The poetics of identity making

Precarity and agency in Tahmima Anam's The Good Muslim

Bibliographic Data

ID2176455
AuthorsXin Yan Chew (Universiti Sains Malaysia), Moussa Pourya Asl (0000-0002-8426-426X, University of Oulu, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume28
Issue1
Pages86-101
Publication date2024-01-02
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal for Cultural Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1479-7585 • E-ISSN: 1740-1666
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14797585.2023.2291711
OpenAlexW4389565444
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited26

Bangladesh experienced a massive surge in humanitarian crises after the 1971 Liberation War due to the systematic use of violence at both public and private spheres. Fictional accounts of the post-conflict period depict women as subjected to institutionalised sexism and aggravated physical and mental violence. Critical studies on such narratives often reiterate a stereotypical and essentialising discourse surrounding women's identity, characterising them as helpless and passive victims of discrimination and exploitation. Drawing upon Judith Butler's notions of precarity and agency, we argue that the Bangladeshi-born British writer Tahmima Anam's The Good Muslim transcends victimhood narratives by creating a more nuanced image of woman as vulnerable victims and resisting subjects at the same time. The novel is preoccupied with notions of vulnerability, violence, religious zealotry, and family estrangement. The findings reveal that the precariousness of women in the post-war period is caused and aggravated by violence and oppression perpetrated at political, social, and religious spheres. Female characters like Maya and Piya are presented as empowered agents of transformation when it comes to vulnerable situations that render them as insignificant and precarious. The study concludes that the novel contests and alters the stereotypical representations of women embedded in normalising and hegemonic discourses

Aesthetics · Agency (philosophy · Art · Identity (music · Literature · Poetics · Poetry · Precarity · Social science · Sociology · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Gender Studies · Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies · South Asian Cinema and Culture

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