(En)gendering diaspora: Negotiating food, culture and women in select Indian diasporic novels

Abstract

This article revisits two well-known novels in Indian diasporic writing, Anita and Me (1996) by Meera Syal and The Namesake (2003) by Jhumpa Lahiri, to examine the cultural agents behind the formation and sustenance of the Indian diaspora. The article first establishes the multivalence of food to understand Indian literature and culture and then contextualizes the novel into the tradition of Indian diasporic food writing. By focusing on the culinary discourses in the novel, the article argues that Indian women employ their culinary strategies and ingenuities to produce a cultural version of Indianness, central to the construction of the Indian diaspora. The article draws the theoretical framework from Anita Mannur’s postcolonial concept of “kitchen Indians” to unravel the structural working of gender roles that operate at the foundation of the Indian diaspora.