Exile, Language and Identity Portfolio
- Submitting institution
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The University of Kent
- Unit of assessment
- 27 - English Language and Literature
- Output identifier
- M-2710
- Type
- T - Other
- DOI
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- Location
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- Brief description of type
- A creative writing collection
- Open access status
- -
- Month
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- Year
- 2016
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The materials in this portfolio are submitted as a single item. They consist of an essay that appeared in a scholarly volume (‘We Are Who We Are Not’), a tale that was performed and filmed for YouTube (‘The Migrant’s Tale’, https://youtu.be/laNdyKZ04PM) and published in a volume on Refugee Tales, and a personal memoir that was first presented as a paper and then published in an online repository (‘Closing the Book of Revenge’). The works combine critical analysis and autoethnography as a methodological aspect and as an interventionist dimension of writing. They do so from the intersection of the personal and the political that asserts microhistories within the main historical narrative of exile(s). ‘The Migrant’s Tale’ mixes voices of two exiles — the author, and Aziz, a Syrian refugee — with the voice of Chaucer, himself writing about exile.
All outputs are based on research into the themes of exile, language, and identity, exploring the interchanges between these categories, and how they have shaped the author’s life between 1995 when he went into exile, and today. They are grounded in theoretical and practical research. The practical research was based on interviews conducted with multiple sources, from exiles to artists, and on autoethnographical inquiries into the author’s own experience. The theoretical research was informed by philosophical writings on exile (most notably Said, Adorno, Baudrillard, and Rancière), but also personal essays of Abani, Boym, Shaffer, and others. The purpose of this study is to establish the influence of exile on language, and through language on identity. It explores through practice research how exile from mother-tongue can become a tool for the exploration of style and content, and how such a linguistic switch affects identity.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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