The Construction of Identity in Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones

The Farming of Bones deals with issues surrounding the dynamic connections between identity and boundary construction in post-colonial context. It will present an analysis of how the novelist problematizes and communicates her idea of social and national identity construction to her readers and how the readers can identify themselves with the struggles and challenges of the protagonist Amabelle who is trying to find her own identity. This essay will show how Danticat’s novel contributes to an understanding of national identity beyond borders and makes the reader take the role of an individual who constructs her identity by uncovering moments of raw humanness. Until now, no literary scholar has examined the protagonist’s therapeutic role in bridging this social and national gap. Instead critics have discussed other issues of the novel like crossing and re-crossing the border, love, dreams, etc. Although this scholarship has been very effective and rewarding, it lacks any focus on the complexity of the characters’ identity construction. Therefore, this paper will reconsider Danticat’s The Farming of Bones with a closer attention to the question of identity.

Women of Substance : The Aspect of Education, Career and Female Identity in Pride and Prejudice and Bridget Jones's Diary

Although two hundred years separate Jane Austen and Helen Fielding and, subsequently, also their portrayals of society, the similarities outweigh the differences. When juxtaposing Pride and Prejudice and Bridget Jones’s Diary in the light of feminism it is evident that both books provide clear examples of the prevailing situation of women in each time and place. The aspects of the study, which are especially important today, show both the development and some degree of stagnation of women’s rights and identities.

Dialectal Speech in Literature and Translation : Bachelor Degree Thesis in English Linguistics

This essay studies how dialectal speech is reflected in written literature and how this phenomenon functions in translation. With this purpose in mind, Styron's Sophie's Choice and Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are analysed using samples of non-standard orthography which have been applied in order to reflect the dialect, or accent, of certain characters. In the same way, Lundgren's Swedish translation of Sophie's Choice and Ferres and Rolfe's Spanish version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are analysed. The method consists of linguistically analysing a few text samples from each novel, establishing how dialect is represented through non-standard orthography, and thereafter, comparing the same samples with their translation into another language in order to establish whether dialectal features are visible also in the translated novels. It is concluded that non-standard orthography is applied in the novels in order to represent each possible linguistic level, including pronunciation, morphosyntax, and vocabulary. Furthermore, it is concluded that while Lundgren's translation intends to orthographically represent dialectal speech on most occasions where the original does so, Ferres and Rolfe's translation pays no attention to dialectology. The discussion following the data analysis establishes some possible reasons for the exclusion of dialectal features in the Spanish translation considered here. Finally, the reason for which this study contributes to the study of dialectology is declared.