Blog Par #8

    In her novel, The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri uses the main character’s pet name Gogol and his good name Nikhil as coming of age story to display the complexities with identities through his need to feel American and his Indian roots.  For Gogol’s father, Ashoke, naming his son Gogol represents the birth of a new life, a new beginning, and a way to connect the events of his past with an uncertain future.  Ashoke views Gogol’s birth as “the second miracle of his life, after the one of surviving the train crash” (24).  The naming of his son allows Ashoke a second birth in his life, an opportunity to connect with the happiness he feels towards his life in America.  His son therefore becomes a mix of the old and new way of life, embodying the loss of his life in India and the migration into their American identity.    Gogol, a Russian name, prevents Gogol from developing an identity because he feels the name does not connect him to his American or Indian roots, giving him a feeling of inbetweenness.  Lahiri describes Gogol’s need to feel a connection with American culture Gogol’s field trip to the cemetery, “looking for their own names, a handful triumphant when they are able to claim a grave they are related to…Gogol is old enough to know there is no Ganguli here” (69). Upon bringing his etchings of the gravestones home, Gogol’s mother cannot identify with his need to keep the drawings, to reassure himself that parents besides his own name their children with unique names that make them stand out from the rest of the world.  Gogol’s name represents, for his family independence and a tie to their culture; they believe his name to represent their family through the importance of representing of loss and beginning. His name represents a uniqueness that Gogol does not want; he wants an American identity, an identity that does not entice people to comment on his background. The death of Gogol and the emergence of Nikhil forces a mental separation between the lives of his parents and his own.  Nikhil embodies everything that is not Indian and a way for him to develop a new persona.  The name Nikhil gives Gogol the ability to separate himself from a world he feels apart from and enter into a life of acceptance and relevance to American society.  A name for Gogol, a child of an immigrant, represents identity and belonging to two different cultures




.http://blog.jammuredefine.in/double-face-of-congress-exposed-again/#sthash.Dh0h6M3C.dpb
The above photo and url link refers to the Women's Reservation Bill members of Indian society are attempting to pass for women who do not want to comply with the traditional marriage conventions.  This bill enables women to marry out of their race and provides freedom for women who do not want to comply with their families wishes and obligations as a female.

Jhumpa Lahiri begins her novel, The Namesake, from the perspective of Gogol’s mother, Ashima.  Lahiri focuses on the alienation Ashima feels giving birth in a foreign country among strangers, with a husband whose habits she is still learning.  American parents allow their children to choose their own spouses, an independence unfamiliar to traditional Indian families.  Reading this novel provides one with a glimpse of the obedience children give their parents and it is through this obedience that their futures are shaped around arranged marriages. 

            Lahiri does not delve deeply into the issues of subservience and duties children show towards their parents, I am specifically interested in the subservience from the female perspective.  Lahiri’s description of Ashima’s marriage and the description given concerning the birth of Ashima’s son led me to question the stifling customs that give women no choices in their own lives, except for what their parents choose for them.  Ashima, like most Indian women, go to school and sometimes university, to bide their time until their family finds a husband for them.  While at school, women broaden their minds and gain some knowledge pertaining to independence and get to explore their own desires.  After completing their education, or during, women forget the dreams and desires and marry the man approved by their parents.  Through the ‘courting’ process, girls’ parents market their daughters by highlighting qualities that will make their daughters exceptional wives, never once considering their brains. Characters like Ashima do not question the arrangements or their parents choices, viewing marriage as a duty  to the family, “it had been after tutoring one day that Ashima’s mother had met her at the door, told her to go straight to the bedroom and prepare herself; a man was waiting to see her” (Lahiri 6). Ashima dutifully obeys and this obedience takes her across an ocean, away from her family, so that her union brings status and pride to her family.  Not marrying in Indian culture brings shame upon the family’s name and if a daughter refuses to marry her noncompliance reflects negatively on the parents as an inability to control their children. 

