International Journal of English Linguistics; Vol. 10, No. 5; 2020 ISSN 1923-869X E-ISSN 1923-8703 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 100 Binarism, Identity (Crisis) and Power Structures in Postcolonial Anglophone Fiction: Analyzing Discursive Strategies in The God of Small Things Sundas Tahreem 1 , Inayat Ullah 1 & Tariq Khan 2 1 Department of English, National University of Modern Languages (NUML), Islamabad, Pakistan 2 Department of English, University of Malakand, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan Correspondence: Inayat Ullah, Department of English, National University of Modern Languages (NUML), Sector H-9, Islamabad, Pakistan. E-mail: inayat_ktk@yahoo.com Received: April 8, 2020 Accepted: June 25, 2020 Online Published: July 8, 2020 doi:10.5539/ijel.v10n5p100 URL: https://doi.org/10.5539/ijel.v10n5p100 Abstract Binary relationship among people of a particular society creates a power correlation that becomes a common social practice of that society with the passage of time. Social structure is based on power structure of any society that defines social identities on the basis of collective social ideology. The present study is based on Fairclough’s approach to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) that takes discourse as social practice. In this study, an effort has been made to show how social practices create power imbalance in the society. The objectives include study of binary relationships that establish power relationships, role of power structures to define social identities, role of ideology to maintain power and hegemony in social structures and to bring into the limelight the resistance of oppressed class against power structures. The study is delimited to the novel, The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, and Postcolonial binarism is applied for analysis of the text. Binary relationships of the society have been exclusively studied through Fairclough’s approach to CDA. The analysis shows that social identities are ideologically driven on the basis of power relationships and it is due to ideological construction that certain group of people sets up hegemony and dominated group gives its consent to dominant group. Firstly, discourse forms knowledge which defines social relationship. Secondly, ideology is constructed due to power relationships. Lastly, social roles construct social identities on the basis of ideology. Roy also has created some economically weak and socially marginalized characters in her novel which try to go against established social practices to bring disorder in the hierarchy of social structure. The study has research implications for the fields of Language and Literature as the evaluation deals with the exploration of a literary text through the lens of the theories of language and literature. Researchers can also further the scope of the present study by conducting an exclusive and comprehensive study of the selected novel on marginalization of women in the given society. Keywords: critical discourse analysis, postcolonialism, binarism, identity, ideology, resistance 1. Introduction to the Study The present research is designed to analyze social practices and social structures that create power imbalance and binary relationships among people on the basis of caste and gender. Fairclough’s approach to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) that discuses discourse as a social practice is applied for the analysis. The analysis of the text traces out the power imbalance created by power structure in the society that defines social identities on the basis of existing ideologies of the people of the town, Ayemenem in India. The research is designed to examine power relationships on the basis of gender, caste, economy, politics and culture of Ayemenem. The analysis shows that social identities are ideologically driven on the basis of power relationships and it is due to ideological construction that certain group of people sets up hegemony and dominated group gives its consent to dominant group. Fairclough asserts that there is always a chance that oppressed group of people may resist against defined social identities. The analysis shows some of the major characters of the novel resist against established social identities and power structures of the society. The significance of this research paper lies in the fact that the analysis of the paper is based on Fairclough’s approach to CDA with a Postcolonial perspective that is unique in its approach. This analysis of the novel, The God of Small Things is also significant in the sense that the issue of bianrism has always been there in these