Day: September 29, 2023

Introduction to”Ruth and the Hijackers”

Language, identity and cultural mores are three important aspects of the culture of a colony in postcolonial studies such as in “Ruth and the Hijackers”. Colonization, argues Ngugi, robs a person of language and ultimately culture of a person, for language carries “the entire body of values,” which are lost with the loss of language (05). In the same way, identity is destroyed when nationalism and imperialism lock horns, and alterity comes into play due to deeper typological domination of the imperialistic episteme where race plays an integral part (Suleri 11-12). In the midst of this struggle of language and identity, cultural mores, the major product of both cultures, takes hold of the situations very often. The story of Ruth, an American national, living in the Lahore cantonment area shows these important traits of postcolonial literature. However, one more thing that strikes the reader and makes him rather baffled is the resistance of the local cultural representatives, and the pliant nature of Ruth, the imperial representative, in “Ruth and the Hijackers”.

Language and Culture in “Ruth and the Hijackers”

As far as the impact of language on a culture and values is concerned, “Ruth and the Hijackers” shows this through Raj Roy and the elite class ladies who are engaged in various activities in clubs that Ruth visits. The language ordinarily spoken in clubs and at every other social spot is that of the colonial power.  It has become a habit for the Pakistanis to have a “penchant for calling people with initials” and even an inspector of the ISI was speaking English that Ruth says was better than she expected. “He spoke better English, “she says (Sidhwa 68) but then comes the very interesting moment that does not need elaboration. Billo has taken up English as her second language from her “memsahib” (59, 68, 69). She does not speak English but tells her employer, Ruth, what to do when a man enters their home, or what not to do in such circumstances. This adoption of the language of the master, however, is not being used to “dismantle the house of the masters” in the Lordian phrase (01). Rather, it is being used to feel proud at as well as for identity formation.

Identity in “Ruth and the Hijackers”

Where identity is concerned, Ruth also makes it clear to Raj Roy at the very start of the story as well as to ISI boy, Junaid Akhtar, that she is from America at the attitude of both of them changes. This is her first attempt at identity formation. However, conversely, Junaid, though, is a bit insolent, tries his best to adopt the language of his last masters and uses it to dislodge Ruth’s identity but still stops short of using the Lordian argument (01). However, the use of the English language makes it clear that this language is merely vehicle of information or to impress the new master, Ruth.  The excuse for this impressing upon the new master is the presence of “an Indian woman” that is anathema to the Pakistani psyche at that time (Sidhwa 68). However, it gets very interesting that the identity that Junaid tries to form evaporates ine thin air as soon as Billo uses the same language to confront him with an entrenched cultural more (69). This confrontation of the imperial language to represent the local cultural more is interesting, as it ultimately saves the new master from embarrassment.

Hybridity and “Ruth and the Hijackers”

The important point of cultural more is that they depict the hybridity; a fine amalgamation of the local tradition of not letting the men enter homes when the owner of the home is not at home. This, Ruth, as a foreigner, does not know. However, Billo is very well aware, and though her linguistic ability does not surpass Ruth, but her knowledge of this specific cultural more saves her landlady. That is why Ruth has a good “appreciation of Billo’s overbearing and meddling ways” (Sidhwa 74). She knows that it is her unawareness of the cultural mores that could cost her dearly in a situation where a paranoid security man is hellbent on making her look like an accused. This hybridity that Bhabha has stated as the state of “ambivalence” has tendency towards an imperialistic attitude, the reason that her Americanness has been graced by the person in power, the retired general. The most interesting is Ruth’s attitude in the story “Ruth and the Hijackers.”

Conclusion

This attitude of the imperial representative to the new imperceptible and invisible colony is imperio-spora . This term implies depicting the colonial attitude of the representative of the new imperialism as somewhat ambivalent that is not domineering and respectful to the local cultural more until it protects. Ruth saves herself through Billo but with the tool provided by Ruth; the language. It, however, is another thing that Ruth has to accept the authority of the apparatus of the state but has to leave her colonial authority in the shape of language; the remains of the old British Raj which she sees very much in the Lahore cantonment. In other words, “Ruth and the Hijackers” amply shows postcoloniality through language, identity, and cultural more.

