5.5 Contemporary Global Literature
Migration literature, climate fiction, and global voices.
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Contemporary Global Literature
The twenty-first century has seen an explosion of literary voices from around the world writing in English. The boundaries between "postcolonial literature," "world literature," and "English literature" have become increasingly blurred as writers move between countries, write from multiple cultural perspectives, and address global rather than purely national concerns.
Contemporary global literature in English reflects the realities of our interconnected world: mass migration, climate change, digital communication, economic globalization, and the persistent legacies of colonialism and inequality. The authors emerging today do not fit neatly into national literary traditions. They are citizens of multiple cultures, and their literature reflects this complexity.
This chapter surveys some of the most important trends and voices in contemporary global literature in English.
Migration Literature
Migration literature is writing that deals with the experience of moving from one country or culture to another. It has become one of the most significant literary categories of the twenty-first century, reflecting a world in which over 280 million people live outside their country of birth.
Key characteristics:
- Explores the physical and psychological journey of leaving home
- Examines the tension between assimilation and cultural preservation
- Often features multilingual characters who code-switch between languages
- Addresses the bureaucratic, legal, and emotional dimensions of immigration
- Questions concepts of home, belonging, and national identity
Distinguished from earlier diaspora literature:
While diaspora literature often focused on communities settled in a new country, contemporary migration literature frequently depicts the journey itself -- the dangerous crossings, the refugee camps, the liminal spaces between departure and arrival.
Key contemporary authors: Mohsin Hamid, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Viet Thanh Nguyen, NoViolet Bulawayo, Valeria Luiselli
Migration Literature: The Defining Genre of Our Time
Migration has arguably become the defining human experience of the twenty-first century. Wars in Syria, Afghanistan, and Ukraine; economic hardship in parts of Africa and Latin America; climate-driven displacement across the Global South -- these forces have created the largest movement of people in human history. Literature has responded to this reality with urgency and compassion.
Mohsin Hamid: Exit West (2017)
The Pakistani-British author Mohsin Hamid reimagined the migration narrative in Exit West, a novel in which magical doors suddenly appear around the world, allowing people to walk from one country to another instantly. By removing the dangerous physical journey, Hamid focuses on the emotional and social dimensions of migration: the decision to leave, the loss of the familiar, the challenge of building a new life, and the question of who "deserves" to live where.
NoViolet Bulawayo: We Need New Names (2013)
The Zimbabwean-American writer NoViolet Bulawayo tells the story of a young girl named Darling who grows up in a shantytown in Zimbabwe before moving to the United States. The novel captures both the vibrant energy of childhood in difficult circumstances and the disorienting loneliness of immigration. Bulawayo writes in a distinctive voice that blends African English with American slang, reflecting her protagonist's hybrid identity.
Viet Thanh Nguyen: The Sympathizer (2015)
This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by a Vietnamese-American author is narrated by a communist spy who flees to the United States after the fall of Saigon in 1975. The novel is simultaneously a spy thriller, a satire of American culture, and a meditation on the refugee experience. It challenges the "grateful immigrant" narrative by presenting a protagonist who is deeply ambivalent about his adopted country.
✏️Example: Magical Realism as a Tool for Exploring Migration
How does Mohsin Hamid use magical doors in Exit West to change the way we think about migration?
In Exit West, magical doors appear that allow people to walk instantly from war-torn cities to new countries. This fantastical device serves several important literary purposes:
1. It removes the dangerous journey
By eliminating the perilous Mediterranean crossings and desert treks, Hamid focuses attention on what comes before and after the journey -- the agonizing decision to leave and the challenge of arrival.
2. It universalizes the experience
The doors make migration available to everyone, not just those who can afford smugglers or have the right connections. This forces readers to consider: if everyone could migrate, would we? What would the world look like?
3. It reveals attitudes toward migrants
The host countries' reactions to the doors -- building walls, deploying armies, negotiating -- mirror real-world responses to migration, but stripped of the "border security" justifications that usually accompany them.
4. It emphasizes that migration is a human constant
The novel suggests that all humans are migrants in a sense -- we all move through life, leaving behind versions of ourselves and the places we have known.
📝Oppgave 1
What distinguishes contemporary migration literature from earlier diaspora literature?
Climate Fiction: Literature for a Warming World
A rapidly growing literary category, climate fiction (often abbreviated as "cli-fi") addresses the causes and consequences of climate change. As the climate crisis has intensified, writers have increasingly turned to fiction as a way of making the abstract reality of global warming feel personal and urgent.
Why Climate Fiction Matters
Scientific reports and statistics about rising temperatures and sea levels can feel abstract and distant. Fiction has the power to make these realities feel immediate and personal by showing how climate change affects individual lives, communities, and relationships. A novel about a family losing their home to rising seas creates emotional engagement that a graph cannot.
