Othering and Cultural Identity in Hanif Kureishi’s “The Black Album”

Abstract

During the colonial period from the 16th century to the 20th century, the Western ideology has created arbitrary boundaries between itself and ‘other’, and labelled ‘other’s land as both the ‘orient’ and ‘the land of barbarians’. Many communities from the former colonial regions have migrated to England during post-colonial period. Nevertheless, the host British society has maintained the discourse of ‘othering’. In this context, Hanif Kureishi’s "The Black Album" (1995) allows readers to analyse the discourse of ‘othering’ in terms of religion, race and culture to establish one’s identity. The novel concerns the quest of Shahid who is torn between a sense of belonging by becoming a member of a fundamentalist group, and liberalism by having an affair with a white postmodernist instructor Deedee Osgood in British society. Leader Riaz and Chad are otherized by portraying binary opposition of different, savage, and fundamentalist because they burn a novel that is considered to be blasphemous and they attach significance to an aubergine. Although Shahid and his elder brother Chili imitate the host culture, they cannot escape being considered as the ‘other’ because of their colour, race, class and culture. Although a Muslim girl Tahira struggles between the host culture and her main culture in a multicultural society, and represents a contemporary woman’s role is also considered as the ‘other’ because of her clothes and religious faith. Shahid’s uncle Asif, representing first-generation immigrants in the multicultural British society, is not only silenced by the ruling British society, which see him as an intruder and dependent, but also considered by representations of the ruling group as suspicious, and the ‘other’. There are racial lines, with the white Europeans on one side, and everyone else on the other. Hanif Kureishi criticizes racism, fundamentalism, Marxism and even liberalism because everybody can become hypocritical to bring forward their thoughts and live on principles they favour. Kureishi does not prefer one side to the other side.