Dog-killings as Anti-Colonial Resistance in Contemporary Fiction from the Global South

Abstract

Notable recent works emerging from postcolonial experiences draw attention to the killings of dogs owned by social elites by agents invested with power to overturn the existing status quo: those in search of a "new order". The article examines five representational novels by JM Coetzee, Chitra Fernando, Kiran Desai, Monique Roffey, and Tishani Doshi that present compelling scenes of violence of the defined nature and probes the history of colonialism that used dogs as agents of control and the underlying traumatic legacies of such attacks. The discussion builds on overlapping historical dispossessions of local communities for whom the elite-owned dog signified an extension of class privilege; which, despite superficial differences, under-writes the chosen novels. Conclusively, it leads to a note on responses and adoptions by the elite class in reacting to their changing social circumstances, and what they generate as hope for post-colonial reconciliation/regeneration.