| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this thesis is to examine Diana Abu-Jaber’s memoir, <italic>The Language of Baklava</italic>, and its approach to the question of identity. To this end the thesis utilizes close reading of passages to explore the relationship between language and identity in the memoir. The thesis positions <italic>The Language of Baklava</italic> among other immigrant and first generation American narratives and argues that the memoir claims to present identity as fluid and changeable and that the narrator tries to illustrate the construction of identity based on this premise. However, the text’s language fails to support this attempt and, instead, reveals an identitarian discourse. This tension between the narrator and her language is not easy to grasp, and without a considered examination of the language, the text may even appear liberal and progressive. The thesis makes its intervention here and positions itself in opposition to the critics that laud the memoir for its progressive approach to food. Rather than a strictly food-based analysis, the thesis explores an analysis of language to reveal the memoir’s underlying conservatism by showing the ways in which immigrant characters are not allowed the promised ‘fluid identity.’ The memoir defines, speaks for, and speaks about the immigrant figure, who is therefore, never allowed to speak for himself. This thesis argues that such an approach to identity is problematic, at best, and dangerous, at worst. The framework of this paper draws largely on Stuart Hall’s seminal piece “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” to position its claims regarding the two views of identity-essentialized and non-essentialized-at work in the memoir. | |
