Survival, Self-Identity and Self Empowerment in Bharati Mukerjee’s Jasmine

Abstract

Bharati Mukherjee is one of the most prominent South Asian women writers. Her works focus on the status of immigrant women and their sense of alienation in the United States. According to her, the immigrant experience is qualitatively different for women and men. Bharati Mukherjee discusses immigrant experience, social oppression, East-West encounter, culture and human psyche in her novels. Jasmine deals with the experience of Jyoti Vijh, a girl from rural India. She is a young widow who immigrates illegally to the United States tofulfill her late husband’s immigrant dream in search of new life in America. She encounters many people and many incidents. Atlast she absorbs he alien culture and succeeds inrooting herself in the culture optimistically. Jasmine reveals more positive approach to the problems of immigration. She successfully comes out of the problems in the alien land and merges with the new culture. In this novel, Jasmine takes new names and identity as she travels. Born as Jyoti in India, her husband names her Jasmine. She becomes Jazzy or Jase, while working as a care giver in New York and she was called Jane while living with Budin Iowa in the Mid-West and finally she becomes Jasmine.