File spoon-archives/postcolonial.archive/postcolonial_1999/postcolonial.9911, message 79


Date: Fri, 19 Nov 1999 10:23:27 -0500
Subject: Re: weird nitpicking (was: syllabus proposal for undergrad course)
From: "Lisa Anne McNee" <lm23-AT-qsilver.queensu.ca>


A point well taken--but I think that the subject is a bit more complicated
(as you suggest at the end of your message). The contrast between the
positions taken by Ngugi and Achebe suggests as much as well. I also find it
problematic to assume that anglophones or francophones usually speak English
or French as their mother tongue. Lisa
----------
>From: Bram Dov Abramson <bram-AT-dojo.tao.ca>
>To: postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Subject: weird nitpicking (was: syllabus proposal for undergrad course)
>Date: Thu, Nov 18, 1999, 12:51 PM
>

>Something that has always bugged me, for reasons unfathomable.
>
>> From: "Lisa Anne McNee" <lm23-AT-qsilver.queensu.ca>
>> 
>> The course sounds interesting as is. I'm assuming you're teaching the course
>> in an English department, as you have only mentioned anglophone works.
>
>Shouldn't this be "English-language" works, not "anglophone"?  Anglophone,
>as I understand it, refers to the language spoken by (usu. mother tongue
>of) a human being.  Texts can only be English-language or French-language
>or whatever -- to call them Anglophone or Francophone (hispanophone,
>lusophone, and on and on) would be to discuss the author's cultural
>background, which isn't usually the point, and can't necessarily be
>inferred from the language in which the book is written.
>
>(To call them anglophone, francophone, etc. might also be to imply
>something else, eg that the work is one taken up within & familiar to
>communities of English-speakers [anglophones], French-speakers
>[francophones], etc.  But in all cases, the word referes to speaking
>subjects.)
>
>Example: "Heart of Darkness" is an English-language book.  Whether or not
>it is an anglophone book is a more complicated question.
>
>No?
>
>cheers
>Bram
>
>
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>


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