Browsing by Subject "Agency"
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Item Aency in Helen Benedict’s Sand Queen(Department of English, 2018) Siwakoti, SalinaAnalyzing Helen Benedict’s Sand Queen(2011), the present research claims that agency plays a vital role in shaping and articulating choices of the people even in the most uneven of the times like the war. Making a detailed study of two of the characters in the context of Iraqi war, this paper attempts to see the ways in which their choices arenegotiated in the critical time. Kate is an American soldier in the prisonguardguard. Kate who became friend withs Naema, an Iraqui medical science student.This study focuses on the way people face their bad times during the war. It shows the consequences of war and their effect in the individuality of people involved in it.Benedict presents the real picture of war and its consequence spenalty. By applying the theories of inner psychology as developed by John Locke, Immanuel Kant, and Charles Taylor, this study presents approaches Kate and Naema as the major characters who assert them selves amid the war. Key words: Agency, Free Will, War and Gender, Iraqi War, Arab Women, ChoiceItem Body resistance and rites of transformation in Toni morrison's God help the child and beloved(Department of English, 2023) Nath, ArjunThis research work explores representations of the African-American people's struggle and their ideological transformation manifested in their bodily experiences in a racist-claustrophobic American society. The bodily transformation of African-Americans liberates themselves through a bodily resistance to unravel their independent self. Morrison’s protagonists become enlightened and experienced individuals in a similar way where they go through separation, liminality, and reintegration during rituals. Central characters in Morrison's God Help the Child (2015) and Beloved (1987) present the rites of transformation of black body. They preserve their dignity and identity in a new communitas creating their own agency and solidarity after going through liminality, a rite of political transformation of self into agency to resist against the social injustice. Communitas is a well defined social space in equilibrium, comparatively having no injustice, segregation and disorder where one’s identity is restored through a bodily and psychic liberation passing through a liminal phase. Morrison's God Help the Child and Beloved depict the characters, Bride and Sethe, through rituals of bodily transformation as a site of resistance along with severe corporeal repression and being reintegrated into a new communitas. Keywords: Body, Rites of transformation, Liminality, Communitas, Resistance, Agency, IdentityItem Conflict between Tradition and Modernity in Samrat Upadhyay's Arresting God in Kathmandu(Department of English, 2020) Lawati, Chandra KalaSamrat Upadhyay's Arresting God in Kathmandu (2001) presents modern Nepali agents on the one hand who are capable of acting on their own resist the repressive cultural, political and social orders on the other hand the old generations want the tradition to be preserved and want to protect it. This collection of short stories is full of subjects resisting the repressive social, cultural and political values. The agency is within the subjects of the society. This research paper is done under the theoretical light of Dilip Parameshwor Gaonkar's alternative modernities, Charles Taylor's making of the modern identity, Peter Wagner's concepts of modernity, Dipesh Chakrabarty and Arjun Appadurai's theories on modernity. The selected stories for this research paper are "Deepak Misra's Secretary", "The Cooking Poet", "The Limping Bride" and "This World". Different characters in the stories act in their own way. Kanti, Jaya, Giri, Moti, Rukmini, Bandana, Deepak and Jill are the main characters. They stop performing social, political and cultural values instead they resist against those values. Thus, the tension between modern subjects; the people who are self-dependent and their resistance against the socio-political and cultural values and the traditional subjects who want new generations to act according to established norms and values is depicted in the selected four stories from the short stories collection, Arresting God in Kathmandu. Keywords: Modernity, Resistance, Self-dependent, Agency, Social, Political, Cultural ValuesItem Envisioning agents in contemporary Tharu novels: An assessment of self and structure(Department of English, 2021) Paudel, DhaneshwarAs the contemporary Tharu novels present, Tharus in Nepal have experienced both success and failure in their attempts to overcome the barriers structurally imposed on them. The formation of agency has taken a very difficult path in their society. The present study explains the exploitation of landlord to bonded laborers, creation of agency and the activities of them in Chhabilal Kopila’s Churiniyan and Krishnaraj Sharbahari’s Lal Kerani. In the backdrop of the Kamaiya system, this study reads the novels as the documents imagining the tension between the self and the society in quest of change at both levels: personal and structural. For one thing, Kopila creates agency and the agency challenges landlord’s exploitation through meetings, dharna, and street demonstration. However, the agency collapses in the end, thereby presenting the failure. On the other hand, Sharbahari imagines Tharus winning their freedom, rescuing themselves from the structural discrimination. This