Thinking Past ‘Post-9/11’ : Home, Nation and Transnational Desires in Pakistani English Novels and Hindi Films 9780367755119, 9781032000213, 9781003172321

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THINKING PAST ‘POST-9/11’

This book offers new ways of constellating the literary and cinematic delinea­ tions of Indian and Pakistani Muslim diasporic and migrant trajectories nar­ rated in the two decades after the 9/11 attacks. Focusing on four Pakistani English novels and four Indian Hindi films, it examines the aesthetic com­ plexities of staging the historical nexus of global conflicts and unravels the multiple layers of discourses underlying the notions of diaspora, citizenship, nation and home. It scrutinises the “flirtatious” nature of transnational desires and their role in building glocal safety valves for inclusion and archiving a planetary vision of trauma. It also provides a fresh perspective on the role of Pakistani English novels and mainstream Hindi films in tracing the multiple origins of and shifts in national xenophobic practices, and negotiating multiple modalities of political and cultural belonging. It discusses various books and films including The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Burnt Shadows, My Name is Khan, New York, Exit West, Home Fire, AirLift and Tiger Zinda Hai. In light of the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, current debates on terror, war, paranoid national imaginaries and the suspicion towards migratory movements of refugees, this book makes a significant contribution to the interdisciplinary debates on border controls and human precarity. A crucial work in transnational and diaspora criticism, it will be of great interest to researchers of literature and culture studies, media studies, politics, film studies and South Asian studies. Jayana Jain is a postdoctoral researcher in the ONLINERPOL project at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany. Her research and teach­ ing interests include diaspora and migration studies, South Asian literary and visual cultures, gender and disability studies, digital politics and media studies. She has been awarded the European Union’s Marie Curie Fellowship and a DAAD scholarship to conduct research on South Asian diasporas and migrants. She has also served as a lecturer of English and postcolonial studies at the University of Münster, Germany.

THINKING PAST ‘POST-9/11’

Home, Nation and Transnational Desires in

Pakistani English Novels and Hindi Films

Jayana Jain

First published 2022 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2022 Jayana Jain The right of Jayana Jain to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-0-367-75511-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-00021-3 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-17232-1 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321 Typeset in Sabon by Taylor & Francis Books

for my grandparents and parents

who gave me the two best gifts—roots

and wings!

a survivor tree

like flying is to a bird

writing is to me

v

CONTENTS

List of figures Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction

viii ix xi xii

PART I

Framing the nexus: the “prism” of 9/11

1

1

Thinking diaspora: (De)constructing nation, home and identity

3

2

Surveying South Asian diasporic texts and contexts through the prism of ‘9/11’

22

PART II

Exploring the nexus: The first decade after 9/11 3 4

43

How did it come to this?: Reconfiguring borders in The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Burnt Shadows

45

Post-9/11 diasporic anxieties in New York and My Name is Khan

79

PART III

Expanding the nexus: The second decade after 9/11 5 6

119

Thinking past ‘post-9/11’: The discourse of insecurity in Exit West and Home Fire

121

Long-distance nationalisms and populist politics in AirLift and Tiger Zinda Hai

152

Conclusion Index

185 191 vii

FIGURES

1 2 3 4 5

A white rose outside the 9/11 Memorial Museum, New York City Starling Murmuration (I) in the countryside of Milan Starling Murmuration (II) in the countryside of Milan Starling Murmuration (III) in the countryside of Milan Metal fences in the snow-clad Þingvellir National Park, Iceland

viii

xii

1

43

119

185

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I must begin by acknowledging Prof. Dr Shoba Venkatesh Ghosh for inspiring me to make the most of words. The sharpness of her criticism with a keen eye for detail, and her generosity with time, expertise and guidance have often sent me back to the basics and to conduct self-scrutiny. I am grateful to Prof. Dr Klaus Stierstorfer for his encouragement and solidarity with my research pro­ ject. His intellectual presence, generous support and motivating words have helped me pursue academic research and teaching. I would also like to thank Prof. Dr Nilufer E. Bharucha for inspiring me to step out of my comfort zones and expand my academic horizons. Thanks to Dr Shefali Balsari-Shah for gifting me Cherry Blossoms: Japanese Haiku Series and encouraging me to explore the creative side in writing. Many thanks to Prof. Dr Sahana Udupa for being such a warm mentor and inspiring me to truly practise interdisciplinarity through my research and teaching stints. I am grateful to the editors of Routledge and the four funding bodies for recognising the value of my project and endorsing its aim of constellating dif­ ferent cultures. The four funding bodies that have supported my work at dif­ ferent stages include the EU Marie Curie Initial Training Network “Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging” (CoHaB: Project ID 289672), the Heinrich Hertz Foundation, the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD), and the Smart Network International of WWU Münster. I also wish to thank the staff members of the Jawaharlal Nehru library (Mumbai Uni­ versity), ULB Münster, Göttingen University Library, New York Public Library and Frankfurt Indian Consulate library for their generous help. Thanks to my colleagues at the English Seminar, the Graduate School Practices of Literature (GSPoL), Textpraxis at WWU Münster and LMU München for supporting my work and encouraging me to explore new avenues in literature and cultural studies. In an age where mobile phones have replaced letters and landline, and laptops have replaced sewing machines and yarns, I thank my grandparents for teaching me empathetic communication and the art of weaving tales with immense care and patience. This book would not have been possible without the love and support of my parents, the strongest pillars of my life who have ix

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

shown immense faith in my talent and have valued the work of the mind. I also cannot thank my siblings enough for being my support system and giving me the much-needed lens through which to approach my research work. I thank all other members of my family for their warmth and support, and all my friends for being the most caring buddies ever! Over the years, I have strongly believed that research and writing are col­ lective experiences, and there can be varied and unexpected stimuli to the intellect. One such unexpected stimulus to my life has been my husband, without whom my book would not have taken such dynamic turns and attained the much-required complexity. My warmest thanks to him for his expertise in planetary sciences and the passionate discussions on films and novels. As I drafted each chapter, his love, patience and the supply of delicious food have been the greatest help. His constant reminder of the Icelandic saying “Petta Reddast” (things will work out somehow!) has driven me to finish this book. Lastly, my loving thanks to another unexpected stimulus to this book, my nephew, for teaching me to rediscover curiosity and asking me to find out about thousands and thousands of stories!

x

ABBREVIATIONS

AL BS EW HF MNIK NY TRF TZH

AirLift Burnt Shadows Exit West Home Fire My Name is Khan New York The Reluctant Fundamentalist Tiger Zinda Hai

xi

INTRODUCTION

Tracing Memories1 The cartridge ink has replaced the ink of the pen.

As the moving finger types, in a world of mighty men,

With Wit and a Rose, shall lure it back to reflect on passing times,

So that no story of a tear remains untold, now and even then.

Fig. 1 A white rose outside the 9/11 Memorial Museum, New York City

xii

INTRODUCTION

Ah yes. 9/11, the day we can’t seem to get away from (Roy 2008) Peshawar school massacre: ‘This is Pakistan’s 9/11 – now is the time to act’ (Fishwick 2014) Charlie Hebdo: After France’s 9/11, this land will never be the same again (Lichfield 2015) Why don’t Londoners remember 7/7 like New York remembers 9/11? (Seidler 2015) Mumbai terror attacks: The deep legacy of India’s 9/11, a decade on (Kugelman 2018) Trump’s history of using 9/11 for political attacks (Nir 2019) Pak’s anti-India actions: Revert to pre-9/11 ‘Free-for-all’ era? (Joshi 2019) We can’t let the coronavirus lead to a 9/11-style erosion of civil liberties (McDonald 2020) The arrival of new technologies and mediating frameworks has altered our capacities and practices of thinking and remembering by privileging and con­ solidating certain memories and violently erasing the others. On the one hand, we have an overwhelming record of some memories that are retrievable at the touch of a finger; on the other hand, there are the suppressed memories of our global past that lie as fragments both untouched and estranged. While we publicly memorialise some moments by planting a white rose, we collectively eradicate shared historical pasts much like uprooting a dandelion. Systemically marginalised and often violently effaced, migrant and diasporic trajectories contain traces of several global historical moments and memories that con­ gregate beyond spatiotemporal borders and unmask the nationalist exception­ alism embedded in the global politics of remembering and oblivion. In the early 21st century, the memorialisation of the 9/11 attacks has led to the ques­ tioning of multiple modalities of cultural and national citizenship as the migrant is further marginalised within the national imaginary. Even two dec­ ades later, the 9/11 terror attacks have often been dramatically recalled and reappropriated in the news media for three reasons: to name an external threat, reflect on the strategies of managing the perceived threat, and justify the state’s authoritative and militaristic intervention on the pretext of ensuring the security and sovereignty of the nation. xiii

INTRODUCTION

After the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai, the moniker “India’s 9/11” was coined in both the Indian and Euro-American media discourses to underscore the tragedy of the attacks. In an article titled “The Monster in the Mirror”, novelist Arundhati Roy (2008) remarked how such rhetoric “forfeited” people’s rights to their tragedies and subordinated Mumbai’s tragedy to a Western his­ torical frame. In exasperation, Roy (2008) pronounced, “Ah yes. 9/11, the day we can’t seem to get away from”. Supplementing her view regarding the pro­ blematic conflation of the two tragedies, my book calls for an examination of the local, national and global ramifications of the discursive strategies deployed to frame the subsequent acts of terror and human-instigated disasters with reference to 9/11. Such a study is necessary to de-centre the American and Euro-centric epistemologies and universalities that have hegemonised the global discourse, legitimised the brutality of counterterrorism policies and silenced alternative narratives of dissent. Following the 26/11 terror attacks, the “9/11” statements made by the Indian state officials in the media underlined the transforming political–economic nexus between India, Pakistan and the USA. As the Indian state officials accused Pakistan-based extremist organisa­ tions of the shooting and bombing in Mumbai, their statements recalled the narratives of the Partition of India and Pakistan, the 1992–1993 Bombay riots, the 1999 Kargil War, and the US economic sanctions on both nation-states owing to their 1998 nuclear tests for weaponisation. After the 2001 terror attacks on the Indian Parliament and the 2002 riots in Gujarat, as the domi­ nant Hindutva ideologies in India realigned with the neoliberal shifts and the discourse on “Islamic” terrorism in the USA and other parts of the West, it changed the stakes for the Muslim citizens in India and the Indian Muslim and Pakistani Muslim diaspora residing in the West. In the past two decades, media, literature, cinema and academic research have documented that the post-9/11 representation of Muslims and the rise of insecurity towards South Asian migrant and diasporic subjects are highly rele­ vant topics. However, as most research volumes concerned with these issues have examined literary works emerging mainly from the West, my book addresses the need for transgression across spatiotemporalities and forms of narration to open myriad possibilities of excavating the literary and cinematic delineation of the contemporary politics of nations, nationalisms, the antiimmigration discourse and anti-Muslim sentiments. To examine the American exceptionalism2 in the War on Terror tactic and the exhortation to other nation-states to re-appropriate counterterrorism and migration policies, my book attends to those South Asian imaginaries that reflect the implications of the political framing and memorialisation of 9/11 in diverse contexts. On the one hand, after having found themselves more enmeshed in the post-9/11 political nexus of global conflicts, the diasporic or migrant writers of Pakistani origin (residing in the USA and/or the UK) have emerged with powerful lit­ erary works. On the other hand, dominated by Muslim star bodies, the Hindi film industry began to immerse itself in questions of representation and xiv

INTRODUCTION

identity of transnational and/or diasporic Indian and Pakistani Muslims. To shed light on some of their strategic responses to the complexities of repre­ senting South Asian Muslim diasporic and migrant trajectories, the primary research corpus of this book includes four novels by the two most critically acclaimed and widely read authors of Pakistani origin. They are Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007) and Exit West (2017), and Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows (2009) and Home Fire (2017). It also includes four mainstream Hindi films that were widely distributed in the global mar­ kets, especially in the nation-states with a majority Muslim population. These include New York (2009) directed by Kabir Khan, My Name is Khan (2010) directed by Karan Johar, AirLift (2016) directed by Raja Krishna Menon and Tiger Zinda Hai (Tiger is Alive) (2017) directed by Ali Abbas Zafar. My study seeks to critically analyse these novels and films as tools, human practices and as narrative “traces”3 in the context of the 9/11 attacks and the historical nexus of global conflicts to examine the aesthetic complexities of narrating the nationalistic politics of memorialisation, and the migrants’ experiences of nation, home and trauma. It also investigates whether the “flirtatious” and transnational desires of the diasporic and/or migratory South Asian Muslim trajectories suggest the building of glocal safety valves for inclusion and archiving a “planetary” vision of trauma (Simmel [1909] [1923] 1984; Kaye 2002; Spivak 2004). Thinking past the hegemonic spatiotemporal framing of 9/11 and about a methodology to shed light on the neglected fragments of the past is a challen­ ging task, especially considering the failures of academic research methods to underline the fallacies of their own chronological thinking and inclinations towards American and Euro-centric dispositions of global history. The most prominent evidence of this fallacy is the construction of the term “post-9/11 era” to underline the global discourse on terrorism/counterterrorism. Accord­ ing to Toros (2017), if the construction of 9/11 marked a temporal rupture in American history, then the term “post-9/11” “extends US hegemony over world time” by imposing itself as a universal temporal marker on other fields that may not have drastically changed due to 9/11 (207). Therefore, to avoid the risk of “imposing an alien and essentially hegemonic chronology” over other nations’ peculiar histories, and to elude the dangers of “making our research ahistorical and exonerating the very state violence we have spent 10 years exposing” (Toros 2017: 212), we need alternative forms of thinking that may resist such historical fallacies and essentialisms. The principal reading method of my book is thinking “past” (and about the past of) “post-9/11” based on Scheiner’s (2005) interpretation of Spivak’s Death of a Discipline (Spivak 2003) where she outlines some key practices of “doing” comparative literature, one of them being “teleopoiesis”. This form of close reading involves contextual and semantic inspection of the spatio­ temporal conditions of the text. It means equal attention is accorded to the language and idiom of both the text and its context. Whereas Moretti’s (2000) xv

INTRODUCTION

“distant reading” demands sacrificing smaller units such as the particularity of the texts for a larger global picture, my book aims for a type of close reading that effectuates a structural critique of the texts, contexts and their interlaced conditions. It also aims for “an other thinking” that involves “epistemic resis­ tance” to the essentialist frameworks of difference and sameness to de-centre ourselves from the hegemony of the centre and an origin claimed by the West (Khatibi 1985: 13–14). To meet this purpose, it draws on the works of theorists who examine South Asian literary and cinematic cultures and explore concepts such as “migrants” with respect to people’s distinct and contextualised move­ ments across geopolitical and cultural borders of nation-states, “diasporic subjectivities” as markers of fluid identities, “race” in relation to the processes of racialisation, “gender” in terms of desire and embodiment, “class” in con­ nection with neoliberal approaches, and “disability” as a product of ableist hegemonies. Based on the sociological theories of flirtation, my book proposes a close reading of “transnational flirtation” as an expression of dissident sexualities and an ideological practice that has the potential to trouble national hier­ archies, disciplinary biopolitics and spatiotemporal fixities. By drawing on studies relating to the “terror of the flirt” (Nagel 2015), I suggest an alternative understanding of the migrant and diasporic subject who, “in saying no and yes”, stages a form of soft resistance to their marginalised subjectivity and the nation-state’s spatiotemporal politics of border-making and border-crossing. The research methodology of the book also includes travel and various sonic cultures (such as listening to radio, TV, interviews, academic lectures, podcasts and eavesdropping) as channels to explore the possibilities of interacting with different landscapes and natural phenomena to encounter alternative modes of thinking.4 While the results of such a methodology are interspersed in the analysis of the selected novels and the films, they have been articulated prominently through the snapshots and haikus in the book.

The nexus approach This book is divided into three parts, and each part includes two chapters affixed with a haiku and a snapshot to set the stage for the discussion of the selected novels and films.5 I captured the three snapshots of the starling mur­ muration from a moving bus in the countryside of Milan in Autumn 2016. This was the time when I had begun researching my book and was con­ templating about its structure. My unexpected, brief yet mesmerising encoun­ ter with the flock of migratory birds helped me to not only organise the three parts of the book, but also delve deeper into the nexus of human migrancy, border making, enforcement and crossing. Thus, the three parts—framing, exploring and expanding the nexus—are inspired by the mysterious process of starling murmuration in which, to escape a predator, starlings often appear to operate in an intricately coordinated and non-linear pattern in the sky. In the xvi

INTRODUCTION

exhibition of self-organising tendencies within a collective escape, the repeti­ tion and interaction of each starling’s simple flight produces diverse patterns. As they continuously converge, disperse, re-converge and continue their swooping movements in the sky without a fixed centre, they function as a metaphor for understanding the migratory movements of humans where indi­ viduals connect with one another in times of “terror” even without an authority. Thus, like a wind-blown giant dandelion6 in the sky, the starling murmuration7 is symbolic of the scattered movements of the diasporas and the migrants where the incessant process of dispersion and congregation is neces­ sary for survival. Affixed to the snapshots, my haiku compositions are inspired by Faiz Ahmad Faiz’s verses translated by Kiernan (1971). Faiz’s poems on the experience of border-crossings, migration and exile are popular not only in Pakistan, where Urdu plays a central role in literature, but also in many regions of India where Urdu is revered as cultural heritage. Since his poems lie on the cusp of the last decades of the British rule in India, the Partition of India and Pakistan, and the subsequent troubled histories of nation-building, they act as relevant nodal points to contextualise post-2000 migratory routes of the South Asian Muslim diaspora. Part I titled “Framing the Nexus: The ‘Prism’ of 9/11” describes and dis­ cusses the nexus between diaspora and transnational theories, 9/11, South Asia, literature and cinema with the help of two chapters. The first chapter explores how diasporic or migratory belonging constitutes revoking attach­ ments, associations and moderating their formations wherein assumptions of the narrow definitions of nation, home and identity are constantly challenged. This chapter also examines how the modalities of race, class, gender, genera­ tion and ability play a significant role in activating migratory movements and altering the nature of diasporic experience in times of terror and trauma. The second chapter calls for an understanding of the mediated frameworks of “9/11” as both a “trace” and “prism” by considering the role and importance of scale and prisming experiments in visual and literary cultures. The latter half of the chapter surveys post-2000 diasporic Pakistani novels and Hindi films to underline the minority and immigrant’s perspective of confrontation with the “post-9/11” insecurities and anxieties of nation-states. Part II titled “Exploring the Nexus: The First Decade after 9/11” is con­ cerned with the migratory and diasporic trajectories narrated in selected Pakistani English novels and Hindi films produced in the first decade after 9/11. In the context of the characters’ migrant life in Burnt Shadows and The Reluctant Fundamentalist, the third chapter grapples with the following ques­ tions: How and when do the desires of difference, differentiating and Othering emerge? How do they manifest? And, what are their implications for the migrant characters’ perceptions of home, nation and identity? The latter sec­ tion of this chapter focuses on the articulations of cosmopolitanism, migratory feminisms and masculinities to examine the discrepancies and commonalities in the gendered experiences of migration. By exploring the production and xvii

INTRODUCTION

consumption anxieties of My Name is Khan and New York and their cine­ matic politics of title design and credits, the fourth chapter surveys the changes in aesthetic practices of Hindi films after 9/11. It also examines the Hindi filmmakers’ use of “transnational flirtation” as a tool to stage soft resistance against the marginalisation of post-9/11 Muslim subjectivities. Eventually, by analysing the cinematic representation of the diasporic locations of disability and the disabled locations of diaspora in My Name is Khan, the fourth chapter hopes to stimulate thought processes that can accommodate multiple embodied practices and challenge everyday ableism. Part III titled “Expanding the Nexus: The Second Decade after 9/11” is concerned with the migratory and diasporic trajectories narrated in selected Pakistani English novels and Hindi films produced in the second decade after 9/11. The fifth chapter confronts the latest conceptualisation of terms like “postpost9/11” and argues that, by performing a close reading of the frag­ mented pasts of the migrant characters in novels like Home Fire and Exit West, it is possible to underline the global discourse on insecurity and precarity rather than reiterating the exceptionalism of 9/11. By attending to the politics of “waiting” in the novels, the chapter hopes to unveil the unjust sides of law camouflaged within the democratic structures of the state, and recognise that nativist policies, even if accepted by the majority, cannot become the universal standard to frame human rights and the rights of burial after death. To understand contemporary forms of right-wing populism and excavate the underlying nationalist and masculinist discourse, Chapter Six examines the long-distance nationalisms of the migratory narratives in AirLift and Tiger Zinda Hai in light of some crucial political and juridical turns in India since 2014. It also scrutinises the sonic politics of Hindi films and their role in arousing a variant of nationalism that sutures the relationship between the nation and its diaspora.

Notes 1 I have composed this rubaiyat in response to FitzGerald’s (1859) translation of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám: “The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ/Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit/Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line/Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.” The photograph of the white rose was clicked in January 2018 when I had visited the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York City for field­ work. Although the white rose at the museum signifies the remembrance of the birthdays of those who lost their lives in the 1993 World Trade Center and Septem­ ber 11, 2001 terror attacks, attention to the historical appropriation of the white rose and a semiotic approach to its study unpack multiple layers of meaning. As I have been conscious of my own positionality and subjectivity in my “affective encounter” (Keefe 2015) with the white rose, instead of elaborating (and thereby privileging) my experiences any further, I suggest that the photograph of the white rose and the accompanied poem be received as a form of conversation within the discourse of youth resistance movements, feminist studies, critical race theory, postcolonial and migration studies.

xviii

INTRODUCTION

2 The deployment of the term “American exceptionalism” is based on Barnett’s (2016) report which underlines the three interconnected ideas underpinning the exceptional nature of the “American experiment” corresponding to the War on Terror tactic. These exceptionalist ideas include “America is God’s ‘chosen nation’, has a unique mission to spread its values, and is a force for good against evil” (3). 3 In the context of my research approach in this book, the meaning of “trace” will be elaborated upon in Chapter Two. 4 For instance, my travels to Iceland in December 2016 have influenced the analysis of the stylistic devices used by Shamsie to narrate Hiroko’s diasporic trajectory in Burnt Shadows (Chapter Two). At the Harpa Concert Hall in Reykjavík, I encountered the Equator Memorial Project’s (2016) Art-History Exhibition called “When the Atomic Bomb Exploded”. This exhibition brought together artists and designers from around the world to build sculptures using historical material remains. As an example of such remains, some artists used historical photographs of the victims of the Hiroshima bombing that were clicked by Japanese and American researchers in 1945. Some of the sculptures at the exhibition were built using these historical pho­ tographs, which included the tragic images of the burnt shadows on stone walls and sidewalks of people who were incinerated due to the bomb. A closer look at these sculptures has helped me understand Shamsie’s title of the novel and the “burnt shadows” engraved on Hiroko’s back. 5 Through my haikus and snapshots, I have attempted to demonstrate that our scat­ tered creative imaginings and unanticipated learnings from the ecosystem need not be separated from the cognisant efforts we make in the academic and critical domain. By navigating the waters of the periphery, my book hopes to be a channel of communication with those academic researchers who often struggle with the codes of academic writing. 6 Notably, the dandelion imagery is also deployed in the protest poems of the Black Lives Matter movement composed by activists in different parts of the globe, and circulated using the popular hashtag #Riseofthedandelions on Twitter. 7 Considering the ecology of migration in the USA, the starling metaphor becomes even more interesting given the historical nexus between literature and migration. The starlings, which are now considered a “menace” in North America, were migrated to New York City’s Central Park in the 1890s by a Shakespeare enthusiast Eugene Schieffelin who wanted all the bird species mentioned in the Shakespearean texts to inhabit the American continent (Keyes et al. 2017).

References AirLift. 2016. Dir. Raja Krishna Menon. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Nimrat Kaur. India: Abundantia Entertainment, Cape of Good Films, Emmay Entertainment, Hari Om Entertainment, T-Series, Viacom 18 Motion Pictures. Barnett, Marc. 2016. “American Exceptionalism and the Construction of the War on Terror: An Analysis of Counterterrorism Policies under Clinton, Bush, and Obama”. INSCT Working Paper Series. https://securitypolicylaw.syr.edu/wp-content/uploads/ 2016/11/Barnett_American-Exceptionalism_and_the_Construction_of_the_War_on-Ter ror-mwedit111716.pdf. Accessed on 29 April 2018. Fishwick, Carmen. 2014 (December 19). “Peshawar School Massacre: ‘This is Pakistan’s 9/11 – Now is the Time to Act’”. TheGuardian.com. https://www.theguardian.com/ world/2014/dec/19/peshawar-school-massacre-pakistans-911. Accessed on 28 December 2014.

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FitzGerald, Edward. 1859. Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. Translated into English Verse. London: Bernard Quatrich. Hamid, Mohsin. 2007. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. London: Hamish Hamilton. Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. Exit West. New York: Riverhead Books. Joshi, Manoj. 2019 (August 9). “Pak’s Anti-India Actions: Revert to pre-9/11 ‘Free-for-all’ Era?”. Orfonline.org. https://www.orfonline.org/research/paks-anti-india-actions-re vert-to-pre-911-free-for-all-era-54271/. Accessed on 14 August 2019. Kaye, Richard. 2002. The Flirt’s Tragedy: Desire without End in Victorian and Edwardian Fiction. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press. Keefe, Anne. 2015. “Introduction: The Affective Encounter”. Journal of Women in Culture and Society. 40(2): 277–280. Keyes, Scott and Karp, Daniel. 2017. “The Shakespeare Fanatic Who Introduced All of the Bard’s Birds to America”. Pacific Standard. https://psmag.com/environment/sha kespeare-fanatic-introduced-bards-birds-america-82279. Accessed on 26 June 2017. Khatibi, Abdelkébir. 1985. “Double Critique: The Decolonization of Arab Sociology”. In Contemporary North Africa: Issues of Development and Integration. Edited by Halim Barakat. London: Croon Helm. 9–19. Kiernan, Victor G. 1971. Faiz Ahmad Faiz. London: Vanguard Books South Publication. Kugelman, Michael. 2018 (November 28). “Mumbai Terror Attacks: The Deep Legacy of India’s 9/11, a Decade on”. Edition.cnn.com. https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/25/ opinions/10-year-anniversary-mumbai-terror-attacks-intl/index.html. Accessed on 30 November 2018. Lichfield, John. 2015 (January 9). “Charlie Hebdo: After France’s 9/11, this Land Will Never Be the Same Again”. Independent.co.uk. https://www.independent.co.uk/ voices/comment/charlie-hebdo-after-france-s-911-this-land-will-never-be-the-same-agai n-9969165.html. Accessed on 30 November 2018. McDonald, Samuel Miller. 2020 (March 23). “We Can’t Let the Coronavirus Lead to a 9/11-Style Erosion of Civil Liberties”. TheGuardian.com. https://www.thegua rdian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/23/coronavirus-civil-liberties-authoritarian-measu res. Accessed on 24 March 2020. Moretti, Franco. 2000. “Conjectures on World Literature”. New Left Review. 1: 54–68. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Nagel, Barbara. 2015. “Three Terrors of Flirtation”. In Flirtations: Rhetoric and Aes­ thetics this Side of Seduction. Edited by Daniel Hoffman-Schwartz, Barbara N. Nagel and Lauren S. Stone. 101–106. New York: Fordham University Press. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Nir, Sarah Maslin. 2019 (April 16). “Trump’s History of Using 9/11 for Political Attacks”. Nytimes.com. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/16/nyregion/trump-septem ber-11.html. Accessed on 14 August 2019. Roy, Arundhati. 2008 (December 13). “The Monster in the Mirror”. TheGuardian.com. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/dec/12/mumbai-arundhati-roy. Accessed on 9 November 2016. Scheiner, Corinne. 2005. “Teleiopoiesis, Telepoesis, and the Practice of Comparative Literature”. Comparative Literature. 57(3): 239–245.

