Challenging the literary norm : decolonizing trauma theory through narrating postcolonial biafran trauma in chimamanda nguzie adichie's half of a yellow sun

الملخص EN

This paper endeavors to have a postcolonial reading of Adichie's trauma novel Half of a Yellow Sun.

It suggests that Adichie's novel challenges the Eurocentric literary norm by fictionalizing trauma in a non-Western postcolonial Nigerian context.

Indeed, in the accomplishment of the decolonizing project of trauma theory, several critics have stated that Adichie's reshaping of the field challenges trauma literary norms by transcendentalizing its canonical originality and applying it to document the 1967 to 1970 violent war inflicted upon the Igbo people in post-independent Nigeria.

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Accordingly, since trauma theory is a Eurocentric coinage, Adichie's novel seems to challenge this classical norm by inviting readers to recognize a non-Western distant Nigerian suffering creating, through such an artistic work, a cross-cultural recognition and solidarity.

Several terrifying traumatic realities are therefore experienced by her fully-rounded characters Olanna, Richard and Ugwu.

The aim of this article is to analyze how Adichie challenges the Eurocentric literary norm by applying trauma theory on the postcolonial Biafran context.