Interdisciplinarity in Tsegaye G/Medhin’s Hahu Weyem Pepu

Tessema, Solomon

Interdisciplinarity in Tsegaye G/Medhin’s Hahu Weyem Pepu

Date

2007-07

Authors

Tessema, Solomon

Publisher

Addis Ababa University

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to show the spontaneously presented disciplines in HaHu Weyem PePu. In literature disciplinary subject matters are not presented in a systematic pattern. This is because literature does not have subject boundaries and it can address issues that are related to various disciplines. As one of the forms of literature, drama is not an exception in this regard. The argument is that through the analysis of literature, we can acquire interdisciplinary knowledge. Besides, this thesis aims to explore questions that are related to the concept of interdisciplinarity through a study of the known Ethiopian playwright Tsegaye Gebre-Medhin’s play HaHu Weyem PePu. This study sees interdisciplinarity in HaHu Weyem PePu as prominent aspects of contemporary drama, which have received little critical attention in drama studies. The basic reasons for the study of interdisciplinarity in drama or generally in literary works are that literature has an immense interdisciplinary potential that should be explored. In this thesis, descriptive method of analysis is analytically and systematically used. Moreover, the key terms and concepts are defined to give the study a conceptual and contextual framework. ‘Interdisciplinarity’ is seriously taken as a significant conceptual instrument for this study. ‘Elements of interdisciplinarity’ and the aspects of interdisciplinarity are investigated before and during analysis. Focusing on the issues of interdisciplinary aspects, the analysis section examines the functional disciplinary materials in details. This section also looks at the relevance of the disciplinary issues to constitute the literary work under investigation and its aesthetic quality. Therefore, among Ethiopian plays, this thesis finds out that HaHu Weyem PePu occupies a unique position because of the manner in which it presents legal, religious, social, economic, historical, political and anthropological decadences. Its distinct approach is most apparent in the way it evokes the interwoven disciplines together through interdisciplinary aspects. Then, the final chapter presents the conclusion of this thesis. Through a cross-disciplinary approach, this thesis has the double ambition of stimulating further debates both on the main objects of the study and in an understanding of the art of drama at the end of the twentieth century.