Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Date of Award

1-1-2019

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

M.A. in English

First Advisor

Leigh Anne Duck

Second Advisor

Kathryn McKee

School

University of Mississippi

Relational Format

dissertation/thesis

Abstract

This collection begins with the premise that colonial relationships manifest in ways beyond exploitation of one nation by another. It relies on the decolonial theory of Walter D. Mignolo in its assumption that imbalances of power in the realms of race gender sexuality and class are fundamentally colonial. With this more expansive understanding of coloniality in mind I examine resistance to colonial exploitation in a range of texts from across the Americas. The first essay in this collection explores the role of the guinea pig in Andean food culture arguing that the continued consumption of guinea pig represents a form of decolonial resistance. The second paper examines the allegory of US imperialism within María Amparo Ruiz de Burton’s novel Who Would Have Thought It?. The third essay scrutinizes solidarity-building in Alfonso Cuarón’s 2019 film Roma. Ultimately this collection argues that an expanded definition of decolonial work is necessary to challenge the expansiveness of colonial thinking.

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