FEMINISTIC IDENTITY IN THE GULF OF TRADITIONAL AND MODERN ASPECTS

This paper will explore the various diasporic aspects in the fictions of Jhumpa lahiri especially the short story collections in Interpreter of Maladies (1999) and Unaccustomed Earth (2008) following her first novel The Namesake (2003). It is very significant that Jhumpa Lahiri is the child of Indian migrant and she thinks that the question of identity is always a difficult one for those who are culturally displaced and growing up in two worlds simultaneously. The condition of people living in diaspora is always a dual state which creates confusion and clashes. Identity and sense of dislocation, alienation and other issues that expatriates deal with. Diaspora is all about the creation of new identities in a new cultural space. Lahiris works manifest the notion of being uprooted from homeland and also put emphasize on the quest for blending in the host country. Her characters try to become a new- self without really letting go of the old - self and thus creates stories that display universal appeal. Lahiri pursues contradictory ways in handling the issues of diasporic life which makes her writing a delicate and poised voice within the Indian and world diasporic literature.