The English Language Poetry of South Asians

In this study, ten independent critical essays and a coda explore the English-language poetry of South Asians in terms of time, place, themes and poetic methodologies. The transnational perspective taken establishes connections between colonial and postcolonial South Asian poetry in English as well as the poetry of the old and new diaspora and the Subcontinent. The poetry analysis covers the relevance of historical allusions as well as underlying concerns of gender, ethnicity and class. Comparisons are offered between poets of different places and time periods, yielding numerous sociopolitical paradigms that surface in the poetry.

Mitali Pati Wong is a professor of English at Claflin University in Orangeburg, South Carolina. She has published two books of literary criticism and several articles, and is the recipient of a two year grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to work on South Asian literature.
The late Syed Khwaja Moinul Hassan was a professor of English at Claflin University. He had published several collections of poetry, several articles, and wrote a weekly column for a newspaper in Bangladesh.

Mitali Pati Wong with Syed Khwaja Moinul Hassan
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 208
Bibliographic Info: bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2013
pISBN: 978-0-7864-3622-4
eISBN: 978-1-4766-0061-1
Imprint: McFarland

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vi
Preface 1
One. Locating South Asian Voices: The Transnational Case for
South Asian Poetry in English 5
Two. The Beginnings of the English-Language Poetry of South
Asians: The Colonial Era in the Indian Subcontinent 22
Three. Strangers in Their Own Lands: English-Language Poetry
in the Indian Subcontinent Since 1947 45
Four. Transnationalism and Hybridity in Contemporary Indian
Poetry 70
Five. Hybridity and Dislocation: Poets of the South Asian
Diaspora in the United Kingdom and Australia 86
Six. Diaspora, Dislocation and South Asian Poetry in Canada 103
Seven. Strangers in a Strange Land: South Asian Immigrant Poets
in the United States 118
Eight. “But here are the meanings”: The Voices of Contemporary
South Asian American Male Poets 138
Nine. “Other” Histories: South Asian Women Poets in North
America and the Caribbean 153
Ten. “Why I’m a poet”: Contemporary South Asian Women’s
Poetry in the United States 166
Eleven. Coda 188
Bibliography 193
Index 196

“The authors address the significance of historical allusions, gender, ethnicity, and class, and also offer comparisons between poets of different regions and times”—Reference & Research Book News.