“Almost the Same, but Not Quite”: Postcolonial Malaysian Identity Formation in Lat’s Kampung Boy and Town Boy
Date
2009
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Producer
Director
Performer
Choreographer
Costume Designer
Music
Videographer
Lighting Designer
Set Designer
Crew Member
Funder
Rehearsal Director
Concert Coordinator
Advisor
Moderator
Panelist
Alternative Title
Department
Haverford College. Department of English
Type
Thesis
Original Format
Running Time
File Format
Place of Publication
Date Span
Copyright Date
Award
Language
eng
Note
Table of Contents
Terms of Use
Rights Holder
Access Restrictions
Open Access
Terms of Use
Tripod URL
Identifier
Abstract
Lat’s comic-book autobiographies "Kampung Boy" and "Town Boy" chronicle the author’s birth in a Perak kampung through his family's move to the town of Ipoh. The books are set during the years surrounding Malaysian independence from British colonial rule; Mat's journey towards finding his individual identity as an adolescent parallels the formation of a new Malaysian national identity. Without a colonial force to unite the highly multicultural populace, the Malaysian people had to form new systems of coherence, which, in the words of Homi K. Bhabha, are "almost the same, but not quite" like those of the absent colonizers.