            Reading texts relating to women’s rights and marital expectations in Indian society frustrates Western readers, largely because our independence and freedoms begin immediately after birth.  Authors like Jhumpa Lahiri and Anne Cherian relate the problems of tradition through their female characters relinquishing their rights to their family by following the marriage arrangement.  Their characters relate their fears and frustrations with the pressures women face in regards to marrying and complying with families desires.  Anne Cherian describes the process of marriage for a woman as a bartering process: “[g]irls were like cows, their pedigrees discussed openly and parts checked out” (Cherian 40).  Reading this defines the role of the Indian woman, a slave. Not only is she a slave to the culture, but her family, her sisters, and her educators.  There is no escape for women, if they toe the line their family rejects them and Indian women have not been educated to survive in the world on their own.  They are bred under the notion of dependence on male figures; they learn from their fathers and then must succumb to the rule of another man, her husband.  Anne Cherian’s novel, A Good Indian Wife, discusses the pressures women face from the family to procure a husband and women’s inability to assert her independence within her household and society.  The main character, Leila, finds herself unwed and well past the expiration date of a fruitful marrying age, issuing concerns from her family that her inability to wed as failure as parents.  Like most humans, Leila has her own desires that she wishes could play out, but the need to fulfill her parents’ wishes overshadow her wants.  Each page you want Leila to walk out and assert her own feelings to her parents, but Cherian continues her betrothal process so that readers understand the isolation women feel within their families and country.  Amma, Leila’s mother, reveals her feelings of shame to Leila, “‘You know how I have suffered all these years? So any people asking why for you are not married’” (Cherian 39).  

Blog Paragraph 7

In Hanif Kureishi’s The Buddha of Suburbia, Eleanor, Karim’s upper-middle class lover, performs beneath her class position, giving her two functioning identities in two different social worlds. Initially, Eleanor’s middle class identity disguises itself from Karim in the forms of manner and dress, “She dressed roughly, wearing a lot of scarves, lived in Notting Hill and-sometimes-talked with a Catford accent” (173). For Eleanor to maintain a hybrid identity, a combination of her new and old lifestyles, her success relies in her ability to dress the part of the ‘Bohemian’ woman. Having grown up in a world of privileges, Eleanor’s aspirations for downward social mobility are consciously chosen which makes her performances unforced. Eleanor merges both identities, playing the role of the dutiful daughter and the party goer who understands that being on time is not party etiquette, with the free-spirited, deep thinking Bohemian. Eleanor wants to identify with people like the starving artist, but still enjoys the privileges of her background, like the nights she eats shark. A social piranha like Eva does not understand Eleanor’s choice to deny her natural class position, “…perplexed by Eleanor’s concealment of her social origins and the way she took her ‘connections’ for granted” (173). In contrast, a character like Eva aspires towards upward class mobility, performing outside her class into roles that make her identity unnatural. She must rid herself completely of her suburban complex to pass as a ‘true’ Londoner. Eva creates an identity as a designer, dismissing her suburban background in her efforts to create a new image. “Cultured” members of society who enter her apartment in London recognize the transparency of her performance, like the photographer from the magazine, “The photographer rearranged the furniture and photographed objects only in the places where they had not been positioned” (262). The photographer being around many “posh” Londoners sees through Eva’s attempts to climb the social ladder, her efforts are forced. Taking on a new identity requires one to accept and transform the old and the combination of the different personas allows the newly created identity to appear natural and pass as acceptable.

Do clothes construct a person's identity and do they contribute to others perceptions of that person? Karim battles with identity through much of the novel, as do many of the characters in search of their own identities. Clothing, in Western cultures, symbolize conformity and individuality.  For a character like Karim, he lives in a suburban society made up of mostly white individuals and it is in this society that he wants to be recognized.  In the book, Kureishi describes an outing with Karim's father, and the choice of clothes Karim chooses for himself to try and impress a local boy from school, whom he idolizes.  He tries to be someone he is not around many kids from school, trapped between the need to fit in with his peers, but also aware of his Indian background, a skin that he cannot shed. Later, Karim is asked to play the part of Mogul from the jungle book and he must deal with the stereotypes associated with his skin tone, but he knows nothing of his Indian heritage, he has never been to India, but because of his dark skin people assume that his identity must correlate with his ancestors from India. He literally cannot be comfortable in his own skin, it is something that he cannot identify with because he does not belong to the Indian background and he cannot associate with his suburban upbringing.  So in this instance, clothing allows him to move between identities and identify with the image that suits him.  Clothing and the pressures to fit in, influence children and adults and often times distorts the image of the self.                         

http://usa.mediamonitors.net/Headlines/Clothing-colonization-and-spiritual-identity
This article discusses clothing as a form of colonization and the impacts it has when shaping identity on people.

