Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction

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dc.contributor.advisorBrink, André Pen_ZA
dc.contributor.authorGeertsema, Johan Hendriken_ZA
dc.date.accessioned2016-03-09T09:03:38Z
dc.date.available2016-03-09T09:03:38Z
dc.date.issued1999en_ZA
dc.descriptionBibliography: pages 277-290.en_ZA
dc.description.abstractThis study considers the relation between irony and otherness. Chapter 2 shows that there is little agreement on the politics of irony in critical discussions. Nevertheless, irony and otherness do appear to be linked in many of these discussions. Chapter 3 offers a consideration of Emmanuel Levinas's conception of ethics in terms of his understanding of the other as face and trace. The tendency of language to foreclose on otherness by reducing it must be interrupted, while otherness must, nonetheless, be Said. The chapter concludes with an attempt to relate Levinas's conception of otherness - as the interruption of conceptualising otherness - to Paul de Man's conception of irony as permanent parabasis in terms of the tropes of prosopopoeia and catachresis. Any representation of the other must be interrupted continually as it is a prosopopoeia of otherness (in that it gives otherness a face) and therefore a catachresis (for the other has no face and must be given one). The task with which the (reading) self is faced is ironic in that it consists at once of positing and interrupting the face given to the other. Chapters 4, 5 and 6 are attempts at reading the interplay of irony and otherness in selected recent South African fiction. Van Heerden's Kikoejoe, as an allegory of the refusal to narrativise otherness, is read as being caught in the double bind of irony; Matlou's Life at Home is read as a text intimating an otherness at the heart of domesticity and within the reader; and, finally, Coetzee's Age of Iron is read as a text in which confession is the nexus of the relation between irony and otherness. This study brackets the political in order to examine the relationship between irony and otherness from the vantage point of Levinas's 'conception' of the other. The task remains to consider whether it is possible to approach irony ethically, or ethics ironically, and to consider the political ramifications of the relation between irony and otherness postulated in this study.en_ZA
dc.identifier.apacitationGeertsema, J. H. (1999). <i>Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction</i>. (Thesis). University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of English Language and Literature. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/17592en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationGeertsema, Johan Hendrik. <i>"Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction."</i> Thesis., University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of English Language and Literature, 1999. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/17592en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationGeertsema, J. 1999. Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction. University of Cape Town.en_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Thesis / Dissertation AU - Geertsema, Johan Hendrik AB - This study considers the relation between irony and otherness. Chapter 2 shows that there is little agreement on the politics of irony in critical discussions. Nevertheless, irony and otherness do appear to be linked in many of these discussions. Chapter 3 offers a consideration of Emmanuel Levinas's conception of ethics in terms of his understanding of the other as face and trace. The tendency of language to foreclose on otherness by reducing it must be interrupted, while otherness must, nonetheless, be Said. The chapter concludes with an attempt to relate Levinas's conception of otherness - as the interruption of conceptualising otherness - to Paul de Man's conception of irony as permanent parabasis in terms of the tropes of prosopopoeia and catachresis. Any representation of the other must be interrupted continually as it is a prosopopoeia of otherness (in that it gives otherness a face) and therefore a catachresis (for the other has no face and must be given one). The task with which the (reading) self is faced is ironic in that it consists at once of positing and interrupting the face given to the other. Chapters 4, 5 and 6 are attempts at reading the interplay of irony and otherness in selected recent South African fiction. Van Heerden's Kikoejoe, as an allegory of the refusal to narrativise otherness, is read as being caught in the double bind of irony; Matlou's Life at Home is read as a text intimating an otherness at the heart of domesticity and within the reader; and, finally, Coetzee's Age of Iron is read as a text in which confession is the nexus of the relation between irony and otherness. This study brackets the political in order to examine the relationship between irony and otherness from the vantage point of Levinas's 'conception' of the other. The task remains to consider whether it is possible to approach irony ethically, or ethics ironically, and to consider the political ramifications of the relation between irony and otherness postulated in this study. DA - 1999 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PB - University of Cape Town PY - 1999 T1 - Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction TI - Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/17592 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/17592
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationGeertsema JH. Irony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fiction. [Thesis]. University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of English Language and Literature, 1999 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/17592en_ZA
dc.language.isoengen_ZA
dc.publisher.departmentDepartment of English Language and Literatureen_ZA
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Humanitiesen_ZA
dc.publisher.institutionUniversity of Cape Town
dc.subject.otherEnglish Language and Literatureen_ZA
dc.titleIrony and otherness : a study of some recent South African narrative fictionen_ZA
dc.typeDoctoral Thesis
dc.type.qualificationlevelDoctoral
dc.type.qualificationnamePhDen_ZA
uct.type.filetypeText
uct.type.filetypeImage
uct.type.publicationResearchen_ZA
uct.type.resourceThesisen_ZA
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