The Pain of Migration in Literature and Conflict of Identity (original) (raw)
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Indian diaspora pertains to Indian migration, their socioeconomic and cultural experiences, experiences of adaptation and assimilation in the host societies. Literature written by these diasporic writers is clearly inspired by their personal experiences. The pain of migration and displacement felt by these writers flows in their narratives too. Novels and stories are the tales of deep anguish, nostalgia and of rootlessness where characters feel more emotionally and mentally tortured than physical fatigue. Predicament of dual identities i.e of their homelands and of nations they migrated to, corrodes their psyche. In a cosmopolitan world one cannot be a cultural and social outsider in a foreign land for long. Sunetra Gupta in her novels like Memories of Rain and A Sin of Colour presents the intercultural relationships. Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies too pins the Indian migration to US.
"Transnational and Intranational Indian Diaspora Identities"
ABSTRACT The migration within the territorial limits of India have made critics to observe that to be a diasporic Indian its not mandatory that one has to take journey abroad .Through inter-state migration it is possible to create the sphere of Indian diaspora within India. K.Sachidanand calls this space the ‘diaspora within’ which is referred to as Intranational diasporic pattern which is the newly accepted identity to the Transnational migration. This Paper attempts to present the Diaspora dimensions of two Indian writers A.K.Ramanujan who emigrated from India to United States of America and Temsula Ao who migrated from Indian state of Nagaland to Meghalaya. Both the writers narrate the loss of their homeland due to migration and exhibit the resonances of the diasporic experience wherein the Transnational and Intranational identities are taken for study. In relation to the essay “Where Mirrors are Windows” of A.K.Ramanujan and the Short story “These Hills called Home: Stories from a War Zone” of Temsula Ao are taken for study . A.K.Ramanujan in his Essays have the Transnational Diaspora identity and Temsula Ao’s, in her short stories recaptures the pain following the struggle for self-determination launched by the Indian Union, present the Intranational Diaspora identity. This Paper will trace how these writers articulate diasporic experience of exile, loss, pain and create Indian Diaspora in America and Naga Diaspora in India.
THE SAGA OF THE JOURNEY OF INDIAN DIASPORA
Indian writers have been making a significant contribution to world literature since independence. The past few years have seen a massive flourishing of Indian fiction in the global market. However, there is a great deal of Indian writers with few themes that usually link them together. The issues of identity and language, the themes of exile and diaspora have become the themes of prime concern of the Indian fiction. The Immigrants’ experience, the question of identity and the expatriate experience continue to furnish remarkable material for fiction. Keywords: Indo-anglian, diaspora, identity crisis, alieanation, immigration, nostalgia for
IMMIGRATION AND ESTRANGEMENT IN INDIAN DIASPORA LITERATURE A CRITICAL STUDY
AABS Publishing House, Kolkata, 2019
The anthology Immigration and Estrangement in Indian Diaspora Literature: A Critical Study attempts to study diasporic sensibilities in writings of Indian Diaspora writers. The book mainly focuses its study on the sense of displacement and dislocation rising due to immigration from homeland to hostland as found in writings of Indian Diaspora writers. Authors have tried to give their best outputs to reach this anthology to its intended goal. Hopefully this book will be helpful to both students and scholars alike.
‘Illusionary Homelands’ and In-Between Identities: Liminal Existence of the ‘Indian (Non)-Diaspora’
Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities
The influence of colonialism and the emergence of globalisation have gradually induced a mixed culture that neither can be attached to the innateness of the traditionalist attributes of the home country nor the foreignness of the Western idiosyncrasies. Though not directly clipped into the identity of a diaspora in spatial existence, the residents in the country also experience an equal or more departure in the context of perpetuating the traditional culture through their lifestyle. There arises an in-between state of existence – neither traditional nor foreign. This research article explores how the residents in India possess alienation in their cultural identities concerning the hybrid forms of lifestyle followed regularly, qualifying to be termed based on the regularity of lifestyle as the ‘Indian non-diaspora’. The argument about the liminal existence of the residents in India, similar to the Indian Diaspora, is substantiated with the help of various secondary sources that descr...
Diasporic Indian Literature Immigrant and Identity
Research Guru: Online Journal of Multidisciplinary Subjects (Peer Reviewed), 2018
Displacement from the motherland, nostalgia, craving for acceptance, and establishment in foreign land are characteristics of a diasporic dilemma. Migration from one place to another, from one land to another is always unpleasant situation and nostalgic. If harassment persists there on the new soil, the immigrant becomes nostalgic and craves for the homeland. Migration may be due to economic necessities, geographical hardships, and socio-political reasons. In the present context, it has become very common for people to settle on the new soil. On account of the issues like homeland, identity and race have become topic for discussion. Literature truly mirrors the change in the society because of immigrant and identity crisis. The Indian women novelists of nineties have depicted the change in migration and mobility. Women writers like Shobha De, Githa Hariharan, Manju Kapur and others have delineated the theme of immigration and identity crises in their novels. Shahi Despandey primarily focuses on the struggle of women to search their identity in the context of Indian Society. Manju Kapur`s „The Immigrant‟ about migration the complications arise in setting on the new soil. The novelist depicts the sense of drift and identity crisis during her stay in Canada.
