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277158

Talking Back to the Empire of Science in Postcolonialism: The Autistic Poet Tito Mukhopadhyay as a Model

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Last updated: 04 Jan 2025

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Abstract

This study explores the persistent, and eternal attempt of some of the neurotypicals who belong to the West or those who could be called as "the neurotypical occidentals" to stabilize the differences between them, and "the autistic Third World immigrants". In the era of colonialism, and even after it, there has been multiple paranoiac, and imperialist Western medical debates which have objectified the disabled Third World immigrants including the autistics. This study examines two selected poems by the autistic Third World immigrant, and Hindu poet Tito Mukhopadhyay (1988-  ). His poems, namely, "Misfit" (2010), and "Poem 1" (2013) talk back to the Western empire of science, and its paranoiac medical myths concerning autism. In these poems, Mukhopadhyay portrays his suffering from the elite Western medicine in the United States which has only spotted the autistic Third World immigrants, and pursued to cure, and normalize them. He has realized that such process of normalization is only an imperial strategy to exclude, and objectify him, and his likes because, basically, they do not belong to the West. That is why in these poems, Tito Mukhopadhyay attempts to resist the colonial medical hegemony of the West, and reconfigure some of its myths concerning autism.

DOI

10.21608/ttaip.2022.277158

Keywords

autistic, immigrant, neurotypical, occidental, normalization

Authors

First Name

Dina

Last Name

Shalaby

MiddleName

-

Affiliation

English Department, Faculty of Arts, Menofiya University, Egypt.

Email

dandash_1982@yahoo.com

City

menofiya-Shebeen El Koom

Orcid

-

Volume

4

Article Issue

1

Related Issue

38514

Issue Date

2022-12-01

Receive Date

2022-05-16

Publish Date

2022-12-30

Page Start

127

Page End

142

Print ISSN

2636-4069

Online ISSN

2735-3451

Link

https://ttaip.journals.ekb.eg/article_277158.html

Detail API

https://ttaip.journals.ekb.eg/service?article_code=277158

Order

7

Type

Original Article

Type Code

1,357

Publication Type

Journal

Publication Title

Textual Turnings: An International Peer-Reviewed Journal in English Studies

Publication Link

https://ttaip.journals.ekb.eg/

MainTitle

Talking Back to the Empire of Science in Postcolonialism: The Autistic Poet Tito Mukhopadhyay as a Model

Details

Type

Article

Created At

23 Jan 2023