The Trauma of Passage and Nostalgia of Return in Selected Arab- American Short Stories (Published)
The current paper investigates the experiences of passage and home nostalgia in four selected Arab-American short stories. These short stories are: O’Lebanon, by Evelyn Shakir, Death and Lebanon, by Barbara Bedway, The Calling, by Nahid Ratchlin, and The Top, by Kaldas Pauline, all which represent three different angles of indigenous cultures in Lebanon, Iran, and Egypt. The four stories celebrate the trauma of ‘transition’ in the light of Arnold Van Gennep’s and Victor Turner’s concepts of passage and transition. Nostalgia of return is approached under the concept of Svetlana Boym’s ‘reflective nostalgia’. The four stories involve home nostalgia as a common trait which colours their symbols of behavior and draw their maps of transition.
Keywords: Hybridity, Liminality, Neophytes, Nostalgia, Transition
Issue of Identity and Double Consciousness in A Colonized Nation: An Analysis of Ali’s “Twilight in Delhi” (Published)
The aim of this research is to represent the nostalgic condition of Indians being faced as the result of colonization. It throws light on the issue how colonized Indians become the victim of double consciousness between the original identity inherited from their ancestors and westernized identity attained through the mimicry of western colonizers. The issue of identity and double consciousness, a sub-category of postcolonial theory, is used as theoretical framework in this research. Bhabha uses the word “hybridity” in order to explain the conflict of identity in colonized people. In Ali’s Twilight in Delhi the character of Asghar suffers from such nostalgic situation due to the clash between his parental and western identity.
Keywords: Colonial, Double Consciousness, Identity Crisis, Nostalgia, Twilight in Delhi