Hybridization and Power: Revising Colonial Legacy in Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things

Abstract

The current study focuses on Arundhati Roy‘s attitude towards the British colonial legacy through paying attention to hybridity and power in her master piece The God of Small Things (1997), a postcolonial-Marxist Indian literary product. The main aim of this thesis is to conceptualize hybridity and its three interrelated types: hybrid language, culture, and identity. It also intends to investigate the characters’ fusion between two different cultures and social classes and castes as it examines this fusion’s aftermath on the Indian society. In connection to this, this study consists of three main chapters, in addition to the introduction and conclusion. The first chapter is a general overview on postcolonialism in India. The second chapter utilizes postcolonial theory to discuss the theme of hybridity, while the third chapter utilizes the Marxist theory to discuss the theme of power. Therefore, selected characters will be analyzed in the light of postcolonial term “Hybridity” as it is viewed by Homi Bhabha. Moreover, selected characters will be analyzed in the light of the Marxist notion “Power” as it is viewed by Karl Marx. In the conclusion, the analysis shows that through the characters of this novel, Roy is unsatisfied with British colonial legacy in India as she is stressing the need to change and challenge the hierarchal structure and rules that have governed the Indian society for years.