Tunkel, N: Transcultural Imaginaries

What impact do global interconnectedness and migrations have on our imagination? How do contemporary writers make use of history to express these changes? Do increasing planetary complexities lead to new constructions of identities? 'Transcultural Imaginaries' traces answers to these questions by presenting an interdisciplinary perspective on recent Canadian literature written in English. The study offers a tour d'horizon of various interrelated socio-cultural issues and theoretical contexts: it examines postmodern and postcolonial trends in the genre of historical fiction in Canada, as well as theories on globalization and approaches to cultural plurality (multi-, inter-, and transculturalism). The study also sketches possible parameters for the analysis of transcultural features in literary texts. These parameters - Space, Place, and Time; Voices and Perspectives; Transfer, Exchange, and Resistance - are applied to a variety of texts by authors such as Dionne Brand, Michael Ondaatje, Madeleine Thien, George Elliott Clarke, and Thomas King.