Questioning Identity in Diana Abu Jaber's book "Arabian Jazz"

Recension Littéraire , 2023 , 21 Pages

Philologie Américaine - Littérature Comparée

Diana Abu Jaber is one of the prominent Arab American women writers. This article aims at discussing one of the literary works of Diana Abu Jaber, namely Arabian Jazz, focusing on the theme of identity. In her writings, Diana Abu Jaber deploys the cultural trope to discuss the Arab-American life and issues of belonging to their homeland. Also, Diana tries to focus on the identity theme to negotiate the existence of Arab in the main stream America and how these characters suffer from the duality and how they try to preserve their homeland identity through a hybridization of both identities. In this article the focus will be on the protagonists of the novel Arabia Jazz and how Diana Abu Jaber tries to analyse the protagonists’ identity in a stylistic way.

1- Introduction

Arab American literature appeared at the beginning of the 1900s and began to develop through the various stages that Arabs knew in America. The social and political circumstances and events affected the Arab communities in sorting and developing this type of ethnic literature.

Most of the early Arab-American writers presented themselves as Arabs without referring to the American part of their identity, but this approach changed over time, and Arab-American writers began to take into account the space provided by the American side of their personality and began to put their experience in building identity in its multicultural American context. Instead of the literary production taking the status of Arab only or only American, writers try to create a balance between these two worlds.

The task of these writers is to make the Arab American voice heard and to confront the misperception spread about Arabs in the United States of America, and this is due to their good understanding of American society and their pride in the culture of the homeland.

This paper attempts to understand how these writers discuss the issue of identity in their writings through Diana Abu Jaber's novel Arabian Jazz, and it is one of post-modern novels within the Arab American literary frame.

Identity has become one of the problematic concepts in sociology for the reason that it is so fluid under the effects of globalization. According to Philip M. Khayal, “Identity formation then, is not a singular process with a definitive end point but an evolving social-psychological experience of self-discovery that changes with events, issues, and socio-political circumstances surrounding a person”. In the same parallel of importance, Stuart Hall claims that the identity of diasporic people is constantly being alerted due to diasporic identity that is a fluid and transforming itself. Continuing Stuart’s argument about identity, he considers identity as a “production” because identity is changeable according to the circumstances. In the long run, Homi Bhabha maintains that the change on diasporic identity and the continuity in this change lead to have a “hybrid identity”; which means the mixture of elements from the home-land and adopted home to create a third culture that reflects immigrants in diaspora to be “in betweenness”. Consequently, Arab-Americans fight with similar identity politics and issues of representation that other migrants encounter.

In the Arab-American diaspora, many issues are raised to be debated over which part of this category should be focused on: Arab, American, or in between; in other words, whether a hyphen should distinguish the different elements of their ethnocultural and national identities, or if this hyphen should be replaced by a hybrid identity in which the identities are blended instead of being separated.

Identity in the Arab-American Literature is considered as one of debatable and skeptical issues because this concept; identity embodies and reflects how others build their judgments on Arabs. In this way, Robert Terwilliger argues that “a man finds his identity by identifying. A man’s identity is not best thought of as the way in which he is separated from his fellows, but the way in which he is united with them.” Thus, Arab-American hold a unique set of cultural values, beliefs and attitudes. They have found the conformity on keeping their culture within the dominant culture of the US.

Thus, Arab-American women’s identity is presented to be in conflict. It is employed to define ethnic identity and to explain the different strategies applied by this ethnic group to adapt appropriately the new home. First and foremost, sociologists among them Atkinson, Morten and Sue have defined ethnic identities as individual’s sense of belonging to a group. For those with multicultural backgrounds, the progress of ethnic identity has been conceptualized as an evolutionary stage process (1979: 23). Furthermore, ethnic identity is the community’s feelings that have a linkage with values, symbols, and shared history which identify them as a distinct group.

As a result, this paper is devoted to Diana Abu Jaber's novel, Arabian Jazz, and analysing how Diana Abu Jaber deploys the concept of identity among Arab Americans by deconstructing the identity aspect of the main characters in the novel: Fatima, Matussem, Jemorah, and Melvina.

2- Identity in Arab American writings

this axis will try to shed light on the treatment of the issue of identity by Arab-American writers, especially contemporaries, Diana Abu Jaber includes.

The question of identity has inspired many Arab-American writers since their early existence in the USA. And most of the writings tried to answer questions related to the issue of identity. Thus, how do contemporary writers provide answers to the question of identity? And how do some Arab American writers see the correct way to discuss it?

The first generation of Arab-American writers dealt with the question of identity differently than the current generation. Before the assimilation process reached its climax, the first generation expressed only their pure culture and their heritage through their writings, without mentioning their Americanness part. Steven Salaita (2000: 14) expresses his reservation, considering that the way they expressed their identity do not go beyond the limits of their imagination:

"Their task is to build a heritage identifiably linked to the Arab world but that is nonetheless their own." [6]

This approach does not serve the Arab-Americans in their quest for integration, which made Lisa Suhair Majaj (1999: 64) calls for the adoption of a new, different approach that relies primarily on considering the Arab-American identity as an indivisible whole, celebrating both components and giving them equal importance:

"As hyphenated Americans we seek to integrate the different facets of ourselves, our experiences, and our heritages into a unified whole."

