University of Guilan

Construction of Female Characters (Continuities

and Discontinuities) in Jhumpa Lahiri’s Interpreter of
Maladies

By:

Narges Sayyadi

June 2014
 
 
 Contents

Abstract iii

1. Introduction 1

2. Indian women: between acceptance and subversion of traditional

gender roles 1

2.1. Collective female voice: prescriptive womanhood 2

2.2. Marriage as a norm 3

2.3. Female identity and marks of alterity 3

2.4. Anti-normative womanhood 4

3. Indian women in the Western space 5

3.1. Male and female roles: ambivalent attractions for otherness 6

3.2. Sanjeev’s rejections: defining traditional Indian female roles 6

3.3. Twinkle‘s “Westernization” – double subversion 8

4. Conclusion 11

Bibliography 12

ii

 
 
 Abstract

The paper investigates overlapping normative and anti-normative concepts of womanhood in

the construction of two female characters (Bibi Haldar and Twinkle) in Lahiri’s Interpreter of
Maladies. My claim is that the hybrid nature of these identities introduces a subversive
dimension. This thesis comes to contradict current criticisms that regard the literature of South
Asian American female authors as a neutral cultural product addressing a new cosmopolitan
audience. While I agree that this world of fiction mirrors aspects of a globalized world, I also
think it constructs alternative visions of Hindu femininity. Since these unsettling identities
undermine both Hindu hegemonic norms and Western stereotypes of subaltern female
identities, the “apolitical safety” of Lahiri’s fiction (Rajan and Sharma 164) may be contested.

Keywords: Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies, Subaltern, Hindu femininity

iii

 
 
1. Introduction

This paper analyzes the construction of female characters in two short stories from Jhumpa
Lahiri’s Interpreter of Maladies which are “The Treatment of Bibi Haldar” and “This Blessed
House”. I rely on the assumption that writers from Lahiri’s generation address a “new
cosmopolitan audience” (Rajan and Sharma 159). This particular readership appreciates
literature that mirrors contemporary aspects of globalization: “[...] a world of emigration,
immigration, travel, multiple authenticities, of diaspora and its attendants, a kind of self-
conscious hybridity, of language that stretches the borders of nations, communities and
ironically, ideas of purity” (Rajan and Sharma 161). I would like to examine whether Lahiri’s
characters’ identity performance corresponds to this mixture of specificity and generality and
whether this mixture is a mere aesthetic device. In other words, my analysis focuses on the
interplay of normative and anti-normative models in the construction of Indian femininity. I
have employed the terms continuities and discontinuities to underline the similarities and
differences in the process of female identity formation. The purpose of this paper is to answer
several questions with respect to an alternation of roles in negotiating female identity: Do the
characters analyzed - whether located in India or the USA – display a normative/ anti-normative
behavior? How can we interpret the interplay of roles other than mere forms of hybridity? Can
one establish a connection between these types of female identities and (female) postcolonial
subjectivities? Rajan and Sharma consider that the popularity of this literature is due to the fact
that it presents difference in “a safe apolitical way” (164). However, my claim is that female
identity performance in Lahiri’s short stories has an oppositional nature that deconstructs this
assumed neutrality.

2. Indian women: between acceptance and subversion of traditional gender roles

Lahiri’s short stories present ordinary episodes from the lives of women placed in two different
countries: the USA and India. “The Treatment of Bibi Haldar” is the story of a marginalized
woman who lives in Calcutta, India. I am interested in analyzing the ways in which the main
character’s choice of identity models involves possible alternatives to traditional female roles.
The normative Hindu womanhood is delineated by Bibi Haldar’s attempts to overcome her

1 
 
marginality and by the attitude of the local community of women. The character’s final choice
of self-fulfilment offers an alternative to this model. The next section of the paper will present
the female identity model accepted locally as it is outlined by the collective female voice in the
story.

2.1. Collective female voice: prescriptive womanhood

The community of women introduced through a collective narrative voice “we” is a local
audience of Bibi’s identity performance. One notices that their reactions to her attitudes define
the normative vision of womanhood from a collective feminine perspective. These women are
sympathetic to Bibi’s fate. They realize that Bibi is not suitable for marriage. Thus, they agree
that Bibi’s illness prevents her from being trained into proper womanhood. By defining what
Bibi lacks, her neighbors actually imply what a normative female identity involves. It becomes
very clear that marriage is a pivotal point in a woman’s destiny. Thus, a husband is defined as
the person who speaks in a woman’s name, protects her and sets her on the right path in life.
Other features of a desirable woman derive from these women’s statements. A marriageable
woman should be able to cook, (i.e. know how to feed a man), wear a sari, embroider, and make
nice conversations. She must also be well-dressed, seductive, smiling and attractive. It seems that
life as a wife involves serving dinner, scolding the servants, going to the beauty parlor once every
three weeks. A part of the marriage procedure is an interview where the girl has to face her
future husband and one of his relatives. They examine her body, her knowledge of politics,
poetry and cooking.