Blog Paragraph 6: The White Tiger

By using the phrase, “what a fucking joke,” Adiga’s novel, White Tiger, suggests that people of power in India want to portray an idealistic society to others. Their efforts to disguise corruption allow citizens like Balram to expose the hypocrisies within power structures, mainly political. “What a fucking joke,” first appears in conjunction with government officials that will be sent to welcome Premiere Jiabo and Balram says, “I see our prime minister and his distinguished sidekicks drive to the airport in black cars and get out and do namastes before you in front of a TV camera and will tell you how moral and saintly India is” (2). Indian government officials perform for those visiting their country to show how “perfect” life is in their country and how democratic their nation is. Those in power want to portray a functioning and democratic India and a country that leaves outsiders in awe of their successes. If the prime minister takes Jiabao to a village slum, the minister runs the risk of exposing the drastic differences between the lives of the rich and poor, and the one-sidedness of Indian “democracy.” Throughout the novel, readers are shown the“jokes” that are hidden from Jiabao, like the people’s love for their “elected”officials. When most have never been able to express the rights they are entitled to in a free democratic nation like electing their own leaders. According to Balram, his father never physically voted, “I’ve seen twelve elections-five general, five state, and two local-and someone else has voted for me twelve times” (84). The government paints a picture perfect image to outsiders, but still cannot rid their country of an old value system. If the Indian government wants a perfect India, they must employ policeman to maintain social order and control those who seek to overthrow and expose their nation’s corruptness. Innocent men sit in jail for crimes their masters committed because their servant’s lives have no meaning. Servants like Balram have no voice and must endure the hallow promises their government makes them, that one day they too can succeed, “…but the masters still own us, body, soul, and arse. Yes, that’s right: we all live in the world’s greatest democracy. What a fucking joke” (145). Adiga’s reference to the “world’s democracy”questions the functions of democracy and what it stands for, just like Balram questions the way government officials portray their country to outsiders. The American phrase, “what a fucking joke,”exposes the hidden lies within a democratic nation and critiques the idea that what works for one person works for another.

  

http://www.forbes.com/sites/worldviews/2012/09/27/india-great-for-women-entrepreneurs-and-bad-for-women-how-is-this-possible/2/
The article above lists some of the most successful female entrepreneurs in India, alluding to the fact that India just recently had a female president.  While noting the successes of many women, the article also points out the problems with Indian culture and the advancement of women.  In the White Tiger, Balram, Mr. Ashoke, and most of the men mentioned in the novel, only mention women in relation to sex.  They do not view them as equals in the field of business, or in Balram's case, as having aspirations outside of the home.  In the novel, lower class students are mainly young boys, women are not given the opporutnities of education, but are limited to duties of the home.  Women are still viewed as objects to exploited in the Indian culture.  They are not seen as equals and boys are taught that a woman is still subservient to their masters.

Rita Marya, the editor-in-chief of Franchise India describes the growing number of Indian people able to partake in entrepreneural acts like Adiga's character, Balram does.  She notes the growing numbers of businesses that take off in India and quickly die, due to other more successful companies, or an owner not understanding how to set themselves apart and make themselves more marketable.   Marya, like Adiga, expresses the importance of giving all that one has and not being afraid to take risks when managing a business. She also warns of the corruption that has plagued India for years with the financial leaders who treat and prevent other people from creating new companies and creating upward mobility for Indians who seek a different life, than say servitude or farming. To become an entrepreneur, one must be tenacious and not be afraid of their acts as an individual to climb the 'corporate ladder.'

