Irony in Benedict’s Sand Queen

Abstract

This research is an attempt to show irony in Helen Benedict’s Sand Queen. Benedict uses irony in order to challenge war-mongering American ideology and raises question on brutality of American soldiers by attacking elevated rules and regulations in army and imparts the message that strict military norms and value should be go through the process of reformation. Moreover, through Kate and Naema, this research paper confronts on Orientalistic prospective of America and takes the departure from the main stream feminism as well in order to glorify Islamic feminism. To accomplish the task, the researcher takes theoretical insight of irony given by Claire Colebrook. According to her, irony is a rhetorical device that is used in order to attack grand claim and meta-narrative, questioning elite values, disrupting norms and constructing higher ideas and giving place to marginalize value and point of view beyond ordinary speech. By using this rhetorical tool, the researcher comes with the finding of ironical reversal as the protagonist who from the beginning glorifies the war and describes her act as noble and heroic one ultimately suffers from trauma. This sudden transformation in Kate shows the disparity between appearance and reality that functions as irony. Hence, by using irony this research paper attacks warmongering American ideology, eminent norms in military force, Orientalistic American prospective, radical feminist and comes in to the conclusion that the horror of war victimizes all.