Queer(y)ing Colonialism: Decolonization and Queer Interventions in the Novels of Caribbean Women (thesis)

Abstract

What follows, then, is the analysis of queer positionalities and decolonized yearning in the novels of three Caribbean women: Maryse Condé, Jamaica Kincaid, and Shani Mootoo. . . . The conclusion, "Embracing the Strange" considers the multiple definitions of queer -- queer as strange, deranged, untamed, and gay. I string together the paper's three novels, contending that the worlds and spaces constructed by Conde, Kincaid, and Mootoo are inherently queer spaces. The goal of this paper is to move toward a broader vision of queerness. In doing so, I argue that the postcolonial novels of these women authors flip European imperialism back on itself to play with traditional conceptions of normativity and subvert historical narratives of hierarchy and power. In short, these authors use queerness to dismantle colonialism. Ultimately, the three novels are as much a mediation of history as a productive construction of the future. These women find within their colonized spaces an enlightened vision for utopia, but one which is arbitrated by realism and political participation. They transform the submissive existence of aberrant bodies, remove its metaphorical shackles, and liberate that body through the celebration of its queered identities. [From Introduction]