Bibi’s female neighbors state their adherence to traditional womanhood. They are placed
somehow in between since they support Bibi without being able to understand her completely.
They sabotage her cousin as a protest against his scapegoating Bibi (they stop buying cosmetics
from him, leading him to bankruptcy). At the same time, they support Bibi, although they
realize she can never overcome her abnormal condition. Consequently, at some point they admit
that they perceive her as a burden and are happy when she is not around. Unable to understand
her sadness, they leave her alone at nights. In conclusion, despite their solidarity, these women
cannot completely relate to Bibi’s difference. There seems to be a barrier created by the fact that
they do not share the same experience of womanhood.

2 
 
The next chapter discusses the main coordinates of female normality as established by Bibi
Haldar’s community.

2.2. Marriage as a norm

Nevertheless, Bibi Haldar wishes to be like any other woman. Thus, she equates normality with
marriage and becomes obsessed with the idea of finding a husband. This craving for a married
life is confirmed by the doctor’s prescription which scandalizes the entire community: he
suggests that a sexual life as a married woman may be the appropriate treatment. Marriage as a
cure implies that normality for a woman is defined in terms of a male presence. Bibi Haldar
seems to have internalized these traditional norms, since she is desperate to become a wife.
Consequently, she begins to take care of her body. Gradually, she becomes interested in keeping
a diet and goes to the tailor’s to make new saris. She also plans her future wedding in detail,
although nobody proposes to her. But the marks of alterity prevent her from reaching this goal.
Her cousin refuses to arrange a marriage, because he does not want to support the wedding
expenses. We can see that Bibi’s sense of agency develops in her attempt to undermine the
cousin’s opposition. She starts spreading compromising rumors about him. As a result, her
cousin advertises her nubility in a local newspaper. But Bibi’s “abnormality” is a well- known
fact in the community and there are no suitors for her.

I have identified the main coordinate of the female ideal that Bibi has to adopt. I will go on by
analyzing the elements that turn Bibi Haldar into a peculiar case in her community.

2.3. Female identity and marks of alterity

The main element that emphasizes Bibi Haldar’s difference is mental illness. She has periodic
convulsions when she falls into delirium. The society considers her disabled, since she is not
trusted to manage on her own. She is far from being beautiful, which further accentuates her
“abnormality”. Her ill and unattractive body is regarded as a sign of failure to perform according
to established norms of (female) identity (Woodward 124).

Another core identity marker is that Bibi Haldar has no family. Her only relative is a cousin
who owns a cosmetics shop. He allows Bibi to live with him and his wife. In exchange for this

3 
 
“hospitality”, Bibi draws up the shop’s sales inventory. When her cousin’s wife gets pregnant,
Bibi’s disease means that her status further deteriorates. Her illness is considered a threat to the
unborn child. Therefore, she has to eat from separate dishes and use separate towels and soaps.
She is no longer allowed to sleep in the same building with the pregnant woman and has to
retreat to the storeroom. The same scapegoating takes place after the child is born. Thus, Bibi
is blamed when the baby catches a cold and the storeroom becomes her permanent home. One
may conclude that, as a sick woman, Bibi is desired neither by her relatives, nor by a man. Her
inappropriate corporeality is a stigma that prevents her fulfilment as a “normal” woman.

The next chapter analyses manifestations of Bibi’s agency, the way she defines her identity on
her own terms, deviating from the norm.

2.4. Anti-normative womanhood

Bibi Haldar wishes to fashion herself in accordance with traditions, but her marks of alterity
force her to choose a different path. Confronted with general hostility, the sick woman reacts
against the community’s treatment. As a result, her fits increase in frequency after Haldar and
his wife launch their separatist campaign. This may be interpreted as an organic protest against
marginalization and it precedes Bibi’s deliberate breaking of rules. Her attitude gradually
changes from attempts to imitate a normative behavior to that of undermining it. One may say
that her identity performance shifts from a “purposeful expression” of normative roles of
femininity to “a suppression of behaviors relevant to those norms conventionally associated with
a salient social identity” (Klein et al. 7).

