Poetics and politics of post-partition cultural memories in Kamila Shamsie’s Kartography

ABSTRACT

The term ‘cultural memory’ signifies a shared memory of a group of people inhabiting a common geographical location with a mutual understanding of religion, culture, and society. While fiction, non-fiction, and fine arts are used for archiving, reconfiguring, and reflecting on the communal memories that are historically, culturally, and politically significant, artefacts such as paintings and photographs are used to keep accurate historical records. This study argues that Kamila Shamsie’s novel Kartography (2002) is a literary rendition that fictionalises the most relevant collective memories of post-Partition Pakistan by providing a new perspective on resolving the political, ethnic and sectarian issues in a postcolonial community. The textual analysis of the novel, in association with cultural memory theoretical perspectives, reveals that it is a ‘mythistorical’ text that mythologises the history of Pakistan. The characters have been personified and condensed into ethno-racial stereotypes. The city of Karachi has been reconstructed into a literary chronotope, and human relationships have been used as metaphors to revisit the political mistakes of the past. Hence, this text is not only an artistic mimesis of post-Partition Pakistan’s ‘cultural memory’, but also a promulgation of a cultural change required for a more cohesive and peaceful South Asian regional politics.

KEYWORDS:

• Cultural memory
• Shamsie
• Karachi
• Pakistan
• Bangladesh
• South Asia
• international politics

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The Muslims who migrated from the Indian part of the Subcontinent at the time of Partition (1947) and settled in Karachi, Pakistan are called Muhajirs.

2 A native of the region of Bengal (was a part of Pakistan from 1947 to 1971 and now known as Bangladesh).

3 The Punjabis are inhabitants of the province Punjab, Pakistan.

4 The people from the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), Western Pakistan.

5 Residents of the province of Sindh, Pakistan.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Qurratulaen Liaqat

Qurratulaen Liaqat, Assistant Professor of English Literature, critically analyzes Postcolonial, Post 9/11, and Posthuman discourses of Pakistani Anglophone Fiction. Among her recent publications are ‘Drone fiction, empathy gap and the reader: Mohsin Hamid's short story Terminator: Attack of the Drone’ (2022) Textual Practice, Taylor & Francis; and ‘Nonwestern Posthuman Cyborg Ontologies: The Man-Automobile Relationship in Mohsin Hamid's Fiction’ (2021), Literature and Aesthetics, Sydney Open Journals.

Asia Mukhtar

Asia Mukhtar, Assistant Professor International Relations, writes on South Asian energy security, human security, and regional security. Among her recent publications are Threat Perception : Pakistan's Nuclear Program (2013) and ‘Prospects of Food Security in South Asia: A Substantial Debate’ (2020), Pakistan Social Sciences Review.