Reading the French Caribbean: The Postcolonial Literature of Martinique and Guadeloupe

The course will focus on postcolonial writing from the islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe, which have come increasingly to be viewed as sites where issues of global import are conspicuously articulated. Against the historical background of slavery and colonialism, questions to be discussed will feature some that loom especially large: the genesis of a distinct multiethnic and multilingual community; the phenomena of migration and diaspora; ongoing tensions between former colonies now incorporated, as peripheral departments, by the "center," that is, France and the European Union; and not least, the matter of geography and the environment.