Abstract
In dialogue with recent criticism on secularism and politics of literature, this essay first establishes the relationship between spatiality and temporality in creating mobility, then explicates mobility in secular criticism and shows how secular criticism offers pluralist/inclusive perspectives in the example of the dystopian novel 2084 La Fin du Monde. Critics of Boualem’s alleged radical secularism have crucially missed spatial and temporal elements of the novel’s form that inform its political position. In particular, through careful analysis of the spatio-temporal politics of the border and the museum, this study elucidates Boualem’s powerful assertion of the human right to non-exclusionary mobility, an assertion which is no less forceful for its being disarmingly open-ended and inclusive.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Availability of data and material
(data transparency): Not applicable.
Code Availability
(software application or custom code): Not applicable.
References
Anzaldúa, G. (2012). Borderlands: The new mestiza = La frontera – 4th. ed. / 25th. anniversary edition. Aunt Lute Books.
Atwood, M. E. (1998). The handmaid’s tale. Anchor Books.
Balibar, É. (2011). Cosmopolitanism and secularism: Controversial legacies and prospective interrogations. Grey Room, 44, 7–25. Retrieved 29 Jan. 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/41236823
Barrows, A. (2016). Time, literature, and cartography after the spatial turn: The chronometric imaginary. Palgrave Macmillan.
Booker, M. K. (2019). The dystopian impulse in modern literature: Fiction as social criticism. Greenwood.
Boyagoda, R. (2017). Big mullah. First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life, (278), 64. Retrieved 20 January 2020, from https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A515578790/AONE?u=anon~da471c17&sid=googleScholar&xid=18c80423
Deleger, O. (2019). A dystopia in the service of fluctuating frontiers: Sansal boualem’s 2084 the end of the world. Romance E-Review, 22. Retrieved from https://ejournals.bc.edu/index.php/romance/article/view/11285
Faichney, E., & Maher, L.-J. (2018). Review of (Un)ethical futures: Utopias, dystopias and science fiction. Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction, 47(1),108-112. Retrieved from: https://fanac.org/fanzines/Foundation/Foundation129.pdf
Fieu, R. P. (2017). De 1984 à 2084: Mutations de la peur totalitaire dans la dystopie européenne. Carnets, Deuxième série – 11 | 2017, posted on 30 November 2017, Retrieved 30 January 2020, from: http://journals.openedition.org/carnets/2344
Foucault, M., Rabinow, P., & Rose, N. (2003). The essential Foucault: Selections from the essential works of Foucault, 1954–1984. New Press.
Gourgouris, S. (2013). Lessons in secular criticism. Fordham University Press.
Humaydan, I. (2016). Boualem sansal′s novel 2084: The end of the world: Tyranny of sorts. Qantara.de. 6 June 2016. Retrieved January 2020, from https://en.qantara.de/content/boualem-sansals-novel-2084-the-end-of-the-world-tyranny-of-sorts
Lefebvre, H. (2004). Rhythmanalysis: space, time and everyday life.Continuum.
Levitas, R. (2014). Utopia as method: The imaginary reconstruction of society. Palgrave Macmillan.
Marker, C. (Director). (1962). La jetee: Sans soleil. Argos Films
Moylan, T. (2014). Demand the impossible: Science fiction and the utopian imagination. Peter Lang.
Nanni, G. (2012). The colonisation of time: Ritual, routine and resistance in the British Empire. Manchester University Press.
Orwell, G. (1954). 1984. Penguin.
Said, E. W. (1983). The world, the text, and the critic. Harvard University Press.
Sansal, B. (2018). 2084: La fin du monde. Editions Gallimard.
Sansal, B. (2017). 2084: The end of the world. Europa Editions.
Schneider, R. (2016). Rejecting fear, resisting islam. Exberliner.com, 1 Sept. 2016. Retrieved 10 January 2020, from www.exberliner.com/features/people/rejecting-fear-resisting-islam
Treacy, C. (2016). 2084: La fin du monde, The Journal of North African Studies, 21(3), 512–514, Retrieved 10 January 2020, from 10.1080/13629387.2016.1161265. Palgrave Macmillan.
Funding
(information that explains whether and by whom the research was supported): Not applicable.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflicts of interest/Competing interests
(include appropriate disclosures): Not applicable.
Ethics approval
(include appropriate approvals or waivers): Not applicable.
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Ulus, H.E. Secular criticism in Dystopia: Time, Space, and mobility in Boualem’s 2084 La Fin du Monde. Neohelicon 49, 403–418 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11059-022-00631-3
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11059-022-00631-3