Otherwise Occupied

Dorothy M. Figueira is Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Georgia. She is the author of several books, including Aryans, Jews, Brahmins: Theorizing Authority through Myths of Identity; The Exotic: A Decadent Quest; and Translating the Orient: The Reception of Sakuntala in Nineteenth-Century Europe, all published by SUNY Press.

"…a forceful polemic against some of the major intellectual strands within the 'theory' revolution of the last thirty years." — Literary Research"This book bespeaks an extraordinarily broad and penetrating understanding of contemporary literary theory in the usual sense, but far more importantly, it presents an extremely clear, lucid, and compelling analysis of its political implications for the classroom, the department, the university as an educational institution, and the body politic of the United States in general. It is not only a courageous investigation and critique of the political positions but also a ringing condemnation of the disingenuous and ultimately shallow and superficial appropriation of the mantle of multiculturalism, trans-culturalism, and similar specialties by monolingual members of academe whose experience outside of the received environment is at best secondhand and all too often condescending and patronizing." — Steven P. Sondrup, Brigham Young University

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. Critical Background to Postructuralist Theories and Pedagogies of Alterity2. MulticulturalismSimulated BattlesThe Institutionalization of MulticulturalismThe Methodology of MulticulturalismMarketing the MarginMasking the Metanarrative of Race3. Postcolonial Criticism and Identitarian PoliticsDefinitions and the Scope of Postcolonial CriticismHistory and Postcolonial SubjectivityThe Postcolonial CriticThe Repressive Allure of Postcolonial Criticism4. The Brahminization of Theory: Commodity Fetishism and False ConsciousnessIntroductionPostcolonial Criticism’s Disciplinary RootsCommodifying Postcolonial Theory and Type-Casting the CriticFalse ConsciousnessCommodity Fetishism and Brahminization5. The Romance of ExileIntroductionSpokespersonshipThe ExileThe NomadA Wand’ring Minstrel I, A Thing of Shreds and Patches6. OccidentalismTheory Confronts RealityRhetoricThe Fallaci AffairFinal Beliefs7. Gestures of InclusionIntroductionPositive Discrimination in IndiaAffirmative Action in the United StatesCosmetic EnhancementConclusion: The Collecting of the OtherNotesBibliographyIndex