Disclosing the “Other(s)” in Elif Shafak’s the island of missing trees and Christy Lefteri’s songbirds

This thesis aims to explore two contemporary novels, Elif Shafak’s The Island of Missing Trees and Christy Lefteri’s Songbirds by using Mikhail Bakhtin’s theoretical framework on language and the novel. The Bakhtinian concepts of heteroglossia, polyphony, and dialogism are used to unveil the different viewpoints which emerge through the utterances of the narrators and characters. The first aim of the thesis is to disclose the viewpoints which consider certain groups or entities as “other(s)”. The second aim is to analyze these viewpoints by employing ecocritical and ecofeminist theories. Ecocritical analysis of both novels reveals that nature and everything related to it is being othered. By using ecofeminist theories, this study also aims to show that in both novels, there are ideologies which support anthropocentric behaviours, regarding certain groups as others. Through both analyses, the thesis claims that in The Island of Missing Trees and in Songbirds, nature, women, underprivileged individuals, female immigrant workers, and nonhuman entities are depicted as inferior others in a society marked by patriarchy and anthropocentrism.