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Austin Overmann
ENG 248
5/12/14
Dr. Wilson
Final Identity Commentary
Where have the Identities gone?
Through many trials and tribulations alike, there have been numerous changes in the
identities of main characters throughout the number of stories that we read. Many characters
made changes in their life styles for the better as well as some for the worse. However, in
reading these novels and plays, I found a lot of characters whom I believed to have completely
lost their identities altogether. These characters tried so hard to change for what they believed to
be the better that they completely forgot who they were and what culture they came from. The
mystery that we must try and answer is why? Why did these characters feel the need to destroy
everything that they had previously known and learned? Most of the time, they were just trying
to fit in within the new culture they had moved into. Other times, characters would struggle to let
go of their old identities and fail to adapt to the changing culture around them.
The fact that so many characters could no longer relate to a culture nor express
themselves as they had previously burdened me quite a bit throughout this past semester.
Originally, I felt like there was something I had to be missing since nobody else had really
mentioned it in class. Over the course of our readings however I realized that what I thought had
been occurring happened to be true. Identity change is not something that we can typically
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visualize right away if it is happening right before our eyes. It’s usually something that we don’t
notice until after the change has happened. In some of the stories we read this was the case. A
lot of the time, the reader was not able to fully recognize the shift in identity until the story was
nearing its end or was over. The fact that some stories ended on open identities, with no real
specific direction to them is what made me want to look into this a bit more. Stories and plays
should always have some sort of a resolve in the end and some of the readings we discussed did
not. For this class, that specifically means that main characters should be able to identify with a
culture or something of that sort at the end of each read. However, in my opinion this wasn’t the
case. I wanted to find out why some characters were left without the ability to relate to their past
selves or their current situation.
The concept of Identity is typically defined as a person's conception and expression of
their individuality or group affiliations. I think that definition accurately depicts what we were
looking for in stories throughout this course. To my point, I also think that this definition
accurately depicts what I believe characters lost over the course of their stories. We saw
characters who no longer felt like they were able to affiliate with groups that they were once
entrenched in. Other characters failed in the end to continually express their individuality which
led them down the same path as those who lost their long term affiliations. Both of these types
of people ended up alone in the stories we read, unable to capture the identity that they once
knew. By using the definition given above, I will show that the characters I talk about indeed
lose their identity completely.
To go more in depth I studied the main characters from 3 of the stories we read. The
characters I chose to examine were Santosh from “One out of many”, Nnu Ego from “The Joys of
Motherhood”, and lastly Eman from “The Strong Breed”. These three characters all share one
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thing in common that contributed to their loss of identity in my opinion. Each of these characters
moved from their native culture and tried their best to fit in, in a different society. Santosh
moved from Bombay to the United States. Nnu Ego and Eman both moved to new villages to
start different lives. One theme that these characters share is the fact that they all strayed from
the beliefs of the culture that they grew up in whether they knew it or not. Santosh had sexual
relations with an African Woman, Nnu Ego couldn’t produce children for a long while, and
Eman deserted his village at a young age when he couldn’t finish out the castration ritual. These
were all things that contributed to their loss of identity altogether as well. To figure out why
exactly all of these characters lost their identity completely we will have to dig deeper into their
own personal stories to find the underlying reasons and possibly connect these characters to each
other even more.
When we first meet Santosh he doesn’t really believe that he has an identity since he
really never thought about identities previously. Santosh is very content with his current lifestyle
in Bombay in which he works for a government official, and sleeps in the streets of the city
despite the fact that he has a wife and kids who live on a hill. At this point Santosh is very
entrenched in the Indian culture that he has grown up in and is stuck in that comfort zone of
sorts. This all changes for Santosh when he moves to the United States however. He would soon
find out that America was nothing like Bombay. The story says that when Santosh landed, he
looked around to find the people like him and he didn’t find a single one. This is exemplified by
the quote: “When we settled down I looked around for people like myself, but I could see no one
among the Indians or the foreigners who look like a domestic. Worse, they were all dressed as
though they were going to a wedding and, brother, I soon saw it wasn’t they who were
conspicuous.” (Naipaul pg.18) People were wearing shoes on their feet (he wasn’t accustomed to
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wearing them) and they even slept inside compared to how he slept on the streets. Other
problems that Santosh faced were, not being able to go on walks (he didn’t know where he was
going), and the fact that money didn’t go as far as it did in Bombay (leading to him spending
most of his pay quickly). This created a huge identity crisis for Santosh causing him to attempt
to reshape his identity as an American rather than an Indian.
An event that caused a major change in the identity of Santosh was when he slept with
the African-American woman. This act is frowned upon in Bombay and Santosh was well aware
of this fact. Santosh however, sort of said screw it since he didn’t believe he would ever see his
wife in Bombay ever again (he didn’t have enough money to pay his way back). It was at this
point when Santosh realized that he only needed to fend for himself. Sleeping with the woman
led to Santosh completely forgetting how he identified with his people back home. After leaving
his employer, Santosh was left with nothing. By leaving he had now lost how he identified with
his employer on top of leaving behind his identity as a man from Bombay after sleeping with the
Hubshi. This left him with essentially no identity. This fact would essentially change Santosh’s
life for the worse. He felt like his only purpose in life was to be able to sustain his life until
death. Life seemed nearly pointless to him since he had nothing to fall back on (can’t go back to
India, no job, slept with the Hubshi). Lastly, the fact that he had no green card had influenced
him to forget his identity as an American since he didn’t think there was a chance he’d be able to
acquire one. No longer having an identity, Santosh lived out the rest of his life unable to relate to
the culture he resided in.