God of Small Things

In Arundhati Roy’s novel, The God of Small Things, Ammu’s refusal to conform to restrictions placed on gender and caste allows for her to reject the rigid social laws of her town, Ayemenem. Although Ammu is not an Untouchable, her gender prevents her from redefining long standing social structures. Ammu’s downfall occurs the day she was born because she was born a woman. Not being a man makes her undesirable in the eyes of her family. Unlike her brother Chacko, her family denies her the right to an education, instead educating her about the duties of her gender. Woman, mother, daughter are roles in place for her the day she is born.  She returns to her home of Ayemenem a divorcee who is not humble, but rather confident and free spirited.  Ammu’s family expects her to feel shame for her failures. Ammu’s strength to escape abuse chips away at history’s demands for women’s subservience. Roy describes Ammu as a woman searching for a voice in a world surrounded by traditions.  Her choice to divorce and raise two children alone shows her progressive mindset, “Maybe they’re right, maybe a boy does need a Baba” (286).  Ammu believes she is capable of taking on the roles of mother and father, but history suppresses this idea.  Ammu struggles with her role of woman as mother and breaks boundaries when she actively pursues her own personal desires, “It was what she had battling inside of her. An unmixable mix. The infinite tenderness of motherhood and the reckless rage of a suicide bomber. It was this that grew inside of her and eventually led her to love by night the man her children loved by day” (44). Before Ammu was born her life was written for her, dictating how she must live. As a woman her life has no room for desire. Ammu choses to deny history’s role for her and this denial threatens the past. Not only does Ammu break the laws of her gender, but her choice of Velutha as a lover destroys history’s caste system. Their actions defy long established boundaries. History attempts to tame the heart and Ammu and Velutha’s pursuit of desire recreates boundaries, “They knew that things could change in a day. They were right about that” (321). Ammu consciously gives into her desires; discarding the “identities” that history tells her she must obey. Breaking boundaries by herself and with Velutha are her attempts to change the past and give strength to those whose voices are lost.  

Ammu's choices and 'wild nature' constantly defies the life her family envisioned for her.  Indian tradition expects their women to conform to what has been dictated for them.  An Indian woman's duties revolve around the needs and expectations of her family and the household. Ammu's nonconformist and wild attitude threatens to disrupt the boundaries that Indian culture constructs for their women.  Ammu understood the consequences of marrying an American, the problems with sleeping with an Untouchable, but she decided to listen to HER needs and not the rules of her culture.  

In Shamim Sarif's film "The World Unseen," she frames the narrative around a woman's right to choose and the difficulties in breaking with tradition.  Sarif uses the character of Amina, an independent business owner and homosexual to comment on a woman's right to choose and the difficulties of containing what comes naturally to a person.  Amina comes from a traditional Indian background that expects her to conform and marry the man they choose for her to fulfill her duty as a daughter and honor her family.  Both Ammu and Amina subvert their gender roles by not adhering to the guidelines constructed by Indian society. For Ammu her duties encompass taking care of the household, raising her children, and performing the duties of a wife, as McLeod notes in his book titled, Postcolonialism. Amina constantly faces pressures from her community for her choice of dress: trousers, men's loafers, and blouses.  Traditionally Indian dress for a woman requires that they wear saris and for Amina to wear what she feels comfortable gives her the label of nonconformist.  In this aspect, women are subservient to their own comforts and must wear the prescribed manner of dress.  

Petra, like Ammu marries a man of a different background, refusing to acknowledge the boundaries placed on who a woman can marry and the process of marriage.  Love, like life, is instinctual and something that should have no restraints.  Petra marries a white man in 1960 South Africa.  There were bans at this time, prohibiting Indians from marrying whites.  Petra's choice to risk her life for the one she loves was slightly over-romanticized/dramatized, but Sarif's message was one of perseverance   Even though tradition runs through India and thought of disrupting scares many women, they must realize that is human nature to listen to one's own desires. 

