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Prehistories of the Postcolonial: On Philosophy, Politics, and Polemic in Timothy Brennan’s Borrowed Light
- Journal of Modern Literature
- Indiana University Press
- Volume 38, Number 4, Summer 2015
- pp. 168-177
- 10.2979/jmodelite.38.4.168
- Review
- Additional Information
Timothy Brennan’s Borrowed Light is a wide-ranging critique of contemporary postcolonial theory by way of a return to intellectual history. Brennan counter-poses a tradition of institutional commitment, systemic thought, and polemic in Vico and Hegel to the interest in subjectivity, fragments, and language games found in Nietzsche and Bataille. He suggests that though the latter has been ascendant since the late 80s, the former school of thought in fact has been the key to overturning colonialism in the past and continues to be so today. This review critically appraises Brennan’s challenging work.