Ethnic Caricatures and Transnational Identity in Hanif Kureishi’s The Buddha of Suburbia
Ethnic Caricatures and Transnational Identity in Hanif Kureishi’s The Buddha of Suburbia

Summary/Abstract: This study focuses on comic ethnic caricatures in Hanif Kureishi’s The Buddha of Suburbia (1990) and argues that the construction and deconstruction of these caricatures transcend the concept of identity. Kureishi’s novel narrates four years in the life of Karim, who is born to an Indian father and an English mother. Karim’s identity conflict due to his mixed racial background prevents him from fitting in the British society. The novel revolves around Karim’s and other immigrant characters’ identity conflicts in the tense political and social climate of 1970s Britain. As the novel is narrated from Karim’s perspective, his humorous perspective of the world produces comic characters, which are particularly caricatured versions of ethnic identities. This study argues that the shifting direction of humour generated by the construction and deconstruction of comic ethnic caricatures exposes the transnational sensibility of ethnic identities in The Buddha of Suburbia.

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