On Reading Grace’s Potiki

TY - JOUR

T1 - On Reading Grace’s Potiki

AU - Knudsen, Eva Rask

N1 - special issue: Thematic Issues about Indigenous Literatures, eds. Angeline O’Neill and Albert Braz, Purdue University Press, 2011

PY - 2011

Y1 - 2011

N2 - In her article "On Reading Grace's Potiki" Eva Rask Knudsen takes as her point of departure the critical impasse of postcolonial analyses of Indigenous literatures and the claim made by some(Indigenous)commentators that non-Indigenous scholars and critics often recolonize the texts they deem to be "postcolonial" because — in their theoretical concern with issues of marginalization and resistance — they overlook(and so overwrite) the specificindigenous knowledges and ontologies that the literatures draw on. Through an analysis of the 1986 novel Potiki by Maori writer Patricia Grace, Rask Knudsen looks in other directions than those catalogued by postcolonial convention. With attention to Maori storytelling procedures and Maori notions of textuality, Rask Knudsen postulates that the non-Indigenous scholar/critic may venture legitimately and purposefully into indigenous territory if the cultural signposts of that territory are acknowledged. As Potiki is structured as a narrative told within the context of a Maori meeting house(whare-nui), a ceremonial site that encourages dialogue and public debate, the novel offers,by extension, a venue also for the scholar's/critic's encounter with indigenous "difference."

AB - In her article "On Reading Grace's Potiki" Eva Rask Knudsen takes as her point of departure the critical impasse of postcolonial analyses of Indigenous literatures and the claim made by some(Indigenous)commentators that non-Indigenous scholars and critics often recolonize the texts they deem to be "postcolonial" because — in their theoretical concern with issues of marginalization and resistance — they overlook(and so overwrite) the specificindigenous knowledges and ontologies that the literatures draw on. Through an analysis of the 1986 novel Potiki by Maori writer Patricia Grace, Rask Knudsen looks in other directions than those catalogued by postcolonial convention. With attention to Maori storytelling procedures and Maori notions of textuality, Rask Knudsen postulates that the non-Indigenous scholar/critic may venture legitimately and purposefully into indigenous territory if the cultural signposts of that territory are acknowledged. As Potiki is structured as a narrative told within the context of a Maori meeting house(whare-nui), a ceremonial site that encourages dialogue and public debate, the novel offers,by extension, a venue also for the scholar's/critic's encounter with indigenous "difference."

KW - Faculty of Humanities

KW - Maori litteratur

KW - Grace (Patricia)

M3 - Journal article

SN - 1481-4374

VL - 13

SP - xx-xx

JO - C L C Web: Comparative Literature and Culture

JF - C L C Web: Comparative Literature and Culture

IS - 2

ER -