Resumen de Hazel V. Carby. Imperial Intimacies: A Tale of Two Islands

Jarula M. I. Wegner (res.)

• This article reviews Hazel Carby's 2019 publication Imperial Intimacies: A Tale of Two Islands. It argues that the text can be considered in the history of postcolonial autobiographies, but that it also moves beyond such easy ascriptions. Imperial Intimacies builds on Stuart Hall's memoir Familiar Stranger: A Life Between Two Islands, but also moves decisively beyond it. Whereas the latter describes the ways in which personal and historical experiences inspire critical theories, the former applies such theories in order to offer a careful and detailed historical analysis. Based on more than twenty years of collecting family memories, travelling to relatives near and far, as well as researching archives in Canada, Jamaica, the United Kingdom and the USA, Carby works through historical tensions, frictions and contradictions to reveal them, contextualise them and thereby to denaturalise them. Through constellating memories, histories and archives, Imperial Intimacies presents an autobiography as critique.