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INTRODUCTION

Seidler, Victor. 2015 (July 6). “Why Don’t Londoners Remember 7/7 like New York Remembers 9/11?”. Theconversation.com. https://theconversation.com/why-dont-lon doners-remember-7-7-like-new-york-remembers-9-11-44214. Accessed on 30 November 2018. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Simmel, Georg. [1909] [1923] 1984. “Flirtation”. In Women, Sexuality and Love. Translated by Guy Oakes. 133–152. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2003. Death of a Discipline. New York: Columbia University Press. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2004. “Terror: A Speech after 9–11”. Boundary 2. 31(2): 81–111. The Equator Memorial Project. 2016 (December 15). “When the Atomic Bomb Explo­ ded”. Art History Exhibition. Reykjavík: Harpa, Concert Hall and Conference Centre. https://40074km.is/exhibition-projects/. Accessed on 21 January 2017. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. Toros, H. 2017. “‘9/11 is Alive and Well’ or How Critical Terrorism Studies Has Sustained the 9/11 Narrative”. Critical Studies on Terrorism. 10(2): 203–219.

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Part I FRAMING THE NEXUS: THE “PRISM” OF 9/11

Diaspora and Routes1 Birds of a feather A flurry of autumn leaves Drifting together

Fig. 2 Starling Murmuration (I) in the countryside of Milan

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-1

1

Note 1 I have composed this haiku in response to Faiz’s (cited in Kiernan 1971: 79) trans­ lated verse “A Few Days More, My Dear!” in which despite the fettered body, chained feelings, imprisoned thoughts and speech censorings, the speaker of the poem expresses the desire to survive and break through the shackles of state brutal­ ity. The imagery of the bird and its flight as a metaphor for human migration and freedom is inspired by the lyricist and poet Javed Akhtar’s Hindi-Urdu verse “Panchi nadiya pawan k jhonke” written for the film Refugee (2000).

2

1

THINKING DIASPORA

(De)constructing nation, home and identity

Thinking diaspora is inconceivable without concatenating the notions of nation, home and identity. Scholars of the humanities have been thinking of, for, from and through diaspora in their own ways, making it difficult to pro­ vide reliable theories and conceptualise the multiplicity embedded within and between diasporic subjectivities. Even the responses to the question of how the meanings of diaspora shift, in times of terror, political upheavals and new boundary formations, remain reasonably obscure. Instead of merely thinking the “what” and “why” of diaspora, the question of “how” and “when” is dia­ spora could be a more productive approach in examining the multiple variants of nationalisms that have (re-)emerged in the past few decades. Since norma­ tive nationalisms often govern modern diasporic subjectivities, a study of the shifting meanings of diaspora also sheds light on the changing dialectics of the national and the global. Through such an approach, it is also possible to underline how and when an articulation of the experiences of dislocation, migration and displacement falls under the substratum of what Jana Evans Braziel (2008: 158) calls “diasporic arts of resistance”. Derived from the Greek term diaspeirein—“dia-”, across and “speirein”, to sow or scatter—etymologically, diaspora suggests both roots (sowing) and routes (scattering) (Fernandez 2009b: 29). Scholars of diaspora studies have described the scattering of the diaspora groups in English and other Indo-Eur­ opean languages using its spora roots such as “spore”, “disperse”, “spread” and “sperm” (Tölölyan cited in Butler 2001: 192). As this kind of dispersal or scattering is a “necessary precondition” for the formation of diaspora, it serves as an exclusive feature of diasporic movements which is “not a one-time transfer” but involves the “processes of diasporization” (ibid.). Although many scholars have written about the scattering process by emphasising on the suffix -spora, the prefix dia- needs further elaboration. Stemming from medical sci­ ences, scientists have used dia- in the formation of compound words to mean “passing through” (diathermy), “thoroughly” (diagnosis), “going apart” (dia­ lysis) and “opposed in moment” (diamagnetism) (Random House Unabridged Dictionary 2015). Based on these implications, intrinsically, the concept of diaspora signifies a process of not just sowing and scattering, but also a DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-2

3

FRAMING THE NEXUS

passing on, passing through, passing within, passing between, passing at and passing off the opposing multiple forces. Thus, thinking diaspora involves inspecting its rhizomic nature and encouraging its necessary open-endedness. It comprises tracing the diaspora’s roots, migratory routes, processes of reloca­ tion, resistance and cross-fertilisation rather than its ossification or fossilisa­ tion. It also demands “quilting” of political, historical and socio-cultural contexts with individual and collective narratives of, from and with diasporic subjects. According to Hua (2005), a quilter puts together, with bits and pieces of fabric and thread, “a quilt that has its own history and presents the quilter’s aesthetic understanding in ways that resonate one’s life” (192). Similarly, anyone attempting to think diaspora needs to be cognisant not only of the scattered bits and pieces of diasporic narratives that are put together, but also of the theoretical lenses, conditions and processes that have enabled particular choices for reflecting on their subjectivities. According to Gilroy (1993), any definition of diaspora seems an impossible task because of the plurality of historical experiences, complexity of trajec­ tories and depth of their agendas. Over the last few decades, diaspora has become a convoluted notion given the intricacies of global movements, multi­ ple dislocations, technological advancements and postmodern consciousness (Gilroy 1993). The birth of terms such as classic diaspora, modern diaspora, voluntary diaspora, transnational diaspora, metropolitan diaspora and post­ diaspora further suggests both a degree of acknowledgment and an “anxiety” with the limitations of its loose definitions (Fernandez 2009b: 29). Since dia­ spora enters a semantic field with other terms and terrains such as exile, migrant, immigrant and globalisation, it risks losing its specificity and critical merit if it deems to speak for all movements and migrations between nationstates, within nation-states, between imaginaries and within imaginaries. Although academic scholars recognise diasporic communities as “exemplary communities of the transnational moment” (Tölölyan 1996: 4), we need to be cautious of the uncritical and unreflective application of the terms diaspora and diasporic to connote all forms of nomadic movements and migrant communities or unspecified contexts of global displacement and movement. Mishra’s Diaspora Criticism (Mishra 2006: 26) cites Armstrong’s (1976: 393) description of diaspora as “any [minority] ethnic collectivity which lacks a territorial base within a given polity”. He examines how the Sheffer School of the 1980s denounced this broad generic base for the description of diaspora and, instead, emphasised the “trans-state networks”, which marks a proble­ matic yet significant break with the theoretical conditions and methodology of earlier diaspora studies (Mishra 2006: 25). In referring to “modern diasporas”, Sheffer (1986) speaks of three sets of actors that are relevant to diaspora theory: (a) “the diaspora group itself”, (b) “the host society”, and (c) “the homeland which may be real or virtual” (3). For him, modern diasporas are groups of migrant origins that belong to a particular ethnic minority. Although they reside and act in host countries, they maintain “strong sentimental and 4

THINKING DIASPORA

material links” with their land of origin (ibid.). Such a complex triadic rela­ tionship among the three sets of actors is further differentiated into a range of sub-groups which may differ considerably as per the levels of commitment, self-interest, power, and interest in one another. While the identification of differences within the sub-groups’ interactions is necessary, Sheffer’s imposi­ tion of a “minority” status on “ethnic” diasporas has provided the base for the continuous and vigorous critique of his theory. Not only is the focus on terri­ torial binarisms of diasporic movements problematic, but also the assumption that diasporic communities have “strong sentimental links” only to the home­ land is ambiguous and distorted. For instance, Mishra (2006) argues that the collective subjectivity of diaspora defined in terms of “sentimentality” may be a result of the forms of “governmentality” rather than psychology. His counter­ argument to Sheffer’s definition of diaspora, and call for analysis of the struc­ tures and practices of government with respect to diasporic communities, are more relevant in the context of the 9/11 terror attacks as the rise of homeland (in)security acts and anti-Muslim sentiments in both India and the USA heightened the feelings of displacement amongst the Muslim diasporas residing in the USA with links to India. Safran (1991) also critiques Sheffer’s postulations about modern diasporas and attempts to stiffen the earlier definitions by drafting an explanation based on the ideas of trauma, exile and nostalgia. By extending Connor’s (1986) broad understanding of diaspora, Safran (1991) characterises six distinguishing features of modern diasporas in his essay “Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return”. He proposes that diasporas are a commu­ nity or a group of people who “disperse from a specific original centre to two or more peripheral or foreign regions” (83). As they retain a collective memory and an ideal vision about their original homeland, they “feel partly alienated and insulated” in the hostland (83–84). Therefore, they are committed to the “maintenance or restoration of their original homelands” and wish that they and/or their descendants will eventually return to the “true, ideal home”—“when conditions are appropriate” (ibid.). Safran (1991) produces an elaborate defi­ nition based on the “memories” of a single diasporic community, “mostly the Jewish diasporic experience”1 (Braziel 2008). Thus, turning his postulations into a general paradigm of diaspora studies is less fruitful in understanding the shifts and experiences of the 21st century’s diasporic movements. Although his classification tightens previous definitions of diaspora, it falls into a new trap of homogenising sentiments towards host nations and excluding differences between and within those groups that have no secure visions of an authentic and ideal homeland. For instance, Fernandez (2009b) postulates that Safran’s focus on the “diasporic entities” extricates diaspora groups from other social collectives and “encourages the ascription of the diaspora [as] a self-nominating agency” or as endowed with a “collective will-to-self-definition” (33). Besides, Safran’s model consistently measures diasporic subjectivities against a con­ formist/non-conformist binary with respect to sentiments for the centre or 5

FRAMING THE NEXUS

homeland and foreign or peripheral hostlands. This not only creates the illu­ sion of authenticity and origins, but also facilitates a hierarchical structure based on the idealist notions of classical diaspora to which other diasporas must conform somehow. In Global Diasporas Cohen (1997) focuses on the “micro” (local) rather than “the macro” (homeland/nation-state/hostland) to challenge Safran’s (1991) notion of the ideal diaspora. Cohen achieves this by claiming that the Jewish case itself offers multiple and contradictory forms of dispersion. He adopts Safran’s theory of diaspora to supplement its contours and suggests four additional characteristics: diasporas are communities who migrate for “aggressive or voluntarist purposes” including “revolutionary minorities struggling for an imaginary homeland as well as those ravelling for commercial trade”; they have a “strong tie to the past” or a “block to assimilation” in the present and the future; they recognise “the positive virtues” of retaining a diasporic identity and acknowledge the “tension between an ethnic, a national and a transnational identity”; and they have a sense of “collective identity in a place of settlement” and “common identity with co-ethnic members in other countries” (Cohen 1997: 7–17). Thus, on collating the works of Safran (1991), Sheffer (1986) and Cohen (1997), it seems that migrants may be defined as diaspora if the following general conditions are met: they have an ethnic con­ sciousness, an active associative life, contacts with the land of origin whether real or imaginary, and a sense of collectivity or relatability with groups of the same ethnic origin across national borders. Reflecting on these conditions of diaspora, sociologist Judith Shuval (2000) warns that conditions of diaspora must not overlook the performativity and everyday realities of diasporic life. These realities encompass “feeling, consciousness, memory, mythology, his­ tory, meaningful narratives, group identity, longings, dreams, allegorical and virtual elements” (43). In addition, in Atlas des Diasporas, Chaliand et al. (1991) propose that diaspora communities form when there is a forced disper­ sion and there emerges a need to retain a collective historical and cultural memory of subjectivities. They may also come into being at the cusp of a desire to transmit a heritage and a will to survive (xiv–xvii). Although these postulations are significant in understanding how and when diasporas form, they overlook the implications of the intertwined taxonomies of class, gender and generation during this process. According to Mishra (2006), they also assume homelands and hostlands as “homogeneous territorial entities” (48). Therefore, he demands that “the new sociology of diaspora will have to focus on […] ‘bricolage’” (48, 67). In response to his demand and extending Hewitt’s (2009) broad definition of diaspora as a “network composed of innumerable singularities” (139), I propose that thinking how and when of diaspora implies envisioning innovative and nuanced ways of belonging across the once deli­ neated terrains of identity and exploring beyond the imbrications of ethnic and national categories. Speaking to, from and with different communities, the theorisation of diaspora necessitates the articulation and representation of 6

THINKING DIASPORA

lived experiences of those people whose lives have unfolded in myriad ways across the globe. It also seeks the analysis of the cultural constructions of dia­ sporic subjectivities in all their ambivalences, contradictions, migrations, hybridity, heterogeneity and multiple traversals.

Diasporic subjectivities, imaginary and nation Diasporic subjectivity, emerging due to the experiences of permeability of geopolitical and socio-cultural borders, is one of the most fundamental char­ acteristics underpinning the literary and cinematic representation of diasporic identities. For instance, the protagonist of Hamid’s (2007) The Reluctant Fun­ damentalist (henceforth, TRF) realises that it is not possible to imagine oneself as an “autonomous being” once boundaries of inside/outside blur or are experienced as permeable (TRF 197). According to Pandurang et al. (2014), diasporic subjectivity derived from such experiences of geo-cultural dislocation and relocation “ensues shifts in identity construction” (2). To examine the spatio-temporality, corporeality and scalar dynamics of such shifts, I will turn to Avtar Brah’s (1996) concept of the “imaginary” diaspora space and under­ line its entanglements with the notion of nation. Brah (1996) calls for an understanding of “diachronic relationality” and “multi-locationality” of dia­ spora that “delineates a field of identifications where ‘imagined communities’ are forged within and out of a confluence of narratives from annals of collec­ tive memory and re-memory” (196). She further elaborates that diaspora space is a point where geo-cultural boundaries of the nation are strongly contested as the distinctions between here and there, and us vs them blur (Brah 1996: 208–209). As the strong association of diaspora with dislocation and displacement chal­ lenges the received notions of homeland and returning home, it unsettles the geographical and political spaces of nation and home as authentic spaces of belonging. Thus, Brah (1996) seems to separate the multiple ideas that appear the same: that of “home” which is related to the individual’s origins or where one comes from, and that of the “feelings of home” and “feeling at home” which is different from the desire for a homeland or the diaspora’s imaginary of the ideal nation. Brah’s (1996) concept of the diaspora’s “homing desires” is also common to the well-known formulation of the diasporic imaginary space postulated by Vijay Mishra (2005) in his work “The Diasporic Imaginary and the Indian Diaspora”. Mishra (2005) suggests that the diasporic imaginary denotes “any ethnic enclave in a nation-state that defines itself, consciously, unconsciously or through self-evident or implied political coercion, as a group that lives in displacement” (14). By this definition, the “imaginary”2 stands for a citizen’s “state of identification with the image in which we appear likeable to our­ selves”, and “Nation Thing” is constructed out of such particular imaginaries of the citizens (Žižek cited in Mishra 2005: 4). Normative nationalisms and racist phobias stem from this imposed particularity and a proprietary sense of 7

FRAMING THE NEXUS

enjoyment of the “Nation Thing” which, in turn, is considered as the “exclusive property” of a given group of citizens, community or race (Žižek 1993: 203). Since the enjoyment of the “Nation Thing” is the unique right of a specific community, then someone who falls outside the ambit of the “Nation Thing” is perceived as the Other who wishes to “steal [the nation’s] enjoyment” (Mishra 2005: 5). Žižek (cited in Mishra 2005) further explains that when one accuses the Other of stealing the exclusive property that one3 possesses, one “represses the traumatic fact that one never possessed what was allegedly stolen from him or her” (5). Therefore, the exclusivity and enjoyment of the “Nation Thing” are always “imaginary”, and one continues to accuse the Other of stealing something that the Self lacks but wishes to enjoy. At the same time, the fantasies of the “Nation Thing” return to the Self after one has negatively imputed the Other for possessing an identical imaginary. However, in Dia­ spora Criticism, Sudesh Mishra (2006) aptly warns of the difficulties that emerge from such theoretical postulations about the diaspora and the imagin­ ary “nation thing”. He questions how the Self and the Other position them­ selves in the same “imaginary” space and if it is even possible for all those who are the “owners of the foundational narrative of the nation-thing” to achieve an “imaginary identification” with themselves and in the space of “diasporic other” (Mishra 2006: 88). He further cautions about the Self and Other’s familiarity with the “border flux” that simultaneously constitutes identity as an “essence” and as “conjuncture/disjuncture” (87–88). Such an understanding of imaginary identification makes it possible to interpret the paradoxical natio­ nalistic claims that indicate a desire to construct “Nation Thing” based on “racial homogeneity” and the imaginary traumatic loss of it (ibid.). I further argue that a study of the construction and memorialisation of the nation’s traumatic loss (instigated by the imagined Other’s theft) also offers insights into processes of nation-building that rely on purist ideologies and the marginalisation of perceived racial otherness. In a study on South Asian diaspora and the nation, Vertovec (1999) states that “right-wing religious organizations in the homeland are known to gain much support from overseas populations” (452). His conclusion was based on two cases: the Indian Hindu diaspora’s support for the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) in India, and the Pakistani Muslim diaspora’s support for the Jamaat-e-Islami in Pakistan in the last decade of the 20th cen­ tury (ibid.). These findings hold much relevance to the book given the histor­ ical and present political circumstances in relation to the Indian Hindu diaspora and BJP. Post-2001 and after the 2014 election of the Modi-led BJP governance in India, the projects of nation-building and especially the “New India” narrative rely on a homogenous model that involves othering its min­ ority citizens like Muslims as well as externalising the nation’s “enemy” by forging “otherness” on “Pakistan”. By examining the cinematic representation of the Indian and Pakistani diasporic trajectories in Tiger Zinda Hai (2017) (henceforth, TZH) and New York (2009) (henceforth, NY), the subsequent 8

THINKING DIASPORA

chapters will discuss the processes of post-9/11 Othering and underline the factors that led to ideological rifts or bonding within South Asian diaspora groups. Salecl (1994) states that over a period, the nation as a “fantasy structure”, a “scenario” through which a society recognises and distinguishes itself as a “homogeneous entity”, “fixates” the recognition of the Other (229). Such a fixation both denies changes and forecloses alternative imaginings of the Other. According to Taylor (1994), at the heart of national politics of multi­ culturalism is the demand for such a “fixated” recognition of the Other, and at the heart of that recognition lies the diasporic subjects. This implies that in relation to diaspora and national belonging, the idealised project of multi­ culturalism must acknowledge the fixated principles of universalism based on “particular” imaginaries linked to a specific Western historical formation. Laclau et al. (2000) suggest that such a particularity which is now rendered as universal is “ingrained in all other particularisms” (86). Supplementing these postulations, we may ask: How does any discourse constitute itself as parti­ cular or universal? What are the boundaries within and of thinking continuity and discontinuity in discourse analysis? It is certain that any discourse does not have clear boundaries or an outside. Therefore, instead of an idealised project of multiculturalism in a nation, we need what Buck-Morss (2006) calls a new “Global Left” which may underline the play of discourses where “universalist” discourse purports to speak of/as universal or even particularly on localised sites, and particular discourses infiltrate the “universal” circulatory fields but make no universalist claims. Building on these ideas, I suggest that diasporic trajectories need to speak, be spoken about, be heard, be responded to and be negotiated with the aim of critiquing the nationalist acts of othering and the marginalisation of diasporic subjectivities. In his analysis of the modern South Asian diaspora, Mishra (2007) also advocates that diasporas need to “self-reflect” on their “demands for particularism” (183). Chapter Three of this book will elaborate on how Hiroko’s diasporic trajectory in Burnt Shadows (Shamsie 2009) (henceforth, BS) reflects on these “particularisms” to challenge normative nationalisms and suggest “planetarity” as a way of belonging (Spivak 2003). It will also analyse the sense of uncertainty, insecurity and anxiety concerning diaspora’s “differ­ ence” fixated by post-9/11 nationalist projects of multiculturalism that engen­ der the protagonist’s predicaments, and lead to diasporic resistance against the foundational narratives of the nation.4

Diaspora, melancholia and homing desires According to Mishra (2007), the condition of mourning depends on a primal loss that the diasporic subject does not want to displace, substitute, repress or deny because to do so would “taint the purity of the object lost” (10). More­ over, since the primal loss of homeland is sustained, deferred and cannot be 9

FRAMING THE NEXUS

replaced by the “new object of love”, “the ego’s relationship to the lost object is much more ambivalent” (Freud [1917] 1959; Mishra 2007: 9). For instance, the diasporic trajectories analysed in Chapters Three and Five will underline how both mourning and melancholia persist, sometimes in intensely contra­ dictory ways, at the level of the social and corporeal. The protagonists’ nar­ rations of diasporic experiences imply not only a simple recounting of the traumas, but also an exploration of how these remembrances affect historical understanding and nationalist memorialisation. By exploring the multiple ori­ gins of their homing desires, ways of belonging and the consequences of trauma, the protagonists seem to be “writing trauma” instead of “writing about trauma” (La Capra 2001). This means instead of reiterating “traditional historiography that records the happening of traumatic events or atrocities”, they align themselves with “processes of acting out, working over, and to some extent working through” (La Capra 2001: 186). By analysing their melancholia and giving it a “voice”, the protagonists in the post-9/11 novels and films come to terms with the traumatic experiences in “hybridized forms” (ibid.). Given the lengthy scope of the novel form, it becomes possible for the novelists to “write trauma” by deploying non-linear structures and fragmented yet elaborate portrayals of the past. This further helps in emphasising a sense of repetition and continuation of the past before and after the 9/11 attacks, and examining the intertwining of past and present migratory experiences that often attends the trauma of the South Asian diaspora. For instance, Chapter Three will examine the wide historical canvas of Shamsie’s BS, and Hiroko’s diasporic trajectory which witnesses the atomic bombing of Naga­ saki, the 1947 Partition of India and Pakistan, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. It will also underline how 9/11 appears as a tiny fragment amidst the big picture as Hiroko’s narrative undermines the predominantly White American terrain of 9/11 melancholia. Chapter Five will discuss how Shamsie, in her latest novel Home Fire (2017) (henceforth, HF), engages with the “post-9/11” sonic politics to “write trauma” in relation to Aneeka and Parvaiz’s diasporic subjectivities. According to Žižek (2002), the deepest assumption shattered on 9/11 was the implicit idea that “the real horror happens [over] there, not here” (13). This kind of a dichotomy between “there” and “here” exemplifies the ideological belief that momentary phases of violence in the developed nation-states of the Global North are somehow more important or “real” than the ongoing vio­ lence in developing nation-states of the Global South (ibid.). The narrator of Hamid’s novel TRF illustrates a collective ideological response to the post-9/11 politics by critiquing American exceptionalism and the foundational assump­ tions of human “difference” and “shared pain”. This will be discussed in detail in Chapter Three to analyse how these frameworks help to confront the interpretative ambiguities and contradictions of “our trauma” versus “their trauma”. In addition, if the quest to settle within nations has been dis­ comforting for Changez in TRF, the questions of what is home and where is 10

THINKING DIASPORA

home have been equally enigmatic for the migratory protagonists Saeed and Nadia in Exit West (Hamid 2017). Conventionally, we have been perceiving home as a space/place of safety and refuge from aggressive and external forces. Certainly, it is a sentimentalised and nostalgic perception of home which elides power struggles, sociological differ­ ences, the threat of violence within homes, and individuals’ different positional­ ities in terms of nationality, race, class, gender, age, ability and sexual orientation. Therefore, it is important that we dissociate from the anachronistic notions of home as a safe haven to explore how home can become a nodal point where historical, economic, personal and social relations are enacted. This may also enable a reading of home as a conceptual site for identification and mis­ identification, and an arena of struggle where individuals with different interests and resources attempt to carve out their identities. Martin et al. (1986), in their article “Feminist Politics: What’s Home Got to Do with It?”, describe “not being home” as the recognition of “an illusion of coherence and safety based on the exclusion of specific histories of oppression and resistance, the repression of dif­ ferences even within oneself” (196). By deconstructing the feelings of “not being home”, Martin et al. (1986) also manage to examine the geographical and gender politics of home as an arena of personal and historical struggles. Thus, their reading of “home” also problematises the bourgeois and patriarchal notion of home which intertwines with the normative and masculinist ideologies of the nation. In the case of South Asian diasporic women’s transitions between homes, we may even read homing desires as a “veiled body” like the “purdah” which renders their subjectivity “more mysterious” and therefore “more attractive” and “more vulnerable” (Minturn et al. 1993). Since the earlier conceptualisations of home have been “re-versed” in dia­ spora “not as a felicitous space of living”, but as a “process of (be)coming” (Zhang 2007: 103–125), home in migrant and diasporic literatures has become “a fiction that one can move beyond or recreate at will” (George 1999: 200). Thus, the search for home in relation to diasporic subjectivities is neither a nostalgic retreat to a familiar past nor a defensive reaction against the brutal­ ities of the present. Instead, it is situated in the “future-oriented projects of constructing a sense of belonging” (Papastergiadis 1998: 9).5 In the post-9/11 context of the selected novels and films, the “homing desire” (Brah 1996) of the protagonists involves attempts to reconstruct home in multiple spaces to “reinvent and rewrite home” as well as “come to terms with an exile from it” (Nasta 2002: 7–8). The subsequent chapters will highlight how home is not a nostalgic lamentation; rather, given the divergent narrative structures of the novels, home becomes a “misty image” that sublimates the protagonists’ needs to confine or return (Mouriño 2009: 319). In addition, as “home” appears to be a fantasy that is accessible in the stream of the protagonists’ dreams and con­ sciousness, it transforms into a carnivalesque space of multifaceted identity performances. In a study about Indian diaspora, homing desires and belonging, Maniam (2001) suggests adopting a “chameleon outlook” for a telescopic or 11

FRAMING THE NEXUS

aerial view of “home” where one must shed the replicated models of isolation, break out of epidermal contexts and adopt a more aerial view of belonging (14). Akin to Hall’s (1997) “positionality” of belonging where one is constantly routing and re-routing to Otherness, we must underline the fluid and inter­ twined taxonomies of identity beyond the scope of the local. Even for Fer­ nandez (2009b), diaspora’s “energy and fullness” of belonging lies in the “awareness that change/transition is a right, not a grief, not a wound” (36). If, for the diaspora, belonging also entails choosing a certain privilege, one chooses in the same context one’s wounding and with it accompanies the power to wound. Since belonging is a series of contesting stories, we need to be suspicious of any singular and hegemonic narratives of diasporic belonging. However, since the protagonists’ tools of choices are tainted with the demands embedded deep in the collective unconscious and the master-narratives of their communities, they seem to belong by unbelonging. This is to say that they revoke their attachments and associations, and moderate their formations. Rather than by existing as by-products of globalisation and neoliberalism, in their slippery, contentious, connected and disconnected ways, the protagonists question the assumptions underpinning the categorised dimensions of identity which include nationality, race, class, gender, and dis/ability. Although these dimensions are fundamentally constitutive of one another and not discrete strands that “intersect” at crucial junctures, for analytical purposes and mind­ ful of its risks and instabilities, I have adapted the intersectionality model for focusing on these strands.

