Situating Cypriot Anglophone Literature

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Published: Apr 12, 2019
DOI: https://doi.org/10.12681/syn.16243
Keywords:
Cypriot Anglophone Literature minor literature Cypriot diaspora Alev Adil Miranda Hoplaros Andriana Ierodiaconou
Marios Vasiliou
Cosmopolis Center for Language and Communication
Abstract

This paper situates Cypriot Anglophone literature in relation to local and international literary categories. Discussing Cypriot Anglophone literature, it draws on Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of ‘minor’ literature that minorities construct within major languages. Cypriot Anglophone literature expresses itself in ways characteristic of ‘minor’ literature because it explores deterritorialisation with regard both to local cultural practices and the island’s English literary legacy. While official nationalist discourses on the island marginalise discourses that question nostalgia for ethnic purity and sexual heteronormativity, Cypriot Anglophone literature re-imagines communities beyond ethnic lines and across heteronormal sexual boundaries, enacting an experimental cosmopolitan aesthetic.

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Author Biography
Marios Vasiliou, Cosmopolis Center for Language and Communication
Marios Vasiliou was born in Cyprus in 1974.  He has a PhD in English Literature and Comparative Cultural Studies from the University of Cyprus. He is the director of the Cosmopolis Center for Language and Communication which is based in Nicosia.
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