Halide Edib as a 'nomadic subject' in Inside India: A poststructuralist critique of travel writing

This thesis examines the travelogue Inside India (1937) by Halide Edib through a poststructuralist framework, situating the text within a critical discourse that accentuates the instability of meaning, the decentering of the subject, and fluid identity by drawing on Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's concepts of nomadism and the rhizome in their book A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (1980). It argues that Halide Edib's travel narrative destabilizes essentialist notions of identity, nationhood, and colonial representation by offering a unique, non-Western, female perspective often absent in traditional travelogues to India. The thesis employs the concepts of nomadism and rhizomatic association of thought to analyze Halide's dynamic, fluid identity as a traveler and observer. Rather than presenting a fixed depiction of colonial India, the travelogue Inside India operates rhizomatically, generating multiple, intersecting perspectives that resist linearity and absolutes. Unlike conventional travel writers, Halide constructs a nomadic subjectivity, shaped by her unique positionality as an Ottoman, Muslim, feminist, and elite intellectual. Her writing reflects a dynamic engagement with cultural and political diversity, challenging dominant narratives. The study further underscores the importance of Halide's distinct female gaze, which offers a culturally sensitive and autonomous portrayal of Indian women, diverging from orientalist representations. Through the poststructuralist lens, Inside India emerges as a fluid text of colonial India, where meaning and identity are constantly in flux, embodying the ongoing processes of 'becoming' that define both the traveler and the world she encounters. It critiques the Eurocentric dominance in knowledge production, emphasizing the importance of integrating non-Western voices like Halide's into literary and historical discourse. In doing so, this thesis contributes to rethinking the role of travel writing as a medium of cultural representation, challenging rigidity in ideas of identity, power, and belonging in both colonial and postcolonial contexts.