The first sign of this change is Bibi’s self-isolation. The second time her cousin sends her to the
storeroom, Bibi seems determined to start a new life. Thus, she is happy to have her own place.
She decorates the room, giving it a personal touch. She comforts her women neighbors telling
them not to worry, since she enjoys her new freedom. She refuses their company and sinks into
further isolation. The idea of finding a husband seems no longer appealing to her. After some
time the women are surprised to discover that Bibi Haldar is pregnant. They stand by her during
the pregnancy period and help her deliver the baby. Bibi refuses to reveal the identity of the
father. Later on, Bibi takes over her cousin’s bankrupt business and becomes an independent

4 
 
single mother. Although her neighbors are curious about the circumstances of conception, they
stop looking for explanations when they realize Bibi is completely cured.

This story presents an Indian woman whose behavior is caught in the dilemma of wishing to be
accepted by the community but being unable to be so. Her illness and unpleasant looks are
obstacles to social integration. The patriarchal standards reject a woman who is unfit for
marriage. Realizing the futility of her attempts, Bibi Haldar finally chooses not to conform to
the prescribed standards. She thus “recovers” by means of an unconventional cure: she becomes
a mother, without being a wife. Her destiny as a woman is fulfilled without the presence of a
man. This is why the child’s conception remains an enigma: the act as such does not matter; the
male role is marginalized in her “cure”. In relation to female subaltern agency, I think Rajan’s
interpretation of silence as “a refusal to speak” (87) can be applied to Bibi Haldar’s story. The
fact that she acts secretly and silently may be read as a sign of empowerment. If one defines
agency as “the extent to which people participate actively in shaping their identities” (Woodward
3), one may consider that Bibi Haldar does have agency. She realizes that society will never allow
her to be a conventional woman. In consequence, she chooses single motherhood as the frame
of her female identity. One may consider that by creating Bibi Haldar, Jhumpa Lahiri offers a
local vision of an Indian woman who steps out of the “victimhood paradigm” (Puwar 22). The
interplay of normative and anti-normative female roles in Bibi Haldar’s case may be a metaphor
for the subaltern female struggle in postcolonial societies. The fact that Lahiri creates an Indian
woman who intervenes in the shaping of her identity may be interpreted as a response to
Western ideology of Indian women’s submissiveness (Purakayastha 111).

3. Indian women in the Western space

In the next section of the paper, I will analyze another story of Lahiri’s, called “This Blessed
House”, whose female character (Twinkle) is located in the United States. I am interested in the
extent to which Twinkle’s identity negotiation involves similar and/or different patterns with
the character of Bibi Haldar. Sanjeev and Twinkle are a young married couple who move to a
new house in Connecticut, the USA. He is a former MIT student and a successful business man
at present. She is enrolled at Stanford University, writing a thesis on Irish poetry. The new house
into which they have moved contains traces of its former dwellers: Christian objects hidden in

5 
 
unexpected nooks around the place. The story conflict consists in Sanjeev and Twinkle’s
different attitudes towards the religious accessories.

3.1. Male and female roles: ambivalent attractions for otherness

From the very beginning, Twinkle is attracted by the objects she gradually discovers. Not only
does she wish to keep them, but she also displays them around the house. Sanjeev and Twinkle’s
different reactions to the foreign items reflect distinct degrees of openness to cultural otherness.

Sanjeev intends to present a Hindu image to the outer world. The fact that they have to throw
a party for inaugurating the house scares him, since he realizes that the guests will see the
Christian objects. He has a similar reaction when they find a plaster statue of Virgin Mary in
the garden. While Twinkle suggests it should be placed on the lawn, Sanjeev considers this a
betrayal of (their) Hindu identity. Thus, he intends to throw it away; Twinkle insists that the
statue should be kept since it is part of their property. They finally reach a compromise: the
statue is placed in a niche, so that it can only be seen by the visitors and not by the passers-by.

Sanjeev’s reticence towards the Christian objects illustrates his adherence to Indian traditions.
His wife’s attraction to them underlies a deeper conflict between Twinkle and Sanjeev’s different
conceptions of gender roles.

The next section of the paper will present the definition of the female identity standard from a
male’s perspective (e.g. Sanjeev’s).