Diaspora and class The primacy accorded by scholars of diaspora studies to deterritorialised ethnic and racial identity formations, over other types of identity structures like class, must be viewed with theoretical suspicion. For Visweswaran (1997), “without more attention to how class determines the differential nature and experience of racial formations, there is a danger that ‘popular diaspora theory’ […] will substitute uncontested stories of culture for accounts of capi­ tal” (5). Since no phenomenon or experience of traumatic events taints every diasporic individual in the same way, we must examine how even the modality of class plays a significant role in activating migratory movements and altering the nature of diasporic experience. While the uneducated, illiterate and the downtrodden face the maximum crisis, the upper strata or the higher-income groups residing in or outside a diaspora may not share the same lot. Discussing the contemporary fate of what Alavi (2002) calls the subcontinental “salariat”,6 Visweswaran (1997) observes how “increased competition for a limited number of positions at home coupled with the acquisition of an ‘English edu­ cation’” led to the mobilisation and fragmentation of South Asian diasporas along ethnic and communal lines in the USA (11). Presumably, this type of fragmentation is inseparable from and simultaneous with strategic class, 12

THINKING DIASPORA

religious and gender alliances of non-subcontinental social formations in the hostland and across the South Asian diasporas. In Diasporic Mediations: Between Home and Location, Radhakrishnan (1996) posits that during the initial phase, immigrants suppress ethnicity in the name of pragmatism and opportunism (205). To be successful in the New World, they actively assimilate, foreground their class alliances and hide their distinct ethni­ city. Under the pretext of being a “free individual”, the diasporic subjects make conscious efforts to “forget the past” and “forfeit community” (ibid.). However, these “individualised escapes” may serve an emotional need, but they are not above the matrix of history, nation, class, race and gender (ibid.). In the sub­ sequent chapters, an analysis of the selected novels and films will underline the class dynamics underpinning the international division of labour and the eco­ nomic turmoil of global capital. Taking into account the populist rhetoric in the election campaigns of Modi centred on “economic turmoil” in India and the role of the Indian diaspora, I will also examine how economic considerations and consumer behaviour manipulate and shape perceptions of the Indian diaspora in the Middle East and the Global North. Based on the Gramscian (Gramsci 1999) views on the growth of “hegemony”, it is also possible to uncover the politics of class consciousness within and between South Asian diaspora groups, and dia­ sporic consciousness within and between the different classes. This implies the investigation of how the members of the same “category” feel a certain solidarity with one another but not with the other categories of the same class. Although a state of consensus is reached in relation to solidarity interests among all the members of a social class, it is also significant to examine why it takes place only in and through an economic realm. Eventually, there is also a need to dissect the complex ways in which class is gendered, racialised and discussed in terms of generation with respect to the everyday lived experiences of the diaspora.

Diaspora and gender In a study on the Irish women diaspora, Gray (2004) argues that diaspora brings “gender, and women in particular, into focus because women are seen as biologically and culturally reproducing diasporas” (5). She adds that “nor­ mative heterosexuality tends to underpin concerns with the survival of dia­ sporas” and “the struggles over diasporic boundary-making frequently focus on women’s bodies and behaviour” (7). Her propositions draw attention to the multilayered dimensions of corporeality and the gendered dynamics of dia­ sporic experiences. They also promote an inquiry into the following genderoriented questions: Do migrant women and queer diasporas define themselves as a displaced collectivity exhibiting the characteristics suggested by scholars like Safran (1991), Cohen (1997) and Sheffer (1986)? How are women inter­ pellated by the ideologies of nation-states and what is the impact of gender imbalance on diasporic formations and trajectories? By highlighting the links between patriarchy, capitalism, and women as “valuable transferable 13

FRAMING THE NEXUS

commodities” in a “resource-impoverished” so-called “Third World” (Gray 2004), my study hopes to shed light on the cultural representations of the South Asian diaspora’s economic and gendered relations with the West. According to Sánchez (2010), “diaspora is a gendered space and the main structures of the transnational economic and cultural market remain male-domi­ nated, which generates a discriminatory construction of the female role in society” (80). For Desai (2004), diasporas articulate nationalisms through “gender and sexual normativities” (30). However, according to Brah (1996), gender is the most powerful factor enabling the inequalities in the global economic system that has been in the making right since the transatlantic trade of human slaves (84). Thus, the incessant migratory movements of humans offer a space for dialogue and a subversive opportunity where women are situated “at the crossroads” (Anzaldúa 1987: 187). To “ungender” (Butler [1990] 1999) diaspora, Anthias et al. (1992) suggest that two factors need to be reassessed: “the double scheme of dia­ sporic gender relations (host country-travelling community)” and “the boundaries in which women still become the carriers of the cultural symbolism that marks out the boundaries of the diasporic group” (82). Bearing in mind these postula­ tions and underlining the gendered “diasporic optic” (Moorti 2003: 362), the subsequent chapters will elaborate on how the delineation of Hiroko’s (BS) and Zoya’s (TZH) diasporic trajectories posits a challenge to the masculine sphere of nationalisms of Changez in TRF and Tiger in TZH.

Diaspora and generation There is an extensive debate about the need, relevance and implications of “generation” as a “demographic” and “sociological” concept (Eckstein 2002; Kertzer 1983; Loizos 2007). Reviewing the biological definition of generation based on positionality within the migrating or “post-migration” family, Eck­ stein (2002) argues for a nuanced historical re-conceptualisation and distinction between the “old” and the “new” generations of immigrants. Experiences of crossing national borders, assimilation stories and economic prospects for both the first and the second (biological) generations reverberate the historical con­ ditions that have fundamentally changed over the years (213). However, this kind of historical separation into earlier and later generations of immigrants is just one of the several meanings of generation “guaranteed to sow confusion” (Kertzer 1983: 142). Fundamentally fickle in its polysemy, the concept of gen­ eration requires continual reconsideration as this has ramifications in the sur­ veys, policy-making, and cultural representations concerning the migrants’ and diaspora’s familial and age-centric experiences. In an attempt to “identify the sources of confusion in the sociological usage of generation”, Kertzer (1983) identifies four meanings of generation: (i) a “principle of kinship descent” or a relational, genealogical concept used to define patterns within the larger uni­ verse of kinship; (ii) a “life-stage” of humans often referring to infancy, child­ hood, adolescence, adulthood, middle age and old age or to more generalised 14

THINKING DIASPORA

life-stage contrasts (younger generation, older generation or college genera­ tion)—in such a case, there may or may not be a genealogical relation such as parent–child; (iii) a “cohort” or a set of similar-age people moving through the life-course, for instance based on a birth cohort; and (iv) a “historical period” where generation refers to a historical event or people living/moving in a particular period (125–149). Despite the multiple approaches to understanding generation, in the case of migration studies, King et al. (2008) have underlined the problematic use of the concept of immigrant generations “to measure the progressive loss of ethno­ cultural distinctiveness en route to assimilation” (6). Extending Kertzer’s (1983) four meanings, they call for a research methodology in migration studies that can foreground the generational connections overlapping historical period, age groups and kinship (King et al. 2008). By examining Changez’s intergenera­ tional longing for the past grandeur of his family in Lahore in TRF, Chapter Three of this book hopes to shed light on how people, despite belonging to different historical periods, share the same genealogical and generational posi­ tion as both the societies of origin and arrival change over time. Since dia­ sporic parents often migrate with their children, and in some cases, even three generations move together, King et al. (2008) also ask if we could consider both parents and children as the first generation in diaspora. Most diaspora scholars would agree that often it takes several generations for an experience of migration to become diaspora; as Cohen (1997) aptly puts it, “time has to pass” for a diasporic condition to emerge (185). However, for Shuval (2000), a sense of diaspora can “occur or reoccur” even though several generations have passed and the diasporic group members do not perceive themselves as immi­ grants despite the diasporic identity of their predecessors (42). In the sub­ sequent chapters of this book, I hope to alert the readers to the difficulties in categorising generational diasporic subjectivities by studying the fractional generation and generational conflicts between Mandira, Sam and Rizvan in My Name is Khan (2010) (henceforth, MNIK); the generational ideologies of Samir, Maya, Omar and Roshan in NY; and generational gaps between Raza, Sajjad and Hiroko in BS. In the case of HF, I will examine how Parvaiz’s father’s diasporic condition influences his and the children’s identity formations as well as their links with the countries of origin and arrival.

Diaspora and disability Erevelles (2011) suggests disability is “not simply another identity category”, instead, it provides the “key to the constitution of all identity categories in transnational capitalism” (6). Her historicist and materialist conception of disability underlines how the body becomes a “commodity of exchange” in a “transnational economic context” (29). As she discusses the problematic deployment of disability as an anomalous and undesirable condition in trans­ national capitalist societies, she makes evident the normative processes and 15

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hegemonic constructions of other social categories, such as race, class, gender, generation and sexual orientation. By interpreting Erevelles’s (2011) Marxist framework on disability and Žižek’s (2008) psychoanalytical approach to the violence embedded in an ableist society, I hope to underline several historical connections between the discourses of diaspora and disability studies. Although Žižek (2008) does not address disability overtly, his work is valu­ able to understand how capitalism impacts corporeality and warps desire to maintain its structures. His work encourages us to consider the everyday mundane community practices and the historical hegemonic operations of societal institutions as being inherently violent against those who, in some way or another, threaten their everyday workings and practices (ibid.). Thus, the systemic and systematic acts of violence on people with different disabilities may be understood by reflecting on the wider circulating practices of dominant ableist culture. Žižek (2008) talks of the violence inherent in an ableist system, not only of the “direct physical violence”, but also of the more “subtle forms of coercion” (1–8). These may include all those systems and practices that attempt to normalise and hegemonise social differences, and sustain relations of domination, for instance, the transatlantic slave trade, present-day global corporate slavery, citizenship tests and national integration courses. Drawing on these theories, it is possible to elaborate on the socio-cultural connections between histories and exclusion narratives of disability and diaspora: “from providing agency to marginalized communities and histories to securing var­ ious levels of access—to turn stairwells to ramps or to provide citizenship regardless of appearance or name” (Ewart 2010: 149). Similar connections between disability and diaspora can be foregrounded by attending to the lan­ guage of disability that is often used to express diasporic alienation and exclusion, and “elucidate agency and figurative empathy for other oppressed and exploited populations” (ibid.). What is also significant in the context of a South Asian migrant or diaspora with disability and the heightened post-9/11 racial discourse on terror is how one might be marked by a racial, corporal and cognitive lack or excess considering the hegemony of the West and Whitecentric models in the ableist practices of the nation (as we will examine in detail in Chapter Four in the case of Rizvan Khan in MNIK). This cognitive and/or corporal lack or excess often based on judgemental and irrational per­ ceptions has strengthened discourses on diasporas’ “madness”, “disability”, “insanity”, “criminality” and “anti-social behaviour” (Ewart 2010), especially in the discussions of post-9/11 radicalisation of the South Asian Muslim dia­ spora. I further argue that such an exclusionary matrix of ableist practices often induces people who are unable or unwilling to assimilate, to adopt an anti-social posture, dissociate and/or engage in what Campbell (2009) calls “tangential desiring”.7 An analysis of such forms of desiring that emerge from the peripheries of national cultures also makes it possible to underline the entangled and marginalised conditions of diasporic and disabled subjectivities, and challenge the internalised ableism within diaspora studies. 16

THINKING DIASPORA

Notes 1 Safran (1991) affirms that the Jewish diaspora is an appropriate prototype for theo­ rising diaspora because their experience comprises aspects such as ethnicity, religion, a consciousness of peoplehood, a history of migration, expulsion, adaptation to a variety of hostlands and a continuing orientation to a homeland. 2 Another critic who has followed Vijay Mishra’s (1985) path is Monika Fludernik (2003). In the introductory essay to her book Diaspora and Multiculturalism: Common Traditions and New Developments, she writes: “people who identify themselves as part of a diaspora are creating an ‘imaginary’—a landscape of dream and fantasy that answers to their desires” (Fludernik 2003: xi). 3 “One” here refers to those power apparatuses that formulate and govern the metanarrative of the nation (Žižek cited in Mishra 2005: 5). 4 The methodology of such an analysis will also involve “forcing a reading” to examine if the novels and films (given each medium’s own specific limitations) can sustain the turning of “identitarian” trajectories (Adorno 1966), embedded within the “post-9/11” context, into an explosive flash or constellation of “dialectical images” (Benjamin 1999). Such a reading hopes to underline the “cognitive shocks” in the protagonists’ trajectories for rigorous conceptual thinking. As a method opposed to all forms of tel­ eology and totality, the “dialectical image” rests on a spatiotemporal paradox and, thereby, involves continuous disputation, contradiction, constant mobility, and muta­ tion (Gregory 1977). Similarly, the Bakhtinian idea (cited in Gregory 1977) of “chron­ otope” as a matrix which “acknowledges the inseparability of time and space” will help explore how the tempo-spatial unity of the diasporic trajectories is materialised for concrete cultural formations, representations and the play of meanings. 5 This also recalls the many discussions concerning the German word “heimat” which scholars often equate with “home” even if its use has been “tentative and apologetic outside the German speaking community, owing to its specific cultural baggage” (Fernandez 2009a: 12). In the essay, “Home meets Heimat”, Ludewig (2007) argues that given, among other things, the politicising of home and reconfigurations of the meanings of diaspora, the semantic shifts in defining the notion of “home” align it more closely with “heimat” because it carries an ambivalence of home and homeland. Thus, given some of the shifts in current scholarship, I argue that “homing” involves negotiations within and through the ambivalence of idyllic notions of home and homeland, and the consciousness of the always-already polluted and contaminated spaces. 6 It refers to a comprador middle class that stood in a subordinate relationship to the British coloniser but was the dominant class in its own cultural environment (Alavi 2002). 7 Campbell (2009) underlines this based on Foucault’s ([1976] 1990) postulation about “peripheral sexualities” that engage in the “thought of the outside” from the margins of culture.

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Anzaldúa, Gloria. 1987. Borderlands: La Frontera. Vol. 3. San Francisco: Aunt Lute. Armstrong, John. 1976. “Mobilized and Proletarian Diasporas”. American Political Science Review. 70(2): 393–408. Benjamin, Walter. 1999. The Arcades Project. Edited by Rolf Tiedmann. Translated by Howard Eiland and Kevin McLaughlin. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: Harvard University Press/Belknap Press. Brah, Avtar. 1996. Cartographies of Diaspora: Contesting Identities. London: Routledge. Braziel, Jana E. 2008. Diaspora: An Introduction. Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing. Buck-Morss, Susan. 2006. Thinking past Terror: Islamism and Critical Theory on the Left. London: Verso. Butler, Judith. [1990] 1999. Gender Trouble. Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge. Butler, Kim. 2001. “Defining Diaspora, Refining a Discourse”. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies. 10(2): 189–219. Campbell, F.K. 2009. Contours of Ableism: The Production of Disability and Abledness. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Chaliand, Gérard and Rageau, Jean-Pierre. 1991. Atlas des Diasporas. Paris: Odile Jacob. Cohen, Robin. 1997. Global Diasporas: An Introduction. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Connor, Walker. 1986. “The Impact of Homelands upon Diasporas”. In Modern Diasporas in International Politics. Edited by Gabi Sheffer. 16–46. New York: St. Martin’s. Desai, Jigna. 2004. Beyond Bollywood: The Cultural Politics of South Asian Diasporic Film. London: Routledge. Eckstein, Susan. 2002. “On Deconstructing and Reconstructing the Meaning of Immi­ grant Generations”. In The Changing Face of Home: The Transnational Lives of the Second Generation. Edited by Peggy Levitt and Mary Waters. 211–215. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Erevelles, Nirmala. 2011. Disability and Difference in Global Contexts: Enabling a Transformative Body Politic. Berlin: Springer. Ewart, C. 2010. “Terms of Disappropriation: Disability, Diaspora and Dionne Brand’s What We All Long For”. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies. 4(2): 147–161. Fernandez, Jane (Ed.). 2009a. Diasporas: Critical and Inter-Disciplinary Perspectives. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press. Fernandez, Jane. 2009b. “Framing the Diaspora: Politics of Identity and Belonging”. In Diasporas: Critical and Inter-Disciplinary Perspectives. Edited by Jane Fernandez. 29–39. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press. Fludernik, Monika. 2003. Diaspora and Multiculturalism: Common Traditions and New Developments. Cross Cultures. Vol. 66. Amsterdam: Rodopi. Foucault, Michel. [1976] 1990. The History of Sexuality: An Introduction. Vol. 1. Translated by Robert Hurley. London: Penguin. Freud, Sigmund. [1917] 1959. “Mourning and Melancholia”. In Sigmund Freud: Collected Papers, 5 vols. Translated by Joan Riviere. Vol. 4: 152–170. New York: Basic Books.

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George, Rosemary. 1999. The Politics of Home: Postcolonial Relocations and Twentieth Century Fiction. Berkeley: University of California Press. Gilroy, Paul. 1993. The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness. London: Verso. Gramsci, Antonio. 1999. “Intellectuals and Hegemony”. In Social Theory: The Multi­ cultural and Classic Readings. Edited by Charles Lemert. 259–261. New York: Routledge. Gray, Breda. 2004. Women and the Irish Diaspora. London: Routledge. Gregory, Frederick. 1977. “Scientific versus Dialectical Materialism: A Clash of Ideologies in Nineteenth-Century German Radicalism”. Isis. 68(2): 206–223. Hall, Stuart. 1997. “Culture and Power”. Radical Philosophy. 86: 24–41. Hamid, Mohsin. 2007. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. London: Hamish Hamilton. Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. Exit West. New York: Riverhead Books. Hewitt, Marco C. 2009. “From Pan-Nationalism to Cosmopolitanism: Epistemological Tensions in Diasporic Filipino Activism”. In Diasporas: Critical and Inter-Disciplinary Perspectives. Edited by Jane Fernandez. 139–150. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press. Hua, Anh. 2005. “Diaspora and Cultural Memory”. In Diaspora, Memory, and Iden­ tity: A Search for Home. Edited by Vijay Agnew. 191–208. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Kertzer, David I. 1983. “Generation as a Sociological Problem”. Annual Review of Sociology. 9: 125–149. Kiernan, Victor G. 1971. Faiz Ahmad Faiz. London: Vanguard Books South Publication. King, Russel and Christou, Anastasia. 2008. “Cultural Geographies of Counter-Diasporic Migration: The Second Generation Returns Home”. Sussex Migration Working Paper. 45: 1–30. Brighton: University of Sussex. La Capra, Dominick. 2001. Writing History, Writing Trauma. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. Laclau, Ernesto and Žižek, Slavoj. 2000. Contingency, Hegemony, Universality: Contemporary Dialogues on the Left. London: Verso. Loizos, Peter. 2007. “Generations in Forced Migration: Towards Greater Clarity”. Journal of Refugee Studies. 20(2): 193–209. Ludewig, Alexandra. 2007. “Home Meets Heimat”. M/C Journal. 10(4): 1–5. Maniam, Krishnan S. 2001. “The New Diaspora”. University of Calgary. 11: 10–15. Martin, Biddy and Mohanty, Chandra T. 1986. “Feminist Politics: What’s Home Got to Do with It?”. In Feminist Studies/Critical Studies. Edited by Teresa de Lauretis. 191–212. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Minturn, Leigh and Kapoor, Swaran. 1993. Sita’s Daughters: Coming out of Purdah: The Rajput Women of Khalapur Revisited. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Mishra, Sudesh. 2006. Diaspora Criticism. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Mishra, Vijay. 1985. “Towards a Theoretical Critique of Bombay Cinema”. Screen. 26(3): 133–146. Mishra, Vijay. 2005. “The Diasporic Imaginary and the Indian Diaspora”. Asian Stu­ dies Institute Occasional Lecture. 2: 1–27. Wellington: Victoria University of Wellington. Mishra, Vijay. 2007. The Literature of the Indian Diaspora: Theorizing the Diasporic Imaginary. London: Routledge.

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Moorti, Sujata. 2003. “Desperately Seeking an Identity: Diasporic Cinema and the Articulation of Transnational Kinship”. International Journal of Cultural Studies. 6(3): 355–376. Mouriño, José M. 2009. “The Return Home through the (Magic) Film Image”. In Diasporas: Critical and Inter-Disciplinary Perspectives. Edited by Jane Fernandez. 319–327. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Nasta, Susheila. 2002. Home Truths: Fictions of the South Asian Diaspora in Britain. Houndmills: Palgrave. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Pandurang, Mala and Munos, Delphine. 2014. “Mapping Diasporic Subjectivities”. South Asian Diaspora. 6(1): 1–5. Papastergiadis, Nikos. 1998. Dialogues in the Diasporas: Essays and Conversations on Cultural Identity. London: Rivers Oram Press. Radhakrishnan, Rajagopalan. 1996. Diasporic Mediations: Between Home and Location. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press. Random House Unabridged Dictionary. 2015. New York: Random House. Refugee. 2000. Dir. J.P. Dutta. Perf. Abhishek Bachchan and Kareena Kapoor. India: J. P. Dutta Films. Safran, William. 1991. “Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return”. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies. 1(1): 83–99. Salecl, Renata. 1994. “The Crisis of Identity and the Struggle for New Hegemony in the Former Yugoslavia”. In The Making of Political Identities.. Edited by E. Laclau. 205–232. London: Verso. Sánchez, Jorge D. 2010. Hybrid Cinemas and Gender Representation in the South Asian Diaspora: The Films of Gurinder Chadha and Mira Nair (MPhil Thesis). Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Sheffer, Gabriel. 1986. Modern Diasporas in International Politics. London: Croom Helm Publishing. Shuval, Judith. 2000. “Diaspora Migration: Definitional Ambiguities and a Theoretical Paradigm”. International Migration. 38(5): 41–55. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2003. Death of a Discipline. New York: Columbia University Press. Taylor, Charles. 1994. Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. Tölölyan, Khachig. 1996. “(Re)thinking Diasporas: Stateless Power in the Transnational Moment”. Diaspora. 5(1): 3–36. Vertovec, Steven. 1999. “Conceiving and Researching Transnationalism”. Ethnic and Racial Studies. 22(2): 447–462. Visweswaran, Kamala. 1997. “Diaspora by Design: Flexible Citizenship and South Asians in US Racial Formations”. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies. 6(1): 5–29.

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Zhang, Benzi. 2007. Asian Diaspora Poetry in North America. London: Routledge. Žižek, Slavoj. 1993. Tarrying with the Negative: Kant, Hegel and the Critique of Ideology. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press. Žižek, Slavoj. 2002. Welcome to the Desert of the Real: Five Essays on September 11 and Related Dates. London: Verso. Žižek, Slavoj. 2008. “Censorship Today: Violence, or Ecology as a New Opium for the Masses”. Philpapers.org. 1–8. https://philpapers.org/rec/ZIZCTV. Accessed on 4 May 2015.

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2

SURVEYING SOUTH ASIAN DIASPORIC

TEXTS AND CONTEXTS THROUGH

THE PRISM OF ‘9/11’

And then?

And then the Towers fell.

And you stopped being an individual and started being an

entire religion.

(Shamsie 2005: 45)

The fall of the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001 has become one of the most significant markers of crisis for the Muslim migrants across the world. In Broken Verses (Shamsie 2005), a victim of the 9/11 tragedy, the diasporic Pakistani Muslim character Ed, soon realises the myth of the American dream and yearns for a supposed pre-9/11 cosmopolitan USA and UK. Conscious of the implications of the War on Terror, stigmatisation of Islam and the exacerbating discriminatory acts against Muslims, Shamsie’s novels are direct products of the contextual moment and history that they delineate. This chapter seeks to trace the framing of “9/11” by confronting the politics of dating 9/11, its scaling, structuring and narration that provoked a heightened sense of insecurity, the framing of unjust policies, implementation of tyrannical laws and the promotion of anti-Muslim right-wing populist politics in the 21st century. By doing so, it also aims to underline the thematic patterns and nar­ rative techniques in diasporic and transnational South Asian literature and Hindi films concerned with the 9/11 attacks and the War on Terror.