IJERT-Hybridization of Cultural Identity of Indian Diaspora
International Journal of Engineering Research and Technology (IJERT), 2020
https://www.ijert.org/hybridization-of-cultural-identity-of-indian-diaspora https://www.ijert.org/research/hybridization-of-cultural-identity-of-indian-diaspora-IJERTV9IS070692.pdf A sense of belonging to a community, nation and culture is an integral part of a person's identity. It strongly influences an individual's self-perception, self-conception and a rationalised relation with nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any other kind of social group. Culture informs the identity irrespective to the causes of migration, for instance, culture remains a defining force in forced migrants i.e. the ones impacted by the push factors as climate disasters, refugee crisis, poverty, wars etc. and it is of equal persuasion for the ones who willingly went for better livelihood and job opportunities abroad. In both cases the immigrants undergo acculturation and therefore they imbibe the cultural aspects of another country. But the ways in which the diaspora negotiate with the sustainability of their ethnicities, identities and cultures while simultaneously undergoing the process of acculturation are intriguing. These complex processes form the subject of the research. It is difficult to ascertain the extent of a person's need for support in sustaining his cultural spectrum, we rather intend to measurably explore whether culture needs to be preserved and sustained at all given that the blending of the cultural spectrum of two different regions has already taken place. And we need to substantiate our findings by exploring nuances and narratives and through secondary research. If an individual or community successfully transmits the cultural identity through practices to other people or coming generations, then it can be taken as the sustenance of the cultural identity. Our intention here is to give a platform for them to connect with the sense of belongingness and for safeguarding the cultural identity of the diaspora. We have tried to avoid the colloquial underdone while using the word culture and have rather used the etymological definition which is 'to cultivate'-It has basically originated from the French word-'culture', which translates into cultivating or idea of promoting growth. The word growth here signifies the true meaning of care which is conserving. By extension, it can be said that culture grows when intangibles are taken care of and conserved.
A Poetics of Going Indian 2011 JÁ Kádár
Prints (1987) present identity as textuality, and narrativize the process of going Native (that is, ethnic identity transformation, or, indigenization) in historiographic metafiction and the post-colonial discourse in general. Ethnic identity transformation Ethnic studies may investigate the subjectivity of ethnicity, the concept of emblematic identity, or the symbolic processes to maintain ethnic boundary, and can apply findings in literary analyses. When reading postcolonial literature, it seems that the literary texts not only reflect these aspects of multiethnic societies, but also provide a more intimate understanding of individuals in passing and other ethno-cultural processes, as well as present some new perspectives that traditionally have been hidden by the colonial discourses. Furthermore, ethnic studies may investigate the culture-learning approach to acculturation, too. On the other hand, the literary texts call attention not only to the given central character's acculturation skills and opportunities, but also to our shared cultural sensibilities. Going Indian stories reveal our understanding of the self and Other, beyond the broader sociocultural context of cultural encounters and (ex)change.
Migration has become a common trend today. Though having an age long history of migration, migration studies have only gained prominence since 1980s and have started to establish itself as a new genre in literature. Migration is a voyage between two cultures in which a migrant is neither able to assimilate the new culture nor able to cast off its root culture and gets tangled in between. The immigrants face the problem of assimilation into the other culture and there is a perpetual push and pull between two traditions. The present paper focuses upon the life struggle of a Bengali couple Ashoke and Ashima who immigrate to America from India and try to incorporate the new culture. They try to keep their roots alive in the foreign land by observing some of the Indian rituals and thus developing a sense of belongingness to their homeland. But for the second generation, the couple had to adopt the tradition of the immigrant country. Gogol and Moushumi often feel as if they are torn and lost between the country of their birth and the values inherited from their parents. Not only Gogol and Moushumi but all other characters are bewildered about their self and are shuttling between two worlds. The present paper explores the theme of displacement and rootlessness in their life and a quest for the self.
Akhil Sharma’s Family Life: Regretting Doubleness of Diaspora Individuals
Poetika
This study discusses a matter of cultural identity faced by diaspora individuals in Akhil Sharma’s novel Family Life. As a diasporic Indian American, Sharma depicts that cultural identity is problematic, especially for an individual who experiences two or more conflicted cultures from home left behind and the home this individual has moved to. Sharma also demonstrates that the identity of this diasporic is never complete. This study aims to critically analyze Sharma’s fiction by highlighting the issues he engages as a diasporic writer. It also depicts how voluntary displacement done by diaspora characters tends to lead them to mourn. The analysis applies a concept of cultural identity by Stuart Hall. It explains a notion of identity within the discourses of history and culture, which is not an essence but a positioning. This study uses a qualitative descriptive method. The result shows there is doubleness of cultural identity conveyed by Sharma. This regretting doubleness appears in...