3.2. Sanjeev’s rejections: defining traditional Indian female roles

Sanjeev is surprised at his wife’s insistence on keeping the Christian accessories. This episode
makes him think of their history as a new family. He feels that her attraction to Western things
actually disturbs him at a more profound level. Having been united by means of an arranged
marriage, Sanjeev and Twinkle have started to know each other only afterwards. Gradually, he
has understood that there are things about her that contradict his model of wifehood: she does
not cook Indian food, she smokes, she is rather unorganized, and she wears high heels – which
makes him appear shorter. It seems that the two of them have been shaped by different cultural
experiences: he finds her favorite films depressing; he knows nothing about the Irish poet on

6 
 
whom she writes her dissertation. Therefore, they seem to be united by a few vague cultural
references (their teenage preference for Wodehouse’s novels and the fact that they both dislike
sitar).

Confronted with Twinkle’s obstinacy in keeping the Christian objects, Sanjeev re-evaluates the
circumstances of their marriage. Thus, he realizes that he would have preferred a more
traditional wife. Sanjeev is clearly aware of his passive acceptance of the Indian traditional
marriage scheme. He has a negative definition of love, i.e. he knows only what love is not
supposed to be. His decision of getting married was prompted partly by his feelings of loneliness
and partly by his mother’s insistence. According to Indian traditional standards, Twinkle is the
ideal person to be loved since she is beautiful, high caste and educated. I think Sanjeev’s inner
conflict comes from the impossibility to reconcile his idea of a wife with Twinkle’s identity
performance. Actually, Sanjeev’s wife-choice is a deviation from the usual marriage pattern
among Indian males coming to study in the USA. According to Kurien, Indian males who chose
to study abroad obey the traditional norm prescribed for men by Indian society. Their access to
education is a path to becoming reliable bread-winners and future heads of families. Since they
represent a segment of the more conservative Indian population, these men usually prefer
traditional wives, mainly selected from India (Hondagneu-Sotelo 158). The reason why they do
not marry Indian female students from the USA is because these women’s emancipation clashes
with their conservative views. Taking into account that Sanjeev has chosen Twinkle and not
someone more traditional, it may be the case that it is Twinkle’s very difference that
simultaneously attracts and disturbs him. This ambiguity becomes apparent in his attitude
towards her childish curiosity and fascination with small things. This is a feature Sanjeev
appreciates, but cannot fully comprehend. On the one hand, Sanjeev admires his wife’s openness
towards the world in general, but on the other hand her attraction for Western things signals
the existence of a cultural barrier that unsettles him. When Twinkle and the guests find the
Christ’s bust in the attic, Sanjeev admits that he hates its solemnity and perfection, but mostly
Twinkle’s fascination with it. As his parents are still in India, while hers live in California, one
may assume that Twinkle has spent more time in the West than Sanjeev, who came to America

7 
 
as a student. This may also account for their different attitudes towards Indian and Western
traditions.

I will go on analyzing Twinkle’s behavior and the manner in which this character’s identity
performance undermines both Hindu ideals of femininity and Western discourse on cultural
otherness.

3.3. Twinkle‘s “Westernization” – double subversion

Twinkle is far from embodying a traditional Hindu wife. It seems that the only frail link she has
with her ancestors’ tradition is the arranged marriage ritual. But this, too, is taken over
superficially, since she does not act according to Sanjeev’s expectations. I suggest that her
Westernized identity can be interpreted as a subversion of both Hindu traditional norms of
femininity and of Western exotic grids of perceiving cultural otherness.

Although her name is Tinima, she prefers to be called Twinkle, an English word borrowed from
a nursery rhyme. She thus chooses to express her identity in Western terms. Her attitude towards
the Christian objects illustrates the complicated way in which her identity has been shaped by
the contact with multiple cultural traditions. First of all, the Christian accessories are not
signifiers of sacredness for Twinkle. She is somehow amused by them: she finds them
“beautiful”, “spectacular” and “cute”. Their accidental discovery renders them even more
attractive. At the party, the Christian objects and Twinkle become the foci of attention, to
Sanjeev’s discomfort. After showing the guests her collection of Christian items, she organizes a
treasure hunt in the attic, hoping to find similar things there. The process of discovering “other”
cultural objects is pictured as a game, a kind of entertainment. The objects are not appreciated
for their cultural value; it is their otherness and their placement in an unusual context (a Hindu
home) that makes them “enjoyable” to the mixed audience (American and Indian guests).
Delighted by the game of discovery, they enter the attic with Twinkle and later come back with
the “prey”: a fifteen kilos silver bust of Jesus, with a solemn expression, on which they place a
women’s feather hat. The last detail is meant to cancel the religious/cultural significance of the
statue which becomes just another funny object. I interpret this attitude towards Western
religious objects as a deconstruction of Western exotic grids of perceiving cultural otherness.

