On The Intertextuality And Self-colonization In The God Of Small Things

Bringing a worldwide literary honor to Arundhati Roy,The God of Small Things has attracted many scholars to study it.This paper,standing on the theoretical standpoint of post colonialism,analyzes more than 20 literary works quoted by The God of Small Things and focuses on the intertextuality of the text to unscramble the multi-culture,which shows a clear ladder-shaped pattern,and explores the phenomenon of Indian self-colonization.Aiming at the cultural colonization existing in India,the paper tries to seek reasons from India itself and analyze the logic of self-colonization.It points out that the cultural colonization during the post-colonial period is not only related to the external powerful culture of empire,but also related to the deep-rooted Indian caste,closely.With the help of Indian internal caste,the ideology of empire carries out a new round of cultural colonization in a gentle and powerful way,under the guise of cultural pluralism and globalization.The introduction sums up the main points as well as the overall features of the Chinese and English papers on The God of Small Things,describing the blank fields briefly and the theoretical standpoint of post colonialism.The first chapter puts forward three forms of intertextuality contained in the novel.The ladder-shaped status of the three kinds of culture represented by European and American literature,Indian epic,and Veda mythology reflects the phenomenon of cultural colonization during the early days after Indian independence.The second chapter points out the cultural colonization existing in the contemporary India is different from the colonization during the colonial period,which owns inner logic of control,occupation,and annexation.The imperial discourse presents a kind of superficial dissonance,and the powerful annexation model of empire no longer exists.The power of self-colonization in the third world countries originates from the countries themselves and belongs to self-colonialism.Chapter three analyzes the logic and essence of Indian self-colonization with the help of post-colonialism,and indicates that originates from Indian deeply rooted caste system.The Empire's ideology takes the caste as the internal motive force to perform a new round of cultural colonization under the mask of globalization and cultural pluralism,in order to consolidate its own hegemony.With analysis on the novel rhetoric,the fourth chapter reveals the fragmented signifier network constructed by intertextuality is based on lies and deceit.The dislocation between the protagonist's story identity and the discourse identity,the continuous involvement of the narrator's words and the protagonist's silence show detachment and distance to the fragmented signifier network,which presents the novel's ironic and subversive attitude towards self-colonization.The author tries to escape from the marginality and comprehensibility imposed by the outside world and to create her own time as well as space.The words are euphemistic but profound.The paper points out that in the post-colonial era,European and American empires execute internal cultural exchange in the third world under the name of cultural diversity,while taking advantage of Indian caste system to force suppression of thoughts.The tragedy of the Indian society originates from the inability to abolish the deep-rooted caste system,which makes India occupy an active position in the new round of colonial operations of the empire and form a cultural phenomenon of self-colonialism.The God of Small Things ridicules the cacophony of cultural colonialism through the protagonists' silence.At the same time,the novel tries to wake up confused India lost in self-colonialism,relying on the rebellion and pursuit of Indian inner self.The paper provides a new perspective and direction for reconsidering the cultural phenomenon of the third world under the globalization background and alerting the new round of cultural colonization from the empire.It also reveals the importance to protect local culture,establish national confidence in multi-culture,besides on guard against the imperceptible cultural colonization of the western world.