Baillie, Justine ORCID: 0000-0002-0056-9155 (2003) '"Two ways to belong in America": Immigrant identity in Bharati Mukherjee's Jasmine'. In: The American Modern: Varieties of Modernism and Modernity, 16 December 2003, Goldsmiths, University of London. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

This paper considers the way in which Bharati Mukherjee’s article, ‘Two ways to Belong to America’, dramatises certain key themes evident in Mukherjee's fiction - articulated in particular in her later work and marked by the publication of the collection of short stories The Middleman (1988) and the novel Jasmine (1989). These works constitute the beginning, in her literature, of her 'optimistic' 'vision' of American immigrant identity that is later consolidated in 'Two Ways to Belong in America'. The preoccupation with 'fluidity' and 'self-invention' is clear in these texts. But this is not the fluidity of the postmodern, fragmented and oppositional postcolonial identity on the margins of the nation state; rather Mukherjee articulates a discourse of nationalism that positions immigrant identity as representing the voice of 'the new America'.

Item Type:	Conference or Conference Paper (Paper)
Uncontrolled Keywords:	South-Asian literature, American identity, Immigration
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PS American literature
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group:	Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences > School of Humanities & Social Sciences (HSS)
Last Modified:	16 Nov 2017 14:12
URI:	http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/18002

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