Lab Activity: Gun Island
Research Activity
Mythification of history and historicisation
Prompt 1: Create a table showing each source with its publication dates,author credentials,and whether its primary source, secondary analysis or opinion piece.
Prompt 2: Which of these sources are more frequently cited or referenced by other sources in this notebook ?
Based on the sources provided in this notebook, the most frequently cross-referenced materials are those associated with Prof. Dilip Barad and the Department of English at Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University (MKBU).
While the other academic articles are independent studies that rarely cite one another, the Barad/MKBU sources function as a connected educational network.
The MKBU / Dilip Barad Citation Network
The following sources are interlinked through direct mentions, links, and shared curriculum:
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Dilip Barad’s Teacher Blog [Source 3]: This source acts as a central hub for the other MKBU materials. It explicitly directs readers to the Thematic Study PPTX [Source 4] and the YouTube Lecture Series [Source 6] for further study.
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Gun Island Thematic Study PPTX [Source 4]: This presentation specifically recommends "Related Content" produced by the Department of English MKBU, which is the same entity responsible for the YouTube transcript [Source 6].
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YouTube Lecture Transcript [Source 6]: The speaker in this transcript references "our thematic study of this novel," which aligns with the structure and titles found in Barad’s blog and PPTX.
Subject vs. Source Citations
It is important to distinguish between the subject of the notebook and the sources within it:
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Amitav Ghosh: Every single source in this notebook cites or references Amitav Ghosh’s books, specifically Gun Island and The Great Derangement. However, because Ghosh’s original texts are not included as source documents in this notebook, they are considered external references rather than cross-referenced notebook sources.
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Independent Academic Sources: The research papers by Dr. Santosh Kumar [Source 2], Kalaivani & Selvi [Source 5], Ashwarya Samkaria [Source 7], and Keni & Mahisha [Source 8] are independent analyses. They do not cite the other blog posts or transcripts found in this notebook, preferring instead to reference established scholars like Stacy Alaimo, Dipesh Chakrabarty, and Joseph Campbell.
Summary of Frequent Internal References
| Source Entity | Internal References Found In... |
|---|---|
| Prof. Dilip Barad / MKBU | Barad’s Blog, MKBU YouTube Transcript, Slideshare PPTX |
| Thematic Study Materials | Directly cross-linked between Source 3, Source 4, and Source 6 |
Prompt 3: Summarize the primary perspective of the top five most substantial sources
The five most substantial sources in this collection offer complementary analyses of Amitav Ghosh’s work, primarily focusing on how myth, history, and the climate crisis intersect to challenge modern Western rationalism.
1. Forrest Brown: The Role of Storytelling
Forrest Brown’s perspective centers on how stories act as vital tools for imagining a future in the face of the climate emergency.
Response to Realism: He views Gun Island as a direct response to the "Great Derangement," a term for the failure of modern realist literature to address the "wild, unthinkable" realities of climate change.
Deliverance through the Past: Brown argues that Ghosh suggests our "deliverance lies not in the future but in the past," specifically in ancient stories that were written when humans lived in closer connection to the Earth.
Colonial Roots: He emphasizes that the current refugee crisis is a direct consequence of centuries of European colonial exploitation of natural resources.
2. Dr. Santosh Kumar: Myth as a Narrative Framework
Dr. Kumar frames the novel as a "critical intervention in Anthropocene literature" that uses myth to make planetary-scale crises intelligible.
Reactivation of Legend: He argues that Ghosh "reactivates" Bengali folk legends not as mere metaphors but as active narrative frameworks to interpret freak weather and mass migrations.
The Refugee/Wanderer Link: A primary focus is the connection between the mythological exile of the "wanderer" and the contemporary plight of the "refugee," portraying climate displacement as a deep historical pattern.
Interspecies Kinship: Kumar highlights the "de-centering" of human protagonists, giving narrative weight to "more-than-human" actors like swarming spiders and dolphins.
3. Prof. Dilip Barad: Historification and Etymology
Prof. Barad’s perspective is pedagogical, focusing on the specific literary techniques Ghosh uses to blend reality and folklore.
