“Criminal Cities: Capitalized Postcolonial Crime and the Contemporary Novels of London, Belfast, Bombay, and Johannesburg” Öffentlichkeit

Abstract

 

This dissertation brings together the fields of postcolonial literary studies, urban studies, and cultural studies to develop an analytical framework called “capitalized postcolonial crime.” “Capitalized postcolonial crime” is a reading strategy or prism that examines the nexus of colonialism, predatory capitalism, and neoliberal economics in contemporary capital cities to argue that crimes in literature act as tightly-packed symbols of imperial legacies through which we can view the malignant residues of empire in the twenty-first century. By moving from the former imperial center (London) to the capital of the United Kingdom’s most visible contemporary colony (Belfast), to the largest city in the former “jewel of the crown” of the British Empire (Bombay/Mumbai), and finally to a city established as a result of a gold rush on the outskirts of empire (Johannesburg), “Criminal Cities” interrogates literary depictions of crime and criminality to think through lingering imperialisms in our contemporary world. By analyzing the writing of Zadie Smith, Ian McEwan, Stuart Neville, Lucy Caldwell, Salman Rushdie, Vikram Chandra, Ivan Vladislavić, Lauren Beukes, and Phaswane Mpe, I make the case that these writers utilize depictions of crimes such as murder, terrorism, home invasion, and theft to ask the reader to think about imperial legacies and neocolonial formations such as racism, institutional violence, gentrification, and other relevant urban issues, ultimately putting forth a case for taking seriously the figuration of crime and criminality in contemporary postcolonial urban texts.  

 

 

Table of Contents

 

Introduction:

“Criminal Cities in a Postcolonial World” ………………………………1

 

“Criminal Murder, Criminal Bombing, and Criminal Violence”:

London and the Neoliberal Loss of Community………………………...24

 

 

“The City’s Invisible Borders Remained the Same”:

Belfast and Post-Agreement Fiction…………………………………….88

 

 

“As if Fiction and Real Life Were Anticipating Each Other”:

Bombay After Mumbai………………………………………………….135

 

 

“But What Did I Really Mean? Who Were ‘We?’”:

Crime in Post-Apartheid Johannesburg………………………………….183

 

 

“Gorgeously and Permanently Overrun”:

Capitalized Postcolonial Crime and the Refugee Crisis…………………..217

 

About this Dissertation

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School	Laney Graduate School
Department	English
Degree	Ph.D.
Submission	Dissertation
Language	English
Research Field	Literature, English Literature, Asian Literature, African
Stichwort	contemporary literature crime Irish studies neoliberalism postcolonial literature urban studies
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Bahri, Deepika, Emory University
Committee Members	Higgins, Geraldine, Emory University Suhr-Sytsma, Nathan, Emory University

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