Kenya 78 Nov 2015 Presenter MAGAART A Seminar on Democracy Stability amp Rights Bhawana Pokhrel Email bhawanapokhrelyahoocom bhawanapokh7gmailcom Mobile 9856022910 Affiliated institution ID: 460005
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A Seminar on Democracy Stability & RightsKenya 7-8 Nov. 2015
Presenter:
MAGAART: A Seminar on Democracy, Stability & Rights
Bhawana
Pokhrel Email: bhawanapokhrel@yahoo.combhawanapokh7@gmail.com Mobile: 9856022910
Affiliated institution
Tribhuvan UniversityFaculty: Humanities Department: English
7-8 December 2015, KenyaSlide2
We are criminals in the eyes of the earth, not only for having committed crimes, but because we know that crimes have been committed.(50)
Michael
Ondaatje,
Anil’s
Ghost (2003)Slide3
Home and Human Rights in South Asian Migration and Diaspora Literary Discourse
Slide4
South Asian Migration and Diaspora Literary Texts
Diary of the Desert (2011)- Devendra
Bhattrai
Atlantic Street
(2008) - RajabTurtle Nest (2003) - Chandani
LukegeAnil’s Ghost (2000) - Michael OndaatjeA House for Mr
Biswas (1961) - V.S NaipaulSlide5
Discoursing Human Rights Through LiteratureSlide6
Articulation of the Inarticulate…Human rights and literature are intertwined as interdisciplinary studies (Schaffer & Smith 2). [Ref: Article number 19 and 29.]
The UDHR 1948 recognizes the ‘rights of individuals…to challenge unjust state law or oppressive customary practice” (Schaffer and Smith 3).
Individuals have already initiated this process: 1. By telling their stories to human rights advocates.2. By inscribing the issues in the literary works.
Slide7
Depiction of HR Issues in Novels…“Novels represent violence; they
do not stop it, not directly at least. In representing violence, they externalize, distance, metaphorize
, and mediate it” ( Khor, 174).
Khor, Lena. Human Rights Discourse in a Global Network: Books Beyond Borders,
2013.Slide8
Textual Extract/s:‘He was frightened’,
Savi said. ‘To do what?’‘Frightened to ask. Teacher
permission to leave the room. And when he leave the room he was frightened again. Frightened to use the school WC.
[. . . ] Anand Cried.
‘He went back to the class room and Teacher ask him to leave.’‘Well just then school was over and everybody walk behind Anand. Everybody was laughing.’ (245)
(A House for Mr Biswas 1961)Slide9
Extract/s from the Texts:Last year, while connecting an electric wire, he fell of a ladder and got his right leg fractured then started his misfortunate days.
Neither his leg was cured nor he got the salary of last six months. Then he went to labour court at the advice of the embassy. When he went to the court, the ‘
Syriyali’ owner not only beat him badly, but at night, also physically assaulted him to near death (45).
(
Diary of Desert 2011)Slide10
Extract/s from the Texts:. . . It was the freshness of the body
. It was still someone. Usually the victims of a political killing were found much later. She dipped each of the fingers in a beaker of blue solution so she could check for cuts and
abrasions. (9) Anil’s Ghost
2000Slide11
Why Are These Implications in Literature?What difference, if any, can literature make through its intervention in the realm of human rights (especially when the cases are universal as depicted in South Asian Migration and
diasporta texts/settings)?Slide12
Double Bind? Or a Debate?! In giving voice to suffering we can sometime
moderate it, even aestheticize. “When it is
transfigured, something of its horror is removed. This alone does an
injustice to the victim.” Indeed, giving voice can also be the matter of
taking voice. (Intd.8) Dawes , James. That the World May Know (2007).Slide13
Telling the Stories OR Staying Silent in Respect?!What are the consequences of respectful silence
? There are so many ways to hurt others when trying to speak for them, so many and so unexpected. But is doing nothing worse than risking something?
(Dawes, 9)Slide14
Impotence to Importance of Story Telling…Much of the work on storytelling and human rights, has focused on the impotence of representation
. However, one of the most important premises of contemporary human rights work is that effective dissemination of information can change the world. [ . . .] (9-10)
Dawes, James. “What Difference Does Storytelling Make?” (2007)Slide15
Hope…Solidarity…Countering all of these fears is the hope (recognizable sometimes only as the shadow of hope) that
literature can, by expressing something true, participate in- or at the very least, act in solidarity with – the work of human rights
. (Dawes , 218)Slide16
Roles that Academia, Social Sciences and Literature Can Play for the Promotion of Human Rights:The academic disciplines ought to work together not only to
diagnose problems, but also to improve the human condition [ . . . ]. This objective can also be achieved by gearing academic work toward the realization of human rights in the real world.
(xvii)
Frezzo, Mark. The Sociology of Human Rights (2015)Slide17
References:
Bal, Mieke.
Travelling Concepts in the Humanities. University of Toronto Press: Toronto, 1993. PrintBhattarai,
Devendra. The Diary of the Desert.
Ratna Pustak Bhandar: Kathmandu, 2010.Dawes, James. That the World May Know: Bearing Witness to Atrocity
. Cambridge: Harvard Uni Press, macquillan, martin. ed. The narrative reader.London: Routlege, 2000.Goldberg Elizabeth Swanson and Alexandra
Schultheis Moor. Eds. Theoretical Perspectives on Human Rights and Literature. London/NY: Routledge, 2007. Print.Freeman, Michael. Human Rights:An Interdisciplinary Approach. 2nd ed.Cambridge: Ploity Press, 2011. Print.
Frezzo, Mark. The Sociology of Human Rights.
Cambridge: Polity Press, 2015. Print
Ishay
,
Micheine
R.
The History of Human Rights: From Ancient Times to the Globalization Era
. Berkley: U of California P, 2004.
Naipaul, V.S.
A House for
Mr
Biswas
.
London: Picador, 2003.Slide18
References:
Ondaatje, Michael . Anil’s Ghost . London: Bloomsbury, 2000.
Peerenboom, Randall, Carole J. Peterson and Albert H.Y. Chen. Eds.
Human Rights In Asia. Abingdon/London: Routledge
, 2006.Peters, Julia Stone. “ Literature, the Rights of Man, and Narratives of Atrocity: Historical Backgrounds to the Culture of Testimony”. The Yale Journal of Law and Humanities. l7 :2 (201)3. Web. 28 Feb 2015.
Rajab. Atlantic Street. Kathmandu: Bibek Sirjanshil Prakashan
, 2065. PrintScahffer, Kay and Sidonie Smith. Human Rights and Narrated Lives: The Ethics of Recognition. New York: Palgrave Macmillian, 2004. Print.Slaughter, Joseph R. Human Rights, Inc. The World Novel, Narrative Form and International Law. New York: Fordham University Press, 2007.Slide19
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