1
Pigs Cant Fly

• Gender and Nation

Sri Lanka
2
Background

• Funny Boy set against the increasing violence
  between a between Sinhalese and Tamil in Sri
  Lank, culminating in the civil war which lasted
  for almost a decade(1983-1991).
• The author Shyam Selvadurai and his family are
  forced into exile after the 1983 racial riot
  against the Tamil in Colombo.
• The protagonist, "Arjie" Chelvaratnam, is the
  second-son of a privileged middle-class Tamil
  family in Colombo.

3
Tamil vs. Sinhalese

• Sinhalese(????)migrated from Northern India to
  Sri Lanka since 5th-6th century BCE, while Tamil
  (????) came from Southern India around since 2th
  BCE.
• Sinhalese -- Buddhism
• Tamil -- Hinduism, more sent to Sri Lanka by the
  British government and supported by the latter.
• Since its independence as Ceylon, the Sinhalese
  (80 majority) put forth Sinhala Only Law in
  support of their political power, which causes
  discontent among the Tamil people (20).

4
Discussion Questions

• Why cant Arjie play bride-bride?
• Because the sky is so high and pigs cant fly.
  (19)
• What does the sky mean? What does being funny
  mean?
• Is he funny because he is homosexual?

5
The title

• Funny --either humorous or strange (17) disgust
• But Meena also crosses gender boundaries in
  playing the cricket game.
• The other girls do, too, in the bride-bride
  game.
• Arjies view of being a bride (5) and jewel and
  sari (15)
• ? the story is about the ideological system (the
  sky), and the power struggle within it.

6
Discussion QuestionsI. Childhood Games and
Social System

• What does "spend-the-day" mean for both the
  adults and the kids, maybe excepting the servant
  cook who cannot have a break? (pp. 1-2)
• How are the boys' game and girls' game divided up
  and located? (p. 3)
• What are the rules of the boys' cricket game and
  the girls' Bride-Bride?   Do these rules make
  sense?   Do these groups' structure reflect that
  of adults, or not? 

7
II. Battle for Power and Gender Boundaries

• Why does Her Fatness want to be the bride?
• What gender roles do Arjie and Her Fatness take
  respectively in their power struggle? 
• If Arjie is the one to be ordered back to the
  realm of men, who else also crosses the gender
  boundaries in this story? 

8
The Girls Game

• Arjie as the leader because of the force of his
  imagination(p. 4)
• His imagination allows him to "leave the
  constraints of his self and ascend into
  another, more brilliant, more beautiful self"
  (5).
• Still conditioned by the goddesses of the
  Sinhalese and Tamil cinema (breaking the racial
  boundary).
• A world for girls the groom the most useless
  (p. 6)

9
The Boys GameCricket

• Competition -- with winning as the goal
• trading players
• less powerful ones Sanjay
• girlie-boy Arjie
• the batting order p. 26
• Numbers marked in the sand for the players to
  step on
• The older and better ones play first

10
The Childrens Struggle for Power

• Her Fatness in need of attention
• An outsider
• Kanthi Aunt her anger (p. 8)
• Wins attention
• by lying (7)
• by showing off the dolls (p. 8) which is less
  powerful than the bride-bride game
• by playing a loud groom (9)
• by appealing to traditional gender boundaries
  (11) A girl must be the bride.

11
Arjies Fight back

• Insisting on the rule to be the first one to play
  ? so that he becomes offensive and can run away
• the sari in the bag as a weapon
• Agrees to play the groom, and then attracts the
  other girls attention.
• Sari gone so is his power.

12
Images representing the system

• Amachi and her cane p. 38
• The seaside and the tall building as a mirage p.
  38