Blog Paragraph 4: Slumdog Millionaire

Gender in Slumdog Millionaire

            In the film Slumdog Millionaire, director Danny Boyle focuses on the Orientalist stereotypes that sexualize and disempower women through their bodies and subservience to men.  According to Orientalist stereotypes, women in an Indian society are seen as sexualized beings and exist specifically for man’s pleasure and disposal. The character of Latika embodies the gender differences and enables Boyle to critique gender discourses through her fairytale existence. Latika is subservient to the dominant male society and exists as a sexual pawn that only acts when told to do so, as she does when her mob boss boyfriend commands her to make a sandwich and switch television channels.  In Latika’s childhood she stands in the rain while Jamal and Salim find protection under a shed and she must wait in the rain until given permission to enter by one of the boys.  At a young age she is conditioned to understand her subservience to men and a role that denies her a voice and mind.  A she grows she becomes man’s sexual toy and her body exploited for man’s satisfaction. Boyle shows this exploitation through his use of camera angles and lighting that highlight Latika’s beauty and allure by shooting pieces of her.  The camera focuses on her henna tattoos, jewelry, and her bare body to highlight her sensual nature.  In the camera’s eyes, Latika is a fragmented being, always doing what others expect of her and the angles in which she is shot depict the view of the world and deny her existence; she exists by the ways in which others dictate her life for her. Fragmentation in Boyle’s film explains the roles women must play in society and their lack of agency in a male dominated world. Latika is constantly shot behind bars, trains, doors which prevent her from being seen clearly and deny her a dominating presence on screen.  Latika, much like the stereotypes in place for women, represents the inequalities between men and women and women’s difficulties in finding a place in a “growing” nation that denounces gender changes.  

http://ladevey.blogspot.com/2010/05/sex-slave-trade-globalization.html
An issue that the film deals with pertains to the problem of globalization and human trafficking.  While I do not condone this horrible act, many are unaware that sexual enslavement/prostitution, as Lawrence states,"Additional evidence of licentiousness was provided by Muslim polygamy and Hindu child marriages, in which the bride was expected to have intercourse on or even before her twelfth birthday, a custom which shocked some commentators" (Lawrence 217).  In Indian culture, sex trafficking and the exploitation of child labor dates back to the 1800's.  When the British colonized India, Indians used their women and children as a way to meet the needs of the British travelers by offering services foreign and exotic to them.  Men wrote of the 'horrific sights,' but brought the customs to the attention of many people and began implementing practices. Globalization has largely contributed to the rise of capital and the demand for human trafficking.  Women and children have little to no voices in society, so therefore makes the sales realistic and plausible, no one will question the disappearance of an unknown citizen.  Many victims of this slavery are women and children of the Dalit class; the Dalit class being linked to the untouchable class.  The Dalits do not have a place within Indian society, so they are viewed as items that will not be missed, and offered up for trade. One can argue that globalization and capitalism preys on the poor. Countries with traditionally defined, class/caste systems, associate success only with the upper echelon.  The lower classes are the tools for the rich to exploit and force into human bondage.  

The video above, relates the horrors of sex trafficking, trying to raise awareness to victims.  Young girls are forced from their homes, the parents are coerced, promised money for their children's bodies, and the daughters are sent away.  The effects of capitalism and the lack of money among the lower class members is evident by some families desperation to sell their children for some money. 

Blog Par 3:

Salman Rushdie’s Shame

            Sufiya Zinobia embodies “Beauty” and “Beastly” in Rushdie’s novel Shame because the shame of Pakistan is the disjunction between the powerful and powerless in gender.  Rushdie identifies Zufiya as being a “sort of idiot,” which is the direct result of a fever, but before her idiocy Zufiya is born into shame because she was not a boy.  Her innocence is what houses her “beauty” and her condemnation by her family is her first venture down a dark road as Rushdie states, “a miracle-gone-wrong a family’s shame made flesh” (144).  The shame the Zinobia’s feel in regards to their daughter’s gender does not relate directly to them, but rather the conscience of Pakistan.  Zufiya exists in two ways and this “in-betweeness” is an example McCloud uses in his text to describe the divisions in a country (83).  Zufiya’s shifts from beauty and beast describes the Pakistani women’s shifts from a passive and innocent gender to ones that can no longer suppress the violence denied to them.  Rushdie constructs Zufiya’s “beastly” person from three situations that connect gender with shame as stated, “humiliate people long enough and a wildness bursts out of them” (119).  Zufiya’s beast constructs itself through the girl that was killed by her father, the shame felt by the girl who was raped and made to feel ashamed, and the truth that shame will always outlive women.  The situations that plague women in Pakistan construct a woman of beastly form that can challenge gender images and the dominant gender system.  