“Tracing” 9/11 The starting point of deploying the concept of “trace” could be located in the readings of Derrida’s Of Grammatology (Derrida [1967] 1997) where trace is the “part played by the radically other within the structure of difference that is the sign” (xvii). In the context of my study, 9/11 is not only the abbreviation of the date 11 September 2001 marking the attacks that took place on that day in New York City, Virginia and Pennsylvania, but also a “trace” that carries “the mark of the absence of a presence, an always already absent present” (ibid.). 22

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-3

SOUTH ASIAN DIASPORIC TEXTS AND CONTEXTS

This means it is a marker of troubled histories or a sign of the “lack at the origin that is the condition of thought and experience” (xvii). Based on inter­ twining meanings of the noun and verb “trace”, I also derive “tracing” as an act of investigating both the origins of the politics of dating 9/11 and the uncanny absence-presence of 9/11 in literature and cinema. Therefore, “tra­ cing” here implies mapping the overt and covert vestiges of 9/11 as super­ imposed on literary and cinematic cultures as well as outlining the cultures superimposed on 9/11. According to Tomasula (2009), “scale plays an enor­ mous role in what is seen, and therefore what is said” (4). He adds: “The selection of scale determines subject—as well as what can be said—and this has ramifications for how we use literature to view our world” (ibid.). Based on his postulation, it is apparent that the instruments we use allow us to recognise, determine, trace, see and listen to the concerned subject comfortably at a particular scale, and systematise the “seeming chaos into patterns of coherence” (Tomasula 2009: 4). Extending his argument, we may examine how the dominant narratives of national and international news media1 serve as instruments to project and narrate 9/11 as a “restricted prism” that reflects a nationalist perspective of human affairs (Curran 2002: 180). A Washington DCbased digital photographer, Sam Hurd (2013) concluded that prisming2 experi­ ments can “breathe life into images and result in a variety of effects” that are almost “impossible to repeat or create from scratch in digital post-processing”. For him, prism experiments demand the consideration of positionalities and scalar politics of the lenses and instruments as much as a thorough knowledge of the subject placed or appearing in front of the camera and in the space surrounding it (Hurd 2013). Even his suppositions about the potential of the digital camera have broad implications for the study of the physical properties of different instruments and lenses that make the narration of certain perspectives possible through digital media, literature and films. Broadcast by several international news TV networks, the images of the series of attacks on 9/113 were compressed in one “spectacular violent” video of the Twin Towers falling (Howie 2016: 2). Since viewers witnessed it “in real-time” on TV, it appeared “as heinous, immediate and real violence”—“it was ugly, sickening, horrific, terrifying […] [y]et it was also difficult to look away” (ibid.). The recurring video segments of the Twin Towers falling further narrowed down the experiential gap between the first-hand witnesses and the TV audiences. Aged 11 years old, as a part of the international TV audience myself, the live images of the 9/11 attacks along with flashy headlines such as “Terrorist Attack on America” served as an immediate interpretive framework for me to make sense of 9/11 and the discourse on terrorism. Significantly, my perception of 9/11 was based on the televised statements of Indian government officials and the ways in which the national television in India reported it. Considerably, these were truncated ideas delineated by the Indian media that suited the discourse on terrorism of the BJP-led government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his political party’s religious, communal and 23

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geopolitical interests. As per the dominant American media’s perspective, 9/11 shattered the supposedly linear progress of world history, creating a rupture and a general state of exception for White Americans. By broadcasting George W. Bush’s infamous statement “You are either with us or against us”, the American media narratives constructed 9/11 as a historical marker that privileged certain psychological, religious, sociological and gendered assump­ tions and binaries. Every attempt to view 9/11 as a prism lens itself, and/or through several lenses, leads inevitably to complex inquiries into its meanings and place in history. Therefore, by interpreting a series of thematic leaps taken by several philosophers, it might be possible to expose the “restricted prism” of 9/11 with the systems of meaning and power that create the conditions for its inquiry. This also implies the examination of how 9/11 functioned/functions as an ideological and institutionalised construct for ruling political parties to implement national (in)security acts and execute state-sponsored terrorism even after two decades. In an interview published in Borradori’s (2003) Philosophy in a Time of Terror, Derrida claims that when we mark a date in a “supposedly universal calendar” (italics in original), there lies a presupposition that the event that happened on this date is “ineffaceable”, and even if “we do not yet really know how to identify, determine, recognize, or analyze”, the event from the date of its marking remains “unforgettable”. As the “place and meaning of this event, remains ineffable, like an intuition without concept […] [and] out of range for a language that admits its powerlessness”, we reduce the event to “pronoun­ cing mechanically a date, repeating it endlessly” (Derrida cited in Borradori 2003). Moreover, this act of mechanical repetition is comparable to a “ritual incantation, a conjuring poem, a journalistic litany or rhetorical refrain that admits to not knowing what it’s talking about” (ibid.). Complementing this view and deliberating on Benjamin’s notion of history, Cvek infers that 9/11 is not a radical break point, but needs to be interpreted as “a moment in which existing historical tendencies are intensified, where various pasts explode the apparent homogeneity of the post-historical ‘now’” (Benjamin cited in Cvek 2011: 12). Only on the premise of such an understanding of 9/11 and the sub­ sequent War on Terror is it possible to rethink the discourse on terrorism, and underline the predicaments and aporias of South Asian Muslim diasporic and migrant communities who have faced and continue to face the pervasive everyday hegemony of racial and religious nationalisms that only aggravate in the wake of disruptions. In “Terror: A Speech After 9/11”, G.C. Spivak (2004) argues that while the War on Terror has led to an intensification of nationalisms, it has nothing to do with just the “boy” (96). Women are also “prominent” in this war—“this monstrous civilizing mission”, and we need more feminist critical theories to discuss terrorism (84). She questions the plausibility of both globalisation and religion as frames for inspecting terror. Instead, she suggests that we may examine terror as a “social movement” which includes both the physical 24

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violence and the “affect” of terror produced through physical violence itself (91). By calling for a re-examination of the frames of terror, Spivak (2004) indicates the need for multiple feminist subaltern voices in the terrorism/ counterterrorism discourse that should not only speak to all segments of society but also demand an open and fair hearing. On the other hand, according to Žižek (2006), the ideological construct of 9/11 needs scrutiny in light of the histories of geopolitical borders. For him, 9/11 is “the symbol of the end of utopia, a return to real history” with “new walls everywhere” and “new forms of apartheid and legalised torture” (Žižek 2006). It also led to the recognition of a spatio-temporal zone in which a “state of peace itself can be at the same time a state of emergency” (ibid.). This is because, for Žižek (2006), even if “America is in a state of war” according to President Bush’s announcement after the 9/11 attacks, the irony is that “for the large majority of Americans daily life goes on and war remains the business of state agen­ cies”. Adding to this supposition, we may argue that, in the post-9/11 War on Terror context, war seems to be a business that needs to be dealt with outside the geopolitical borders of America and perhaps outside the bodies of White Americans. By arguing for rethinking the distinction between conditions of war and peace, in a similar vein to Derrida and Spivak, Žižek (2006) questions the state agencies’ blurring and constricted perceptions of “terrorist”, “war”, “terrorism”, “preventive anti-terrorism” and “counterterrorism”. To further contextualise theories in relation to 9/11 and South Asia, the next section will attend to the nexus of the inconsistent geopolitical relations between India, Pakistan and the USA.

9/11, South Asia and the USA After the Partition in 1947 and the three wars in 1948, 1965 and 1971, the strained relations between India and Pakistan have deteriorated for an array of reasons but the geopolitical issue of Kashmir has often been framed as their epicentre. Because of the nuclear explosion tests conducted by India and Paki­ stan in 1998 and the escalating insecurities about border disputes pertaining to Kashmir, the USA had imposed economic sanctions on both nation-states in the same year. Although, after the 9/11 attacks, the American government lifted these sanctions, the economic and security politics between the three nation-states took significant turns vis-à-vis the discourse on counterterrorism. According to a study conducted at the Pakistan Institute of International Affairs in Karachi, “in the Pakistan-India context, the 9/11 incidents and the transition in global politics have acted as catalysts in worsening their already critical relations” (Gul 2004: 67). Since the Cold War and the Soviet troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan as well as the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993, even the USA’s relations with South Asia, particularly the Pakistani military, have been based on its own national security interests (67–68). However, after 9/11, the USA has viewed India as a much more 25

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“useful ally” than Pakistan (77). Although the India–USA joint counter­ terrorism operations formalised in January 2000 (i.e. soon after the hijacking of Indian Airline Flight 814 in December 1999), the talks on terrorism and security agreements between the two nation-states had already been initiated in the mid-1990s after the 1981 insurgency in Punjab and the American government’s ban on the fundraising activities of USA-based diasporic Sikhs’ “terrorist” organisations. In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, the Indian mili­ tary and naval bases as well as the Pakistani military became a crucial supply route in the USA’s ongoing War on Terror in Afghanistan. However, after the attack on the Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001 led by a terrorist orga­ nisation based in Pakistan, and the 2002 anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat,4 the tensions between India–Pakistan and the Hindu–Muslim communities in both nation-states significantly escalated. Post-the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack, whereas the signing of the Counterterrorism Cooperation Initiative (CCI) strengthened relations between India and the USA, populist anti-American rhetoric in Pakistan weakened the ties between Pakistan and the USA. Palp­ ably, the BJP-led government’s Hindutva agendas resonated with the Bush administration’s post-9/11 political sensibilities and aided the restructuring of the so-called counterterrorism policies directed towards Muslim citizens and Muslim-dominated nations like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. In the pretext of managing and containing local-global threats, some of the major strategies of the Bush administration’s War on Terror declaration included waging war in Afghanistan and Iraq, constructing the Department of Homeland Security and implementing the 2001 US Patriot Act. State-sponsored militarised sites like the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, Abu Ghraib prison, and US ICE detention centres were built for containing and managing “ter­ rorist” bodies.5 This led to the construction and the reinforcement of the bin­ aries of “Us vs Them”, “Self vs Other”, “White Americans vs Other”, and “Christian vs Muslim”. A consistent governmental rhetoric justifying these dualities and enmities ultimately aimed to “reify white Americanness” and the racialisation of Muslim citizens, refugees and immigrants to reinforce security anxieties around them (Bloodsworth-Lugo et al. 2011: 273). The renewed nativist and narcissistic rhetoric also included building fences demarcating the USA–Mexico international border and the deployment of military personnel at several junctions for guarding borders. Such narratives served to justify the racialisation of immigrant and diasporic groups as threatening, and Muslimdominated nation-states as harbours of terrors, while simultaneously position­ ing the USA as a peace-loving democratic society seeking progress. In a pithy study titled The Muslims Are Coming!, Kundnani (2014) cites several case studies of immigrant or diasporic Muslims who, after 9/11 and the declaration of the War on Terror, were falsely charged of criminal offences and faced federal charges and deportation. He discusses the case of the Pakistani immi­ grant Shahed Hussain who was charged for running a fake driver’s license scam and became a victim of the American Federal Bureau of Investigation 26

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(FBI)’s “fallacious model of radicalisation” and provocation tactics (Kundnani 2014: 182). Chapters Three and Four will elaborate on the operations of such coercive and fallacious models of radicalisation through the diasporic trajec­ tories of Raza in Shamsie’s BS and Omar in Kabir Khan’s New York (2009) (henceforth, NY). Besides, according to Kundnani (2014), if by declaring War on Terror, the Bush administration justified the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq “on the grounds that fighting them ‘over there’ was the best way to prevent attacks ‘over here’”, under President Obama’s rule, “a new phase of the War on Terror intensified the fear that Western Muslim citizens were also a threat” (ibid.).6 This new phase further legitimated the FBI’s and the government-controlled media’s racialisation tactics as well as the framing of Muslim immigrants and diasporic communities as “radicals” and “extremists” who are a threat to the White Western world. For example, after 7/7 in London, the renewed discourse on a “radicalised” individual was presented as a more “liberal alternative” to the previous interpretations of a potential “terrorist”, and provided the pretexts for a substantial reorganisation of preventive anti-terrorism strategies to con­ trol the Muslim immigrant population (Kundnani 2014). Such a renewed radi­ calisation model was based on intuitions about corporal signs that proclaimed even “growing a beard” or “starting to wear traditional Islamic clothing” are warning signs of the terrorist body and, thereby, a source of anxiety (ibid.). Kundnani (2014) also highlights the predicaments of one such victim of the renewed radicalisation model: I tell people that, after 9/11, freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of religion, take an empty shoe box, put all of them in it, and put them in the closet. America is no longer the same as before 9/11. Just be a responsible citizen. He says that Muslims should avoid “loose talk,” which he defines as anti-American sentiment or anything to do with 9/11, or anything to do with Iraq or Afghanistan. Why make these kinds of statements when you really don’t need to? (Bombayvala cited in Kundnani 2014: 197) Thus, hiding bodily markers, withdrawing from certain religious activities and repressing and forgetting historical facts function as defence mechanisms for the diasporic Muslim bodies who constantly struggle to negotiate a “symboli­ cally charged site of national memory”.7 In this sense, the act of framing 9/11 is representational of the “hegemony, imperialism, and domestic authoritar­ ianism” of nation-state politics (Steinmetz 2003).8 It also refers to a political framing where nationalisms emerge around a “complex act of constitutive forgetting—forgetting of a peculiar kind” (Renan cited in Cvek 2011: 26). These peculiar acts of forgetting intensified the stigmatisation of the diasporic Muslim citizens in Europe and the USA, the repercussions of which are visible in the anti-Muslim rhetoric of the Trump administration in the USA, 27

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Islamophobic policies of the European nations and the BJP’s Hindutva politics in India. Thus, the War on Terror led to the vulnerability of Muslim dia­ sporas, and the realisation of “the futility of any attempt to define diasporas simply in terms of their origins” (“slavery”, “genocide”, “indentured labor”, and so forth) or by type (“victim”, “trade”, “cultural”, “labor”, “imperial”) (Werbner 2011). In a broader sense, it elucidates that the questions “how” and “when” one becomes diaspora are also a matter about rewriting collective oblivion, narrating interconnected histories, memorialising national historical moments and imagining the nation. In the context of the 9/11 attacks and the War on Terror discourse, if we “trace” the practices of different diasporic Muslim groups whose trajectories “frequently converge”, it is possible to conclude that the state’s exclusionary acts of framing particular moments in history as catalysts make them “sus­ ceptible to being constructed as dangerous outsiders with loyalties beyond the nation-state” (Werbner 2011). Citing Tomasula, in an article about sensation, science and the new media, Banash (2015) argues that “the cultural production and circulation of meaning and the physical realities of nature meet on the plane of the human body, and not merely a body understood as an inert sur­ face of social inscription” (4). By extending this argument, we may explore how socio-economic, cultural and political constructs like nation, home and identity are inscribed on Muslim diasporic corporealities in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Simultaneously, we may ask, in general, how diasporic bodies are made meaningful by inscribing certain ideological constructs on them. Tomasula (cited in Banash 2015) suggests that bodies are not just organisms or entities in themselves; they are a “mechanism of a series of open-ended sys­ tems” (5). Bodies function with other larger systems and are unable to control the tools (like language and art) from which the bodies acquire their abilities and capacities. These large systems are also indicative of the processes of evo­ lution that give rise to our bodies and through which culture is itself evolving and feeding back into the process of evolution that is framing the “condition of possibility” (Banash 2015). Thus, we may conclude that diasporic bodies, as dynamic and open-ended systems, acquire their abilities and capacities to per­ form their identities through systems that are in the process of evolution, and they feed back into the systems of nation, home and identity to make their survival conditions possible. Part III of this book will examine these notions in detail and inspect how the “post-9/11” context is narrated in novels such as Home Fire (Shamsie 2017) and Exit West (Hamid 2017) (henceforth, EW). It will also analyse how the cultural representation of this context takes on new meanings in an age of populist, narcissistic and normative nationalisms including the Pakistan civil-militant government’s rising antipathy towards the USA’s and India’s economic and national security policies, the Modi-led gov­ ernment’s Hindutva politics in India, the Trump administration’s Executive Order 13769 in the USA, and the Theresa May-led government’s 2016 EU Membership Referendum and dual citizenship amendments in the UK. 28

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Surveying the post-9/11 Pakistani English novels9 Since the beginning of the 21st century, Pakistani English novels have received much global attention and critical acclaim considering their meaningful dialo­ gues with the complexities of the changing political and cultural scenarios in South Asia and the Global North. In her study concerning “duality” and “diversity” in Pakistani English literature, Muneeza Shamsie (2011) claims that although Pakistani English literature “shares a regional dynamic as well as a long colonial history” with other South Asian literature, “the Pakistani imagi­ nation is also linked to the wider Islamic world” (119). According to Amit Chaudhari (cited in Lee-Potter 2017), “9/11” provoked “Pakistan’s new nove­ lists” to reject the old postcolonial arguments and embark on different forms of expressions (154). “Interestingly poised”, the “diasporic optic” of the new novelists implicates them in “the unfolding and the unravelling of our age” (Moorti 2003: 355; Lee-Potter 2017: 155). This is particularly evident in the articulation of the dialectics of the national, local, postcolonial and global imagination in the novels of Kamila Shamsie and Mohsin Hamid. Both authors are of Pakistani descent and have dual citizenship of Pakistan and the UK. They reside or have spent a considerable amount of time in Pakistan, the UK and the USA. While both may be called Pakistani-British authors, Hamid states in an interview that he prefers the term “hybrid” or “mongrel” for the categorical description of both his personal identity and his latest novel EW: my personal identity is someone that is a complete hybrid—not just in America but also in Pakistan […] if people like me—hybridized people are not wanted in Britain and they’re not wanted in America and not wanted in Pakistan—then through my fiction I need to create a space for people like me to exist […] I’m like a sailor who gets off a boat and feels land-sick on land. (Hamid cited in Travers 2018) This notion of the extraterritorial in Hamid’s EW is also common to Shamsie’s (2009) novel Burnt Shadows (henceforth, BS) that has been described as “part of the ‘centrifugal literature of extraterritoriality’” (Lee-Potter 2017: 154). In an interview with Lee-Potter (2017), Shamsie highlights how the political tactic of framing 9/11 created a “new literary border” where the White American novelists seem to be “writing about the day” while the diasporic Pakistani writers are “more interested in what comes before and after” (154). Besides, in his survey of post-9/11 Pakistani British fiction, Lee-Potter (2017) claims that the Pakistani novelists are not “enticed” by some of the national and market expectations directed at them. For him, this tendency is in stark contrast to the Indian novelists who are “beguiled by the old ideas of the nation and its colonial past” or are expected to “provide a commodity like a package holiday” in their novels (155).

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While I agree with Lee-Potter’s (2017) argument about the unbiased attempts of the Pakistani “new novelists” to narrate marginalised historical accounts in a nuanced manner and free from the “old rehearsals” of identity, his study of the Indian novels published after 9/11 is problematic as it fails to consider the positionalities of Indian writers within and outside India. His study also dodges the contextual and ideological differences between the two nation-states despite their shared colonial pasts. Equally significant is his study’s obliviousness to differences in the post-9/11 political, social, economic and cultural structures of India and Pakistan, and their implications for the experiences of the Indian and Pakistani diasporic and migrant groups. Although there is a dearth of novels by Indian writers examining 9/11 overtly, they have engaged with the cultural and political discourse on 9/11 and the War on Terror to challenge the homo­ geneous narratives of history, nation, identity and terror.10 Besides, more than the novels, Hindi cinema took up the task of such mediations considering the predominant visual projection of the 9/11 attacks in the American and the Indian media. Moreover, post-2001, after attaining the status of an “industry” open to national and international investment, the Hindi film industry (for instance, Bollywood) was attaining an influential global presence, becoming both economically powerful and far-reaching in its emphasis on visual spectacles that were unbound by the constraints of literacy. In such a milieu of the dominance of the visual spectacle and the times of turbulence after 9/11, V.S. Naipaul, despite winning the 2001 Nobel Laureate for his novels, declared “the death of the novel” because writing seemed “futile” or an act of “weaving a little narrative” (Naipaul cited in Liao 2013: 14). Yet, after a decade, Liao (2013) observes,11 “around 164 novels, dealing directly or indirectly with 9/11, have been published or distributed so far in the USA, not to mention those published elsewhere” (14). To describe the literary trends in post-9/11 American novels, she classifies them into four categories: the “novel of recuperation, the novel of first-hand witnessing, the great New York novel, and the novel of the outsider” (17). Although she refrains from generalising, she finds these categories useful to classify the “Euro-American” narcissism in these novels. While much is written and said about the Westcentric novels,12 there is a need to survey how the 21st century’s diasporic Pakistani English novels stage resistance against the post-9/11 Euro-American narcissism and normative nationalisms that have been dominating the literary and political discourse on terrorism. Nadeem Aslam (cited in Lee-Potter 2017) suggests that after the 9/11 attacks and the re-emergence of the discourse on War on Terror and Islamophobia, the Pakistani novelists are “more enmeshed in history than they have ever been”, therefore, they are more inclined to give alternative versions of history to reflect on the “global political dissonance” (156). This “global political dis­ sonance” in the War on Terror context manifests in different sub-themes, and is articulated using multiple narrative tropes in the novels. Lee-Potter’s (2017) comparative study of the three novels Hamid’s (2007) The Reluctant 30

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Fundamentalist (henceforth, TRF), Shamsie’s BS and Nadeem Aslam’s (2013) The Blind Man’s Garden reveals that if, for Changez in TRF, 9/11 is the starting point that bursts the myth of the American dream, then for the pro­ tagonists in Shamsie and Aslam’s novels, 9/11 is the mid-point which enables both the realisation and delineation of a wider historical context and global imagination. Lee-Potter (2017) also identifies three common thematic and formal strands in his analysis of the novels which include the “Janus view” of the protagonists, the mode of “palimpsest” in telling alternative histories, and the diaspora’s mounting “corporeal” vulnerability after 9/11. Some of the other common themes in these novels include the tensions concerning the perfor­ mance of one’s ethnic-religious and national identity, the aporias of inbetweenness, the appropriation of national histories, and post-9/11 experiences of racialisation. A comparative analysis of Ali Sethi’s (2009) The Wish Maker and H.M. Naqvi’s (2010) Home Boy also draws attention to the impact of heightened surveillance and the post-9/11 biopolitical regimes on young South Asian Muslim men and their masculinities. As these novels question the post-9/11 American exceptionalism and the discourse on Islamophobia, they deliberately play on Islamic tropes such as the Quranic stories of the Prophet and weave a long family saga to map the changing political scenarios across a wide histor­ ical timeline. For all five novelists, Shamsie, Hamid, Aslam, Naqvi and Sethi, narrative techniques such as flashback, unreliable narration or the refusal to name certain settings enable the examination of the temporal, spatial and cor­ poral politics of the 9/11 attacks and the War on Terror. For instance, even if most of their protagonists are vacillating between the borders of Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, the USA or the UK, the novels dedicate several pages to narrate the respective nation’s both dominant and marginalised historical accounts. Such a narrative tendency is adopted “not for nostalgia as such”, but to locate the local within the global and provide a “retrospective prologue” of 9/11 (Kanwal 2015: 7). Thus, by using pre-9/11 settings, the novels attend to the local and regional specificity of Pakistan and locate it away from the Par­ tition shadow and within the global context. For instance, akin to Shamsie’s BS, in Jamil Ahmad’s (2011) The Wandering Falcon, the narrative time com­ prises the British colonial rule in India, post-partition Pakistan, the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan and the military operations of the USA after 9/11. In charting out such a vast historical canvas, Ahmad’s (2011) novel locates the trajectories of the marginalised Pashtun communities within the global context of the War on Terror and forces the readers to reflect on other marginalised narratives suppressed by the nation’s dominant imaginary. Eventually, even if most post-9/11 diasporic Pakistani English novels project state exclusions, postcolonial legacies and neocolonial tendencies of the nations as the main causes of the diaspora or immigrants’ loss, trauma and exile, the protagonists step away from victimhood and are concerned with, above all, the strategies of survival and an acceptance of the migratory nature of identities. 31

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Diasporic trajectories in post-9/11 Hindi cinema While contemplating the title of this book, one of my major concerns was to decide on a categorical description fitting the films selected for detailed analysis. Although some researchers may categorise the films as global Bollywood, post­ 2000 Bollywood or popular modern Indian films, I have decided to label them as Hindi films for several reasons. Since all the cinematic labels for films emerging from India carry with them their own ideological dynamics depending on the specific aims of the researchers, aesthetic trends and economic, sociological and linguistic structures, my study locates the selected films within the nexus of all three categories. This is because if they seem to emulate the key features of what some scholars have defined as global Bollywood films or Indian popular films, then they also counter the characteristics of those very categories. It is possible to elaborate on this ambiguity by citing some of the differences that film scholars illustrate between Hindi films and Bollywood films. The onset of liberalisation in the 1990s and the shifts in political structures in India generated their own unprecedented anxieties in cinematic cultures and altered the nature of representation of the Indian nation. In Bollywood: A Guidebook to Popular Hindi Cinema, Ganti (2004) categorises the postIndependence Hindi cinema into three time periods which include the films of the “1940s to 1960s” involved in nation-building processes, the “1970s to 1980s” concerned with war and crisis, and “1991 onwards” exhibiting the effects of liberalisation (23–43). Although she categorises post-Independence Hindi cinema based on a timeline and their thematic concerns, perhaps the films after 1991 remain uncategorised because of the erratic nature of globalisation, the changes that have emanated from it, and the impact of such changes on filmmaking. Chakravarty’s (1998) National Identity in Indian Popular Cinema 1947–1987 classifies Hindi films based on their popularity in India and their broad themes that include the questions of identity, authenticity, citizenship and collectivity. Even if both Chakravarty (1998) and Ganti (2004) use the terms “popular”, “Hindi cinema”, “Indian Popular Cinema” and “Bollywood” in the titles of their works, they do not define the boundaries of these terms or draw specific distinctions between them. Although the term “Bollywood” has been active in non-academic and aca­ demic fields since the 1990s, it is only with film scholars like Prasad (2003) and Rajadhyaksha (2007) that questions concerning the distinctive features of Bol­ lywood and Hindi cinema were raised. For Prasad (2003), Bollywood is a “symptom” of the commodification of fetishes, tightening of sociological hier­ archies, linguistic experimentations, and particular formal transformations13 like the song and dance sequences in Hindi cinema. He elaborates on the need to analyse the stylistic transformation of the song and dance sequences as: not just the dimension of textuality, but also in a larger sense as the set of relations between the elements internal to the text as well as

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those which constitute its habitat, its audiences, its economic structure, its ideological matrix, etc. (Prasad 2003) In Global Bollywood: Travels of Hindi Song and Dance, Gopal et al. (2008) examine such a transformation in the context of globalisation, national iden­ tity and the Indian diasporas’ need for that “touch” and “feel” of the Indian nation. By examining films such as AirLift and Tiger Zinda Hai, Chapter Six evinces the aesthetic capacities of the song and dance sequences in narrating the multiple variants of nationalisms and/or staging resistance to the mar­ ginalisation of minorities in India and the White supremacist tendencies of post-9/11 America. In Beyond the Boundaries of Bollywood: The Many Forms of Hindi Cinema, Dwyer et al. (2011) outline the history of the Bollywood industry and the wide variety of Hindi film aesthetics that have emerged in relation to the changing political and economic structures. Similarly, in Travels of Bollywood Cinema: From Bombay to LA, Roy et al. (2012) explore the characteristics of Bolly­ wood films and those produced by other industries in India in relation to global cinematic cultures and international economic affairs. In Bollywood and Globalization: Indian Popular Cinema, Nation and Diaspora, Mehta et al. (2010) also examine the links between the post-Independence and post-liberal­ isation Indian economy and the cultural dissemination of Hindutva ideologies to contextualise and scrutinise the Indian popular film’s portrayal of diasporic, national and gendered identities. To call for new reading methods for exam­ ining multiple variants of nationalisms in Bollywood and other Indian film industries, in Salaam Bollywood, Kishore et al. (2016) trace the journey of popular Hindi cinema aesthetics since 1913 to 2016 by considering India’s economic and diplomatic relations with the Global North. Despite the multiple approaches of studying Indian cinema, most film scholars generally agree that popular Hindi films reflect and reinforce the dominant ideologies of the poli­ tical ruling party in India and seek to sustain a particular variant of Indianness (Chakravarty 2000; Dwyer et al. 2002; Vasudevan 2010; Virdi 2003). Since Indian cinema’s marketability for its diasporic audience is a matter of a variant and vision of “Indianness”, Bollywood is an “attempt to hold on to the idea of an essence of Indian cinema” (Prasad 2003). For instance, in one of the most popular Bollywood films, Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (The Brave Hearted Will Take the Bride) (1995), for the first time, an overseas diasporic Indian experience was celebrated and desired even if the longing for India and Indianness remained intact (De et al. 2016). As the film revered the diasporic Indian identity, it retained the dominating patriarchal ideologies of Indian culture interpellating its Indian as well as the diasporic Indian audiences, and simultaneously feeding into the exotic desires of the West. Bollywood and Indian Popular films do not merely fulfil the desires for “Indianness” and “exotic difference” of their audiences, they are mostly 33

