ANALYZING THE RE-ORIENTALIST PERSPECTIVES IN SELECTED PAKISTANI DIASPORIC ANGLOPHONE FICTION

Abstract

This research explores the concept of re-orientalism, which corresponds to the approach used by the Pakistani diasporic writers as a mechanism to create an oversimplified and imperial representation of their homeland. This research is qualitative in nature. In contrast to Orientalism, re-orientalism is interested in how the East has been commodified into a consumption spectacle for Western audiences by writers from the East. The process of appropriating and imitating their native culture and areas by the culturally appropriating and imitating groups is provoking a simulated truth over Pakistani diasporic writers, portraying a holistic picture of Pakistan in the 21st century. In this research, the question is how the West promotes such authors as insiders, but in the actual sense, they are outsiders since they have lost their roots. The critical analysis of the chosen text highlights that the modern Pakistani narrative must be radically epistemically detached from the colonial grid of power and aims at underlining the formation of plurality of knowledge systems and the dismantling of knowledge-based and cultural domination among different epistemologies.