I found this interview on youtube, and Salman Rushdie discusses the history and the oppression that women face, concerning the issues of honor and shame.  Rushdie notes, honor is always associated with man and anything shameful or dishonorable falls on the women.  He uses the example of women's dress as being dishonorable and shameful, enticing men to commit shameful acts.  The men have no dishonorable flaws in this nation, and tradition and culture tells them that if they commit shameful acts, they may find a woman to blame or turn the problem around on women.  A point that Rushdie discusses concerns the idea of sin and redemption, a part of many western religions.  If a woman or man sins in this religion, than their soul has the opportunity to be redeemed and forgiveness allows the people to be responsible for their own actions.  In India, there is only honor and only shame, two binaries, good and evil. According to Rushdie, a woman can be dressed from head to toe and one can only see her eyes, but an act of adultery or loss of virginity to a man who rapes her falls back to her 'actions.'  I find the shamefulness to be a way for Indian culture to not be held accontable for their own actions and a way for men to use excuses.  The safest route for a woman to take is to sit at home because going out causes her more grief and leaves her more vulnerable for 'shameful' acts. 

Blog Paragraph #2

Cracking India

    Bapsi Sidhwa uses the term "cracked" to describe India.  By using this word she is juxtaposing the importance placed upon a country's history and the physical boundaries that have been long established to parallel the difficulties a new nation faces when identifying themselves.  When one considers a nation's foundation, one envisions a strongly bonded community and finds the struggles in other nations.  Sidhwa displays the internal struggles of India through the a neighborhood, places people associate civility with, "My world is compressed.  Warris Road, lined with rain gutters, lies between Queens Road and Jail Road; both wide, clean, orderly streets at the affluent fringes of Lahore"(11).  A physical alienation is depicted, a girl is born into division and an understanding that highlights her otherness and denies her an affiliation to her surrounding barriers.  Nations are connected because the past has a collective and celebrated meaning among its inhabitants and when this powerful body becomes isolated parts boundaries become physically visible and differences are easily recognized.  By separating a nation one loses a solid foundation and this in turn transposes a solid history into one of fragments, "they'll dig a canal...this side for Hindustan and this side for Pakistan-cracking India with a long, long canal" (101). Nations are difficult to dispose of because of long standing tradition and landmarks that have become permanent staples to economic and daily life.  

 

 During a class discussion, concerning boundaries and the infringement of boundaries in the book, Cracking India, we looked at the partition of India.  In her novel, Sidhwa portrays the partition between the Hindus and the Muslims and the battle of religions that forms the country, Pakistan.  According to an article published by Emory University, "Hindu revivalists also deepened the chasm between the two nations.  They resented the Muslims for their former rule over India...many are still in search of identity and a history left behind beyond an impenetrable boundary" (Keen). The article focuses on the history of the partition, but what interested me most about this article was the religious persecution both sides faced and practiced on one another. http://english.emory.edu/Bahri/Part.html

Sidhwa uses the servant, Ayah's sexuality to explore the issues surrounding partition.  Typically, people view countries in relation to the female sex.  Traditionally, men left the home to fight wars to protect their women and they refer to their country as female; something fragile that needs protection.  The right to claim India as their own, emerges in the novel between the Hindu Ice Candy Man and the Muslim, Masseur. In the beginning of the novel, Muslims, Sikhs, and Hindus sit together discussing politics and fawning over Ayah.  They enjoy one another's company and do not see one another as the enemy, but as a group of friends. Ayah is the center of the groups affections and the men treat her as an object, a prize to be won.  An aspect that intrigues me, is the idea that men fight over the women, imprison Ayah and women like her through prostitution, and their family's denounce them after they have been defiled.  If woman is a prize to be coveted, than one would expect their virtue and beings would be more respected.  During Partition, women were subjected to numerous forms of prostitution and the opposing sides violently raped and abused each others women.  The women, doing nothing but existing, had no way of defending themselves and have no voice in religious and political matters, but were the ones who suffered the most violent punishments at times. At least this seemed what Sidhwa was portraying when she wrote Ayah's character and the women who were with her in the 'prison' because they had been shamed. In Lawrence James' book, The Raj, The Making and Unmaking of British India, he recounts the brutality towards women with violent rapes and the dismembering of women's breasts and the breasts being carted off so that all of the Hindu men could see what the Muslim men had done in a retaliation.