Historification of Myth: He defines this as setting actions in the past to draw parallels with contemporary events, enabling a "thinking response" from the reader.
Etymological Mystery: Barad places heavy emphasis on Ghosh’s use of language, noting that words—like sailors—are travelers that point to the "intermeshing of cultures" over ages.
Genre Study: He positions the work firmly within "Cli-fi" (Climate Fiction), a genre meant to "wake people up" through the power of urgent storytelling.
4. Kalaivani & Selvi: Myth as an Epistemological Tool
These scholars view myth as a "trans-historical archive" and a vital mode of knowledge for understanding ecological crises.
Departure from Modernism: They distinguish Ghosh from modernists like T.S. Eliot or James Joyce; while modernists used myth to critique cultural decay, Ghosh uses it for "ethical urgency" and "planetary survival".
Deconstructing Rationalism: Their perspective validates myth as a "lived, phenomenological reality" that captures what linear history cannot, such as diasporic trauma and nonhuman interrelations.
A Survival Manual: Ultimately, they argue the Gun Merchant’s tale serves as a "survival manual" for marginalized communities facing "slow violence".
5. Ashwarya Samkaria: Post-Anthropocentric Relationality
Samkaria offers a "post-anthropocentric" reading, focusing on how the novel blurs the borders between the human and nonhuman worlds.
Trans-corporeality: The primary perspective here is that human bodies are "ultimately inseparable from the environment," creating a state of "inescapable interconnectedness" with all matter.
Nonhuman Agency: Samkaria studies how Ghosh recognizes the "agentic capacities" of the nonhuman, presenting animals and ecosystems not as background objects but as storied subjects with their own voices.
Challenging Dualism: The source argues that the myth of Manasa Devi serves to dismantle the "nature-culture dualism" promoted by Western modernity.
Prompt 4: Identify ‘Research Gap’ for further research in this area.
Application of Indian Poetics (Rasa Theory)
While Prof. Dilip Barad’s blog provides a detailed overview of Rasa Theory—the Indian concept of aesthetic flavor involving sentiments like Bhayānakam (terror) and Adbhutam (wonder)—none of the academic research papers in this collection explicitly use this framework to analyze Gun Island.
• The Gap: Most scholars use Western theoretical lenses, such as Campbell’s "Hero’s Journey" or Lévi-Strauss’s structuralism.
• Further Research: A study could evaluate how the "Navarasa" (nine rasas) are evoked in climate fiction to create a "thinking response" in the reader, rather than just using the Western "Cli-fi" definitions.
Digital Literary Cartography
One of the sources recommends a presentation on studying Gun Island through the lens of Digital Literary Cartography, but the actual methodology and findings are not detailed in the substantial research papers.
• The Gap: The sources discuss "mythic geographies" and the "intermeshing of cultures," but they do so through traditional literary analysis.
• Further Research: There is a gap for research that uses GIS mapping or digital tools to track the Gun Merchant’s 17th-century route against modern climate-induced migration patterns, providing a visual data-driven companion to Ghosh’s narrative.
Comparative Modern Climate Fiction (Cli-Fi)
Scholars in these sources frequently compare Ghosh to 20th-century modernists like T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, and Toni Morrison to highlight his use of myth.
• The Gap: There is very little comparative analysis between Ghosh and his contemporaries writing within the "ecological weird" or speculative fiction genres.
• Further Research: Future research could compare Gun Island with other modern climate novels (e.g., works by Richard Powers or Kim Stanley Robinson) to see if the "reactivation of myth" is a unique postcolonial strategy or a broader trend in the global Anthropocene.
Feminist Ecocriticism and Goddess Agency
The sources frame the goddess Manasa Devi as a "mediator" or a "trope for trade" and "nature’s power".
• The Gap: While the "nature-culture dualism" is discussed, there is a lack of deep feminist ecocritical analysis regarding why the agency of the environment is personified specifically as a female deity who uses "divine fury" to check male "profit motives".
• Further Research: A study could explore the gendered dimensions of Manasa Devi’s "wrath" and how it intersects with the subaltern status of characters like Moyna and Lubna.
