Belonging - the Namesake
‘An individual’s interaction with others and the world around them can enrich or limit their experience of belonging.‘ Discuss this with detailed reference to your prescribed text and one other text of your own choosing.
An individual’s connection to their family, a culture or place can develop a greater understanding of themselves or can act as a barrier to truly belonging. In the novel, The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri and Whale Rider, a film directed by Niki Caro, the barriers to belonging are ---- whether it be self-inflicted alienation or alienation based on gender, race or language, whilst showing that belonging to oneself can enrich their sense of belonging to the world.
Belonging is a multifaceted notion that relies one’s interactions with their physical, social and cultural environments, as well as finding acceptance within one’s self. While there interaction can enrich one’s life, it can also serve as a barrier to self acceptance and true belonging. The novel The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, and Whale Rider, a film directed by Niki Caro, explore these interactions with the physical, social and cultural world, and the consequences of their interactions, whether it be enriching or limiting.
While culture can add significant value to one’s life, the sense of tre belonging to only one culture must e sacrificed in order to final acceptance and belonging with others. In The Namesake, Ashima Ganguli is faced with the struggle to overcome the language and cultural barrier posed by her migration to America causing disorientation. The deliberate grammatical mistake used by Lahiri ‘ten finger and ten toe’, symbolises the often embarrassing struggle that Ashima faces in navigating these differences. Lahiri further uses the food motif in marking Ashima’s journey from attempting to transform her unfamiliar surroundings into familiar ones - “a humble approximation of the snack sold on Calcutta side walks and railway platform over India” – to assimilating the two
An individual’s connection to their family, a culture or place can develop a greater understanding of themselves or can act as a barrier to truly belonging. In the novel, The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri and Whale Rider, a film directed by Niki Caro, the barriers to belonging are ---- whether it be self-inflicted alienation or alienation based on gender, race or language, whilst showing that belonging to oneself can enrich their sense of belonging to the world.
Belonging is a multifaceted notion that relies one’s interactions with their physical, social and cultural environments, as well as finding acceptance within one’s self. While there interaction can enrich one’s life, it can also serve as a barrier to self acceptance and true belonging. The novel The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, and Whale Rider, a film directed by Niki Caro, explore these interactions with the physical, social and cultural world, and the consequences of their interactions, whether it be enriching or limiting.
While culture can add significant value to one’s life, the sense of tre belonging to only one culture must e sacrificed in order to final acceptance and belonging with others. In The Namesake, Ashima Ganguli is faced with the struggle to overcome the language and cultural barrier posed by her migration to America causing disorientation. The deliberate grammatical mistake used by Lahiri ‘ten finger and ten toe’, symbolises the often embarrassing struggle that Ashima faces in navigating these differences. Lahiri further uses the food motif in marking Ashima’s journey from attempting to transform her unfamiliar surroundings into familiar ones - “a humble approximation of the snack sold on Calcutta side walks and railway platform over India” – to assimilating the two