Rejection of Victimhood in Literature by Abdulrazak Gurnah, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and Luis Alberto Urrea (Textxet: Studies in Comparative Literature, 96)

This book examines how selected works of fiction advocate for just memories and promote identities that accept ethical agency and that exercise power and control over their own lives and destinies, no matter how limited such control may be. Half Title Series Information Title Page Copyright Page Contents Abstract Acknowledgements Notes to the Reader Introduction 1 Background 2 The Authors 3 Just Memory 4 Diaspora Space 5 Nationalisms, Frames, and Precarity 6 Transnationalism, Hybridity, and Pluralist Governmentality 7 Hospitality in the Diaspora Space 8 Structure of the Book Chapter 1 Abdulrazak Gurnah 1 Precarity and Entanglement 2 Zanzibar as a Diaspora Space 3 Entanglement of Stories 4 Appropriation of Symbols 5 Stories and Memory 6 Closing Remarks Chapter 2 Viet Thanh Nguyen 1 An Emerging Forerunner 2 Memories of Betrayal 3 Ghosts and Just Memory 4 Representing Themselves 5 Recovering the ‘Ultimate Gook’ 6 Closing Remarks Chapter 3 Luis Alberto Urrea 1 Writing from the Borderland 2 The Latino Threat Narrative 3 Nobody Liked Nobody 4 Lacunae and Memories 5 The Familia de la Raza 6 Closing Remarks Chapter 4 Comparative Analysis 1 Complicating the Reverence for Transnationalism 2 Undermining the Superiority of Host Diaspora Spaces 3 The Industry of Memory 4 Rejection of Victimhood 5 Transborder Familial Dynamics 6 Closing Remarks Conclusion Bibliography Index This Book Builds On Existing Scholarship By Leading Theorists To Offer An In-depth Examination Of An Intriguing Selection Of Writers. It Explores How Works By Abdulrazak Gurnah, Viet Thanh Nguyen, And Luis Alberto Urrea Represent A Recalibration Of How Stories About Marginalised Migrants In The Us And The Uk Are Told - Stories About Their Rights, Their Suffering, And Their Relationships To The Citizens Around Them That Reject Victimhood And Embrace Just Memories. The Selected Works Reject And Counter Descriptions Of The Marginalised That Are Framed In Terms Of Victimhood And Passivity. As An Alternative, They Emphasise The Need For Just Memories And Narratives That Not Only Accept Personal Agency, But Also Afford Their Characters Opportunities To Exercise Power And Control Over Their Own Lives And Destinies, No Matter How Limited These May Be. Transnational writers are increasingly opposed to representations of refugees, exiles, migrants, and their descendants as emblematic victims. With the rise of populist nationalisms in the USA and the UK in the eras of Trumpism, Brexit, and their aftermath, targets of nationalist groups have increasingly been represented, and thus constituted, as individual suffering victims. Certain groups embrace such representations. They use them to secure help and protection for themselves. Less scrupulous individuals may even embrace these representations to elide their own accountability and further nefarious goals. This book examines an intriguing selection of writers to show how they are attempting to recalibrate such stories to reject victimhood. It explores how just memory is deployed to ascribe agency to transnational characters.