The Routledge Companion to Literature and Social Justice

The Routledge Companion to Literature and Social Justice is a comprehensive and multi- purpose collection on this important topic. With contributors working in various fields, the Companion provides in- depth analyses of both the cumulative and emergent issues, obstacles, praxes, propositions, and theories of social justice. The first section offers a historical overview of major developments and debates in the field, while the following sections look in more detail at the key traditions and show how literature and theory can be applied as analytical tools to real- world inequalities and the impact of doing so. The contributors provide reviews of major theoretical traditions, including Marxism, feminism, Critical Race Theory, disability studies, and queer studies. They also share literary analyses of influential authors including W. E. B. Du Bois, Yang Kui, Edwidge Danticat, Octavia Butler, and Rivers Solomon amongst others. The final section considers future possibilities for theory and action of justice, drawing specifically from theories and knowledges in decolonial, Indigenous, environmental, and posthumanist studies. This authoritative volume draws on the intersections between literary studies and social movements in order to provide scholars, students, and activists alike with a complete collection of the most up- to- date information on both canonical and emerging texts and case studies globally. Cover Half Title Series Information Title Page Copyright Page Table of Contents List of Contributors Acknowledgments Note to the Readers Beyond Awareness: An Introduction Spectacle of Justice Chapter Summaries Part I: Introducing Social Justice Part II: Theoretical Interventions in Social Justice Part III: Social Justice and Antiracism Part IV: Social Justice for Diverse Bodyminds Part V: Social Justice and Democracy Part VI: Global Justice and Anti-Imperialism Part VII: Future Justice for a World More Than Human Notes Bibliography Part I Introducing Social Justice Pedagogy 1 Advancing Social Justice Through the Study of Literature: Basic Pedagogical Principles Literature Instructors Can and Should Teach for Social Justice How Uninstructed Reading Might Advance Social Justice Making Students Aware of Injustices Motivating Students to Reduce Injustices: Developing Empathy Beyond Empathy: Fostering Universal Compassion The Necessity of Pedagogy Training in Causal Analysis: Developing Adequate Mental Models An Adequate Mental Model of the Causes of Character, Behavior, and Life Outcomes Causes of Injustice as Points of Intervention A Mental Model of Human Nature: Basic Needs A Mental Model of the Human Condition: Environmental, Systemic Causes of Injustice Transferring Classroom Learning to Real Life Conclusion Notes Bibliography 2 Literary Analysis: Social Justice: A Philosophical Introduction The Right and the Good The Ancients Distributive Justice Recognition as Social Justice The Phenomenology of Justice Conclusion Notes Bibliography 3 Praxis: The Solitary Reader and the General Strike Notes Bibliography Part II Theoretical Intervention in Social Justice 4 Feminism and Social Justice: Translating Private Problems Into Public Problems Notes Bibliography 5 Disabled Diaspora: Transnational Models of Disability Justice No Pity!: Disability Rights and Disability Pride Disability Rights for Whom? From Disability Rights to Disability Justice Crip-of-Color Critique and Intersectional Solidarity Conclusion Notes Bibliography 6 Queer Theory: A Brief History and Its Contemporary Influences Around the World Sexology and the Invention of Pathologized Sexuality From Biology to Social Production The Role of Intersectional Feminisms in Queer Theory Globalization, Capitalism, and Intersectionality Within Modern Queer Theory Towards a Future of Intersectionality and Uplifting Voices Notes Bibliography 7 Critical Race Theory: A Theoretical Overview CRT: A History The Tenets of CRT Who’s Afraid of CRT?: The Academic Critique A Contemporary (And Public) Critique The Strategy CRT Matters Notes Bibliography 8 Ecocriticism: From the Wilderness Idea to Just Multispecies Futures Colonialism, Nationalism, and the Wilderness Idea Apocalypse, Now: Settler Terror and Indigenous Futurity Humans, Animals, and Multispecies Justice Conclusion Notes Bibliography 9 Marxist Theory I. II. III. Notes Bibliography 10 Postcolonial Theory: A Theoretical Overview Introduction The Politics of Language The Politics of Representation The Politics of the Market The Politics of the Nation A Feminist Conclusion New Directions in Postcolonial Studies Notes Bibliography 11 Bringing Theory Home: Decoloniality and the Global South Decolonial Turn: Beyond Postcolonialism Time In/of Decoloniality: Subaltern and Decolonial Cosmopolitanism Present Terrains of Praxi-Theory: Notes On Decoloniality in the Global South Notes Bibliography 12 A Short History of Liberation Theology: From Latin America to the United States, Palestine, and India: 1968–1989 