Deconstructing Issues of Identity and Cultural Clashes in ‘An American Brat’ by Sidhwa

• Published in: Revista argentina de clínica psicológica 2020-01, Vol.29 (4), p.32
• Main Authors: Liu, Linhong, Akhter, Shamim, Abrar Hussain Qureshi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Assimilation; Cultural conflict; Cultural differences; Culture; Diaspora; Disjunction; Ethnic conflict; Frustration; Identity crisis; Immigrants; Multiculturalism & pluralism; Noncitizens; Personality; Postcolonialism; Qualitative research; Transformation; Western culture
• ISSN: 0327-6716; 1851-7951
• DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.804

After getting freedom, the post-colonial nations are still under of Western control in terms of language, culture, and education. These nations like to follow the westerns by adopting their ways of life especially when the people of these nations go to western countries and in this effort of assimilation, they face many issues. Identity crisis is one of them which is the product of cultural clash. ‘An American Brat’ by Sidhwa (1993) highlights the impacts of identity crisis resulting from Hybridity and Diaspora in postcolonial discourse. The conducted research sheds light on the issues faced by the immigrants in the United States. They start living in the situation where they have to face unending frustration due to their racial backgrounds while adjusting themselves according to the culture of America. The immigrants try to adopt the culture of America for the sake of becoming Americanness and in doing so, identity crisis is created. At the disjunction of frustration, the distinct impression of “imagined communities” is established which is not inevitably identical or geographically bordered but rather diasporic and multinational, among multitude of foreigners. In this way, culture shapes the new individuality with multicultural nature. Consequently, the conflict between the ethnic and the exotic cultures scatter the individualities of the immigrants and their quest for identity is started. The present research aims to reveal the issue of identity created by cultural conflict and diasporic displacement and its effects on immigrants by keeping in view Sidhwa’s An American Brat (1993). To explore the issue of identity, qualitative research will be employed by focusing on Said (1993) and Bhabha (1994) ’s frameworks. The results will show that the issues of individuality occupies a significant place in the literature regarding diaspora and the main figure of the undertaken novel goes through the process of several alterations. Owing to the journey of transformation, the central character encounters the dilemma of displacement and cultural individuality. Despite of the fact that the main character, Feroza tries to integrate herself into the western culture, but she fails in this attempt because of having different cultural origin.