The Struggle for Identity

Understanding who you really are in the early years of your life can be a challenge. Young kids are always asking questions due to their curious nature. “Who am I?”. “Where did I come from?”. These are very common questions that people pose themselves throughout their lives. 

In The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, Gogol Ganguli faces many struggles to discover who he is. Before starting his freshman year at Yale University, Gogol expresses his disapproval for his name.

“How could you guys name me after someone so strange? No one takes me seriously” (Lahiri, 100).

After hearing this, his father suggests that he should simply change his name, which Gogol does. He feels a sense of freedom after doing this, and introduces himself to everyone he meets as Nikhil, his new official name. He feels as if the name doesn’t relate to him at all, and by getting rid of it, he feels better. In my case, my name is originated from Arabic even though I’m a Pakistani Canadian, which makes my naming similar to Gogol’s. Over time, I realized my name represented good luck, success, and good fortune, and also had religious importance. This made me appreciate my name and realize its uniqueness.

Gogol’s struggles with his cultural identity are also a recurring idea in the book. After graduating from Yale, he meets a woman named Maxine, and immediately falls for her. As time goes on, he starts spending more and more time with Maxine’s family and develops a bond with them. The way the Ratliff’s live their life is completely different from his family. At this point in the book, we can see that Gogol becomes increasingly attracted to the American culture of Maxine’s family, and drifts further apart from his Bengali customs and culture. He starts becoming more and more American and slowly loses his identity as an Indian. Even Maxine remarks that he’s different from his parents.

“But you’re so different. I would never have thought that” (Lahiri, 138).

In my last post, I brought up the idea of foreign cultures, and whether there’s a limit to how much one should adapt to a new culture. In Gogol’s case, he has decided to completely adopt the American lifestyle over his family’s traditional Bengali lifestyle. This might be because of how far he’s living from his parents and how his entire family is separated across the country. He also rarely visits India, which can cause him to forget what it’s like to be Indian while living in a foreign country. I visit Pakistan with my parents regularly to meet my relatives, and I feel like that helps me to retain my heritage and culture.

In chapters 7-8, Gogol starts to reach back to his Indian heritage. After his father’s death, he goes back to Boston to live with his mother. He starts spending more time with his own family rather than the Ratliff’s. When he returns to New York, he calls his mother and sister every day and rebuilds his relationship with his family. He also stops rejecting his Indian culture, and starts following his religious rites. He also accepts his mother’s arranged date with Moushumi, a Bengali family friend.

After his experience with his American girlfriends, he decides to return to his roots and date someone from his country. Gogol begins to get a better understanding of who he is as the story progresses. He does not avoid and reject his heritage and name anymore, and starts embracing it instead after many years of denial. Living in a country with a distinct culture from your own can cause you to feel divided, and make it harder for you to grasp your identity.

Works Cited

Lahiri, Jhumpa. The Namesake. Boston, Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,
  2004.