“SAME OLD, SAME OLD”

Abstract

Close examination of White Teeth and Brick Lane illustrates why postcolonial frameworks continue to be relevant when discussing “black British literature”. To differing degrees, both these novels maintain postcolonial contexts in their representation of British‐born black and Asian individuals, even as they express the confidence of this new generation. This paper addresses how the tensions between British‐born confidence and familiar tropes of migrant alienation may call into question readings of these novels that emphasize their uniqueness and positivity.

Keywords:

• Black British
• Monica Ali
• Zadie Smith
• postcolonial
• identity
• confidence

Notes

1 Smith, White Teeth 160.

2 I use “black British” to encompass both British‐Asian and black British literature. However, I am aware of the debates surrounding this usage. Where a specifically British‐Asian reference is made, this is indicated by the use of “British‐Asian”.

3 See, for example, Falconer, and Walker.

4 See, for example, Sesay 15–19. Distinctions between “black British” and postcolonial writing can also be found in Nasta and in Stein.

5 Ali is also rewriting these narratives in terms of gender and timescale. However, Buchi Emecheta and Jean Rhys rewrite the male migrant narrative, whilst Rushdie in The Satanic Verses exposes the late 20th‐century Asian experience (Sandhu 106, 127–29).

6 Tebbit’s famous quotation—“The cricket test—which side do they cheer for? [ … ] Are you still looking back to where you came from or where you are?”—is given as an epigraph to the second section of the novel (107).

7 See, for example, Stein’s reading of Diran Adebayo’s Some Kind of Black (18). For the sort of alternative reading I propose, see Upstone.

8 See, for example, Walter, and Gorra.

9 This debate is best characterized by the dialogue between Gilroy’s The Black Atlantic and Chrisman’s Postcolonial Contraventions.

10 For an interesting speculation on this by Adebayo see Alberge.

11 See Hiddleston. The subsequent saga has been well covered, in particular by Maev Kennedy in The Guardian, who likened the response to “The Rushdie Affair”.

12 The position on the “burden of representation” has been well documented by Issac Julien, Kobena Mercer, and Stuart Hall; see Procter’s summary (6–9).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sara Upstone

Sara Upstone is Lecturer in English Literature at Kingston University, Surrey. Her research interests include postcolonial literature, black British and British‐Asian literature. She has published on authors including Wilson Harris, Ben Okri, Salman Rushdie, Toni Morrison, Zadie Smith, and Diran Adebayo.