A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF IDENTITY CRISES AND CULTURAL ROOTS IN SIDHWA’S AMERICAN BRAT AND DESAI’S INHERITANCE OF LOSS

Abstract

The study investigates the dilemma of identity faced by Sai and Jemubhai in The Inheritance of Loss and Feroza in An American Brat. As immigrant novels continue to emerge from the South Asian diaspora across the globe, theories of gender and identity that mostly treat such novels as moral and psychological growth of the main character, that are often used to bring to light the precarious situation of literary characters caught between two different situations. Taking Bhabha’s concept of hybridity as an analytical tool, however, this research will use mimicry, ambivalence, and homeliness, concepts under hybridity, to facilitate the understanding of Feroza’s experiences in American and Sai in her own country or Jemubhai in UK. Besides, this work will also investigate whether they are responsible for their decision to choose to stay either in their own country or in the migrated land. The analysis shows that when the individuals are forced to leave their native lands to chase good fortune or due to some crises and to settle in a new land, the new cultural, economic and social values are not ready to accept them whole heartedly. Sometimes they are harassed on the bases of religion, sometimes on the basis of culture and sometimes on the basis of creed and colour. It brings out the psychological depression in the characters.