LiteraryStudies in the Era of New Tribal Conflicts: Trying to Make a Move

The postmodern humanities have affirmed difference in the fields of methodology, concepts, cultures, races, languages, etc., and yet the celebration of difference and plurality has not spread beyond the academe at least not in an affirmative manner. Instead, this celebration of difference takes on the distorted form of separate differences, increasing cultural clashes and new tribal conflicts. This results in agonistic attitudes, which reinforce the notion that'the public space is the battleground where different hegemonic projects are confronted, without any possibility of final reconciliation' (Chantal Mouffe). Koziolek explores how literary studies can fulfil their traditional tasks of research and education while also performing an act of combating difference, which, according to Kristeva, excludes and tends to kill.