in inspiration and a straightforward journalist while his achievement as a writer extends well beyond the modes and methods of traditional realism or documentary presentation is to disregard the complexities of his art. For this reason, new readings and modern critical approaches constantly shed light on new sources of value in Steinbeck's work

The Appeal of Haiku in the Countries of the Former Yugoslavia

According to Boris A. Novak (2016), haiku has become one of the most popular poetic forms in the world (45). The article elucidates the initial reception and later development of this micro-poetic form in the former Yugoslav republics, particularly in Slovenia, Serbia and Croatia. Analyzing some representative poems, with particular attention to understatement as one of the vital aesthetic features of haiku, the article demonstrates that it responds to local socio-political and cultural realities and has the potential to make a distinctive contribution to contemporary public life and interpersonal relations