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market-driven for global profits. As Rajadhyaksha (2007) aptly reminds us, Bollywood is not just a “global” condition, but also an “industrial” condition in which even the “box office turnover” plays a significant role in determining the label of Bollywood or not for an Indian film (451). Although the films selected for analysis in this book have earned significant profits at the box office, they do not necessarily fulfil or reproduce the nationalistic desires of their audiences. Instead, they deal with socio-political concerns that hold the potential to stage resistance against the hegemony of the Hindutva ideas of Indianness, stigmatisation of Muslims, and post-9/11 Islamophobic acts across the different parts of the globe. Apart from the “dynamics of economic struc­ tures” and an “ideological matrix” of national concerns, “Bollywood” films carry their own “symptoms of formal transformations” which the films selec­ ted for this study may or may not demonstrate (Prasad 2003). Thus, although subject to debate, I have refrained from using the category Bollywood films in the title of this book. Instead, considering the dominant use of the Hindi lan­ guage (even though the characters occasionally speak English, Urdu and Arabic), I have preferred the less market-driven category “Hindi films”. My study has also not preferred the category “Indian” or “Indian Hindi” films even though the directors, actors and the characters in the films have geographical origins in India, and India takes a prominent position both cov­ ertly and overtly in the films’ plots. This is because of two reasons. At first, the selected films are mainly about the migrant or diasporic Indian experiences in the West and/or the Middle East. Secondly, unlike the selected Pakistani Eng­ lish novels which encompass a wider Pakistani imagination and glocal con­ cerns, the Hindi films’ narration of an imaginary India is problematic and confined to the Hindu–Muslim binary. Even if the films locate “India” within the 9/11 global context and contain their respective moments of deviations from the Hindutva ideologies of the ruling Modi-led BJP government, they run the risk of mediating homogeneous images of Indians, Indian diasporas and their respective concerns. To further examine the cinematic representation of India, Indian diasporic and migrant identities as well as the binaristic dynamics of Hindu–Muslim14 subjectivities, my study will now broadly survey the post­ 2000 Hindi films that are concerned with the 9/11 attacks and the global War on Terror discourse. There is no doubt about the massive audience Hindi cinema has in parts of South Asia, West Asia, East Africa and Latin America. Despite its popularity in these regions, Bollywood has generally framed a stereotypical and homo­ genised image of the West as the ultimate “dream destination” for its audi­ ences. The filmmakers have often projected marvellous images and dreamy landscapes of the USA, UK or Canada to ascertain the perception of the “wellsettled” and happy Indian diaspora. However, after the emergence of the War on Terror discourse and heightened forms of Othering with respect to South Asian diasporas and migrants, Hindi cinema echoed a “long overdue acknowledgment” of the inherent complexity of the West as well as the 34

SOUTH ASIAN DIASPORIC TEXTS AND CONTEXTS

diasporic life in the West (De et al. 2016). The 2001 US Patriot Act shattered the “American dream” of many Indians considering the rising number of racial profiling cases of diasporic South Asians, extensive surveillance and the inde­ finite trials in Guantanamo Bay. In such a situation, through Hindi cinema, the concept of the “Australian dream” emerged which was more appealing and easier to chase. For instance, the domestic and overseas box office success of the film Salaam Namaste (2005) demonstrated the successful promotion of Australia in India and among the Indian diaspora in the UK and the USA (Hassam 2010). A comparative inquiry into the earliest post-9/11 Hindi films like Bandhak (Hostage) (2003), Madhoshi (Intoxicated) (2004) and Kabul Express (2006), and films of the second decade like Tere Bin Laden (Without You Bin Laden) (2010) and I am Singh (2011), demonstrates a changing perception of “9/11” and the West as a dream destination. Whereas the earlier films focus on the immediate impact of the 9/11 attacks on South Asian diasporas, the latter films delineate the emotional, physical and sociological impact of the post-Partition racial discrimination and the War on Terror on diasporic South Asians and/or Muslims residing in India. In the post-9/11 Hindi film Yun Hota Toh Kya Hota (What If?) (2006), the narrative time comprises events that take place just the day before the 9/11 attacks, and the plot consists of four parallel narratives that are driven by the protagonists’ “perverse desire” and “anxiety” to associ­ ate themselves with 9/11 (Thakur-Basu 2010: 89). On the one hand, if the film creates and/or reflects the “fantasy to belong with the victims of the 9/11 attacks”, on the other hand, it “demonstrates the construction of a national imaginary against the attackers” (ibid.). In his research paper, Thakur-Basu (2010) also quotes one of the reviewers of the film who expresses her dis­ comfort with the title and wonders if it would have made more sense if the film had been titled Yun Naa Hota Toh Kya Hota or “What If This Had Not Happened” (89). This trope of victimisation and demonisation is common to most post-9/11 Hindi films that eventually perpetuate the binaries of the inno­ cent Self and the demon Other. As the protagonists make victimisation desir­ able, they expose some uncanny ways of belonging and reinforce the populist rhetoric of conventional morality. By examining films such as My Name is Khan and New York, Chapters Four and Six will elaborate on some thematic concerns and cinematic tropes that reinforce the hegemonic dichotomies of Us vs Them and/or unveil the possibilities of resisting them. According to Misri (2016), we need to pay attention to “Bollywood’s 9/11”15 because it offers a “perspective that is not available elsewhere” (276). She observes how, after the 9/11 attacks, most American films and the media focused on the losses of the White, abled, male, middle-class heterosexual subjects while the miseries of the rest were conveniently ignored, suppressed or marginalised. She adds that Hollywood films ranging from United 93 (2006) to Reign Over Me (2007) and Zero Dark Thirty (2012) have been “uninterested” in the impact of 9/11 on non-White subjects in America (ibid.). Thus, there 35

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arises the need to examine Bollywood films that project the 9/11 attacks and global War on Terror discourse as they delineate the minority immigrant’s perspective. Misri’s (2016) remarkable analysis of the post-9/11 gendered experiences of the diasporic protagonists in NY serves as a template to exam­ ine other post-9/11 Hindi films like Kurbaan (Sacrifice) (2009) where the dia­ sporic South Asian women display signs of agency in committing or resisting the acts of terror. Interestingly, in both these films, there is a sense of renewal of the melodramatic mode, and the strategic use of thriller, impersonation and parallel narratives.16 In addition, the voyeuristic gaze of the camera depicts the terrorist masculine body of the protagonists in both films as desirable.17 The next sections of this book, Part II and Part III, will carry forward these dis­ cussions and examine the production of such desires emanated through the bodies of the star actors playing the role of a migrant or diasporic model minority.

Notes 1 The data gathered here are based on my visit to the “Newseum” in Washington, DC. It is an interactive museum pertaining to political news, history and the freedom of the press. It includes an exhibit called the “9/11 Gallery” displaying international newspapers’ headlines about 9/11. 2 Prisming experiments involve holding a small prism in front of the camera lens while shooting. Hurd (2013) suggests that for securing the best results, it takes more than simply holding a prism in front of the lens. One needs to be experimental with the prisming experiment itself. He gives an example: “using a 6-inch triangular prism works best […] because you can twist the prism into creating a curve and bend-like distortion of your surroundings […] [making] things look much more natural” (ibid.). I argue that such a distortion of the “real” which is achieved through a prism to make the real look more “natural” should be taken into account while conducting any discursive study concerned with aesthetic, representative and communicative media. 3 A third airplane had also crashed into the Pentagon in Virginia and another in the fields of Stonycreek Township in Pennsylvania. Although the American media reported and discussed these attacks, they were not a part of the dominant visuals of the 9/11 attacks that were circulated and repeatedly displayed on TV networks. 4 Interestingly, around this time, certain sections of the Indian and international media also accused the then Chief Minister of Gujarat Narendra Modi for inciting the Godhra riots and criticised him for remaining complicit in the anti-Muslim pogrom which led to the killing of more than 2000 Muslims in India. Following this, the American government had denied Modi a visa and banned his entry into the USA on the grounds of this alleged crime. This incident further complicated the diplomatic relations between the two nation-states. 5 US ICE refers to the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 6 Kundnani (2014) also points out the cancellation of President Obama’s visit to the Sikh Golden Temple in Amritsar in 2010 because “he would have been expected to cover his head, giving rise to the possibility of photographs of him looking Muslim” (197). 7 For instance, Cvek (2011) observes that, after the 9/11 attacks, “some street vendors in the USA started selling T-shirts with an old photograph of Native American

36

SOUTH ASIAN DIASPORIC TEXTS AND CONTEXTS

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

warriors and the label ‘Homeland Security: Fighting terrorism since 1492’” (45). I argue that such masquerading tactics are a common cinematic trope in Hindi films that blur the distinctions between the past and the present for a parodic take on contemporary Indian state politics. Cvek (2011) also cites an article from the Special Issue of CR: The New Centennial Review titled “Whose Homeland?”. As the project calls for establishing a “pre­ history for the post-9/11 detention centres”, it also warrants a critical documenta­ tion of the “changes in immigration legislation after 9/11”, and an exploration of the relationship between “hyphenated identities and security panic” (45). It is beyond the scope of this book to include all the diasporic Pakistani English novels published after 9/11 including all the literary works of Shamsie and Hamid. Shamsie’s (2002) novel Kartography deals with identity crisis in the context of the historical turbulences in Karachi in the 1980s and 1990s. It makes use of “maps” as a narrative trope to question the singularity in interpreting cartographic borders. Her novel Broken Verses (Shamsie 2005) is also concerned with Pakistan’s history and recollects the elitist politics of the 1970s by focusing on the struggles of the protagonist Aasmani Inqilab. Shamsie’s pre-9/11 novel Salt and Saffron (Shamsie 2000) concerns Aliya Dard-e-Dil and Mariam Apa’s trajectories rooted in the sub­ text of the division of India and Pakistan. Thus, the rifts between hybrid identities, state histories, nation and politics have always been the dominant themes in Shamsie’s novels. In the case of Hamid, by experimenting with the narrative point of view, his pre-9/11 novel Moth Smoke (Hamid 2000) and post-9/11 novel How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia (Hamid 2013) underline the global politics of neoliberal capitalism and its implications for immigrant South Asians. The well-known Indian novels engaging directly with diasporic subjectivities in the context of the 9/11 attacks include Salman Rushdie’s (2005) Shalimar the Clown and Kiran Nagarkar’s (2006) God’s Little Soldier. Since the primary focus of this book is on post-9/11 Pakistani English novels and Hindi films, it is beyond the scope of this chapter to reflect on the vast body of Indian novels published after 9/11. However, wherever required, I have referred to them to substantiate my arguments. The qualifying criteria for the books in such a survey need more scrutiny. According to Gamal (2012), there is a growing tendency in the American academy to classify con­ temporary fiction based on either “national” or “transnational affiliation” which depends on “either the geographic stratification of several sites of production, circula­ tion and translation, or the linguistic categorization of different strata of bilingualism and multilingualism” (597). In the case of American libraries, there seems to be a shift in the classification of books based on their physical size and dimension due to the lack of space in the old buildings of the city libraries. This is evident from the recent changes in the New York Public Library (5th Avenue, New York City, USA) where a food recipe book is placed next to a book on law considering their same physical dimensions. Some of these novels include Rick Amburgey’s (2003) United We Stand, Karen Kingsbury’s (2003) One Tuesday Morning, John Updike’s (2006) Terrorist, Pete Hamill’s (2011) Forever, Foer’s (2005) Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and DeLillo’s (2007) Falling Man. Liao (2013) summarises the thematic concerns of these novels within the four categories of the post-9/11 novels (16–19). Dimitrova’s (2016) study suggests that the aesthetics of Bollywood films are derived from Indian music and dance, folk dramatic tradition, Urdu literature, classical Sanskrit drama, the epic narratives of the Mahabharata and Ramayana, Shake­ speare and European drama, Parsi Theatre of the Colonial period, and European and World Cinema. In the Hindi cinema of the 1950s and 1960s, Muslim subjectivities were articulated often in Urdu, and the role of the Muslim character was generally that of the

37

FRAMING THE NEXUS

emperor or the aristocrat. This is evident in films like Mughal-e-Azam (The Great Mughal) (1960) and Chaudhvin ka Chaand (A Full Moon) (1960). Between the 1970s and the early 1990s, the role of the Muslim character was often that of the doctor, poet, tailor or a benevolent old man like “Khan chacha (uncle)”, all of whom contributed to the nation-building process as model minority Muslims but never as the main protagonist (Dwyer n.d.). 15 In another article, Misri (2013) also talks about “India’s 9/11” to question the “hyper-mnemonic usage” of it in the context of the terror attacks that took place in Mumbai. Notably, her call for analysis of “India’s 9/11” implies “examining how ‘India’ perceives and constructs the events of 11 September 2001 through a field of cultural production” (157). 16 This is also evident in the Pakistani Urdu film Khuda Kay Liye (In the Name of God) (2007). After 9/11, when the diasporic Pakistani protagonist Mansoor is sub­ jected to racial profiling in the USA, viewers encounter the unfolding of a simulta­ neous plot of his brother at the borders of Pakistan and Afghanistan being lured by a group of religious extremists. Set in a High Court in Pakistan, the last scene of the film includes an elaborate discussion on Islam and the Quran from multiple angles to question their singular interpretations. 17 The construction of such desires through the male terrorist figure (although not in the role of a diasporic subject) is also apparent in 1990s Hindi films like Roja (1992) and Dil Se… (1998) (Chakravarty 2008).

References Ahmad, Jamil. 2011. The Wandering Falcon. London: Hamish Hamilton. AirLift. 2016. Dir. Raja Krishna Menon. Perf. Akshay Kumar and Nimrat Kaur. India: Abundantia Entertainment, Cape of Good Films, Emmay Entertainment, Hari Om Entertainment, T-Series, Viacom 18 Motion Pictures. Amburgey, Rick. 2003. United We Stand. Baltimore: Publish America. Aslam, Nadeem. 2013. The Blind Man’s Garden. London: Faber & Faber. Banash, David (Ed.). 2015. Steve Tomasula: The Art and Science of New Media Fiction. New York: Bloomsbury. Bandhak. 2003. Dir. Hyder Bilgrami. Perf. Farokh Daruwala and Aasha Patel. India and USA: Ramzan Lakhani. Bloodsworth-Lugo, Mary K. and Lugo-Lugo, Carmen R. 2011. “Post-9/11 Discourses of Threat and Constructions of Terror in the Age Of Obama”. Altre Modernità. (September): 261–278. Borradori, Giovanna. 2003. Philosophy in a Time of Terror: Dialogues with Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. https:// www.press.uchicago.edu/books/derrida/derrida911.html. Accessed on 4 July 2016. Chakravarty, Sumita. 1998. National Identity in Popular Indian Cinema 1947–1987. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Chakravarty, Sumita. 2000. “Fragmenting the Nation: Images of Terrorism in Indian Popular Cinema”. In Cinema and Nation: Interdisciplinary Approaches to National­ ism and National Identity. Edited by Mette Hjort and Scott MacKenzie. 222–238. London: Routledge. Chakravarty, Sumita. 2008. “The National-Heroic Image: Masculinity and Masquer­ ade”. In The Bollywood Reader. Edited by Rajinder Dudrah and Jigna Desai. 84–94. New York: McGraw Hill.

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Chaudhvin Ka Chaand. 1960. Dir. M. Sadiq. Perf. Guru Dutt and Waheeda Rehmaan. India: Guru Dutt Films. Curran, James. 2002. Media and Power. New York: Routledge. Cvek, Sven. 2011. Towering Figures: Reading the 9/11 Archive. Leiden: Brill. De, Sanchari and Sarwal, Amit. 2016. “Old Wine in the New Bottle: Bollywood Films Shot in Australia after 9/11”. In Salaam Bollywood: Representations and Interpretations. Edited by V. Kishore, A. Sarwal, and P. Patra. 280–295. Abingdon/New York: Routledge. DeLillo, Don. 2007. Falling Man. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. Derrida, Jacques. [1967] 1997. Of Grammatology. Translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. Dil Se…1998. Dir. Mani Ratnam. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Manisha Koirala. India: Madras Talkies. Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge. 1995. Dir. Aditya Chopra. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Yash Raj Films. Dimitrova, Diana. 2016. “Hinduism and its Others in Bollywood Film of the 2000s”. Journal of Religion and Film. 20(1): 1–20. Dwyer, Rachel. n.d. “Top Ten Muslim Characters in Bollywood”. CriticalMuslims.io. https://www.criticalmuslim.io/top-ten-muslim-characters-in-bollywood/. Accessed on 10 July 2018. Dwyer, Rachel and Patel, Divya. 2002. Cinema India: The Visual Culture of Hindi Film. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Dwyer, Rachel and Pinto, Jerry. 2011. Beyond the Boundaries of Bollywood: The Many Forms of Hindi Cinema. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Foer, Jonathan Safran. 2005. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Boston, Massachusetts: Houghton Mifflin. Gamal, Ahmed. 2012. “The Global and the Postcolonial in Post-Migratory Literature”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 49(5): 596–608. Ganti, Tejaswini. 2004. Bollywood: A Guidebook to Popular Hindi Cinema. New York: Routledge. Gopal, Sangita and Moorti, Sujata. 2008. Global Bollywood: Travels of Hindi Song and Dance. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Gul, Nabiha. 2004. “Post-9/11 Pakistan-India Relations”. Pakistan Horizon. 57(3): 67–77. Hamid, Mohsin. 2000. Moth Smoke. London: Penguin. Hamid, Mohsin. 2007. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. London: Hamish Hamilton. Hamid, Mohsin. 2013. How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia. London: Penguin. Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. Exit West. New York: Riverhead Books. Hamill, Pete. 2011. Forever. Columbus, Georgia: Back Bay Books. Hassam, Andrew. 2010. “Salaam Namaste, Melbourne and Cosmopolitanism”. In Bol­ lywood in Australia: Transnationalism and Cultural Production. Edited by A. Hassam and M. Paranjape. 63–86. Crawley, WA: UWA Publishing. Howie, Luke J. 2016. “A Pop Cultural History of 9/11”. International Žižek Journal of Studies. 3(3): 1–22. https://zizekstudies.org/index.php/IJZS/article/download/173/173. Accessed on 19 January 2017. Hurd, Sam. 2013. “Prisming, Photography Techniques, Hurding”. Samhurdphoto­ graphy.com. http://www.samhurdphotography.com/2013/wedding/prisming-photo graphy-techniques. Accessed on 14 September 2014. I am Singh. 2011. Dir. Puneet Isaar. Perf. Gulzar Inder Chahal and Rizwan Haider. India: P.S. Thind.

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Kabul Express. 2006. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Arshad Warsi, Salman Shahid, Hanif Hum Ghum and Linda Arsenio. India: Yash Raj Films. Kanwal, Aroosa. 2015. Rethinking Identities in Contemporary Pakistani Fiction: Beyond 9/11. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Khuda Kay Liye. 2007. Dir. Shoaib Mansoor. Perf. Shaan Shahid, Rasheed Naz and Fawad Khan. Pakistan: Shoman Productions. Kingsbury, Karen. 2003. One Tuesday Morning. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan. Kishore, Vikrant, Sarwal, Amit and Patra, Parichay (Eds.). 2016. Salaam Bollywood: Representations and Interpretations. London: Routledge. Kundnani, Arun. 2014. The Muslims Are Coming! Islamophobia, Extremism, and the Domestic War on Terror. New York: Verso. Kurbaan. 2009. Dir. Rensil D’Silva. Perf. Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor. India: Dharma Productions. Lee-Potter, Charlie. 2017. Writing the 9/11 Decade: Reportage and the Evolution of the Novel. New York: Bloomsbury. Liao, Pei-chen. 2013. ‘Post’-9/11 South Asian Diasporic Fiction: Uncanny Terror. London: Palgrave. Madhoshi. 2004. Dir. Tanveer Khan. Perf. Bipasha Basu and John Abraham. India: Anil Sharma Films. Mehta, Rini B. and Pandharipande, Rajeswari. 2010. Bollywood and Globalization: Indian Popular Cinema, Nation and Diaspora. London: Anthem Press. Misri, Deepti. 2013. “Queer Resolutions: 9/11 and Muslim Masculinities in New York”. South Asian Popular Culture. 11(2): 157–167. Misri, Deepti. 2016. “Bollywood’s 9/11: Terrorism and Muslim Masculinities in Popular Hindi Cinema”. In Global Asian American Popular Cultures. Edited by Shilpa Dave, Leilane Nishime and Tasha Oren. 276–290. New York: New York University Press. Moorti, Sujata. 2003. “Desperately Seeking an Identity: Diasporic Cinema and the Articulation of Transnational Kinship”. International Journal of Cultural Studies. 6(3): 355–376. Mughal-e-Azam. 1960. Dir. K. Asif. Perf. Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Madhubala. India: Sterling Investment Corporation. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Nagarkar, Kiran. 2006. God’s Little Soldier. Delhi: Harper Collins. Naqvi, H.M. 2010. Home Boy. New York: Crown Publishing. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Prasad, Madhava. 2003. “This Thing Called Bollywood”. India-Seminar.com. https:// www.india-seminar.com/2003/525/525%20madhava%20prasad.htm. Accessed on 23 February 2015. Rajadhyaksha, Ashish. 2007. “The ‘Bollywoodisation’ of Indian Cinema”. In The InterAsia Cultural Studies Reader. Edited by Kuan-Hsing Chen and Chua Beng Huat. 449–466. London: Routledge. Reign Over Me. 2007. Dir. Mike Binder. Perf. Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle. USA: Relativity Media, Mr. Madison 23 Productions and Sunlight Productions. Roja. 1992. Dir. Mani Ratnam. Perf. Arvind Swamy and Madhoo. India: K. Balachander Films.

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Roy, Anjali G. and Huat, Chua B. 2012. Travels of Bollywood Cinema: From Bombay to LA. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Rushdie, Salman. 2005. Shalimar the Clown. London: Jonathan Cape. Salaam Namaste. 2005. Dir. Siddharth Anand. Perf. Saif Ali Khan and Preity Zinta. India: Yash Raj Films. Sethi, Ali. 2009. The Wish Maker. London: Hamish Hamilton. Shamsie, Kamila. 2000. Salt and Saffron. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2002. Kartography. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2005. Broken Verses. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Muneeza. 2011. “Duality and Diversity in Pakistani English Literature”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 47(2): 119–121. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2004. “Terror: A Speech after 9–11”. Boundary 2. 31(2): 81–111. Steinmetz, George. 2003. “The State of Emergency and the Revival of American Imperialism: Toward an Authoritarian Post-Fordism”. Public Culture. 15(2): 323–345. Tere Bin Laden. 2010. Dir. Abhishek Sharma. Perf. Ali Zafar and Pradhuman Singh. India: Walkwater Media. Thakur-Basu, Gautam. 2010. “Globalization and the Cultural Imaginary: Constructions of Subjectivity, Freedom and Enjoyment in Popular Indian Cinema”. In Bollywood and Globalization: Indian Popular Cinema, Nation and Diaspora. 75–110. Edited by Rini Bhattacharya and Rajeswari V. Pandharipande. London: Anthem Press. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. Tomasula, Steve. 2009. “Emergence and Posthuman Narrative”. Flusser Studies: A Multilingual Journal for Cultural and Media Theory. 9: 1–18. Travers, Andrew. 2018 (June 18). “Novelist Mohsin Hamid Discusses Aspen Literary Prize-Winning ‘Exit West’.” AspenTimes.com. https://www.aspentimes.com/entertainm ent/novelist-mohsin-hamid-discusses-aspen-literary-prize-winning-exit-west/. Accessed on 18 June 2018. United 93. 2006. Dir. Paul Greengrass. Perf. Christian Clemenson and Cheyenne Jackson. USA: Studio Canal, Working Title Films and Sidney Kimmel Entertainment. Updike, John. 2006. Terrorist. New York City: Alfred A. Knopf. Vasudevan, Ravi S. 2010. “Geographies of the Cinematic Public: Notes on Regional, National and Global Histories of Indian Cinema”. Journal of the Moving Image. 94–117. Virdi, Jyotika. 2003. The Cinematic ImagiNation: Indian Popular Films as Social History. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Werbner, Prina. 2011. “Diaspora in History: Reflections on 9/11 in the Aftermath of the Arab Spring and UK Riots, 2011”. Essays.ssrc.org. https://items.ssrc.org/10-years-a fter-september-11/diaspora-in-history-reflections-on-9-11-in-the-aftermath-of-the-arab -spring-and-uk-riots-2011/. Accessed on 9 November 2015. Yun Hota Toh Kya Hota. 2006. Dir. Naseeruddin Shah. Perf. Konkana Sen Sharma and Irfan Khan. India: Shabbir Boxvala and Prashant Shah. Zero Dark Thirty. 2012. Dir. Kathryn Bigelow. Perf. Jessica Chastain and Jason Clarke. USA: First Light Productions. Žižek, Slavoj. 2006 (September 11). “On 9/11, New Yorkers Faced the Fire in the Minds of Men”. The Guardian.com. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/sep/ 11/comment.september11. Accessed on 30 August 2015.

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Part II EXPLORING THE NEXUS: THE FIRST DECADE AFTER 9/11

9/111 September Morning

Reluctant wings on fire

Casting their shadows

Fig. 3 Starling Murmuration (II) in the countryside of Milan

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-4

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Note 1

This haiku is written in response to Faiz’s (cited in Kiernan 1971: 99) translated verse “We” in which the speaker of the poem speaks for a collective that is “exhausted” by the present, “saddened” by the past and “paralysed” by a dreadful tomorrow. Although Faiz wrote the poem in the 20th century while serving his term of imprisonment, it echoes the diasporic predicament of South Asian Muslims who have been facing a heightened form of systemic estrangement since 9/11. The titular “we” in his poem reflects the diaspora’s ambivalent position between competing national loyalties, and the post-9/11 processes of Othering that consolidated the differences and borders between Us and Them. This section will engage with these issues by examining the Pakistani English novels The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Burnt Shadows (Chapter Three) and the Hindi films New York and My Name is Khan (Chapter Four).

