Identity and Destruction Asian American in The Namesake...

In Mira Nair’s film, The Namesake, the disparate cultures of India and America affirms to the binary paradigm of â€Å"the one† and â€Å"the other†, manifesting the dominance of one from the other and its impact to influence and cause cultural and identity issues. The collision of the two cultures forms a process of trying to construct an identity and a destruction of an ethnic identity, with different factors to consider such as space and other sociocultural codes. This film about the Indian American also shows the concept of model-minority image, standards and expectations imposed to Asian Americans. The Namesake embodies the cultural and identity issues of an Asian American, particularly the Indian Americans, exemplifying the experiences of the†¦show more content†¦In first few scenes of the film, the man who befriended Ashoke Ganguli in the train said words that marked in Ashoke’s mind after the dreadful accident. The man asked Ashoke if he e ver had the chance to see the world, referring to England and America. He also mentioned his travel in England and pertained to it as dreamlike experience, away from the unclean landscape of India. Then, he advised Ashoke that he must go out of Indian and conquer the world while he’s still young. After his survival from the accident, Ashoke went to America, following the man’s advice. The scene in the train affirms to the binary schema between Indians and Americans, their perception of higher value of â€Å"the one† over â€Å"the other†. As Ashoke settled in the United States with his new wife, Ashima, as first-generation immigrants and started their own family, Ashoke insisted to her wife the life that America can offer to their children, from sufficient education and multiple possibility of a better future than a life in India. Ashoke’s principle towards life proves the conceptualized idea of America’s supremacy in different sociocultural aspects that again places the Asian Americans in the margin of the culture paradigm. Racism is another portion of the marginalization that is displayed in Nair’s film. A scene from the movie exhibits the perception of some Americans