Discourses of Difference

by Sara Mills

Discourses of Difference unravels the complexities of writings by British women travellers of the `high colonial' period. Sara Mills examines the relation of women travellers to colonialism, positioned as they were at the site of conflicting discourses: femininity, feminism, and patriarchal imperialism. Using feminist discourse theory, Sara Mills analyses the writings of three women travellers - Alexandra David-Neel, Mary Kingsley and Nina Mazuchelli. Her examination of agency, identity, and the contemporary social environment, is an important and inspiring step forward in post-colonial cultural and literary theory.

Genres: Travel, Theory, Feminism

232 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Sara Mills is a Research Professor at the School of Cultural Studies, Sheffield Hallam University. She has published on feminist linguistic and literary theory and on feminist post-colonial discourse theory.

Reviews

[Zuzanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book makes great points, but the author is repeating some of them a lot as if she constantly needs to remind what is her stance on women’s writing. Which is also a very ambivalent, „safe” stance. Postcolonialism and feminism as perspectives for literary analysis are very tricky methodologies and radical interpretive applications can lead to duplication and deepening of the issues they address which I think that the author was very afraid of doing here.

[Ameya Warde · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent analysis of the discourses of Femininity & Colonialism and how they interact and influence texts from this genre. I feel like it's an important read for any of the academically-inclined fans of Victorian-era travel writing.