Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-4hhp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-12T22:20:13.555Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 5 - Ecologies of Empire in Oceanian Modernism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 November 2020

Caitlin Vandertop
Affiliation:
University of the South Pacific
Get access

Summary

This chapter considers post-independence writing from the urban South Pacific, focusing on the capital of Fiji, Suva, and its association with the birth of Oceanian modernism in the 1970s. Elaborating first on the ‘swamp to city’ narrative surrounding the construction of the capital on reclaimed land, it examines the amphibious themes that appear in narratives of gendered walking by writers including the Fijian environmental activist Vanessa Griffen and Indo-Fijian writer Subramani, alongside fiction and essays by the Fijian/Tongan writer Epeli Hau‘ofa. Drawing on the critical framework structuring previous chapters, the chapter shows how each of these writers interrogates colonial narratives in the Pacific port city by linking the reappearance of its terraqueous past to issues of ecological precarity and the colonial legacies that have exacerbated them.

Type
Chapter
Information
Modernism in the Metrocolony
Urban Cultures of Empire in Twentieth-Century Literature
, pp. 120 - 145
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×