Third World Literature is a metropolitan fabrication, not a pre-existing category

Evidence

It is in the metropolitan country, in any case, that a literary text is first designated a Third World text, levelled into an archive of other such texts, and then globally redistributed with that aura attached to it. It is useful, therefore, to demystify the category of ‘Third World Literature’ which is emerging in the metropolitan university now as something of a countercanon and whichlike any canon, dominant or emergentdoes not really exist before its fabrication. — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 192

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: World literature is a material category of metropolitan accumulation, not a universal condition — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, 78; The category ‘Third World Literature’ emerged only when ex-colonial migrants demanded metropolitan middle-class inclusion; Third World Literature as a field was professionalized by metropolitan universities — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, 185 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• The category ‘Third World Literature’ emerged only when ex-colonial migrants demanded metropolitan middle-class inclusion #expands (0.95)
• Third World Literature as a field was professionalized by metropolitan universities #expands (0.90) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 185
• Local oral literatures resist absorption into any unified Third World Literature category #qualifies (0.75) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 318
• The ‘Third World Literature’ category presumed a primordial civilizational difference from the West. #exemplifies (0.72) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 100
• Third World literary theory’s rise marked retreat from activist anti-imperialism #expands (0.72) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 145