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Colonialism/Postcolonialism Ania Loomba London: Routledge, 1998 ISBN 0-415-12809-9
Key Concepts in Postcolonial Studies Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin London: Routledge, 1998 ISBN 0-415-15304-2
As is evident from the respective titles of these two recent additions to the field of post-colonial studies, the very term 'postcolonial' or `post-colonial' is a contested one. To hyphenate or not to hyphenate; that is (one of) the question(s). Although a seemingly trivial point, it does point toward a significant ambiguity in the term. That is, what exactly does the 'post' in post-colonial signify? Is it an indicator of temporal succession-that is, the period after colonialism is over-or does it instead indicate that colonialism has been supplanted in an ideological sense? And further, as Kwame Anthony Appiah has asked, is the 'post' in 'postcolonial' the 'post' in 'postmodern'? Loomba devotes part of her opening chapter to defining the crucial terms `colonialism,' 'imperialism,' 'neo-colonialism' and 'postcolonialism' and there are entries devoted to each of these terms in the Ashcroft, Griffiths and Tiffin volume also. Each of these books sets out to provide some assistance to the student or researcher working in the field of post-colonialism, although they perform different functions within that overall rubric.
Loomba's Colonialism/Postcolonialism is another addition to the spate of introductory surveys of post-colonial theory, which have appeared...