“Interpreter[s] of Maladies:” A Study of Some Selected Short Stories by Ahdaf Soueif and Jhumpa Lahiri

Abstract

cultural exchange which, in turn, provides a chance for a better communication among the members of different cultures involved in that process. Welz explains that "cultural barriers are much more difficult to fix, let alone map on to territorial divides, as communication channels transgress and migrant communities routinely cross them" (38). Shedding light on the unique nature of transculturation, Sommer argues that it ascribes a positive connotation to cultural hybridity, cosmopolitan globalisation and ethnic fragmentation while establishing them as counter models to exclusively national or ethnic identities. Therefore transcultural concepts are marked by a utopia moment: they develop optimistic counter approaches to the 'classic' models of multicultural assimilation and alteration to the extent of approaching visions of dissolution of fixed cultural identities. (qtd. in Sissy Helff, "Shifting Perspectives: The Transcultural Novel" 80) Sales adds: transculturation, the in-between third space, emerges as a productive way for the borderline experience of contact between cultures, both in life and in fiction, where the negotiation of differences, sometimes incommensurable, may create a complex tension that could also grow into a strategy of cultural survival: beyond polarizations, against the grain of the rhetoric of binarism, from a creative inbetween transcultural space of communicative bridging. (88) Bhabha"s "Third Space," Pratt"s "Contact Zone" and Soueif"s "Mezzaterra" embody the "utopia moment" suggested in Sommer"s words. The three concepts reflect the attempts of the writers to overcome cultural differences. The short stories of both Soueif and Lahiri depict the cultural encounter experience. Their protagonists negotiate their identities to resolve cultural tensions in order to survive in a world of acute binarism. Various theories have been proposed to approach cultural encounters and how they affect identity formation. Challenging colonial