Latin American Theology of Liberation Black Theology of Liberation Palestinian Theology of Liberation Pedagogies of Liberation Theology Notes Bibliography Part III Social Justice and Antiracism 13 Praxis: Life Among the Lowly: The African American Struggle to Make a Home in America The Inhumanity and Hypocrisy of the American Slave Trade New Starts and Old Problems The Fight for a Fair Day’s Wage The Fight for an Education The Modern Civil Rights Movement, Or the Second Reconstruction Notes Bibliography 14 Literary Analysis: W. E. B. Du Bois, James Cone, and the Black Christ: The History and Legacy of Black Liberation Theology I II III IV Notes Bibliography 15 Literary Analysis: “To Be On Fire for Justice”: James Cone’s Legacy and Cornel West’s Prophetic Commitments to Liberational-Theological Social Justice Notes Bibliography 16 Literary Analysis: Navigating the Gaze: The Gaze, Double-Consciousness, and the Politics of Passing in Nella Larsen’s Passing Introduction Passing, the Gaze, and Double-Consciousness Colorism and Passing Ethics of Care The Rhinelander Case The Jezebel and Mammy Figures Conclusion Notes Bibliography 17 Literary Analysis: Black Futurities Beyond the Human in Rivers Solomon’s An Unkindness of Ghosts Afrofuturist Post-Humanism Afrofuturist Social Justice in An Unkindness of Ghosts Conclusion Notes Bibliography 18 Literary Analysis: From Politics to Ethical Aesthetics: Literary Peace Activism, Social Emotions and Poietic Justice in Australian Minorities Fiction Justice Sensitivity, Inequity Aversion, and the Creative Process: Cognitive-Affective Literary Responses to Injustice in Australian Minorities Fiction Turning Politics-Oriented Discourse Into Aesthetic Fictional Representations: The Creation of Shock Value Fiction In the Moral Lab: From Literary Peace Activism to Poietic Justice Conclusion Notes Bibliography 19 Pedagogy: Challenging Racial and Religious Stereotypes Through Literature Prejudice and Stereotypes and How to Redress Them Correcting Stereotypes Through Diverse, Representative Exemplars “Nobody Made Me! It Was Entirely My Decision.” “Fanatically Determined to Be a Lawyer.” Empathy “There Was Always Somebody in the Playground to Tell the Darkies to Go Home.” Safe Haven Conclusion Notes Bibliography 20 Pedagogy: Examining Students’ Critical-Ethical Interruptions of Racial Discourse in Singapore Literature Classrooms Introduction: Engaging With Race in Literature Classrooms Race in the Singapore Context Towards an Ethics of Responsible Readings and Interruptions Context of the Unit Students’ Strategies of Critical-Ethical Interruptions Interpretive Interruption: Resisting State Narratives of Race Authoritative Interruption: Questioning State Actors’ Authoritative Interpretations On Race Empathetic Interruption: Interrupting Resistance to Antiracism By Promoting Empathetic Perspective-Taking Linguistic Interruption: Interrupting One’s Own Racial and Linguistic Privilege to Account for Minority Perspectives Discussion and Conclusion Disclosure Statement Acknowledgements Notes Bibliography Part IV Social Justice for Diverse Bodyminds 21 Praxis: Trans Youth Movements TSER’s Creation and Growth Trans Youth History Understanding Trans Youth Activism Movement-Building Ethics Knowledge Production Conclusion Notes Bibliography 22 Praxis: Making Sense of the Disability Autonomy and Collectivity Binary: A Review... Romantic Autonomy, IDJP, and Access Intimacy Intersubjectivity, Romantic Love, and Access Intimacy Blindness Autobiography, Informal Access Intimacy Pedagogy, and Romantic Love Registers of Autonomy, Psychodrama, and Romantic Love Organic Collectivity as Access Intimacy Transnationalizing IDJP: Transnational Disability Praxis and Political Consciousness Crip Solidarity Disability Consciousness Conclusion Notes Bibliography 23 Literary Analysis: “It Hurts, That’s All I Know”: Hyperempathy, Race and Gender Disability, and the Possibilities of Social Animacy in Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower #WhatOctaviaTriedtoTellUs: Warnings From the Speculative Future Revisioning Kinship Through Shared Discourses of Pain and Empathy Seeding Possibilities of Abolitionist Transformation in the Classroom Notes Bibliography 24 Praxis: Postcolonial Feminism: Women’s Digital Activism and Its Challenges in South Asia With a Focus On Pakistan Postcolonial Feminism Nationalism in South Asian Countries Double Bind of Religion and Gendered Digital Activism in South Asia The Female Subaltern in the Digital Age Pakistan’s Gender Digital Divide Subalterns in Digital Spaces: Aurat March in Pakistan The MeToo Movements in Pakistan and Their Suppression Conclusion Notes Bibliography 25 Literary Analysis: Re-Defining Dalit Female Identity: A Study of Dalit Feminist Movement and Dalit Women’s Writings Caste–Gender Entrapment Dalit Women “Talk” Differently The “New” Dalit Woman Dalit Women “Write” Differently Baby Kamble’s The Prison We Broke Bama’s Karukku and Sangati Conclusion Notes Bibliography 26 Pedagogy: “World”-Traveling in