8 
 
The paradox of postcolonial studies along with performance theory may offer a key to
understanding the deconstructing of exotic assumptions in “This Blessed House”.

According to Huggan, postcolonial studies are thought to operate at the intersection of two
regimes of value: postcolonialism and postcoloniality. Postcolonialism is defined as a system
meant to oppose colonial epistemologies and assumptions; postcoloniality is linked with the
condition of global market where cultural products and ideas about cultural otherness circulate
as commodities (28). It follows that within the area of postcolonial, cultural otherness is
endowed with a political value, while within the regime of postcoloniality it acquires an aesthetic
one (Huggan 13). The exotic discourse – a product of colonialism – is based on this dialectical
relationship: it pretends to honor cultural difference in order to disguise the inequality of power
relations established in the cultural clash. In the global era, exoticism functions under the form
of mass-market consumption of products from other cultures. Its assumptions remain the same,
but its mode of operation changes. Twinkle’s attraction to the Christian objects may be
interpreted as a subversion of exoticist assumptions. First of all, she is a non-Western female
observer living in the symbolic center of the capitalist world. Her fascination with Western
religious accessories turns them into objects displayed under an exotic (female) gaze. The
location of the Christian items in hidden places of the house obeys the aesthetics of
decontextualization (Appadurai quoted in Huggan 16). The removal of objects from their
context simultaneously domesticates their cultural specificity and feeds the spectator’s need for
novelty. Twinkle, too, is a product of a history of cultural transplantations. Her movement to a
new house may be read as a metaphor for her perpetual dislocation. She is a diasporic Indian
woman who exoticizes Western culture while literally inhabiting it. I think the construction of
this female character allows the author to encode multiple subversive significations. Twinkle
treats Christian symbols as objects-to-be-admired, devoid of religious and cultural meanings.
Therefore, her gesture overthrows exotic assumptions, showing how Western culture may
become the object of the postcolonial gaze. The subversive potential of performance identity
consists of repeated enactments of an established norm: “performance is always a reiteration of
a norm or a set of norms, and to the extent that it acquires an act-like status in the present, it
conceals or dissimulates the conventions of which it is a repetition” (Butler in Goodman and de

9 
 
Gay 69). Twinkle’s admiration for the Christian accessories is a repetition of the exotic norm
that distorts the original.

On the other hand, Twinkle’s Westernization clashes with Hindu hegemonic versions of female
gender roles. In the case of immigrant populations, religious conservatism is a means of
preserving cultural identities (Van der Veer 9). In the American context, Indian immigrants
react against racism and assimilation by constructing the image of South Asian communities as
“model minorities” (Purkayastha 91, Kurien quoted in Hondagneu-Sotelo 167). Considering
that most of the Indian population in the USA is of Hindu origin, Hinduism is the religion
employed as an emblem of ethnicity. A hegemonic version of Hindu identity is created by male-
led Indian cultural organizations. The discourse fashioned by these groups employs gender codes
to support their religious-nationalist doctrine. Thus, women are conceived as preservers and
transmitters of cultural norms. They are supposed to act as dedicated wives and mothers, and
initiate their children into Hindu traditions. Men are the bread-winners whose professional
success is conditioned by wife support. In the larger postcolonial nationalist discourse, women
as symbols of the family are identified as mothers of the nation and are supposed to be protected
against foreign influences (Chatterjee quoted by Loomba 191). Although the hegemonic version
of culture is not shared by various groups within diasporic Hindu communities, it is an officially
accepted version of Indianness (Purkayastha 88). Hindu women of the diaspora are thus faced
with a double challenge. They have to shape their identity negotiating two ideological
constructions of womanhood: the Hindu hegemonic one and mainstream stereotypes that
conceive Hindu women in terms of submissiveness and victimhood.

