Trajectoires identitaires en postcolonie : entre hétérotopies et hétérologies du sujet dans Contours du jour qui vient de Léonora Miano

Abstract

This study analyses identity construction modalities to show how space management acts as a discourse that reveals knowledge categories informing its framework. Using Said’s contention that postcolonial narrative are always written within a strategic description of a particular space with global discourses, this study argues that an analysis of postcolonial fiction must take into account referential postures towards former colonizers such as France or England, with the purpose to anchor our understanding of identity construction within contemporary Africa. Using concepts such as heterotopy and heterology put forth by Foucalt and de Certeau, this analysis demonstrates that postcolonial fiction is essentially a signifying practice in which identities are contested and reconfigured as a dynamic experience of loss.

Keywords

• postcolonial
• knowledge
• space
• place
• identity
• discourse
• heterotopy
• heterology
• narrative