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400396

Can the Subaltern Really Speak?: Analyzing the Precarity of the Subaltern in Betty Shamieh's <i>The Machine</i> (2007)

Article

Last updated: 04 Jan 2025

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Tags

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Abstract

The paper examines Betty Shamieh's one-act play The Machine (2007) in the light of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's seminal work "Can the Subaltern Speak?" (1994). The play presents five hybrid poets who are narrating their histories, but face being silenced by the shredding machine. The machine threatens their existence and censors them. The paper analyzes the hybrid identities in the play as precarious lives, as well as their subaltern status in the power structure. Themes like racism, hybridity, precarity, voice, and power are also traced and analyzed. Moreover, the paper highlights the importance of storytelling to narrate the counter-history and to cause change. Hence, the paper, through Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's article on the subaltern, Judith Butler's work on precarity, Homi K. Bhabha's hybridity trace the journey of the hyphenated poets in the play. The paper also highlights the importance of storytelling as a technique used in the play. Finally, the paper traces the attempts of the subaltern's resistance, and it also questions if the subaltern can find a way to be recognizable and heard, and if the subaltern's endeavors for voicing themselves can ever be achievable.

DOI

10.21608/ttaip.2024.400396

Keywords

Race, precarity, subaltern, voice, Hybridity, Arab-American

Authors

First Name

Hagar

Last Name

Eltarabishy

MiddleName

-

Affiliation

Faculty of Al-Alsun (Languages), Ain Shams University, Egypt.

Email

hagar.eltarabishy@alsun.asu.edu.eg

City

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Orcid

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Volume

6

Article Issue

1

Related Issue

52493

Issue Date

2024-12-01

Receive Date

2024-05-16

Publish Date

2024-12-15

Page Start

174

Page End

191

Print ISSN

2636-4069

Online ISSN

2735-3451

Link

https://ttaip.journals.ekb.eg/article_400396.html

Detail API

https://ttaip.journals.ekb.eg/service?article_code=400396

Order

400,396

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

Can the Subaltern Really Speak?: Analyzing the Precarity of the Subaltern in Betty Shamieh's <i>The Machine</i> (2007)

Details

Type

Article

Created At

30 Dec 2024