SALMAN RUSHDIE’S MIGRANCY AS A LITERARY FORM OF GIORGIO AGAMBEN’S PROFANATION

Abstract

This paper addresses Salman Rushdie’s idea of migrancy as a literary version of Giorgio  Agamben’s notion of profanation. Contrary to Agamben, who refers to profanation based  on the sacred man (homo sacer), Rushdie’s work shows that profanation or impurity is at hand through migrancy. It displays, surveys, and discusses migrancy as an ambivalent  reality which does not only embody the potential of uplifting human condition, but also  reinforces and nourishes ostracisms. This paper argues for continuous cultural negotiation 
and renewal required by migratory rationality to uplift life quality in human condition. Theoretically, an intersectional approach that looks at “relationships among seemingly 
different phenomena” is convoked to examine the intellectual affiliations between Rushdie and Agamben. Rushdie being a writer and Agamben a philosopher, the paper implicitly 
pleas for the necessary reinforcement of connections between all subjects, like literature  and philosophy, in the field of humanities in academia. The study itself consists of three sections. The first section deals with the significance of migrancy in Rushdie’s work. The  second section deals with Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses. It addresses the relationship  existing between migrancy and impurity in the novel. It also displays consequences of common perceptions about impurity in today’s cultural or ideological constellations. The  last section deals with the scholarly affiliation of Rushdie’s impurity with Agamben’s profanation. It ends with discussion of impurity/profanation’s prospects in the ‘community  to come.’