In response to the hesitation of some to present their multidimensional identity and express the richness of the new multicultural environment, Majaj (1999:71) claims:

"As we continue to strengthen our networks and develop our group identity, we need to expand our vision and to move beyond cultural preservation toward transformation […] We need to probe the American as well as the Arab dimensions of our Arab American identity, and to engage not only in self-assertion, but also in self-criticism."

This new approach to identity is what the current generation of Arab-American writers has adopted. An approach formulated to reflect the cultural diversity that Arab Americans add to American society. Thus, identity and culture were invested as a kind of enrichment rather than as an element of difference.

Recently, the most important fiction writings show that Arab Americans seem ready to extrapolate the most important aspects of their identity in a way that has not been discussed before. The Arab-American writer Diana-Abu Jaber's novel "Arabian Jazz" is an explicit example of how Arab American writers approach the topic of hybrid identity.

3- Conceptx of identity in Diana-Abu Jaber's novel "Arabian Jazz"

Through the two main characters in the novel, Jemorah and Melvina, Abu Jaber discusses the question of the dual identity; in-betweenness, of Arab Americans. Throughout the novel's chapters, the older sister Jemorah (Jem) tries to find a definition of her dual identity. The conflict she is experiencing reflects Abu Jaber's analysis and investigation of the Arab-American identity. Without reaching any conclusion, Abu-Jaber deploys the jazz as a metaphor to express Jemorah’s complex identity.

Like Arab culture, American society includes other dual identities, such as Latin Americans, American Indians, African Americans, etc. And all these identities struggle to prove their presence within the multicultural stream of American society. Abu Jaber referred to this topic in her writings to clarify that Arab Americans, like other minorities, have common connections represented in the struggle for identity. In this context, the relationship of Jemorah with Ricky, exemplifying this as an event through which Abu Jaber highlights that many other characters belonging to different heritage have the same issue as Arabs. Ricky, as he belongs to an Indian background, is also searching for himself through the identity conflict he is experiencing.

In this regard, Steven Salaita argues:

" In Arabian Jazz, contextualizing the Arab within a broader rubric of minority discourse produces a textual paradox worth our attention: Abu Jaber creates an essentialized Other—the Arab American— who interacts with other marginalized characters so that the essentialist tendencies of the dominant society can be mitigated and ultimately restructured.” (2001:436)

Abu Jaber chooses a small, poor white town called Euclid, where the novel takes place, and as an environment for the main characters to explore the complexity of their identities through their interaction with the place. Here, Abu Jaber wants to point out that the town is marginalized by society, just as the Arab family is. Salaita states, "It is in the community where critics can see living contrasts of preservation and assimilation, Arabism and Americana, xenophobia and camaraderie - all split visions that demand expressions.” (2000)

By setting the events of the novel in an isolated town, Abu-Jaber aims to draw attention to how this small community perceives values and how it understands differences.

The place has a strong connotation in the novel, and the town of Euclid became home to an Arab family in America, the Matussem Ramoud family, and his two daughters, Jemorah and Melvina.

“Without the mall, Euclid remained an amoeba of a town, thirty miles straight out Route 31 north of Syracuse. It took in dirt farmers, onion farmers, and junk dealers and produced poorly clothed and poorly fed children, who’d wait for driver’s licenses then leave in rotting-out Chevies, going as far as a case of Black Label would take them. Usually just far enough for them to come back for good.” (A-Z:93)

Poverty and marginalization are reflected in the town, as these difficult conditions can be seen in the children Jem saw as a rider on the school bus. Abu-Jaber embodies marginalization through children and puts the reader in front of the anxiety she feels about this society in which families cannot properly educate their children.

“A band of seven children, ranging from around ten to eighteen, emerged from the defunct bus, crossed the lot, and climbed onto the school bus. Jem noticed a clothesline loaded down with diapers. The Broom kids looked savage. Their faces were sharp and blank, branded with grime. Jem felt heat rising from their hands, their mouths, the way they ran, banging down to sit in the last rows in the bus. (A-Z:91-92)

Arabian Jazz brings us closer to the reality experienced by families in the Euclid area through the Peachy Otts family, which lives next to the Ramoud family, reflecting the life of marginalization and poverty without any horizon. Peachy Otts has two sisters, Glady and Dolores. The latter gave birth to her first child when she was barely twelve.

"she’d turned herself over so many times to that damn man, that damn man being many men, forty, maybe fifty, or even a hundred. Who was counting? It didn’t matter, they were all the same, parading around with their dicks like trophies, and nearly every one put a baby in her.” (A-Z:101-02)

Through the character of Dolores, Abu-Jaber would like to describe the instability experienced by families in Euclid and their dissatisfaction with themselves, as the role of Dolores became only to get pregnant. While dying, Dolores is still asking about her younger sister, Peachy, as she wants her sister to have a better life than her and go to university to get out of this marginalized place represented by Euclid.