Works Cited

1. Bhabha, Homi K. “”Signs Taken for Wonders” — Hybridity and Resistance. The Postcolonial Web. http://www.postcolonialweb.org/poldiscourse/bhabha/bhabha4.html. Accessed on 17 April 2018.
2. Lorde, Audre. “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House.” UCLA. n. d. http://bixby.ucla.edu/journal_club/Lorde_s2.pdf. Accessed on 17 Apr. 2018.
3. Suleri, Sara. The Rhetoric of English India. University of Chicago Press: Chicago. 1992.
4. Wa Thiong’ O’ Ngugi. Decolonizing the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. East African Publishers, 1992.

Relevant Questions about”Ruth and the Hijackers” by Bapsi Sidhwa

1. How does “Ruth and the Hijackers” by Bapsi Sidhwa explore the postcolonial identity and the impact of colonialism on its characters and setting?
2. In what ways does the novel, “Ruth and the Hijackers,” reflect or challenge traditional postcolonial literary themes, such as cultural hybridity, resistance, or the legacy of colonialism?
3. Can you discuss the role of gender and power dynamics in “Ruth and the Hijackers” and how they intersect with postcolonial themes in the story?

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Introduction to Racism in Othello

Othello, the most innocent tragedy where deus ex machina does not appear, has become perhaps the most controversial in terms of racial discrimination and prejudice as shown through this analysis about racism in Othello. Even the most modern performances and readings of Othello have elicited such responses where race and its associated features are given a prominent place. Writing on the performance of Othello in America, Kevin Young has discussed the question of racial hatred, racial prejudice and the performance of Othello. However, he has used a very pointed argument saying “Othello was a handy sobriquet when white Americans needed a metaphor for b**ck criminal behavior (41). This shows that racial hatred is deep-seated in the very psyche of white people, for Young has listed various newspaper reviews of the performance of Othello to come to the conclusion that, in fact, it is the white supremacy in America that has created this version of meanings regarding Shakespeare and his creation, Othello. In fact, racism in Othello has various dimensions including the Othellophilia and alienation and isolation as its psychological impacts. 

Racism in Othello: Difference

Othello and its modern performances and readings have elicited diverse responses. If compared to two diverse responses, Martin Okrin says that South African and European visions differ regarding racism in Othello. He alleges that this is purely a Eurocentric concept and in the case of Othello, it is even English Eurocentric that Elizabethan audiences in English used to experience racism and attributes b**ckness with “barbarous, treacherous, libidinous, and jealous” (167) behavioral qualities. That is why Iago uses racial slurs against Othello in the early scenes such as “the Moor” (I. i. 57) which is used against the aliens and then “the thick lips” (I.i. 66) which is specifically used against the b**ck men. Both of these terms show barbarity that is associated with Moorish people and then libidinous attribute that is associated with sexual dominance. He even uses “an old b**ck race” (I. i. 88), which shows prejudicial behavior existing in English and English audiences at that time. In other words, Martin Okrin’s point is correct that this is an English Eurocentric view about racism. However, this is specifically associated with the b**ck color, another perspective of Othello that is still prevalent.

Racism in Othello: Color

B**ck color is associated with various bad behavioral traits but first, this b**ckness is considered the foundation of bad behavioral traits as Kader Mutlu has argued in his paper that in Othello, “the portrait of race and being b**ck can be seen more explicitly (136). He is of the view that the hatred in the heart of Iago is due to b**ckness. However, the marriage of Othello to Desdemona, a white woman, further intensifies this hatred, leading him to utter entirely racial slurs as pointed out earlier (136). In other words, he means that this inter-racial marriage that has caused Iago to feel jealousy and hence weaves plots against Othello, leading to his downfall. It means that inter-racial marriage is another perspective of racism in Othello.

