Contemporary Refugee Literature

In the twenty-first century, millions have been forcibly displaced due to ethno-religious conflicts, socio-political instability, and economic crises, turning migration into a global phenomenon.

The traumatic realities of refugees – imprisonment, torture, loss, discrimination, and marginalisation – have increasingly become subjects of academic inquiry across multiple disciplines. Literature has also played a crucial role in representing these complexities, and offered fictionalised accounts of refugee experiences before, during, and after migration. This book critically examines contemporary refugee narratives, and highlights their potential to universalise the refugee experience. It argues that while contemporary refugee literature challenges dominant representations and reclaims subjectivity, it is also shaped by the Western literary marketplace, which refashions displacement into marketable narratives of resilience and redemption, tempering its radical potential and framing it within apolitical humanitarian discourse that prioritises empathy over structural critique.

The book calls for refugee narratives to resist market-driven expectations and engage in epistemic disobedience, challenging dominant frameworks that dictate how refugee experiences should be represented, understood, and consumed.