This setting is of paramount importance for the novel. It embodies all the complexity that resides in building the identity of an Arab American family. Euclid is a small copy of the greater American society where Arab Americans struggle to identify themselves. The two sisters will test their strength to overcome this issue in a complex environment.

Diana Abu-Jaber expresses the displacement to which this family of Arab origin is exposed through two important events strongly connected to each other in the novel. The first event is manifested in the family moving from Syracuse to Euclid, and the second event

connected with it is the death of the mother, Nora. Through these two related events, Abu Jaber seeks to highlight the concept of homesickness and the relationship to the mother country.

For Jemorah and Melvina, the loss of their mother is the same as the loss of their home. On the other hand, for Matussem, the event of moving to Euclid is a repetition of the events of his parents' departure from Palestine to Jordan and not returning to the original country again. Thus, Matussem's desire to find a home in Euclid is similar to the desire of his parents to find a home in Jordan.

“Euclid, lost to the rest of the world, was Matussem’s private land, like the country his parents tried to leave as they made lives in Jordan, as they let go of their children’s memories and let them grow up as Jordanians. Matussem was only two when the family left Nazareth. Still he knew there had been a Palestine for his parents; its sky formed a ceiling in his sleep. He dreamed of the country that had been, that he was always returning to in his mind. After they’d moved to Euclid, he found there were ways to lose himself in a place. Euclid, my misplaced past, he thought when he walked the gravel roads, past shacks and barking dogs. When he first saw Euclid he remembered it, every silver leaf and broken-backed creek. Nora had been his history once; now only the land was left.” (A-Z:260)

The mother's loss at an early age made the two girls, Jem and Melvie, experience emotional and psychological displacement, besides the problem of dual identity they suffer from. This situation resulted in a profound impact on the construction of the daughters' identity.

The mother's death, due to typhus during the family's trip to Jordan, cut off the relationship with Nora's parents because the grandparents consider Mattussem to be the cause of their daughter’s death and consider the two girls, Jemorah and Melvina, to be accomplices. This made the two girls' isolation worsen, and their relationship with American society further complicated.

Mattussem considers the other half of his two daughters to be Arab, while the grandparents consider him half a criminal, and the two girls have to live with this accusation for the rest of their lives.

"His in-laws never forgave him. Although they called the girls on birthdays and holidays, they wouldn’t see them in person. “It hurts too much,” his mother-in-law had said to Jem, “to see so much of our daughter mixed up with the body of her murderer.” (A-Z:85)

The grandparents' rejection of the Arab half also means stripping the two girls of their American half, judging them as strangers, and placing them in the category of foreigners’ subject to hate. Thus, the Ramouds are condemned to be rejected by the family, and the two girls have known this matter since their childhood, as they had an awareness of their difference.

The feeling of difference was increased by the effect of the physical aspect and the skin color, which differs from their peers. The thing that causes them problems often develop into verbal or physical abuse. Jemorah was subjected to this rejection and psychological torture many times on the school bus, and she got off the bus and went straight to her room. It is as if she is escaping to her own world, where no such children exist.

"One day someone tore out a handful of her hair; on another someone pushed her down as she stood to leave; on another someone raked scratches across her face and neck as she stood, her eyes full, the sound of her name ringing in rounds of incantation. Waiting to leave, she could see her name on the mailbox from a half mile away, four inches high in bright red against the black box: RAMOUD. Matussem had been so eager to proclaim their arrival. There was no hiding or disguising it. She would run off the bus, straight to her room, but the voices would follow and circle her bed at night.” (A-Z:93)

It is clear that the Arab half of Jemorah, which led to the cut of the relationship with the grandparents, is the same one who caused her trouble with her surroundings.

Abu-Jaber highlights that Jemorah resorts to "invisibility" to confront her painful journey, and "self-erasing" is the only way to escape troubles with her environment. Thus, Arabian jazz is a vibrant example of the efforts made by Arab American writers to portray the experience of their suffering within American society and the difficult path they pass through to form their identity.

Another character in the novel was used by Abu Jaber to highlight the racism that Arab Americans and other ethnicities suffer from is Portia. It seems that American society has not yet assimilated the multicultural and ethnic pluralism that constitutes its various components.

The character of Portia, the director of Jemorah at the hospital, was used by Diana Abu Jaber to reflect the arrogant view that white Americans view of other races.

[...]

• Université: Sultan Moulay Sliman University
• Auteur: Dr. Adil Ouatat (Auteur)
• Année de publication: 2023
• Pages: 21
• N° de catalogue: V1334028
• ISBN (PDF): 9783346838803
• ISBN (Livre): 9783346838810
• Langue: anglais
• mots-clé: : Identity, hybridity, dual identities, ethnocultural identity, Arabian Jazz, Diana Abu Jaber