• Login
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.
    Brick Lane: A Materialist Reading of the Novel and its Reception 
    •   QMRO Home
    • School of English and Drama
    • Department of English
    • Department of English
    • Brick Lane: A Materialist Reading of the Novel and its Reception
    •   QMRO Home
    • School of English and Drama
    • Department of English
    • Department of English
    • Brick Lane: A Materialist Reading of the Novel and its Reception
    ‌
    ‌

    Browse

    All of QMROCommunities & CollectionsBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsThis CollectionBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjects
    ‌
    ‌

    Administrators only

    Login
    ‌
    ‌

    Statistics

    Most Popular ItemsStatistics by CountryMost Popular Authors

    Brick Lane: A Materialist Reading of the Novel and its Reception

    Volume
    52
    Pagination
    25 - 42 (17)
    Publisher
    Sage
    Publisher URL
    http://rac.sagepub.com/content/52/2/25.short
    DOI
    10.1177/0306396810376335
    Journal
    Race & Class
    Issue
    2
    ISSN
    0306-3968
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Abstract
    Monica Ali’s 2003 novel Brick Lane was feted by the literary establishment but prompted protests on Brick Lane itself. In a now familiar pattern, such protests were generally regarded as reflecting a conflict between creative freedom and religious or cultural minority rights. In this article, the underlying assumptions of such an interpretation are challenged, suggesting that, in a context of racial and religious inequality, where access to the public sphere is unevenly distributed, the protests are better understood as symptomatic of a subordinate social position. The occlusion of social and historical context in the mainstream response to the protests is mirrored in the novel’s obscuring of the power relations between the Bangladeshi community it focuses on and wider British society. It is argued that, by focusing on the patriarchy of that community in isolation, the novel fosters a culturalism that allows it to be read as an allegory of a woman’s individual liberation from community oppression and her journey into the neutral space of an ‘inclusive’ multicultural Britain. The necessity of a collective politics of self-representation is thus elided
    Authors
    AHMED, RS
    URI
    http://rac.sagepub.com/content/52/2/25.short
    http://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/7542
    Collections
    • Department of English [154]
    Language
    English
    Copyright statements
    Copyright © 2010 by Institute of Race Relations
    Twitter iconFollow QMUL on Twitter
    Twitter iconFollow QM Research
    Online on twitter
    Facebook iconLike us on Facebook
    • Site Map
    • Privacy and cookies
    • Disclaimer
    • Accessibility
    • Contacts
    • Intranet
    • Current students

    Modern Slavery Statement

    Queen Mary University of London
    Mile End Road
    London E1 4NS
    Tel: +44 (0)20 7882 5555

    © Queen Mary University of London.