Key Works
Amitav Ghosh: The Great Derangement (2016)
This non-fiction work by the Indian writer Amitav Ghosh argues that the literary establishment has been strangely reluctant to engage with climate change. He calls on writers to address the climate crisis as the defining issue of our time, suggesting that future generations will look back at our era's literature and wonder at its silence on the most important issue it faced.
Richard Powers: The Overstory (2018)
This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel interweaves the stories of nine characters whose lives are transformed by trees. It is a monumental work about humanity's relationship with the natural world and the ecological destruction being wrought by short-sighted economic priorities.
Jenny Offill: Weather (2020)
A librarian in New York becomes overwhelmed by climate anxiety while trying to maintain her ordinary life. The novel captures the psychological experience of living in a time of ecological crisis -- the way climate dread seeps into everyday existence.
Climate Fiction (Cli-Fi)
Climate fiction (cli-fi) is a genre of literature that deals with the effects of climate change and environmental destruction on human societies. It can be set in the present, near future, or distant future.
Types of cli-fi:
- Speculative/dystopian: Set in a future devastated by climate change (e.g., flooded cities, uninhabitable regions)
- Contemporary realism: Set in the present, depicting current climate impacts on communities and individuals
- Historical: Looking at past ecological changes and drawing parallels to the present
- Activist: Literature explicitly designed to inspire environmental action
Key themes:
- The relationship between humans and the natural world
- Environmental justice -- how climate change disproportionately affects the poor and the Global South
- The tension between economic growth and ecological sustainability
- Climate anxiety and its psychological effects
- The failure of political systems to address the crisis
Important distinction: Climate fiction is not the same as science fiction. While sci-fi often imagines speculative technologies and distant futures, cli-fi typically engages with scientifically grounded scenarios and near-term realities.
📝Oppgave 2
According to Amitav Ghosh in The Great Derangement, what has been the literary establishment's main failing regarding climate change?
Global Voices Today
Contemporary English-language literature is more diverse and geographically dispersed than ever before. Some of the most exciting literary voices today come from parts of the world that were previously underrepresented in global literary culture.
Ocean Vuong (born 1988), Vietnam/USA
A Vietnamese-American poet and novelist, Vuong's debut novel On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (2019) is written as a letter from a Vietnamese-American son to his illiterate mother. It explores the refugee experience, intergenerational trauma, queerness, and the power of language to bridge the gaps between cultures and generations.
Akwaeke Emezi (born 1987), Nigeria/USA
Emezi, who identifies as non-binary and ogbanje (an Igbo spirit), writes novels that blend Nigerian mythology with contemporary issues of gender, identity, and belonging. Freshwater (2018) reimagines the ogbanje tradition in a modern American university setting.
Leila Aboulela (born 1964), Sudan/UK
Aboulela writes about Muslim identity and faith in a secular Western world, a perspective that is often absent from mainstream English-language literature. Her novels, including Minaret (2005) and Bird Summons (2019), present Islam not as a political issue but as a lived spiritual experience.
What Connects These Voices
Despite their diverse backgrounds, these contemporary writers share certain characteristics:
- They write across cultures, refusing to be confined to a single national tradition
- They challenge Western literary conventions by incorporating non-Western storytelling forms
- They address global issues (migration, identity, environment) while grounding their stories in specific, local experiences
- They expand the range of what English-language literature can be and who it can represent
📝Oppgave 3
Choose one of the three contemporary authors discussed in the "Global Voices Today" section (Ocean Vuong, Akwaeke Emezi, or Leila Aboulela). In 150-200 words, explain why their particular perspective is important for contemporary English-language literature. What voice or experience do they bring that might otherwise be absent?
Summary
Contemporary global literature in English reflects a world of unprecedented movement, connection, and crisis:
- Migration literature has emerged as perhaps the defining genre of the twenty-first century, with writers like Mohsin Hamid, NoViolet Bulawayo, and Viet Thanh Nguyen exploring the physical, emotional, and political dimensions of human movement across borders.
- Climate fiction is a rapidly growing literary category that makes the abstract reality of climate change feel personal and urgent, challenging what Amitav Ghosh calls literature's "great derangement" -- its strange reluctance to address the defining crisis of our era.
- New global voices from previously underrepresented communities are expanding the range of English-language literature, bringing perspectives rooted in Vietnamese refugee experience, Igbo spirituality, Muslim faith, and many other traditions.
What unites these diverse writers is their refusal to be confined by national borders or literary conventions. They write across cultures, incorporate non-Western storytelling forms, and use the English language in ways that reflect their multilingual, multicultural realities. They are creating a genuinely global literature for a genuinely global age.
📝Oppgave 4
Which of the following best describes "cli-fi" (climate fiction)?
📝Oppgave 5
Reflect on the entire section on "Literature from the English-Speaking World" (chapters 5.1-5.5). Choose two authors from different chapters and write 200-250 words comparing how they use the English language to express their cultural identity. Consider: How does their use of English differ from standard British or American English? What does their style tell us about their cultural background and perspective?