Racism in Othello as Othellophilia

A very interesting point has cropped up in the book of Celia Dialeader which she has penned down on racism with reference to Othellophilia or “Othello Myth” saying that it means love or marriage between a b**ck man and b**ck woman. In her review of the book, Christy Desmety has praised Celia Dialeader saying that this is the first time that Celia Dialeader has raised this point with reference to inter-racial marriages (281). She argues that Celia means that such marriages in canonical narratives involve white women with b**ck men. In other words, she states that this inter-racial sexual interest and ensuing social prejudice is less with men than with white women. She has, in fact, singled out white women and their perception of b**ck men and the projection of their sexuality (281). It is very interesting that she has drawn rather a positive point of racial attraction rather than racial prejudice; nevertheless, it is associated with racism. However, the negative point of alienation has been ignored by her.

Impacts of Racism in Othello

Racism and racial hatred or prejudice cause the subject to feel various psychological issues including but not limited to alienation. Alpaslan Toker has termed this as “racial alienation” (33) with reference to Othello after deducing it from various theoretical studies regarding Othello. He has concluded that alienation, in fact, is a “mode of experience in which the person experiences himself as an alien” (33). Commenting on it further, he further says that a person suffering from such alienation often becomes estranged from his own personality (33). In other words, he means that Othello is feeling alienation in the Venetian society which makes him “estranged from himself” (33). However, Toker refers to Roderigo’s words against Othello to prove his argument that his an outsider and is considered of “here and everywhere” (qtd. Toker 33). Touching on the systematic study of the Orient as Orientalism, he concludes that though different interpretations of Othello exist, “the question of race is at the heart of the play” (36). However, he has not concluded that even racism has a multiplicity of perspectives which has made Othello as memorable and controversial as Hamlet is.

Conclusion

Briefly stating, it could be concluded this racism has not been compartmentalized vis-à-vis its associated behavioral traits of the racial victims or the attraction of the white women. Even the modern-day interpretations are so much diverse that they have also the tinge of the same old English Eurocentric vision as Kevin Young has written in his review of Othello in America. Celia Dialeader’s Othellophilia has taken another direction that is about the white women and racism in Othello, a markedly different but significantly positive point. However, the rest of the psychological issues such as alienation and subsequent estrangement of the victim itself point to the strangulation of Desdemona by Othello and his own final suicide. In fact, he wins positivity through marrying Desdemona but could not contain his own self-estrangement which makes him an assassin as well as a murderer. Finally, the prevalent racism in Venice forces him to end his own life.

Works Cited

1. Desmet, Christy. “Racism, Misogyny, and the ‘Othello’ Myth: Inter-Racial Couples from Shakespeare to Spike Lee.” Medieval & Renaissance Drama in England, vol. 20, Jan. 2007, pp. 281–284. EBSCOhost, url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=26650487&site=ehost-live&scope=site.
2. Mutlu, Kader. “Racism in Othello.” Journal of History, Culture and Art Research, vol. 2, no. 2. Jun. 2013. DOI: 10.7596/taksad.v2i2.243.
3. Orkin, Martin. “Othello and the ‘Plain Face’ Of Racism.” Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 38, no. 2, 1987, pp. 166–188. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2870559.
4. Toker, Alpaslan. “Othello: Alien in Venice.” Journal of Academic Studies, vol. 15, no. 60, Feb. 2014, pp. 29–51. EBSCOhost, url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=95380257&site=ehost-live&scope=site.
5. Young, Kevin. “Not Just B**ck or White.” Canadian Musician, vol. 39, no. 4, July 2018, pp. 49–56. EBSCOhost, url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=131039605&site=ehost-live&scope=site.

Relevant Questions about Racism in Othello

1. How does Othello’s experience with racism in the play influence his actions and decisions, and what impact does it have on the unfolding of the plot?
2. In what ways does Iago exploit racial stereotypes and prejudice to manipulate characters and advance his schemes in Othello?
3. How does Shakespeare’s portrayal of racism in Othello reflect the societal attitudes and biases of the time in which the play was written, and what insights does it offer into the broader issue of racism?

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