Negotiating spaces : identity (de) constructions in migrant writing

Abstract

Migration literature within postcolonial discourse contains at the heart of its narrative identity formations outside national frontiers. This dissertation aims to explore how identity is processed through the consolidation and repudiation of cultures within the “host” and “home” countries, and how fragmentation as a result of historical narratives as well the creation of nation states result in ambiguous states of the self. Through the works of several writers consisting of Zadie Smith‟s White Teeth (2000), Hanif Kureishi‟s The Buddha of Suburbia (1990), Jhumpa Lahiri‟s The Namesake (2003) and its film adaptation directed by Mira Nair (2006), as well as the films East is East (1999) and its sequel West is West (2010), I shall be exploring how multiculturalism is experienced differently between men and women