Twinkle’s adherence to Western values clashes with traditional roles assigned to Indian women.
Her fluid identity makes it impossible for her to be associated with the core of Indian traditions.
As a diaspora Indian woman, Twinkle inhabits a double structure. Westernization provides her
the tools to deviate from a normative Hindu conception of womanhood. In the same time, the
character’s shallow adherence to Christian symbols via a counterfeit exoticism can be interpreted
as a contestation of Western cultural supremacy. I think Twinkle’s belonging to neither of the
two worlds goes beyond a mere aesthetic hybridity. Her vague connections with both Hindu
and Western cultures allow her to fashion a female identity that is not prescribed by either of

10 
 
them. If the political dimension of literature consists in its ability to offer alternative discourses
to hegemonic truths (Rushdie 14), then one may say that “The Blessed House” offers alternative
models to established visions: Western exoticism and hegemonic Hindu femininity.

4. Conclusion

The stories analyzed allow us to formulate several conclusions with respect to subversive identity
negotiations in Lahiri’s short stories and the idea of literature as a product for consumption. The
continuity of female identity performance consists in the characters’ deconstructions of norms.
Bibi Haldar accepts the status of a single woman in a community where marriage validates
womanhood. The absence of a man in her life signals the assertion of her individuality and
ultimately independence. Twinkle, an Indian woman located in the United States, acts in an
anti-normative way, as well: she subverts both Hindu hegemonic ideals of womanhood and
Western assumptions of female otherness.

The discontinuity of their identity construction resides in the means by which they fashion
alternative female selves. Bibi Haldar chooses single motherhood. Although this is not a cultural
specific model, it allows her to shape her identity in her own terms. As an Indian woman from
diaspora, Twinkle inhabits a double cultural structure. The fluid nature of her cultural
affiliations dismantles both Eurocentric discourses and Hindu hegemonic standards of
femininity. Twinkle’s parodic Westernization is the means she chooses to fashion a female
identity that is neither Western nor Hindu.

It is true that Lahiri’s stories mix local and global realities. This fact may partly account for their
appeal to a new cosmopolitan audience. I agree with the fact that the hybridity of her female
characters corresponds to the shifting nature of things typical of the global condition. Still,
despite their vague cultural specificities, the women of Lahiri’s fiction perform female roles that
contradict certain standards of and stereotypes about Hindu female identities. Thus, Lahiri’s
stories may be interpreted as illustrations of “the postcolonial exotic” (Huggan 28). They
circulate both as cultural commodities on a global market and as means to construct oppositional
subjectivities. To the extent that these stories dismantle hegemonic models of female identity,
they cannot be regarded as mere aesthetic narratives.

11 
 
 Bibliography

1. Primary sources:
Lahiri, Jumpa. 1999. Interpreter of Maladies. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
2. Secondary sources:

Goodman, Lizbeth and Jane de Gay (eds.). 2000. The Routledge Reader in Politics and
Performance. London and New York: Routledge

Huggan, Graham. 2001. The Postcolonial Exotic, Marketing the Margins. London and New
York: Routledge.

Loomba, Ania. 1998. Colonialism/Postcolonialism, London & New York: Routledge

Mohanty, Chandra T. 2003. Feminism without Borders, Decolonising Theory, Practising

Solidarity. Duke University Press

Purakayastha, Bandana. 2005. Negotiating Ethnicity: Second Generation South Asian Americans,
Traverse a Transnational World. USA: Rutdgers University Press

Puwar, Nirmal. 2003. South Asian Women in the Diaspora. Berg Publishers

Rajan, Gita, and Shailja Sharma (eds.). 2006. New Cosmopolitanisms: South Asians in the US.
California: Standford University press

Rushdie, Salman. 1991. Imaginary Homelands, Essays and Criticism 1981-1991, London: Granta
and Penguin

Sotelo-Hondagneu, Pierrette, 2003. Gender and U.S. Immigration. Berkeley: University of

California Press

Spivak, Chakravorty G. 1990. The Postcolonial Critic: Interviews, Strategies, Dialogues. London
& New York: Routledge

Sunder, Rajeswari R. 1995. Real and Imagined Women: Gender, Culture and
Postcolonialism. London & New York: Routledge

Woodward, Kath, 2002. Understanding Identity. London: Arnold, Hodder Headline Group

3. Online sources:

Klein Olivier, et al. (n. date) “Social Performance: Extending the Strategic Side of SIDE”.
www.ulb.ac.be/psycho/psysoc/Papers/identityperformance.pdf (Last retrieved 15.6.2014)

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Van der Veer, Peter. 2001. “Transnational Religion”, paper given to the conference on
Transnational Migration: Comparative Perspectives, Princeton University,
www.transcomm.ox.ac.uk/working%20papers/WPTC-01-
18%20Van%20der%20Veer.pdf (Last retrieved 15.6.2014)

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