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3

HOW DID IT COME TO THIS? Reconfiguring borders in The Reluctant

Fundamentalist and Burnt Shadows

If all the world is a stage, then borders are its scenery, its mise en scène, its ordering of space and action, wherein actors and obser­ vers must work at making borders intelligible and manageable, and must do so in order for the drama to proceed. (Wilson et al. 2012: 19–20)

The construction of borders is one of the most poignant ways in which we assert differences1 to identify the Self. We draw topographical, corporeal and cognitive borders to locate ourselves on the binaristic entities of “us” and “them” to define our individual and collective identities. And yet, we often fail to imagine that every atom, which makes up the human body and the sur­ rounding environment, is intertwined and in a perpetual state of flux, thereby deferring the very process of sustaining borders. If change, movement, and interdependency define human nature and the basic principles on which our planet functions, then how have we become increasingly stringent in our assumptions and attitudes especially in the post-9/11 context?2 “How did it come to this,” wonders the prisoner about to wear an orange jumpsuit in the prologue of Kamila Shamsie’s (2009) novel Burnt Shadows (henceforth, BS). Such a remark, right in the beginning of the novel, sets the tone for the fol­ lowing questions: How do we perceive differences as a threat and arrive at junctures where we feel increasingly insecure and anxious to reveal or hide certain facets of our identity? At the beginning of Mohsin Hamid’s (2007) novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist (henceforth, TRF), the protagonist Changez confronts the American visitor and wonders, “How did I know you were American?” (TRF 1), thereby revealing that understanding the mechan­ isms of recognition3 and the determinants of different identities are his main concerns. This chapter is broadly concerned with the representation and the deconstruction of the “hierarchy of difference”,4 and the processes of drawing physical and metaphorical borders demarcating the Self and the Other in the 9/11 context. Its aim is to explore the relationship between man-made catastrophes, the chronotopic structure of borders, and the systems of thought and language deployed to produce the knowledge of difference. Such an DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-5

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exploration hopes to foreground the processes of “Othering”5 and the multiple subjectivities underlying the gendered identities and the imaginings of home and nation in the novels. Although several scholarly articles have been published on both TRF and BS, not much has been written about the processes of differentiating and racialising, the objectification of the marginalised diasporic bodies, and the role of language and narrative structure in blurring the borders of aesthetics and politics in these novels. My analysis aims to bridge this gap by challenging the reductive readings6 of both novels based on the politically flawed binaries of Islam and America, nation and diaspora, racialised West and East, and before 9/11 and after 9/11 sentimentality with regards to the causes and con­ sequences of terrorism. By building on those scholarly articles7 that view TRF and BS as “post-migratory”8 and “deterritorialising” literature, my study will map the novels’ engagement with complex global processes, ways of reima­ gining trauma, and exploration of the differential meanings of power and ter­ rorism.9 Rather than using a biographical approach that draws on Shamsie or Hamid’s personal narratives of migration, the chapter amalgamates multiple theoretical approaches—semiotic, postcolonial theory, critical race theory, diaspora and transnational theories and queer theory—with an aim to trigger a “decolonisation”10 of thinking, and the reimagination of border epistemology in the 9/11 context. The focus of the next section is to underline the ways in which the selected novels challenge the myth of borders, differences, history, nation and religion as natural and stable entities. I will then investigate how migratory masculinities and cosmopolitan feminisms both condition and are conditioned by these myths. The final section will demonstrate how Changez and Hiroko stage a critique of White American exceptionalism to suggest a reimagining of trauma in the post-9/11 context.

Framing The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Burnt Shadows Addressing an American visitor seated in a café in Lahore, Hamid’s TRF fol­ lows the story of the protagonist Changez who recalls his life experiences of crossing borders before and after 9/11 in the first-person narrative. At first glance, such a unidimensional narrative that plays out as a dramatic mono­ logue appears problematic as it silences other characters in the novel. How­ ever, in the 9/11 literary context, the novel’s first-person narration technique deconstructs the simplistic “geographical and mental perpetrator/victim binary” (Ilott 2013: 572), which allows for agency on the part of the reader and challenges the prescriptive frames of post-9/11 White American-centric literary representations. By deploying a narrative structure that moves back and forth in time and space (Lahore, New York, Rhodes, New Jersey, Manila and Val­ paraiso), the novel paradoxically reinforces and blurs the borders of the pre-9/11 and post-9/11 trajectories of Changez so that the first half of the novel can be juxtaposed with the latter half, and his perspective is understood in its 46

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entirety. Such a juxtaposition also challenges our partial acts of reading nar­ ratives and the desire for fixities and closure. By setting the tone for a more active readership, according to Ilott (2013), the novel “restores a sense of agency through the cathartic function of narrative control”, and “keeps the wounds of 9/11 open, ensuring that a state of critical evaluation, and a sense of the ‘thickness of history’11 is retained” (582). In a similar vein, but with a more profound historical approach, Shamsie’s BS revitalises and recasts the ways in which most post-9/11 American texts have imagined past histories. It weaves the story of the protagonist Hiroko Tanaka with a series of historical events: the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Partition of India, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, 9/11 and the beginning of the War on Terror. The themes of human interdependency and survival, history and trauma, and the futility of wars are established right in the beginning of the novel as Shamsie quotes from works of the Indian subcontinent’s most revered writers: Agha Shahid Ali’s “A Nostalgic Map of America” and Sahir Ludhianvi’s “Parchaiayaan” (shadows) (BS 1). The shifting focalisation of the four sub-sections in the novel and the number of pages allotted to each of them reflect the ideological purpose of the novel. By fictio­ nalising selected historical contexts and highlighting the connections between them, Shamsie challenges the nationalist exceptionalism of historical narratives and demonstrates a dialectical relation between the global and the post­ colonial. Unlike the minimalist structure of TRF, the epic form and the wide lens of BS urge an aesthetic vision of interdependency and inclusivity. In their respective structural capacities, historical settings, narrative techniques, lin­ guistic methods and character frames, both novels demonstrate the processes and outcomes of the experience of crossing borders and migration.

Crossing borders, exploring difference Crossing borders, living diasporically involves grappling with many differ­ ences, questions and movements which are coincidentally corporeal, cognitive, temporal and spatial in nature. According to Derrida ([1968] 1973), “to differ is to temporalize, to resort, consciously or unconsciously, to the temporal and temporalizing mediation of a detour that suspends the accomplishment or ful­ filment of desire or will” (136). Différance also involves the desire or will that “annuls or tempers” its fulfilment (ibid.). Building on his views, and in the context of a nation’s diasporas and differentiated subjectivities, Brah (2005) suggests, “[d]ifference for the most part is about difference of social condition” (435). Thus, for both theorists, difference is an articulation of the distinct spatio-temporal and social conditions where the incompatible notions of empirical and transcendental co-exist. This also implies that the differ­ entiated and essentialised subjectivities of the “diasporas”, “migrants” and “nationals” are perceived differently in different times and spaces, and this per­ ception and the process of differentiating continually defer based on the changing 47

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spatio-temporal and social conditions. Instead of grappling with the ques­ tions—did I migrate to a nation because I am different than a national or was differentiated? Or did I become different or was I differentiated because of a nation’s migration control?—Changez’s and Hiroko’s trajectories trigger the contemplation of the flawed social processes of differentiating that categorise the “migrant” and “national”. Their narrative perspectives reflect on when, how and from where the desires of asserting, fixating and deferring the borders of differences emerge in defining one’s nation, home and identity. Changez’s diasporic explorations across geographical and cultural borders (Lahore, New York, Rhodes, New Jersey, Manila and Valparaiso) and Hir­ oko’s migratory routes (Nagasaki, Delhi, Istanbul, Karachi and New York) underline the hierarchy of differences not only within South Asian Muslims, but also between and within diasporic Muslim and non-diasporic groups in India, Pakistan and the USA. Challenging the hegemony of such differences and recognising the exploitative power structures that differentiate humans based on categories of nation, race, ethnicity, religion, class, gender and sexu­ ality are a crucial matter for both Changez and Hiroko. According to Michaelsen et al. (1997), borders that create the illusion of eternity and “strangely elide the difference between inside and outside” are the beginnings of “colonialist” thoughts (9). Such thoughts presume “identity difference as an effect of an identity relationality”, and assert the existence of some separate and well-defined fundamentals of different cultures by overlooking their “con­ stant interplay” and creating false perceptions of cultures that need “to be crossed” (Murray cited in Michaelsen et al. 1997: 9). Changez’s assumptions about the American visitor’s Americanness and the want of assistance in Lahore emerge from the recognition of the traps of the colonialist and neo­ imperialistic discourse built on civilisational missions that impose hierarchal cultural borders of difference, and a mode of “seeing people in terms of one dominant identity” (Sen 2009: 247). When Changez introduces himself to the American visitor, he articulates the ambivalences within his migrant PakistaniAmerican identity; he says “I am both a native of this city and a speaker of your language” (TRF 1). His utterance problematises the notion of cultural differences that is often emphasised for the formation of national borders and national identity. By reminding the American visitor that America, like Paki­ stan, is also a former English colony, Changez draws attention to the con­ voluted histories of British colonialism and debunks the purist myth of the American identity (TRF 36). As Changez draws comparisons between Lahore and New York, and enunciates his complex sense of belonging, he triggers a reconfiguration of the West’s hegemonic sense of territoriality and entitlement. He considers himself as a part of “the people of the Indus River basin” who had cities that “boasted underground sewers”, and finds it baffling that they were labelled as “illiterate barbarians” (TRF 36). By explaining to the Amer­ ican visitor that he is not poor, “far from it”, and that his great-grandparents “had enough means to endow a school for the Muslims of the Punjab”, 48

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Changez also challenges the stereotypical perception related to the primitive notion and economic state of Pakistanis (TRF 9–10). Although the novel lacks a detailed description of Changez’s initial experience of his flight journey from Pakistan to the USA and surveillance before 9/11, Hamid’s description of Changez’s life in Princeton and later in the valuation firm Underwood Samson highlights the politics of difference and recognition central to understandings of border formation and main­ tenance in the novel. It is necessary to note that his narration takes place in a café in the Old Anarkali district of Lahore where the image of “manmade decorative lights that arc through the air” is juxtaposed with the “expressive beauty of the Empire State building” and Manhattan area lit in “different coloured lights” by night (TRF 101–102). Such an orientalist ambiance evoked through Lahore’s architecture and food, the bustling sounds of the bazaar and references to Urdu poets, vis-à-vis the Occidental multiculturalist images of New York, raises a crucial question—how to narrate and negotiate the discourses on multiculturalism and orientalism that frame the schemes of differentiating and recognising migrant subjectivity? Changez critically remarks, “I am after all, telling you a history and in history, as I suspect you—an American—will agree, it is the thrust of one’s narrative that counts, not the accuracy of one’s details” (TRF 118). Thus, it is evident that Chan­ gez’s self-conscious and self-confessed allusion to the subjective nature of his tale challenges the orientalist and multiculturalist lens of recognition12 and differentiating. In Princeton, Changez imagines himself as an American film star rather than a Pakistani Muslim immigrant student. Although Princeton exemplifies the educational, cultural, economic and political power of the American melting pot, Changez is aware of the global unequal distribution and utilisation of resources as “America had universities with individual endowments greater than our national budget for education” (TRF 34). His decision to enter the world of Underwood Samson after his formal education in Princeton marks a significant moment in which the cosmopolitan diversity of the USA seems to melt away. Symbolic of the USA in the novel, Underwood Samson projects a nationalist culture and a capitalist society that is determined to assimilate cul­ tural differences only if they are suppressed and replaced by another set of differences. To become “American”, preserve this “difference” and mark the borders of being an Underwood Samson employee, Changez makes an effort to define himself by negating some activities and consciously highlighting the performance of some cultural and corporal codes (36). As he follows his boss Jim’s advice of chasing the “American dream” by burying the past and facing the future, he soon realises the inability to escape the Janus-faced nature of the dream at the heart of which lie the economic hierarchies of difference. Chan­ gez’s discomfort at Jim’s party also suggests that the supposedly efficient and cosmopolitan society represented by Underwood Samson is unable to challenge the implicit borders of elitism that marginalise the newly rich immigrant 49

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outsiders like Jim and Changez based on the perceived “old world” differences of race, ethnicity, culture and place of birth. According to Hartnell (2010: 342): while many European nations do, of course, place similar demands on new immigrants, the American experience distinguishes itself by incorporating a racist and xenophobic aversion to difference with the more appealing sense that shedding “old world” difference is precisely what becoming American is all about. Building on Hartnell’s (2010) views, it is possible to infer that the premise of shedding of “old world” differences or concealing them is also projected as the only choice of survival in an increasingly precarious world blinded by materi­ alistic dreams and a narrow vision of being, becoming and belonging. Becom­ ing a student at Princeton University and an employee at Underwood Samson marks a significant moment for Changez to cross borders, explore “contact zones”13 and perform a kind of subjectivity that eases the assimilation into the American society before 9/11. However, in BS, Hiroko’s departure from Nagasaki is associated with challenging the imperialistic power structures of Japan and America, deconstruction of mechanisms of differentiation and recognition, and the will to survive. Hiroko opts to assimilate into the cultural and religious practices of many nation-states out of sheer practical reasons and to aid the building of intimate relationships. Her decision to marry Konrad in a church even though she does not identify with Catholic rituals is linked to one of her romantic fantasies (BS 21). Such a decision also suggests that for her, the notion of difference is fantastical, contingent and always-already susceptible to changes. Even if Hiroko realises that “everything can disappear in a flash of light” (BS 49), she does not fear the volatile nature of life, rather, her fear stems from the reduc­ tion of her identity to “hibakusha”.14 In her trajectory, “newness enters [her] world with every act of displacement” (Chakrabarty 2011: 165) as she echoes what Mishra (2007) observes in his study on diasporas: “identity should not be closed off but indefinitely deferred” (130). Her work as a translator for Amer­ icans in Japan is also a revelation as she soon draws the borders of ideological differences between herself and those Americans who tell her that the nuclear bombing was inevitable and it had to be done to save American lives. Acutely conscious of the ethics of one’s doings, as compared to other protagonists of the novels and the films, Hiroko appears to do migration differently. She lays emphasis on experiencing pleasure in the porosity of borders and exemplifies a cognitive acuity for drawing borders of difference between human-instigated disasters and uncontrollable forces of nature. According to Bhabha (1994), “It is the trope of our times to locate the question of culture in the realm of the beyond” and “being in the beyond is inhabiting an intervening space” where the “past-present” becomes “part of the necessity, not the nostalgia, of living” (1, 10). In the case of Hiroko, there is no 50

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diasporic nostalgia but there is the awareness of the aporias of diasporic belonging. In each location, Hiroko asserts that identity is always in the pro­ cess of becoming and involves negotiation with shifting cultural borders. Ana­ logous to her decision of adopting Catholic rituals to marry Konrad in Nagasaki, to marry Sajjad in Delhi “without making things more difficult with his family”, she chooses to embrace a Muslim identity. She casually asks Sajjad, “How does one become a Muslim?” to which he responds, “By repeating the Kalma—la ilaha ilallah Muhammadur rasool Allah—three times” (BS 118–119). In “A Glance into the Archives of Islam”, Žižek (2012: 103) remarks: one becomes a full member of a community not simply by identifying with its explicit symbolic tradition, but only when one also assumes the spectral dimension that sustains this tradition, the undead ghosts that haunt the living, the secret history of traumatic fantasies trans­ mitted “between the lines,” through the lacks and distortions of the explicit symbolic tradition. Hiroko simply repeats the “Kalma” three times without expressing any belief in it or paying heed to its meaning, and resists becoming a “full member” of Sajjad’s Muslim community. On the one hand, she exposes the “relativity”15 of religious identity, reveals the multiple ways of belonging to a religious com­ munity, and challenges the very meaning of the state of being a “full member”. On the other hand, she creates a space in which religious differences are a matter of contingent symbolic practices and, therefore, it is acceptable to take a position of indifference towards the meaning of such practices. While Hir­ oko’s stance further complicates the paradoxes of the “tolerant” multi­ culturalist attitudes, it promotes a “mestiza consciousness” that makes her embrace the ambiguity of religious rituals and its inherent contradictions for the sake of solidarity and survival (Anzaldúa 1987: 59).

Questioning nation and home, challenging history, constructing memory How do we negotiate between my history and yours? […] Could we, in other words, afford to have entirely different histories, to see ourselves as living—and having lived—in entirely heterogeneous and discrete spaces? (Mohanty 1989: 66)

Extending Mohanty’s (1989) postcolonial questions about writing and framing history, both Shamsie and Hamid articulate alternative versions of history and/ or engage with alternative ways of writing history through their novels. Although the title of my book refers to the selected novels as “Pakistani 51

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English novels”, neither this book nor the novels make any promises about giving an authentic account of Pakistan or being Pakistani. Rather, the attempt is to decentre and deterritorialise the preconceptions about the notion of nation and national belonging by foregrounding the diasporic routes of the characters who mark a complex spatio-temporal nexus between several nationstates and recall their interlocked national histories. According to Nora (1989), “History is a laboratory of many memories [and] the quest for memory is the search for one’s history” (13). For Sajjad, his memories are attached to his “Dilli”, and whatever the outcome of national histories may be or wherever he may die, it would make “no difference” to him (BS 40). After the Partition, this “no difference” and other newly established differences and collectivism in both nations are passed on from one generation to the next. According to Haselsberger (2014), such a transmission takes place “via time-independent preservative symbolic artefacts (e.g. anthem, flag, state treaties, national holi­ days) and operational educational practices (e.g. school curricula, musical tra­ dition, collective remembering)” (522). They become “essential points of reference” for the subsequent generations, making it more difficult “to re­ establish formerly relational geographies” (ibid.). In Raza’s school, his friends often played the “guess which one of these two boys is not Pakistani” game and Raza finds such a game entirely absurd as he deciphers the unjust ways of perceiving identities and the nationalistic desire to fix the meaning of identity (BS 190). Given the changing political and social dynamics within and between nations and their citizens, it is also important to ask how certain national decisions, and global or local events, interrupt the construction of home, its tangibility and imagination for the protagonists of Shamsie’s novel. For Sajjad, before the Partition, home is the world of his “mohalla”, the “fluttering of pigeons”, the “call of the muezzin” of Jama Masjid, the “cacophony” of the arguments between his three brothers and so on (BS 126–133). For him, remembering and constructing home demands the materiality of spaces along with the presence of certain people, their sounds, tastes, smells, and gestures and “no dividing boundary walls” (BS 151, 237). This is in stark contrast to the colonial house of the Burtons, where even the homogeneous flowerpots are lined up and everywhere there are “separations and demarcations” (BS 33). Based on these contrasts, it is possible to deduce that home and homing desires in the case of Sajjad and James reflect the dominant heteronormative model embedded in their respective cultures. Shamsie also questions the foundational structures of nationhood and home by focusing on the trajectory of Hiroko, whose occupation of diasporic space enables a syncretic form of belonging and challenges the hegemony of all those positions that threaten what Mohanty (1989) calls “commonality”. After moving from Tokyo to Delhi, she craves for familiarity and for the comfort of breathing in a known place (BS 99), but gradually realises that there is some­ thing dangerous and precarious about a finished home. Each time something 52

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new is added to her house in Nagasaki or Karachi, and every time she meets a new person, there is a reiterating sense that home is becoming. She echoes Minh-ha’s (2011) postulation that home is a “sum of all our travels” and in narrating our homes, we translate our old homes to create new forms of “dwelling” (11, 40). Like her travels, story-telling and language also play a role for Hiroko in determining the ways of dwelling and desiring home. Instead of considering language as a barrier to building intimate relationships in foreign nations, Hiroko considers it as the most effective medium to translate and communicate both trauma and feelings of affection. In one of the conversations with Sajjad, she learns the Urdu word “gham-khaur” or “grief eaters—who take in a mourner’s sorrow”, a phrase and meaning missing in the English language (BS 77). Such a learning and the act of translation serve as a lens to magnify an alternative representation of history, and rethink trauma and ways of mourning. Hiroko’s skills of translation and story-telling through Islamic and Japanese folk tales (BS 109, 120, 177, 318) also leave a significant mark on her son Raza who discovers the slippery world of languages while crossing nation-state borders. On his way to the USA, when Raza wishes to ask Ahmed in Pashtun about home, he knows how to ask where someone is from, or where they live, but “the word for home in Pashto eludes him” (BS 334). Raza’s use of language to understand the nuances of how and where people locate their home also highlights the ambivalences embedded in certain languages and the anomalies of cultural translation. In BS, the detrimental effects of bombing, violent histories and nations at war in the conceptualisation of home are demonstrated not only through spoken language and folk tales, but also by deliberately referring to the chan­ ging flora and fauna surrounding the protagonists (BS 6, 7, 63). After the nuclear bomb is dropped, the world is described as going white (BS 23) fol­ lowed by two blank pages in the novel (BS 24, 25). On the one hand, it denotes the place where the bomb fell that is the “ground zero” and on the other, it triggers a dystopic imagining of the damaged state of our environment.16 Such a representation connotes the aporias not only of the author and the narrator, but also of language itself to have to be able to describe such destruction. By incorporating formal strategies that involve going beyond the use of everyday words and language, Shamsie’s mode of representation may also be labelled as an experimental literary practice.17 In his non-fiction work, The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable, Ghosh (2016) urges writers of fiction to actively and creatively engage18 in bringing to the fore the “vividly horrifying” images of global warming (119). Through BS, Shamsie already seems to be undertaking this task as Hiroko critically remarks, “we want to speed up everything in our modernity […] even destruction” (BS 67). Like Shamsie, Hamid also alludes to different living creatures in Changez’s surroundings but for a limited purpose such as describing his life in the con­ crete jungle of New York (TRF 63, 71). Instead, for Changez, home is dis­ covered through the opportunities that the metropolis provides, and the 53

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attachments and affiliations he discovers as he navigates Princeton and New York. His “homing desire” is realised through these places where he strives to “create home”, and where bodies and relationships have touched him in a meaningful way (Fortier 2003: 122). However, according to Fortier, the physi­ cal and emotional work of creating home is inseparable from the act of remembering home; that is, the homing desires are always-already embedded within home (ibid.). Even while he is in New York, he often recalls the history of Partition and nation-building in Pakistan, and compares the developments in Lahore with New York. For Changez, his memories of home are made up of “eight cousins, three dogs and a duck in the same compound” (TRF 19), however, for Erica the notion of home is limited to her feelings for Chris, “the guy with long, skinny fingers” (28). Their different reimaginings of home, and the homing desires of the characters in Shamsie’s novel demonstrate that there exist multiple forms of inhabitancy, and within every lived and living experi­ ence of home reside an engagement with the borders of differentiation, a negotiation with the hegemony of national histories, and the struggles of a diasporic identity. The myths of an authentic home and the perfect nation dismantle for Changez in the post-9/11 context of the novel as he traverses and spends time in all those territories that speak to the complex history of British colonialism and American imperialism. By inhabiting a diasporic space, he draws compar­ isons between nations and traces contradictions and changes within them. In Manila, he is reminded of the poor version of the America of the 1950s where he shares a “Third World sensibility with a Filipino driver” (TRF 67). His reaction to 9/11 (TRF 72–73) brings to the fore a paradoxical mix of emotions (the shock and smile) that initiates an understanding of the hypocrisies of his life at Underwood Samson. During his travels to Chile, there is also an emer­ ging sense of alienation as he connects the historical dots between the nationstates. For instance, he realises how residents of Valparaiso were consistently marginalised and faced huge economic losses due to the construction of the Panama Canal and that their aspirations to grandeur echo those of the resi­ dents in Lahore (TRF 145). On being able to imagine nations beyond the nationalistic images of isolation and grandeur, Changez manages to develop a cosmopolitan sensibility that condemns the American army’s invasion in countries such as Vietnam, Korea, Taiwan, Iraq and Afghanistan. Ultimately, Changez’s choice of being the “reluctant fundamentalist” is also prompted by the mounting political tensions between India and Pakistan, and their race for securing nuclear weapons (TRF 122, 128). He wonders how the Bush-led government and US army were able to orchestrate an entire war in Afghanistan, and both India and Pakistan failed to reckon the disastrous con­ sequences of nuclear tests (TRF 131). According to Ahmed (2011), “we have to plant our historiographical feet in the frontier space of present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan and north India […] to pay attention to the localised production of history and memory” so that we can decontextualise the hegemony of the 54

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imperial context (60). By deliberating on Raza’s trajectory in BS, it is possible to trace the turbulent conditions of Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the con­ sequences of the imperialistic involvement of the American army in the two regions. According to Raza, Afghanistan, “the country once known for beautiful light-blue sky”, is reduced to “guns and rubble” due to the “remnants of the American bombing campaign” (BS 317). Raza’s experience at the mujahidin camp with his friend Abdullah makes him realise how the fatal nexus of the capitalist and imperialistic politics of America, Pakistan and India turns Afgha­ nistan into a permanent battleground. Their diasporic optics underline the need for magnifying the historical accounts of South Asia and post-9/11 experiences from the marginalised perspectives of people living in Afghanistan and its dia­ sporas. In an article “The Nation-State and its Others”, Tölölyan (1991) refers to the potential of diasporic communities to subvert the nation/state through an articulation of a separate-but-equal narrative which exists alongside the domi­ nant cultural narrative of the nation (5). However, I suggest that the nation and national identity themselves be conceived as fluid and contingent, and the nar­ ratives of diasporic communities be considered as convoluted, not separate or equal but always-already enmeshed in the narrative of nation. Considering borders are not just visible metal fences and barricades or lines on the maps demarcating nation-states, both novels demonstrate that they are complex social constructions with many different meanings and functions imposed on them. Even if they do not aim to preach an eradication of borders as they view borders as essential to everyday life, the novels call for imagining different kinds of coexistence at the intersection of the illusory borders and within them. Considering these discussions on borders and difference, and alternative imaginings of home and nation, it is necessary to think about the gendering of characters in the novel and their implications for the borders of the narrative itself. In The Economy of Character, Lynch (1998) suggests that a critical analysis of characters in literary works must address the historicity of chronotopic frames where the function of the characters is socially constructed to serve the pertinent needs of the author and readers in a given context. I argue that a study of the gendered identities of characters in both novels may not only allow a recognition of the processes of history where we may catch a glimpse of the patriarchal versions of our present society, but also offer a fuller and thicker view of gendered accounts of histories.

