Hydro-Criticism, Symbolism and the Use of Water Imagery in Joe Ushie's Poetry
Abstract
Joe Ushie, a strong voice of contemporary Nigerian poetry in English
emerged in the late 1980s. He has written extensively on the
environment, socio-political, cultural, economic and postcolonial
predicaments of the contemporary Nigerian society. Scholars have
analysed his preoccupations fromthe realities of contemporary society
influenced by modern technology, capitalism and globalisation.
However, Ushie's captivating inquiry into eco-criticism especially as it
affects hydro-criticism with special reference to the use of imagery and
symbolism of water bodies in his local environment, needs more critical
focus. Hydro-criticism, an intellectual construct that captures and
explores how human activities impact negatively on the ozone layer,
which results into maritime and oceanic spin, whirl, turn, rise or growth
in the sea level, is applied as a theoretical anchor to evaluate
Ushie'sdeployment of water imagery and symbolism in dealing with and two major interventions. The first one is how aqueous locations become sites of queer community and punishment while registering associations with the fluid female body, the second deals with how human and nonhuman intimacy is enabled by aqueous proximity (2).
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