study has read the two novels through the critical design that Michel Foucualt has developed for the critical concept of body politics. Finally, the Tharu novels hold the story of success and failure of people while making the agents in their society. The imagination helps understand the nature of interaction between the self and and the social structure in Tharu society in Nepal.Item Gender Role as Performance in GhanashyamKhadka’sNirvana(Department of English, 2021) Thapa, SushmaThis research analyzes Ghanashyam Khadka’s novel Nirvana from the perspective of gender role as performance and female masculinity. It examines the social construction of power, femininity and gender roles corresponding between sex and gender identity. The characters show their performances through masculinity and challenge the conventional gender roles. The major thrust of this research is to examine how female characters have challenged the stereotypical patriarchal system where women are tagged as inferior, feminine, and fragile. In addition, it also analyzes how female characters establish their identities possessing confidence, assertiveness, and independence. Using Judith Butler’s theory of gender perform ativity where everyday action, gestures and representation, and behaviors challenge the prescriptive and proscriptive approaches of sex, sexuality, and gender. In addition,masculinity is exhibited through the perspective of Judith Halberstam’s theoretical concept of Female Masculinity, where female characters Dipti, Monica, Savita, and Aaryaa act like male characters and establish their identities.Finally the analysis proves that the novelistis against the imposition of gender roles and identities by patriarchal society. Also, this research emphasizes how a woman can perform like a man. It also suggests that masculinity is not the sole property of male. Masculinity is the social position that can be practiced in an individual way. Keywords: Gender performativity, Female Masculinity, Femininity, AgencyItem The Margins in Nehru‟s Toward Freedom and Roy‟s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness: A Study of Subaltern Consciousness(Faculty of English, 2021) Awasthi, Prabeen KumarSubaltern people, in every part of the world, have been placed at the bottom of the society. They have not got proper space in Indian society too. However, subalterns in India have become successful to hit the discriminatory forces time and again with the help of their consciousness. Subaltern consciousness plays a vital role to dismantle various injustices imposed upon them by the people at the center. The study investigates the politics of subaltern consciousness and the substantive representation of marginalized groups in Jawaharlal Nehru’s Toward Freedom: An Autobiography (1936) and Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness (2017). The subaltern resist existing social construction in the quest of their autonomous self and it is achieved with the help of continuous resistance on their part. Colonized Indians reveal their resistance to counter the British Raj. In the like manner, Hijras, women and Dalits resist the conventional norms of the mainstream by developing anti- normative body and by adopting new roles in the society. The study employs Gramsci, Spivak and Guha’s ideas on ‘subaltern’ to analyze the life of the people in the periphery of social, economic and political strata in the 1930s and the 2010s in India. Besides them, Migual Tamel and Michael Garnett’s notion on ‘self,’ ‘interpretation,’ ‘agency’ and ‘resistance’ are applied to show the way subalterns dismantle their subordination at multiple levels. Subalterns in India have succeeded to transform themselves from victim of colonialism to self-dignified people capable to challenge discriminations prevalent in the society.Item Projection of Female Agency in Tennessee Williams’s The Rose Tattoo(Department of English, 2019) Chaudhary, TribhuwanThe major thrust of this thesis is to project female agency in Tennessee Williams's play,The Rose Tattoo. Most of the female characters in the play believe that they have the right to decide on the circumstances under which the sexual act should be performed. They could also determine most of the decisions that measures in their lives. This new mentality puts them on the path to self-transitions. Itis awakening that consists in a pair of silk stockings that attract subjugated person into self-assertion. The esthetic and sensitive self is awakened by a simple touch. Transformation takes place. The former self of the higher social classes takes over the entire personality. An agent of awakening experiences is not only a discovery of the self but also a rediscovery of her own body. It has been entrapped and enslaved by domestic labor that has alienated her genuine physical potential. The focus is on an individual's awakening which takes place when she experiences a self-discovery achieved by means of the assessment of her own body and sexuality. Serafina duty as wife and mother causes frustration and rebellion against the oppressive system. A submissive and sentimentally coy woman has become isolated from the politics of choice. She used to feel trapped within the household sphere. But at last she gets rid of it. Key words: Female, agency, praises, respectItem Representation of Chuck as a National Allegory in H.M. Naqvi's Home Boy(Department of English, 2022) Devkota, AavashRepresentation of Chuckas a National Allegory in H.M Naqvi's Home Boy The novel,Home Boy by H.M