Migratory masculinities Changez According to Farahani (2012: 164): a variety of intersecting factors (lighter skin, high education, age, language ability, occupation, look, wealth and social and cultural 55

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capital) have an impact on how one could feel closer to “normative” masculinity and “pass” in order to occupy a position of privilege. However, the problem with “passing”, as he quotes Skeggs (cited in Farahani 2012), “is that someone may catch you out” (164). Skeggs’s (2002) research explains that the enormous anxiety generated out of this wish to “pass” also involves the intimate desire to know “how to be accepted”. Such a desire embodies the politics of difference and reinforces it due to the paradoxical desire to absorb the Other’s difference and, at the same time, hide differences of the Self to become another Self. In New York, Changez’s “Pakistaniness was invisible” as it was cloaked by his suit, his expense account and his companions (TRF 71). In his own eyes, he becomes “a veritable James Bond—only younger, darker and possibly better paid” (34). The image of James Bond involves an identification of his life story with a thriller film, a “masculine genre”, and of himself as a “thriller hero”, a symbol of “supreme individualism” and “the apotheosis of masculine fantasy” (Al-wazedi 2014: 540). According to Hooper (2000: 67), the construction of such an “entrepreneurial frontier masculinity” that revolves around the merger of science, technology and business also shows how globalisation is the final frontier dominated by an elite international cos­ mopolitan male culture. As an Underwood Samson employee, Changez becomes a part of this battleground of the elite global corporates. Akin to the images of workers in Fritz Lang’s dystopic film Metropolis (1927), with that “shorn off hair and dressed in battle fatigues”, Changez and his co-workers also become “virtually indistinguishable” (TRF 3). In another instance, Changez is compared to a young Skywalker by his teammate Wainwright who quotes from Star Wars (TRF 4). The novel juxta­ poses this comparison of Changez to Skywalker, using the masculinised genre of science fiction films, with Changez’s mother’s reference to the Pakistani poets Faiz and Ghalib who have often been described as “effeminate”19 due to their poetical inclinations. In addition, the name of Hamid’s hero Changez also invokes the historical figure “Genghis Khan”, the first Khan of the Mongol Empire, a militant leader and a warrior who built a huge empire in Eurasia occupying most of the present-day Silk Route (Turnbull 2003). Although the use of stereotypes may reflect Hamid’s market-driven approach to writing and entail the danger of reiterating them, the unreliable narration, word play and the satirical approach of the novel render such desires ambivalent. In the initial days of Changez’s arrival in New York, the affirmation of his desirable cosmopolitan masculinity stems from a gay gentleman who gives him an “invitational” smile on the subway (TRF 34). In another instance, Changez asks the American visitor in Lahore if he had left behind a “love—male or female” (TRF 16). By deploying a condescending rhetoric, Changez challenges the hegemonic heterosexual ideology of both the American and Pakistani socie­ ties and uncovers the possibilities of queer desire. When Changez is with Erica in Greece and they sit “side by side”, Changez is “acutely aware of visible female 56

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skin” (TRF 22). He acknowledges how he is unable to escape the scopophilic instincts that emerge from the dominant patriarchal and heteronormative ethos of Pakistan and the USA. In the Old Anarkali district of Lahore, Changez is aware of the rules that govern both men and women in the bazaars of Lahore and although he exposes the patriarchal practices of protectionism in Pakistan, the novel fails to imagine beyond the discourse of protectionism and lacks narrative moments discussing, for instance, a woman’s “right to take risk” as much as safety provisions for women in public spaces (Phadke 2007). Hamid’s novel rarely engages with the migrant subject’s domestic predica­ ments and when it does, it is only through female figures, thereby reasserting the stereotypical association of the domestic with the female. Changez’s homing desires only surface in the context of his love for Erica who is para­ doxically described as both a “lioness” and infantilised: “a child who could sleep only with the door open and light on” (TRF 57). In such a domain of American and Pakistani national politics in the novel, women and domestic values are viewed as threats to the “supreme individualism” of the heroic leader, and in this final frontier of the masculine space, Changez becomes “the reluctant fundamentalist” (Al-wazedi 2014: 540). Although Al-wazedi’s (2014) analysis perceives Erica “as the symbol of an older world, a veritable Statue of Liberty that could have saved Changez”, this chapter suggests that such an essentialist view which stems from looking at Erica merely as a symbol of the nation or of the old American world order is problematic. On the one hand, it monumentalises America’s hegemonic and neo-imperialistic image as the saviour of the world; on the other hand, it views Changez’s dissent to Amer­ ican fundamentalist assumptions of race, class and masculinity as “far removed from the historicity of late capitalism” (Gamal 2012: 603). According to Aslam (2014), the Pakistani youth, living in militarist conditions in Pakistan within a globalised world, experiences “dissonance between the pre­ scribed, normative and idealized Muslim masculinity imperatives and the socio­ economic and political location of Pakistani men in the real world” (135). In such a context, the most discernible form of masculinity among Muslim populations is “emasculated masculinity” that is a product of both local and global experi­ ences of marginalisation (Al-wazedi 2014). In the case of Changez, he appears to embody such a masculinity which generates a protest context in response to the marginalising experiences after 9/11. Hamid uses the trope of the “beard”, a corporeal marker of difference, to elucidate Changez’s “protest masculinity” (Al­ wazedi 2014: 537), experiences of racialisation, and “demasculinisation” in a White America fearful of its Muslim diasporic subject’s perceived hypermascu­ linity. By growing a beard in the aftermath of 9/11, Changez is aware that he is challenging the racialised and “gendered scripts that frame Muslim men as sus­ picious” (Cilano 2009: 211). A few pages later, the reader of the novel is forced to wonder that apart from growing the “protest” beard, what else did Changez do to resist post-9/11 American-centrism? As Changez rhetorically states in the novel, “what exactly did I do to stop America, you ask?” (TRF 160). 57

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Although Changez returns to Lahore for justice and takes up a teaching job at the university in Lahore to connect with the young minds of his nation, he feels like “Kurtz waiting for his Marlowe” (TRF 183). According to Al-wazedi (2014), “like Kurtz he cannot let go of his heroic, masculine stature and waits for the CIA officer as Kurtz waited for Marlowe” (540). However, Al-wazedi’s (2014) meta­ phorical and binaristic reading of Changez and the American visitor is proble­ matic as it falls into the trap of what Martin (1994) terms as “methodological essentialism” and ahistoricity. It overlooks the literariness of the novel and what it does as a frame narrative deploying an unreliable point of view. By resisting closure and offering gaps for interpretation, the novel suggests reading the gen­ dered nature of trauma and choices in multiple contexts, and challenges the myths of Americanness through a deterritorialisation of hegemonic gender norms and “intersection”20 with “migratory” masculinities. Sajjad and James In BS, the colonial and neo-imperialistic contexts expose the intricate relations between racial, class-conscious, ableist and religious ideologies of masculinity and the articulation of everyday practices. Unlike TRF, the third-person nar­ ration enables Shamsie to establish every character’s perspective and delineate the confrontation of “local patriarchies” with “colonizing patriarchies” through the gendered practices of Sajjad and James (Connell 2005: 1804). By weaving the narrative using multiple viewpoints, Shamsie’s novel produces what Connell (2005) calls a shifting “global gender order” where, in the arena of new global relationships, both the colonial heteronormative norms and the “local gender arrangements” restructure one another (1804). Considering that the “civilizing” mission of the British Empire relied on “mimicry”, it implied paradoxically both the “resemblance and menace” to the coloniser’s identities (Bhabha 1994: 123). In BS, the “mimic man” Sajjad generates gender anxiety in both James and Elizabeth who echo the White colonial gendered logics. An agent and a victim of colonial norms, James supervises and controls Sajjad’s “otherness”, to confine it to the boundaries of the colonial rules and maintain the hierarchy of masculinities. Bearing in mind that James occupies the highest position in such a hierarchy, one might expect him to be the securest of all bodies producing stable and authoritative narratives of the Self. Yet his narra­ tive reveals a shared form of gender anxiety that “arises precisely as a con­ sequence of the position outside visibility” (Newell 2009: 246). His gendered anxieties surface when read in relation to other characters in the novel. James is aptly described by Hiroko who understands his “complacency” the minute she sees in his room a portrait of an upper-class White colonial patriarch sur­ rounded with trophies (BS 42). For James, Hiroko’s solo travel to India in trousers is unfathomable and irreverent as he believes there are “rules and common sense”, and he certainly would not “allow” his wife Elizabeth to transcend the “rules” (BS 43). Thus, Shamsie’s portrayal of James, as someone 58

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who can display “a complicated matrix of emotion” (BS 41) in relation to all characters, defies a homogenised, stereotypical and racial representation of the coloniser. Sajjad’s narrative also defies an essentialist image of the colonised subject as it exposes the ambiguities underlying his mental and physical struggles with internalising the “otherness” imposed by James and Elizabeth.21 According to Aslam (2014), “[w]hile interacting with the British, Muslim men adopted wes­ tern mannerisms and dress but Muslim women were denied integration into British customs” (139). In BS, Sajjad along with his uncles and cousins work for the English during the day but when they return home at night, they wear “kurta pyjama” and become “men of moholla” again (BS 113). In comparison to TRF, where Changez’s “white starched kurta” exhibits the cosmopolitanism of New York (TRF 48), the semiotics of Sajjad’s dressing in BS reflect broader concerns underlying the relationship between colonial power, politics, mascu­ linity and clothing.22 Sajjad’s negotiations with the visual markers of difference reveal the slippages between his contrasting identities. Throughout the novel, Sajjad seems to constantly slip into different styles of communication which take different forms depending on the time, space and listener. He resists his colonial effeminisation through a speech “Why have the English remained so English?” directed at James (BS 82). Such a speech is delivered to his colonial master James only after “eight years” of service at the Burtons, in the changing colonial public space of Delhi, and in front of Hiroko who “disrupts all hier­ archies” (BS 83). Within the private space of home, Sajjad shows “no political allegiances but many narrative preferences”, especially in the stories of Rani of Jhansi and Razia of the Mamluk Dynasty narrated by his mother Khadija who makes him fall in love with the images of powerful women (BS 52). However, when his mother asks him to get married to Mir Yousuf’s daughter, She­ herbano, and move to Pakistan after the Partition, Sajjad asserts, “once I marry the girl she will enter our home; I will not become part of her house­ hold” (ibid.). His assertion indicates that he may have developed affinities for powerful women of his regions and beyond, but he is unable to escape the local constructions of patriarchal ideologies and colonial masculinities embed­ ded within the institution of marriage in his society. He is unable to locate a married woman’s notion of “home” outside her husband’s household and insists on stereotypical gender-based courtesies within his heterosexual mar­ riage (BS 132). However, soon after Partition, Sajjad’s notion of home and household courtesies take a sharp turn, and it is only after the birth of their son Raza and the move to a private house in Karachi with Hiroko that Sajjad reconstructs his fractured masculinity. Raza and Harry While most feminist theories have discussed motherhood, masculinity studies have delved into the intricacies of fatherhood. However, both branches of 59

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gender theories have often failed to address the issues of queer, single parent­ ing and/or discuss the issues of motherhood and fatherhood beyond the insti­ tution of marriage, and the taxonomies of gender and sexuality. They have also overlooked the changing family structures and parenting styles in war and conflict situations. Considerably, even the daughter or the son’s voice regard­ ing their performances and perceptions of identity within the discourse of parenthood has not been considered by feminist, masculinity and queer studies. The aim of this section is admittedly narrow as it focuses only on the narration of the performative masculinities of Raza and Harry as sons within their family structures. However, it hopes to invoke larger discussions on the per­ spective of the child, the changing family structures and parenting styles within the discipline of gender and literary studies. Diamond’s (2004) study on the archetype of father–son relations suggests that a developing male child’s mas­ culine Self is based on the relational identities of both the mother and father, but boys move away from mothers in an attempt to dis-identify with a femi­ nine identity and adopt a more masculine orientation towards their identities (361). Like their fathers, both Raza and Harry are expected to become the dominant providers for their families, discouraged from expressing vulnerable emotions, and required to protect and sustain their masculinity by avoiding anything feminine. Although Shamsie frames an intricate narrative of the shared histories of the two migrant and heterosexual families, the dynamics of the Hiroko–Sajjad–Raza family are illustrated differently from those of the Elizabeth–James–Harry family. At home, the performance of Raza’s masculinity displays the impact of patriarchal ideologies underpinning his society. He tells his mother to become more “Pakistani” by wearing “shalwar kameez”23 (BS 130). Hiroko’s yielding response to his demands affirms his sense of masculine attainment as it also draws a “slightly wounded look” from his father Sajjad who realises that Hiroko succumbs to the demands of her son but not her husband’s (ibid.). In Pakistan, as Changez suggests in TRF (171), sons are expected to run family establishments from generation to generation, hence Raza is under constant pressure to become the masculine breadwinner of his family (BS 144). How­ ever, his career choice of “polyglot” is neither considered practical nor mas­ culine in his society (BS 146). Ultimately, Raza’s ambivalence concerning his professional desires and the shifting nature of his masculinities further com­ plicate the sense of belonging he feels towards his father’s ideological inclina­ tions. As a 16-year-old boy, his relationship with his sexagenarian patriarchal father Sajjad is reflective of the intertwined anxieties of generation and gender. His difficulties in playing the role of a young son to his migrant parents overlap with some of Harry’s experiences as a son. For the British passport holder Harry, it is easy to navigate his routes in the world no matter where and how he chooses to travel and settle—as a member of the colonialist family in India, an upper-class Englishman in England, a White English immigrant in the USA, a CIA agent in Pakistan or an American 60

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contractor of private arms in Afghanistan. His gender, race, nationality and class act as a “passport to privilege”24 (Dyer 1997) and aid an unrestrained journey of crossing borders. While Dyer’s (1997) metaphor makes us aware of the privileges Harry possesses, and his obliviousness to his White supremacist tendencies,25 it is important to consider matters such as: Who issues the pass­ port to privilege? How is it appropriated? At the cost of whose lives? In the year 1949, it is easy for Harry to weave himself into the national fabric of America as it accepts migrants like him in a way “no other country had ever done” (BS 170). His process of becoming “American” involves learning Amer­ ican words, the rules of baseball, engaging with the American public and pri­ vate spaces, participating in its national defence force and expressing his emotions in front of the Babe Ruth monument (ibid.). Acceptance into the national fabric of America comes easily to him merely on the basis of his “will” whereas this is not the case for the “Negro students” in his school (BS 170–171). It is important to note that the year 1949 marks the protests of the Civil Rights Congress (CRC) in the USA against the discriminatory laws that imposed illegitimate death penalty sentences on African-Americans. These protests were staged during the second inauguration of Harry Truman as the President of the USA. Shamsie’s interspersing of the history of violence and trauma in America through the metaphorical trajectory of Harry Burton draws our attention to the post-9/11 discriminatory acts like the 2001 US Patriot Act. Such a narrative strategy also locates the post-9/11 War on Terror and border security acts within a continuous historical series of operations like the COINTELPRO (1956–1971) that was launched to suppress the dissidence of political groups such as the CRC. Thus, the novel debunks the exceptionalist state of terror on 9/11 as the “absolute historical juncture” (Morey 2011: 139). As opposed to Harry, whenever Raza crosses geographical borders, he seems to inhabit a “liminal” (Bhabha 1994) space that lies in-between his conflicting identities. Raza’s decision to join Abdullah in Afghanistan displays a variant of “protest masculinity” which is different from Changez’s protest masculinity in TRF. According to Broude (1990), “protest masculinity represents an uncon­ scious defensive manoeuvre on the part of males who are in conflict or who are insecure about their identities as males” (103). This may emerge either in “the context of the status-envy theory of sex identity acquisition” or as “the out­ come of father-absence” (ibid.). The absence of Sajjad’s tender support as a father and a lack of sense of belonging perhaps make Raza more vulnerable to emulating other forms of masculinities within the local–global dialectics of gender performance. According to Anthias (2008), “belonging”, not to be confused with identity, involves “experiences of being part of the social fabric and the ways in which social bonds and ties are manifested in practices, experiences and emotions of inclusion” (8). During his journey to Peshawar with Abdullah, his dilemmas and thoughts about Japanese words reveal that his sense of belonging lies in the spaces where Hiroko dwells (BS 166–169). Even in her absence, to Raza, his mother is like what Minh-ha (2011) calls a 61

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transmitter of a “body full of sentences, proverbs and noises”, and the origi­ nator of the “warm fabric of [his] memory” that “shelters and nourishes [him]” (39). In Afghanistan, challenging Harry’s work as a CIA agent helps him uncover a “hierarchal homosociality” with Harry and build “horizontal homosociality” with Abdullah (Hammarén et al. 2014). In his confrontation with Harry, Raza realises that if his father were alive and found out the implications of the kind of work they executed in Afghanistan, “he would have wept to know” the kind of “men” they had become (BS 286). By recognising masculinities as complex performances demanding endless reconfigurations of everyday practices, the narratives of both Raza and Harry draw attention to the importance of choice and agency as sons as much as their complicity with gender norms. Based on the above discussions, this section concludes that the postcolonial, diasporic and transnational Muslim masculinities of Changez, Sajjad and Raza are relative, flexible and in certain cases even privileged. They take different forms around objectives such as “identity reassertion”, “anti-colonial resis­ tance” and “religious revivalism” (Aslam 2014: 139). It is also evident that, more than Sajjad and Raza, Changez demonstrates what Hobbs (2013) calls “alternative masculinities”26 in contrast to the “hegemonic masculinity” (Con­ nell et al. 2005) dominantly displayed by James and Harry. Thus, a decon­ struction of Changez, Sajjad and Raza’s gendered practices in both the public and private spheres of life reveals the migratory nature and play of multiple masculinities27 that evade definitions but involve appropriation and qualification.

Women on the move Hiroko According to Horvat (2013), “Women on the move, especially those who move for personal reasons—to experience new intellectual, cultural, or artistic chal­ lenges—are kept at the margins of collective memory; and silenced by official historiography” (109). In BS, Hiroko grapples with several models of patri­ archal gender arrangements using distinct strategies, and performs her migra­ tory and diasporic subjectivities in different locations and time zones that she inhabits (Japan, India, Turkey, Pakistan, the USA). A close reading of her trajectory may underline the capacities of “translocational positionality”28 and “female nomadism” in destabilising hegemonic White Western male historical accounts and exposing the relative nature of feminisms and patriarchies (Passerini et al. 2007; Ponzanesi et al. 2005). Early in the novel, Hiroko defies an identification of a “relational triangle with both mother and father” (Chodorow 1978: 167), and professes a multiple sense of belonging that transcends her domestic and national sphere (BS 3–20). After the nuclear bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki that incinerates her 62

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familiarity with the notion of nation and home, the borders between her body and the Urakami valley blur (BS 27). Butler (2004) claims that “although we struggle for rights over our own bodies, the very bodies for which we struggle are not quite ever only our own” (26). For Ahmed (cited in Newell 2009), bodies are “capable of remembering histories, even when we forget them” (243). Extending these arguments, it is possible to suggest that Hiroko’s body bears the imprint of national histories as the permanent bird-shaped burnt scars on her back not only become the marks of “difference” that categorise her as a “hibakusha”, but also symbolise the wounds of a masculine war on her female body.29 It is necessary to note that, in BS, just before the American air force explodes the bomb on Hiroshima, Hiroko puts on her mother’s kimono (imprinted with two large birds on the back) as she experiences moments of bodily pleasures and sexual fantasies with Konrad. As soon as she feels in complete control of her body, the bomb permanently numbs all kinds of sensation on her back. Such a numbing of her back is indicative of the suppression of her corporeal pleasures, and according to Khan (2011a), it can also be read “as a manuscript for the transcription of capitalist violence” (59). When Hiroko decides to migrate to India to meet Konrad’s step-sister Eliza­ beth, her decision to move out of Japan is entwined with her decision to move away from the narcissistic preoccupations with her own suffering and imagine the “larger picture”. Most significantly, it is also to challenge the monopoly of all those positions which reduce her to a “hibakusha” and threaten a plurality of identities (BS 99–100). Through this shift, the novel already activates the reader to mourn in “planetary” dimensions (Spivak 2003). After arriving at the Burtons’ house in India, Hiroko negotiates the mascu­ line world of colonial India gripped by anticolonial sentiments, post-Partition India and Pakistan. Her ways of articulating dissent to the traditional con­ structions of female identity highlight the complexities involved in “gendered (dis)belonging” (Anthias 1998). Hiroko subverts the stereotypical image of a demure Japanese woman as she enters the colonial masculine space of exploration. Her pragmatic responses towards James’s patronising questions or in times of love-making with Sajjad challenge the taming of woman in patriarchal cultures of both the colonialist and colonised societies. As she demonstrates her ability to transcend the borders of space, time, history and mourning, her feminisms impel Elizabeth to think of “wants” in a way that unsettles the capitalist patriarchal structures (BS 100). Hiroko can also be described as a “mobile female” or the “woman on the move [who] connotes the collapse of spatial borders (of home) and gender borders of domesticity” (Horvat 2013: 108). Her marriage to Sajjad also means a marriage into the patriarchal culture of Karachi where she constantly negotiates with the gen­ dered spaces within home. Although she gives into her son Raza’s nationalistic and patriarchal demand to be more “Pakistani”, she is conscious of the fact that “there is no myth bigger than nationalism” (BS 130). In organising weekly gatherings with other Japanese women in Jimmy’s coffee shop, Hiroko brings 63

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her feminist visions “out of closets”30 and discusses them in public spaces (BS 140). The reading club organised by Hiroko serves as an “in-between” or an intervening space where cultural differences are negotiated through cultural translation of women’s personal narratives. By allowing for the development of alternative discourses, such a space is particularly useful for Hiroko and other women in the diaspora in Karachi since it offers an alternative frame­ work for building solidarity and survival strategies. Hiroko also seems to dis­ play two characteristics of the variant of cosmopolitanism suggested by Brennan (2000). On the one hand, it “designates an enthusiasm for customary differences, but as ethical or aesthetic material for a unified polychromatic culture”, on the other hand, “it projects a theory of world government and corresponding citizenship” (Brennan 2000: 41). Palpably, Hiroko’s diasporic narrative proposes a creative vision of understanding commonality and soli­ darity by raising an important question: When one wants to be a citizen of the world, why does one end up becoming a citizen of nowhere? Certainly, her narrative demands an ever-expansive understanding of citizenship. When Hiroko visits a book stall in Karachi, she looks for the Russian writer Tolstoy’s novel War and Peace (BS 142). When the seller advises her that she should not read certain books as it is against Islam, Hiroko’s enquiry, “What makes a cover unIslamic?” (BS 142), calls into question the act of drawing borders of cultural and religious difference that determine the nature of being. Her linguistic act of posing such a query indicates that it is necessary to go beyond a mere recognition of differences across cultures and use language to expose the incommensurability31 in one’s own and others’ ways of distin­ guishing and identifying. When the seller responds, “[p]ortraiture,32 particu­ larly of women” makes a book cover unIslamic, the novel draws attention to its own front cover depicting a kimono-clad woman, and Shamsie’s engage­ ment with her own feminist politics in relation to Islam (BS 142). Ultimately, Hiroko’s experiences in Karachi make her realise that although certain ideo­ logical practices are beyond her control, she cannot deny her own agency in her inability to share the intimate details of her trauma and the survival story in Nagasaki with her reading club friends. Through Hiroko, Shamsie echoes what Minh-ha (1986) calls “the dehumanization of forced removal-relocation­ reeducation-redefinition”, and “the humiliation of having to falsify your own reality, your voice” (12). However, instead of narcissistic mourning or the urge of a violent retaliation, it is the narration of myths and fairy tales to her son, a survival spirit while crossing borders, and the recognition of human interdependency that liberate her (BS 223). Unlike Changez, Raza and Abdullah, who go through rigorous surveillance each time they cross geographical borders, Hiroko’s experience of the act of crossing geopolitical borders while entering the USA is entirely different. When a New York airport immigration official looks at her face and passport, and tells her she will be “safe” in America, Hiroko is amazed at the officer’s obliviousness to irony (BS 287). Such an instance in the novel also reflects that 64

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female nomadism is tolerated and permitted so long as it is not perceived as a threat to national security and the hegemonic structures of race, class, religion and ethnicity. Even according to Horvat (2013), “Female nomadism is not always equally morally monitored by the mainstream society: surveillance and condemnation are class and ethnically structured” (111). In addition to Hir­ oko’s geopolitical border-crossing experiences, her translation skills help her survive the tragic moments of her life. Through language, Hiroko retains the secret of her burnt marks and the story behind them, and remains an absentpresent fragment in her son Raza’s wandering routes. In her final struggle against a dangerous nationalist ideology, Hiroko requests Kim to transport Abdullah to a safer place (BS 313). Her request is suggestive of the desire for building a transnational feminist alliance with Kim to oppose nationalist, sexist and racist power structures. Unlike Kim, who interprets Abdullah as a threat to her nation, for Hiroko, Abdullah is a “man of lost homelands” and not someone who drew her son Raza into violence (BS 313). Thus, Hiroko’s reading of feminist and diasporic practices is not juxtaposed as an alternative to national practices, rather, it is a more “porous practice of not being at home in terms of potentiality and becoming” (Mummery 2006: 41–42). Like a “tissue of quotations” (Barthes 1994: 166), Hiroko weaves her trajectory using several patches of diasporic experiences, and can be described as the woman in Mahmoud Darwish’s (2007) poem “No more no less” living her life as it is “thread by thread”. Ilse/Elizabeth Contrary to Hiroko’s cosmopolitan feminism, Elizabeth’s dormant feminism is intertwined with her feelings of nationalism. Before the arrival of Hiroko in her life, she is both an agent of and subservient to hegemonic patriarchy33 that is governed by the colonial norms of her British society. She passively accepts James’s control over her decisions and seems to embody the portrait, “The Colonial Wife Looks upon her Garden” (BS 35). Her life, represented dom­ inantly through the institution of marriage, becomes an “accumulation” of all those things she does not want (BS 100). The news of her brother Konrad’s death calls for an “assurance” of her own bodily existence which is ironically experienced through an “orgasm” (BS 72). Tuana (2004) in her article “Coming to Understand: Orgasm and the Epistemology of Ignorance” posits that “[w]omen’s bodies and pleasures provide a fertile lens for understanding the workings of power/knowledge-ignorance” (199). She further states, “as we come to understand our orgasms, we will find a site of pleasure that serves as a resource for resisting sexual normalization through the practices of becoming sexual” (ibid.). Although for Elizabeth, her orgasm serves as a means of oblit­ erating the pain of her brother’s death, her choice of seeking “refuge in orgasm” (BS 72) also challenges the hegemonic gendered practices of mourning as much as it contests her sexual normalisation. 65