the Classroom as an Enactment of Critical Pedagogies The White Feminist Scholar and “Loving, Knowing Ignorance” Educators, Learning Spaces, and “Loving, Knowing Ignorance” Foundational Critical Pedagogies “World”-Traveling in the Classroom Conclusion: Sustaining Multiplicity and Complexity Notes Bibliography Part V Social Justice and Democracy 27 Pedagogy: Teaching Literature as Equipment for Living Democratically A House Divided Literature, Equipment, and Rhetoric Pedagogical Equipment Equipping Our Classrooms Notes Bibliography 28 Literary Analysis: Collaging the Vox Populi: The Crowdsourced Poetics of Hong Kong’s Anti-Extradition Law Protest “... and in the End Carthage Was Destroyed.” – Hong Kong Without Us “Failed Revolutions Beget Beheadings.” – Annex III: A Book of Nothing Conclusion: Towards a Bilingual Hong Kong Literature Notes Bibliography 29 Literary Analysis: Blasphemy, Religiosity, and Digitality: An Enchanted Pakistan Introduction Politics of Religiosity Constructing Blasphemy A Disenchanted People Notes Bibliography 30 Literary Analysis: “Without Inspection” and the Poetics of Abolition Introduction Historical, Political, and Literary Context “Without Inspection” and the Poetics of Abolition Conclusion Notes Bibliography 31 Praxis: Romania’s “White Revolution”: A Case Study On Social Movements for Civil Rights and Democracy in Eastern Europe Introduction: The Need for Social Justice in Romania and Eastern Europe A Theoretical Approach: Social and Historical Contextualization of the Movement in the National and Global Context Case Study: The Comparative and Qualitative Content Analysis Methodology and Materials Findings and Interpretation Romania Poland and Hungary Germany France The U.K. The U.S.A. Conclusion Acknowledgment Notes Bibliography Part VI Global Justice and Anti-Imperialism 32 Literary Analysis: Happiness, Social Justice, and the Bildungsroman: On the Postcolonial Biopolitics of Waiting for Happiness From Satisfaction to Real Happiness The Bildungsroman Goes to West Africa Happiness, Death, and Communication Biopolitical Factors in a Postcolonial Bildungsroman Conclusion Notes Bibliography 33 Literary Analysis: Class-Nation, Nation-Class: Anticolonial Marxism as Justice Politics for Redistribution and Recognition in Yang Kui’s “Newspaper Carrier” and “A Model Village” Introduction “The Newspaper Carrier”: Contradiction Between Class and Nation A Model Village: Contradiction Reconciled Conclusion Notes Bibliography 34 Literary Analysis: To Read for Suffering: Using the Film Burn! to Challenge Imperialism Notes Bibliography 35 Praxis: Speak Up and Dance: The Convergence of Palestinian and African/Black Struggles in Afrodabke Introduction: Music and Dance in Times of Crisis The Arts in Anti-/Decolonial Struggles The Interlocking History of Mutual Recognition Between Palestine and Africa Weaving Anticolonial African and Palestinian Histories The Anti-Apartheid Boycott as a Model for the Palestinian BDS Movement Moves of Afrodabke to “Jerusalema” Beats: Grounding Africa in Palestine in the Ubuntu-Sumud Praxis of Resistance Acknowledging Afro-Palestinians Through Afrodabke Afrodabke and “Jerusalema”: A Transnational Allegory of Home, Resistance, and Decolonial Resilience The Obstacles to Reciprocal Solidarity Conclusion: Towards a Politics, Poetics, and Kinetics of Everyday Life Notes Bibliography 36 Pedagogy: The 1947 Partition Archive: A Contemporary Pedagogical Resource to Teach the Rival History of the Partition of India Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism: An Introduction Anti-Imperialism The Theoretical Approach: What, Why, and How 1947 Partition in History Textbooks: An Overview History Textbooks of Pakistan History Textbooks of India The Alternative: A New Way of Teaching the Partition History 1947 Partition Archive Partition Library Oral History Social Media Workshops and Internship Opportunities Conclusion Notes Bibliography Part VII Future Justice for a World More Than Human 37 Literary Analysis: Artificial Beings, Servitude and Rights: Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun Klara, Care, and Moral Standing Robot Servitude and Justice Towards Robots Conclusion: Anthropocentric Posthumanism and Rehumanizing Notes Bibliography 38 Literary Analysis: Toward an Oceanic Taiwanese Imaginary: Syaman Rapongan’s Sea Writing and Liao Hongji’s Cetacean Narrative From Route to Root: Searching for the Tao Codes in Floating Dreams On the Sea Liao Hongji’s Cetacean Narrative Conclusion Notes Bibliography 39 Praxis: The Standing Rock Water Protectors: Indigenous Sovereignty as a Refutation to Extractive Settler Colonialism Introduction An Incommensurable Encounter The Legality of DAPL Money Protectors Water Protectors: Mni Wiconi Indigeneity and the Future Notes Bibliography 40 Pedagogy: Teaching Climate Change Under Capitalist Realism Capitalist Realism Useful Contradictions Class Consciousness-Raising Inoculation Agitation Actually Existing Climate Justice Backwards Planning Notes Bibliography Index