Naqvi, tells the story of Pakistanimen who migrate to America to fulfill their dream of freedom and prosperity. The novel is set during tragic event of 9/11 terrorist attack on USA and in volves the after math faced by Muslim citizens with no stalgic autobiographical representation of past, in form of sharing memories hugely associated with Pakistan. The concept of ‘home’ is highly stressed in the novel. The title Home Boy itself contradicts regularly in the text. The space between the character's present and his home is maintained by association of his home and home land memories.So, the research investigates Chuck's role in the formation of the meaning of the textin light of Fredric Jameson's theory of allegory and ideology. Naqviin his novelusesChuckasnational allegoryto represent the various elements experienced by immigrants away from their home land and to put forth the American response to the 9/11 event. He uses memories and nostalgic representation of past associated with the homeland of experiencing agent to deploy the meaning. Most common elements represented are hardships, fear, suppression, racism, stereotyping, inequalities,issues of identity andinhumane treatment suffered by the immigrants. Keywords: National Allegory, Representation, Agency, Immigrant, Stereotyping, 9/11Item Representation of Transnational identity in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's The mistress of spice(Department of English, 2009) Ghorasaini, SumanThe present research paper analyzes the fictional postcolonial text The Mistress of Spices authored by the notable south Asian postcolonial writer, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. It argues that the writer employs her central protagonist as an agency of transnational identity as a tool to settle the cultural clash between the two cultural worlds: Eastern and Western as represented by Tilo, Geeta, Lalita and Raven respectively. It further explores how Divakaruni offers the new social phenomenon of transnationalism as an instrument to address the cultural complexity instigated by the encounter between the eastern and western cultural values in the multicultural society of America. The state of being transnational represents the possibility of having two identities, two homes, two families, and two cultures at the same time. Despite being deterritorialized from her original culture and geographical locations, Tilo exercises the typical Indian tradition of Ayurbedic business in Oakland and also serves the non-Indian people. Her romantic affair with Raven, an American boy, further shows her transnational simultaneity. To further support the argument, the paper incorporates the theoretical insights from the theory of Transnationalism accompanied by Paul Jay, Natasha Garrett, Nyla Ali Khan, Steven Vertovec, Jahan Ramazani, Homi K. Bhabha's theoretical notion of Hybrid Identity. Likewise, The paper sheds the light on the postcolonial encounter between eastern and western values in the multicultural society and concludes with findings that transnational movement can replace the essentialist notion of fixed identity and practically resolve the cultural clash in the multicultural society. Key Words: transnational identity, diaspora, transnationalism, globalization, agencyItem Resistance of Female Characters in Grimm Brothers’ Selected Fairy Tales(Department of English, 2021) Khanal, Govinda RajThis research paper examines thecondition offemale charactersin“Snow White”,“Cinderella”,“Little Red Riding Hood”and“Sleepy Beauty”from thefeministperspective.In these fairy tales,we can find horrifying images whereweak and poor characters are suppressedinasociety either a person images or forces a state of society where therearegreat suffering and injustice. Theconditionsof female charactersaredreadfulin“SnowWhite”,“Cinderella”,“Little Red Riding Hood”and “Sleepy Beauty”. In“Cinderella”, the stepmothertellsCinderellato cut off her toe. Thegirl cuts off her toe, swallowsthe pain,and goesout the prince. In “Snow White”, the stepmother gives apoisonous apple toSnow Whiteand sheswallows it accidentally.In “LittleRed Riding Hood”,thewolf desires to eat Little Red Riding Hood.“Sleeping Beauty”, a teenagerdrugged by the jealous witch is locked in a tower where a prince effectively comes into her bedroom and decides the best thing t doin this situation is kiss her.Thisresearch work deals withthepsychological dehumanizing of childrenparticularly female charactersconcerningsexual abuses.Item Tenzing Norgay as a Subaltern Hero in John Hunt‟s The Ascend of Everest(Department of English, 2021) Duwadi, SamirThe research paper examines the transition and transformation of a subaltern hero, Tenzing Norgey Sherpa with reference to John Hunt’s The Ascend of Everest. Though the text documents Sherpa as the supplementary agent of Mt Everest expedition of 1953 within hegemonic power structure, but his impressive personality which climbing skills establishes him as a subaltern hero. The transformation of Tenzing from an ordinary individual to an extraordinary climber creates an indispensable space within elitist discourse where Sherpa stands as subaltern hero. On the foundation of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s “Can the Subaltern Speak ?” , this paper investigates how Sherpa speaks as a subaltern hero, who in the very beginning, is represented as a porter but in the later part of the expedition establishes himself as a subaltern hero despite the fact that there is meager space to him to act as key actor.