PASHTUN IMAGES IN CONTEMPORARY PAKISTANI FICTION IN ENGLISH
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.33195/p86z2628Keywords:
Pashtun Images, prevailing discourses, power narratives, contemporary Pakistani fiction in English, subversiveAbstract
Living in an area that has long been a battlefield where various world powers have
often been at loggerheads, Pashtuns have frequently drawn the attention of several
works of fiction. Yet literary scholars have largely ignored the importance of these
works of fiction looking into the lives of Pashtuns. This paper proposes that from
the times of the Cold War to those of the War on Terror, Pashtun identities have
been clouded by the hegemonic discourses of the contesting global powers, leading
to gaps and silences in their depiction in literature.This paper argues that the
Pashtun images in contemporary Pakistani fiction in English exhibit strong
influences of the dominating narratives; simultaneously, however, they seem to
offer various patterns of subversion of the prevailing power narratives. Despite the
fact that Pashtuns are generally regarded as the most subversive people of South
Asia and that their lands have been regarded significant strategically as well as
geographically, yet they are portrayed as the Others of the mainstream cultural
discourses. This paper aims to highlight the contours of the socio-cultural and
political valuation of Pashtuns in contemporary Pakistani fiction in English.
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