Machine Translation and Global Semiotics
Prof. Barad raises a "Point to Ponder" regarding how Machine Translation (Google Translate) helps readers navigate the Italian and Bengali words that Ghosh leaves untranslated.
• The Gap: The research papers focus on "philological decoding" as a detective story but do not address the technological experience of the modern reader.
• Further Research: Research could examine how the "polyphony of language" in the Anthropocene is mediated by AI and digital translation tools, and whether this enhances or flattens the "etymological mystery" Ghosh intends to create.
Prompt 5: Draft literature review ending with hypotheses and research questions pertaining to this research gap.
This literature review examines the scholarly landscape surrounding Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island, focusing on how the novel utilizes myth and migration to address the climate crisis, before proposing a new research direction through the lens of Indian Poetics (Rasa Theory).
Literature Review: Myth, Migration, and the Anthropocene
Current scholarship on Gun Island identifies it as a critical intervention in Anthropocene literature, designed to address the "Great Derangement"—the failure of modern realist fiction to capture the "wild, unthinkable" realities of climate change.
1. The Reactivation of Myth
The primary focus of recent research is Ghosh's "reactivation" of the Bengali legend of Manasa Devi and the Gun Merchant. Scholars argue that Ghosh uses myth not as a mere metaphor but as an active narrative framework to make planetary disruption intelligible.
- Historification: Researchers like Dilip Barad utilize Bertolt Brecht’s concept of "historification"—setting action in the past to draw parallels with contemporary events—to explain how Ghosh encourages a "thinking response" in the reader.
- Epistemological Tool: Myth is framed as a "survival manual" or a "trans-historical archive" that preserves ecological memories erased by official history.
2. Migrant Ecologies and (B)orders
A significant body of work explores the link between the mythological "wanderer" and the contemporary "climate refugee".
- Trans-corporeality: Ashwarya Samkaria emphasizes trans-corporeality, arguing that human bodies in the novel are inseparable from their environment, which blurs the man-made borders of the nation-state.
- Colonial Roots: Scholarship highlights that the current refugee crisis is presented as a direct consequence of European colonial exploitation of the planet’s natural resources.
3. Interspecies Kinship and the Uncanny
Scholars have noted that the novel "de-centers" the human protagonist, giving narrative agency to "more-than-human" actors like spiders, dolphins, and king cobras. This creates an experience of the uncanny, where the familiar environment becomes unsettlingly responsive to human action.
The Research Gap: Indian Poetics (Rasa Theory)
While current research extensively applies Western frameworks—such as Lévi-Strauss’s structuralism, Campbell’s hero’s journey, and ecocriticism—there is a notable absence of deep analysis using Indian Poetics, specifically Rasa Theory.
Prof. Dilip Barad defines Rasa as an "aesthetic flavor" or "sentiment" intended to transport an audience into a parallel reality where they reflect on spiritual and moral questions. Although the sources define the Navarasa (the nine sentiments), they do not apply them to analyze the reader's emotional and ethical journey through the climate catastrophes in Gun Island.
Hypotheses
- H1: The "ecological weird" and "uncanny" elements of the novel are specifically constructed to evoke Bhayānakam (terror/horror) and Adbhutam (wonder/amazement), leading to a "thinking response" that Western "Cli-Fi" definitions alone cannot fully explain.
- H2: The novel’s conclusion achieves a state of Śāntam (peace/tranquility), functioning as the "string of a jeweled necklace" that gives form to the preceding chaotic rasas, thereby facilitating the "deliverance" through the past that the protagonist seeks.
Research Questions
- How does the interplay between Bhayānakam (terror) and Kāruṇyam (compassion) in the portrayal of climate refugees (e.g., Rafi and Tipu) shift the reader’s ethical orientation toward the Anthropocene?
- In what ways does the Adbhutam (wonder) triggered by the "miracle" in the Venetian lagoon serve as a "moral technology of resilience" for the reader?
- To what extent does Ghosh’s use of historification align with the traditional goals of Rasa Theory to transport the audience into a "parallel reality" for moral reflection?
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