Responding to Neoliberal America: A Jamesonian Reading of David Foster Wallace’s Girl with Curious Hair

Subject Areas : Journal of Language, Culture, and Translation

Golbarg Darvishian ¹ , Javad Yaghoobi Derabi ² , Hassan Shahabi ³

1 - Ph.D. Candidate of English Literature, Department of Language and English Literature, Karaj Branch, Islamic Azad University, Karaj, Iran
2 - Assistant Professor of English Literature, Department of Language and English Literature, Karaj Branch, Islamic Azad University, Karaj, Iran.
3 - Assistant Professor of English Literature, Department of English Literature, Faculty of Foreign Languages, Kerman Branch, Islamic Azad University, Kerman, Iran

Received: 2024-04-09 Accepted : 2024-07-11 Published : 2024-07-11

Keywords: Alienation, History, Identity, Ideology, Power, Reification,

Abstract :

This research intends to read David Foster Wallace’s Girl with Curious Hair from a Jamesonian perspective. In this research, it is argued that the American people’s ideology has been shaped by liberalism and neoliberalism which are the main products of modernity and postmodernity and it is discussed that Wallace, as a critique of neoliberal society rejects the capitalist values that are influencing people’s lives. This research proves that liberalism and neoliberalism are imposing false identities on people to preserve their power. According to Fredric Jameson, historicizing literary texts helps the readers comprehend all layers of meanings in a text. He talks about the alienation and reification of postmodern man caused by the authorities’ use of ideology to preserve power. With ideology, the citizens are turned into consumers who have lost their identity and the postmodern man loses his true identity and faces his death. Wallace’s Girl with Curious Hair can be studied to see how Wallace shows the importance of ideology in the American neoliberal system which can help them preserve power, give people false identities, and turn them into alienated, reified people who only follow the values of a neoliberal society and forget about all the other values.

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