The Namesake By Jhumpa Lahiri Essay On Identity

Jhumpa Lahiri has an important place among the contemporary writers. She got fame with her first collection of short-stories title Interpreters of Maladies which won for her the coveted Pulitzer Prize for fiction. The Namesake is her first novel and has been followed by Unaccustomed Earth, another collection of short- stories. It has been one of the best-sellers and has been named as the ‘Best Book of the Year’ (2003) by the USA Today. Based on this novel, the film of the same name directed by Mira Nair was released in February, 2007. Lahiri’s The Namesake, explores many issues and aspects of immigrant families in an alien milieu, but primarily addresses the problem of identity. As a diasporic novel, it deals with the problem of identity
Moushumi’s gives preferences to the Italian, French or Chinese cuisines rather than the Indian ethnic cuisine. She says that her mother is appalled that she is not making Indian food for him. Moushumi’s is a product of transcultural identity “She is always flattered when they assume she herself is French or half-French” (Lahiri 253). But at the same time she also oscillates between the two cultures. They do not make Indian food frequently yet they crave for “the food they’d grown up eating, they ride the train out to Queens and have brunch at Jakson Diner, piling their plates with tandoori chicken and pakoras and kabobs, and shop afterwards for basmati rice and the spices that need replenishing” (Lahiri229). But the Indian food does not induce emotions in them for their native land. By giving preference to ethnic rituals and cuisine, first generation immigrant want to recreate fragmented past in the present along with nostalgia. So, ethnic cuisine hardly arouses his senses. “….Food is one of the chief planes upon which the young Gogol and his sister Sonia work to define themselves against their Bengali heritage. They insist on pizza and Coke. Dining rituals often provide a framework that reflects and expresses human desires and behaviors. Ultimately
Food has also fusions, mixings and hybridity. Though, acculturation is a slow process in which acceptance, resistance and preservation of culture can be seen. And this process is in a way unearthed by gastronomic factors. Through food, Ganguli tries to preserve their culture in the host country. On the occasion of Gogol's annaprasana, a ceremony marking his sixth-month birthday, Ashima made payash, a warm rice pudding and biryani, the carp in yogurt sauce, the dal, six vegetable dishes. Later, for the sake of their children, they began to prepare peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and a slice of bakery cake on each of Gogol’s birthdays. Sometimes, they order pizza or Chinese for the kids. Gradually, intermixing of cultures is inevitable. Therefore: “In the supermarket, they let Gogol fill the cart with items that he and Sonia, but not they, consume: individually wrapped slices of cheese, mayonnaise, tuna fish, and hot dog. For Gogol’s lunches they stand at the Deli to buy cold nuts, and in the morning Ashima makes sandwiches with bologna or roast beef. At his insistence she concedes and makes him an American dinner once a week as a treat, Shake’n Bake chicken or Hamburger Helper prepared with ground lamb’’ (Lahiri