Nnu Ego grew up as a girl with traditional Ibo values and her whole life had set her up to
become a fantastic mother of many sons. This plan took a drastic change when for a long time,
Nnu Ego couldn’t produce any children for her husband which forced her to be sold to a new
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husband named Nnaife. When she finally became a mother, a lot of the Ibo values that she
learned growing up began to change around her, leaving her behind. All that Nnu Ego ever
hoped for in her future was to marry a man and provide him with children to be his heirs.
However, her daughters were able to dream of much more than that. They were able to dream of
an education instead of just getting married to have children and serve their husband. There was
a much higher chance of her children living a better life than she had in terms of employment
and wealth if they were to get a proper education. While this was all happening, Nnu Ego
continued to try and live under the old Ibo traditions. She actually expected her daughters to live
their lives in the same way that she had. As you could guess, Nnu Ego’s children had much
larger aspirations than simply getting married and having children. It was because of this that
Nnu Ego and her children became separated until her death. Her children were never really able
to relate to her due to the fact that she kept on trying to live in the past, unaccepting of the lives
that they had decided to live.
For the most part, Nnu Ego considered herself a failure as a mother due to the fact that
she was unable to relate to her children throughout their lives. It wouldn’t be until she passed
away that she was finally recognized as a good mother. The funeral that she received sort of
helped restore the connection to her children, but I do not think that it was enough to fully
connect Nnu Ego to the identity of a mother. She really struggled to identify with the new
culture that she gets sold into when she became the wife of Nnaife. This story as you can see is
once again a story where the main character (Nnu Ego) fails in their attempts to change who they
are or who they were in order to better fit in within the current culture.
Much like both Santosh and Nnu Ego, Eman from “The Strong Breed” tried his best to fit
into a brand new culture throughout the course of the play. Eman’s problem is that he really
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doesn’t fit in with either of the cultures he has lived in throughout the course of his life. Of
course, he was fitting in pretty well in his new village until he found out about their carrier
rituals. Through multiple flashbacks we can see that Eman no longer fit in with his old village
either. This is due to the fact that Eman neglected to finish out his duties at the “man” camp
where was to be castrated thus alienating himself from his similar people. However, in his old
village the mentally challenged were not treated nearly as horrible as they are in the village he
ran away to. Eman especially did not agree with how the mentally challenged were treated as the
carriers. He has a lot of sympathy for them and was appalled at Sunma’s treatment of both the
little girl and Ifada. In his former village, the carrier was a boat that would hold onto the burdens
of the people, not an actual human being. Instead of the mentally challenged they used people
who were known as the “strong breed” of people since they were the only people who were
strong enough to carry the burdens as well. There was no death involved whatsoever in his old
village whereas in his new village the carriers were murdered in order to relieve the burdens of
the village for the New Year. In both villages, this carrier position is considered an honor, but it
is certain that nobody wants to voluntarily die for their village if they are mentally competant.
When Eman is deemed the carrier of his new village, it creates an identity issue within
his character. In his past village, this would have been a great honor, but Eman has no intentions
of dying for his new village. When he is deemed the carrier and a stranger to the village I believe
it cements him as the village outcast leaving him with no true ability to identify with his new
villages people. Eman could no longer identify with his old village due to the fact that his wife
had died, and now that he has been named to die, I don’t believe he can identify with the new
village he lives in either. Of course, there are many other factors as to why he can’t identify
which I listed previously (treatment of the disabled, being an outcast). Eman lived his entire life
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on the run essentially whether it was running away from his previous village, or running away
from the men who wanted to kill him as their carrier. Either way, Eman carried with him an
enormous burden in his identity. He was not able to identify with either of the communities he
lived in during his short life.
As you can see, these characters have a lot in common. Each one of these characters had
to cope with a great deal of hardship in their lives. On top of that, each character had to deal with
the life transition of moving from one place to another. All of the characters were very
entrenched in the customs and beliefs of the place where they originated from and they all found
it tough to adjust their beliefs in order to fit in within a new society. These three characters all
finished their lives without anyone to identify with. Santosh, was no American, no longer
employed, and had disgraced his Indian culture. Nnu Ego, failed to live up to her expectations as
a mother, and in doing so failed to identify with the Ibo traditions and her children. Eman, ran
away from his home village due to the fact that he didn’t agree with their traditions and in turn
tried to run away from the village he moved to due to the fact that he didn’t agree with their
customs either.
Through digging deeper into the lives of these 3 characters I think I have solved the
puzzle that I originally set out to complete. I believe that each of these three characters simply
failed to make adjustments. Each one of them showed signs of fitting in within their new
culture, but none of them were fully able to grasp the concept of change. Santosh was in over his
head in America, Nnu Ego couldn’t keep up with a modernized community, and Eman could not
respect the traditions of a new village. A trait that each of these characters shared was
stubbornness. None of them wanted to fully change to be a part of the majority (they only
partially tried to change), which ultimately hurt them in the long run. If they all had been willing
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to accept the customs of their new countries/villages I think that they would have adopted new
identities. However, since they couldn’t fully commit to it, they lost their home identities and
failed to grasp on to the identity of their new environment.