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As Elizabeth and Hiroko reveal the intimate details of their lives to one another, they establish a camaraderie different from the one between Raza and Abdullah. Their “female friendship” is based on both complementarity34 and drawing connections. While Hiroko seems to suggest “planetarity” in imagin­ ing trauma (Spivak 2003), for Elizabeth, even though she is in India, she cannot escape feeling “entirely German” every time Berlin is firebombed by the British forces (BS 73). Unlike her brother Konrad who was determined to “see a pat­ tern of people moving towards each other” (BS 71), and her friend Hiroko’s cosmopolitanism, Elizabeth’s gendered and racialised nationalisms suggest a Euro-centric vision of trauma and mourning (BS 266). However, both Eliza­ beth and Hiroko identify with each other in their spirit of survival and the memories of home in India that surface only after they cross its geopolitical borders. Kim Like her grandmother Elizabeth, Kim too lacks a cosmopolitan feminist sensi­ bility. Although her “macho” choice of occupation of “structural engineering” enables her to question the hegemony of gendered professions, it reflects her need to control everything and her inhibitions about dwelling in uncertainty (BS 272). After 9/11, she loses that sense of control because her ability to con­ struct buildings that are “earthquake-proof” no longer suffices the demands of the new contractors. She “hates” that “everything in the world is so scary” as she is “frightened all the time” (BS 266). It is necessary to note that her sense of hatred emerges from not only the shifting nature of her narrow perception of American society, but also an anxiety of losing her role model, her father. After the dissolution of her parents’ marriage, the four-year-old Kim is raised by her father and grandmother. This complicates the hegemonic hetero­ normative structure of her family as she craves for familiar figures to emulate their behaviour. Both Harry and Elizabeth fill in those gaps that give her a sense of belonging as a child. However, like them, the rigid and gendered boundaries of her thoughts thwart every possibility of the Other’s perme­ ability. Eventually, Kim’s trajectory exposes the failure of the qualified and the highly educated White American feminists to escape the American-centric and binaristic rhetoric of the Self and the Other, as well as their participation in reinforcing the bigotry after 9/11 (BS 361). Born and raised in America, Kim has never crossed the geographical borders of her nation-state and lacks Hiroko’s sense of exploration and discovery. She takes for granted her ability to enter and exit geographical borders of nation at will and never conceives of visiting those nations which require Americans to go through a visa-application process. Instead, it comes as a “shock” to her to discover that Hiroko will require a visa to visit Paris and that it would be difficult for her to attain a visa given the long list of requirements (BS 340). Building on Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of “territorialisation”, Nadeem et al. 66

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(2015) argue that “cartographies are made to territorialize people to bind them physically and mentally” (74). By imposing physical boundaries, “people are striated in their ideologies […] creating the spirit of nationalism [that] give the powerful existence of that state” (ibid.). Towards the end of the novel, Kim’s approach to Abdullah’s views on Islam and the act of informing the police about him reiterate the post-9/11 mental cartography of American exceptionalism and the White American woman’s feminist practices that “fostered the con­ solidation of US nationalism” (Puar 2007: 5). Unlike TRF, where the discourse on terror and fundamentalism is approa­ ched in the form of a monologue in a café and restricted to a masculine voice, Shamsie’s dialogic approach to the subject of terror in both public and private spaces offers multiple perspectives and exposes colossal confusions that take the form of violence. If Hamid’s monologue imposes a singular masculine voice and demands blatant answers from the listener, alternatively, Shamsie’s dialogic narratives create a space for multiple gendered voices and challenge the asymmetrical power relations. Bakhtin (1981) cautions that “the dialogic imperative mandated by the pre-existence of the language world […] ensures that there can be no actual monologue” (330). In this sense, Hamid’s use of monologue cannot and does not escape the “overpowering force of hetero­ glossia” and demands multiple “readerly” responses (426). It also cautions the reader against judgements that link terrorism to Islam by accessing the issue from more than one perspective. Erica While the third-person narration and plurality of women’s migratory experi­ ences in BS further Shamsie’s feminist agendas, in TRF, Erica is introduced by Changez and it is in her feminised body that an allegory of America is embedded. In an introduction to the monograph Out of Bounds: Male Writers and Gender(ed) Criticism, Claridge et al. (1990: 3) postulate: to write against patriarchy as a male fettered by it does not necessarily result in writing for liberation of gender bondage […] many male writers are interested in a space or possibility for expression coded as “feminine”, they are not necessarily interested in particular women and their plights or even the general plight of the generic “woman”. Extending this argument, it appears that Changez needs a narrative space to express what he or his society term as “feminine” to elucidate the complexities of the patriarchal construction of his masculinity, and America’s neo-imperialistic tendencies in the “post-9/11” context. Clearly, rather than a feminist agenda, Changez has other dominant political agendas. After the death of her first boyfriend Chris and then the 9/11 attacks, Erica’s sexuality becomes more “dormant” (TRF 90). As she tries to resort to writing to overcome her sense of 67

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nostalgia, “she end[s] up dwelling on it more in the process of writing” (112). By projecting Erica as self-absorbed, submissive and non-violent, Hamid rein­ forces the stereotypical assumptions of a White woman’s position in American society and the post-9/11 stance of the “submissiveness” of America. However, even a reading of Erica’s inward-looking response and suicide as an allegory for America’s self-absorbed response and submissiveness is pro­ blematic because it reinstates the “victim” tale narrated by America to justify its militant actions based on 9/11. As Gardner (2011) argues, “it is tempting because of the feminized nature of her self-abnegation to read Erica merely as a victim” (5). However, if Erica’s trajectory is read without such national allegorical implication, she seems to paradoxically demonstrate a resistance to America’s nationalism and violent acts in the 9/11 context. Her longing for Chris (even before 9/11) reinforces that 9/11 was not the origin of her trauma. Besides, according to Gardner (2011), in terms of “shadow femin­ ism”,35 she “demonstrate[s] a concomitant ability to use self-abnegation to disrupt the narrative of sovereignty promoted by [her] respective nation state” (5). However, in response to Gardner’s (2011) proposition, I argue against the interpretation of suicide as any form of feminism and liberation from exploitative power structures, or an effective local, national or transna­ tional form of resistance. In the case of Erica, it only feeds into the ideology of women’s subordination, and strengthens the hierarchy of male-dominated power-relations.

Critiquing post-9/11 American exceptionalism and reimagining trauma American exceptionalism given its economic, political and religious variances has been critiqued in both TRF and BS. In TRF, it denotes a kind of funda­ mentalism that is mired in one’s own delusions of greatness and manufacturing schemes of differentiation and recognition to draw the borders between the Self and the Other. In such a scenario, the Other is framed as an enemy who is given a visible face so that the use of force in the name of counterterrorism can be justified.36 Through the protagonists’ transnational travels and the cosmo­ politan network of memories,37 both novels force a historical reading of America’s border-making processes. After his return to Pakistan, Changez is vocal about his critique of American imperialism and exceptionalism. He is “filled with rage” at the mystery sur­ rounding the treatment of one of his missing students in Lahore and declares that “no country inflicts death so readily upon inhabitants of other countries, frightens so many people so far away, as America” (TRF 182). In BS, Hiroko agonises based on a similar experience in New York when she sees posters of missing individuals in New York after 9/11. Kim presumes Hiroko’s trauma emerges because of an identification between the trauma of the victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and the 9/11 attacks. Although Kim’s 68

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assumption encourages readers to consider the mechanisms through which identification is enabled, Hiroko’s trajectory encourages the readers to reflect on what identification conceals. According to Lyon (2013), “identification hides the powerful differences of material conditions, sensory practices, semiotic technologies, and discursive structures” (60). Vigilant of such powerful differ­ ences, it is the reading of a variety of history books on Truman, Churchill and Stalin that makes Hiroko realise that her “stories seemed so small, so tiny a fragment in the big picture” (BS 294). In contrast, for Kim, Hiroko’s trauma as a victim of the nuclear bombing is noteworthy because of her personal and family’s loss. Kim’s narrow vision of trauma is appalling for Hiroko as she responds, “Is that why? That’s why Nagasaki was such a monstrous crime? Because it happened to me?” (BS 294). At this point, Hiroko is also able to draw comparison between Kim and the American soldier in Tokyo who tells her the bomb had to be dropped in Japan to save American lives (ibid.). Unlike Harry and Kim, who are caught up with their own insecurities, personal suffering and professional angsts after 9/11, Hiroko finds herself caught in feelings of profound solidarity and seeking commonality (BS 289). For instance, she demonstrates her interest in listening to the stories of survival of Indian and Pakistani taxi drivers in New York amidst the nuclear tensions between India and Pakistan, and in the aftermath of 9/11 (BS 288). She even randomly decides to donate blood despite her age and even though her blood is not accepted (because she is from a malarial country), the nurse at the Red Cross society gives her a badge stating “inten­ tion matters”. Hiroko’s satirical response to the American nurse that “Prophet Muhammad made exactly the same point” (BS 289) demonstrates her resis­ tance to American ethnic nationalism, particularism and post-9/11 Islamophobia. Both TRF and BS also project the need for further analysis of the political media discourses on international humanitarianism and terrorism that impose vulnerability and suspicion onto certain bodies and not others to influence national and international policies. With more complexity than Hamid’s novel, Shamsie’s novel also raises questions about a migrant’s rights after death38 as the novel enquires about the “corpses of the two Bangladeshi TCNs” who were lying in storage rooms and waiting for a decision from the embassy (BS 300). This inquiry is juxtaposed with the representation of the death of Harry Burton who is considered as a “patriot”, and “his death is a proud one” as he dies looking for Osama bin Laden (BS 324). Although both Shamsie and Hamid pose questions about the “methodolo­ gical nationalism” (Wimmer et al. 2002) of America in the 9/11 context, some borders continue to exist and are reiterated in both novels while some are reimagined in the process. The climax of both TRF and BS centres on a collision of certain Muslim values upheld by their characters, and the post-9/11 racial profiling of Muslims as potential terrorists. According to Al-wazedi (2014), Hamid falls into the trap of portraying Changez in the “new 69

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masculine image” that the West has constructed of the terrorist: “young, educated, professional men, in the most economically productive age brackets, often employed in fields such as computer programming, business, science and technology and as foreign students studying aboard” (Rygiel cited in Al-wazedi 2014: 538). Before 9/11 in the novel, Changez seems to be making the most out of the emancipatory potential of multiculturalism in American society; however, after 9/11, racial discrimination seems to be more rampant in American society as he feels increasingly threatened. In BS, Raza and Abdullah experience immense despair as Pakistani Muslims in the post-9/11 American society. The failure of both novels to imagine their ambiguous relationship to Americanisation outside the discourse of terrorism, in the end, only reinforces the prejudices that both novels supposedly set out to undermine. Eventually, Kim’s decision of ensuring the arrest of Abdullah (simulta­ neously leading to Raza’s arrest) unveils the narrow definitions of fundament­ alism and secularism, and the borders of American trauma in the 9/11 context. According to Hiroko, one of the reasons for Kim’s problem lies in her wish to hear only a part of the story (BS 271). Clearly, for Hiroko then the borderopening processes are not sufficient to reimagine trauma and break all barriers that arise out of hegemonic differences. What are required are the “detection of relational geographies which are disrupted by this state border”, and the “coordination of differing or even conflicting interests and intentions on both sides of the border” (Haselsberger 2014: 522). By demanding a reflection on the “little corners of the big picture” (BS 362), Hiroko contemplates the futility of war and encourages sensitivity towards the despair and disruption it causes in millions of lives. Unlike Am/Erica in TRF who “writes about trauma”, “an aspect of his­ toriography” that involves reconstructing the past “as actively as possible” but with the “denial of one’s implication in the problem one treats”, in BS, Hiroko seems to be “writing trauma” that is “working over”, “acting out”, “analysing past events”, “giving voices to it”, coming to terms with its effects in “different combinations and hybridized forms” (La Capra 2001: 186–187). Building on Spivak’s (2003) concept of planetarity, this chapter has suggested that both novels are significant in their narration of trauma and the call for collective healing. They intervene in the debate about Othering of immigrants and marginalisation of Muslims in a way that questions America as a dream destination, and its hegemonic framework of both liberal multiculturalism and liberal monoculturalism.39 Both TRF and BS suggest that we need to recognise our failure in producing the politics of solidarity and uncover the modalities of Othering within the Self. Although for Changez, such an awakening is articulated through a particular national space, Hiroko’s drifts away from such spaces to expose the gaps within and between borders, thereby offering a more capacious narrative to articulate cosmopolitanism. 70

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Notes 1 The meaning of difference used here is discursive and in the Derridean sense (Der­ rida [1968] 1973), as always deferring. It is perceived as both a lack that the Self needs for its enrichment and a certain peculiarity or a deviance threatening the Self. 2 Butler (2004) cautions, “Contemporary forms of national sovereignty constitute efforts to overcome an impressionability and violability that are ineradicable dimensions of human dependency” (xiv). 3 According to Ghosh (2016), the most important element of the word “recognition” lies in its first syllable, which harks back to something prior. Therefore, the knowl­ edge that results from recognition is not the discovery of something new: it arises rather from a renewed reckoning with a potentiality that lies within oneself (4–5). 4 Not to be confused with “difference hierarchy” in mathematical set theory which refers to the hierarchical formation of a larger set of points over another point-class based on some definable differences. Instead, the hierarchy of difference here refers to the essentialising of human differences in a way that determines the politics of belonging and distribution of resources. 5 It implies the way “otherness” is constructed and the meanings of “the other” determined by different power structures (Hegel 1967; de Beauvoir 1976). 6 These include the readings of Munos (2012), Hayati (2011), Khan (2015) and Shirazi (2015). 7 These include works of Khan (2011a, 2011b), Olson (2011), Singh (2012), Liao (2013), Ilott (2013), Gamal (2012), Itakura (2014) and Aumeerally (2017). 8 In an article titled “The Global and the Postcolonial in Post-Migratory Literature”, Gamal (2012) builds on Elleke Boehmer’s postulation about redefining the new postcolonial genre of writing as “post-migratory”. He views both TRF and BS as representative of post-migratory literature as they comprise dialectical narratives where the global and the postcolonial seep into one another (596–608). 9 These include works of Hartnell (2010), Morey (2011), Gamal (2012), Nadeem et al. (2015), Vitolo (2016) and Kiczkowski (2016). 10 See Mignolo (2007), for whom decolonisation refers to an epistemological “de-linking from the colonial matrix of power” (455). 11 Ilott (2013) borrows the term from Elleke Boehmer’s study on postcolonial litera­ ture and terror to describe how “postcolonial writing undoes the compression of time” (9/11 in this case) by uncovering the deep layers of history and supplying “channels to think through and beyond terror” (571). 12 This is drawn from Butler’s (2005) “social theory of recognition” that proposes we are constituted by “schemes of recognition” which mark the boundaries according to which we become intelligible (30). 13 This chapter draws from Pratt’s (1992) definition of “contact zone” as an attempt to invoke the spatial and temporal co-presence of subjects previously separated by geographical and historical disjunctures, where the “relations among colonizers and colonized, or travelers and ‘travelees’ is perceived not in terms of separateness or apartheid, but in terms of co-presence, interaction, interlocking understandings and practices, often within radically asymmetrical relations of power” (7). 14 It is the Japanese term for the “explosion-affected person” (literal meaning) or the surviving victims of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 15 It refers to Mohanty’s (1989) notion of relativism that signals “care and attentive­ ness to the specificities of context”. For him, relativism emphasises the “differences between and among us rather than pointing to shared spaces” with an ultimate aim that “one day, we will learn to share” (59). 16 At this juncture, it is important to highlight a stark present-day reality that Sham­ sie’s novel seems to draw attention to, for instance, the continual destruction of

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17

18 19

20

21

22

23

24 25

26

27

land due to the testing of nuclear weapons. Desai’s (2014) report concludes that even 40 years after the Pokhran I nuclear tests in India, villagers complain of crops turning white, groundwater contamination and frequent cancer deaths in Pokhran. Such experimental strategies are also evident in Shamsie’s previous novels like In the City by the Sea (Shamsi 1998) and Kartography (Shamsi 2002) which contain a hand-drawn family tree and the street map of Karachi. These strategies will also be compared to the narrative style in Shamsie’s latest novel in Chapter Five. Ghosh (2016) draws on the mode of the “subjunctive” to elucidate the phrase “imagining of possibilities through fiction” (171). The genre of poetry and certain styles within the genre of poetry have often been considered effeminate (Cox 1996). For instance, Faiz’s passive opposition to powers of tyranny and exploitation through his poems is labelled as “feminine” (The Express Tribune (Editorial) 2011). Here, the chapter refers to the encounter with intersection “as a site of conflict, confusion, anger or as a nexus of engagement, growth of specific identity and creativity”, and “migratory” in the sense of “migratory subjectivities”, which involves an assertion of agency, a continual negotiation, and an intersection of plural experiences that shape identity in the process of migration (Boyce-Davies 1994: 1, 3, 41, 110). In Black Skin, White Masks, Fanon (1986) reveals the psychological impacts of colonialism on the colonised subjects who internalise the sense of “otherness” in their image of the Self (114). Though he has been often critiqued for “focusing merely on racial subjectivities” (Bergner 1995: 76), his theory is more useful when extended from its class, race and historic specificities to understand the individual rooted in larger socioeconomic, religious, gendered and material frameworks of colonialism. For instance, classifying and managing the “native” bodies, clothing them and imposing a “hygiene” regime was a central focus of the Christian missionary project in the early colonial encounters (Cohen 1989). In the case of India, the power of cloth and identity politics is evident through “khadi,” a “key visual symbol of the freedom struggle” and resistance against British colonialism (Gupta 2012: 77). An outfit that most Pakistani women wore in Raza’s society; also considered the national dress of Pakistan worn by both women and men. It is necessary to note that, unlike in some Muslim-majority countries, there is no dress code imposed on women by the government in Pakistan. Raza’s insistence on following a certain dress code calls attention to the recent debates concerning International Islamic University Islamabad’s notice on the imposition of a dress code within its university campus to prevent the “westernisation” of Pakistani women (PTI 2018). This refers to the privilege and power associated with Whiteness. See Dyer (1997) who uses the term to question the normative power of “Whiteness” that has been historically used to suppress and marginalise the Other (44). For instance, see Leonardo (2009) who distinguishes between “White privilege” and “White supremacy” to centre a discussion beyond the advantages the Whites receive and trace the historical process of domination that began on the backs of people of colour (76). While there might be parallels here with Yekani’s (2011) concept of “marginalized masculinities” or Connell’s (2005) “subordinated masculinities”, Hobbs (2013) envisages discussions beyond the discourse on colonialism (387). Hobbs (2013) pre­ fers the term “alternative” over “marginalized” or “subordinated” to underline the celebratory nature of alternative masculinities and challenge the lens of victimhood. For Newell (2009), more than femininity, the noun masculinity demands qualifiers; and the array of adjectives like “hyper, damaged, abject, hegemonic, postcolonial”

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28 29 30

31 32

33 34

35 36 37

38 39

attached to masculinities could be regarded as “signs of encounter, of the mobility of manhood” (247–248). “A translocational positionality is […] structured by the interplay of different loca­ tions relating to gender, ethnicity, race and class (amongst others), and their at times contradictory effects” (Anthias 2008: 15). This echoes Butalia’s (1998) memorable line, “History is a woman’s body” (143). Joseph Addison (1711), in The Spectator Magazine, famously stated, “Philosophy out of Closets and Libraries […] at Tea-Tables, and in Coffee-Houses” (53). Although Addison’s desire may have entirely escaped the vision of inclusion of women and queer philosophers, I argue that his suggestion to shift the scene of philosophy to informal public venues is useful as he believed that polite conversation would generate ideas, and promote individual discussions and collective decisions necessary for the growth of any society. See Taylor (1985) who distinguishes between “difference” and “incommensur­ ability” in his essay “Rationality” published in Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers (134–151). Here, there seems to be an intertextual reference to the essay collection Islam Our Choice: Portraits of Modern American Muslim Women (Dirks et al. 2003). Such an episode in the novel also reminds us of the contemporary debates on Islam, and the ethics of art and free speech in the aftermath of the attack that took place in the offices of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris in 2015. This underlines the fact that patriarchy is not equated with males alone or to hegemonic masculinities, and that the notion of patriarchy itself shifts and differs in every society. Abel (1981), in exploring female friendship in literature and cinema, observes that the most common portrayal of female friendship is “women [seeking] com­ plementarity rather than commonality in their friends”. For her, this emphasis on complementarity has only led to “fragmentation” and a feeling of competition and exclusivity. Alternatively, novels that focus on the actual friendships of women suggest, “identification replaces complementarity as the psychological mechanism that draws women together” (415). Quoting Halberstam, Gardner (2011) states, “shadow feminism serves as an alter­ nate version of feminism, one that explores the long-ignored assertion of will that can be found within self-abnegating action” (2). According to Baudrillard (2002), it is therefore a “clash neither of civilizations nor of religions” and this goes far beyond Islam and America (406). The chapter draws from Erll’s (2011) notion of “travelling memory” and the notion of “cosmopolitan memory” (Levy et al. 2006: 234). It refers to a memory that transcends national boundaries, envisions global solidarity, examines local concerns that seep through the “container of the nation-state” and “provides a gauge for personal suffering” (Levy et al. 2006: 2, 191). This is dealt with in detail in her latest novel Home Fire (Shamsie 2017) through Parvaiz’s trajectory, which will be analysed in Chapter Five. According to Ahmed (cited in Kay 2015), liberal multiculturalism (under the banner of respecting difference) is a fantasy which conceals everyday forms of racism and violence in a way that paradoxically seems to support the desire for racism. Thus, on the one hand, there is the liberal multiculturalist fantasy that the differences of the migrants must be treated with hospitality and love; on the other hand, the pre­ mise of liberal monoculturalism is that the hospitality was disrespected, and the love was abused by the migrants. Therefore, there emerges a need to reinforce common values to overcome the threat of Others’ difference.

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Hartnell, Anna. 2010. “Moving through America: Race, Place and Resistance in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 46(4): 336–348. Haselsberger, Beatrix. 2014. “Decoding Borders. Appreciating Border Impacts on Space and People”. Planning Theory & Practice. 15(4): 505–526. Hayati, Daryoosh. 2011. “East Meets West: A Study of Dual Identity in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. Journal of Subcontinent Researches. 3(7): 31–52. Hegel, Georg W.F. 1967. Phenomenology of Mind. Translated by J.B. Baillie. London: Harper and Row. Hobbs, Alex. 2013. “Masculinity Studies and Literature”. Literature Compass. 10(4): 383–395. Hooper, Charlotte. 2000. “Masculinities in Transition: The Case of Globalization”. In Gender and Global Restructuring: Sighting, Sites and Resistances. Edited by Marianne H. Marchand and Anne Sisson Runyan. 59–73. New York: Routledge. Horvat, Ksenija. 2013. “Engendering Borders: Some Critical Thoughts on Theories of Borders and Migration”. Klagenfurter Geographische Schriften. 29: 106–113. Ilott, Sarah. 2013. “Generic Frameworks and Active Readership in The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 50(5): 571–583. Itakura, Gen’ichiro. 2014. “A Lanky Shadow on the Rock: Trauma in Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows”. In 4th Global Conference: Trauma Theory and Practice. Prague, Czech Republic. Kay, Joseph. 2015. “‘Liberal Multiculturalism is the Hegemony – It’s an Empirical Fact’ – A Response to Slavoj Žižek by Sara Ahmed”. Libcom.org. https://libcom.org/ library/%E2%80%98liberal-multiculturalism-hegemony-%E2%80%93-its-empirical-f act%E2%80%99-%E2%80%93-response-slavoj-%C5%BEi%C5%BEek-sara-ah. Acces­ sed on 17 June 2018. Khan, Gohar K. 2011a. “The Hideous Beauty of Bird-Shaped Burns: Transnational Allegory and Feminist Rhetoric in Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows”. Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies. 3(2): 53–68. Khan, Gohar K. 2011b. “The Treatment of ‘9/11’ in Contemporary Anglophone Pakis­ tani Literature: Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist as a Postcolonial Bildungsroman”. ESharp. 17: 84–104. Khan, Sobia. 2015. “Alienated Muslim Identity in the Post-9/11 America: A Transnational Study of The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. South Asian Review. 36(3): 141–160. Kiczkowski, Adriana. 2016. “‘Glocalization’ in Post-9/11 Literature. Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie”. Journal of English Studies. 14: 125–136. Kiernan, Victor G. 1971. Faiz Ahmad Faiz. London: Vanguard Books South Publication. La Capra, Dominick. 2001. Writing History, Writing Trauma. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. Leonardo, Zeus. 2009. Race, Whiteness, and Education. London: Routledge. Levy, Daniel and Sznaider, Natan. 2006. The Holocaust and Memory in the Global Age. (Vol. 64). Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Liao, Pei-chen. 2013. ‘Post’-9/11 South Asian Diasporic Fiction: Uncanny Terror. London: Palgrave. Lynch, Deidre. 1998. The Economy of Character: Novels, Market Culture, and the Business of Inner Meaning. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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Lyon, Arabella. 2013. Deliberative Acts: Democracy, Rhetoric, and Rights. Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press. Martin, Jane R. 1994. “Methodological Essentialism, False Difference, and Other Dangerous Traps”. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. 19(3): 630–657. Metropolis. 1927. Dir. Fritz Lang. Perf. Alfred Abel and Brigitte Helm. Germany: Ufa. Michaelsen, Scott and Johnson, David. 1997. Border Theory: The Limits of Cultural Politics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Mignolo, Walter D. 2007. “Delinking: The Rhetoric of Modernity, the Logic of Coloniality and the Grammar of De-Coloniality”. Cultural Studies. 21(2–3): 449–514. Minh-ha, Trinh T. 1986. “Difference: ‘A Special Third World Women Issue’”. Discourse. 8: 11–38. Minh-ha, Trinh T. 2011. Elsewhere, within here: Immigration, Refugeeism and the Boundary Event. Abingdon: Routledge. Mishra, Vijay. 2007. The Literature of the Indian Diaspora: Theorizing the Diasporic Imaginary. London: Routledge. Mohanty, Satya P. 1989. “Us and Them. On the Philosophical Bases of Political Criti­ cism”. New Formations. (8): 55–80. http://banmarchive.org.uk/collections/newforma tions/08_55.pdf. Accessed on 19 February 2016. Morey, Peter. 2011. “The Rules of the Game Have Changed: Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Post-9/11 Fiction”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 47(2): 135–146. Mummery, Ruth. 2006. “Being not-at-Home: A Conceptual Discussion”. In Diaspora: The Australasian Experience. Edited by Cynthia Vanden and Ralph Crane. 27–44. New Delhi: Prestige Books. Munos, Delphine. 2012. “Possessed by Whiteness: Interracial Affiliations and Racial Melancholia in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 48(4): 396–405. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Nadeem, Sabeen and Hashmat, Safana. 2015. “Physical Cartographies—The Harbinger of Mental Cartographies in Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows”. Journal of Literature, Languages and Linguistics. 8: 66–75. Newell, Stephanie. 2009. “Postcolonial Masculinities and the Politics of Visibility”. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 45(3): 243–250. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Nora, Pierre. 1989. “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire”. Representations. (Special Issue: Memory and Counter-Memory). 26: 7–24. Olson, Greta. 2011. “Identity and Identification in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. In Seminar on Terrorism. 1–18. Giessen, Germany: Justus Liebig University Giessen. Passerini, Luisa, Lyon, Dawn, Capussiti, Enrica and Laliotou, Ioanna. 2007. Women Migrants from East to West: Gender, Mobility and Belonging in Contemporary Europe. New York: Berghahn. Phadke, Shilpa. 2007. “Dangerous Liaisons: Women and Men: Risk and Reputation in Mumbai”. Economic and Political Weekly. 42(17): 1510–1518.

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Ponzanesi, Sandra and Merolla, Daniela. 2005. Migrant Cartographies: New Cultural and Literary Spaces in Postcolonial Europe. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books. Pratt, Mary L. 1992. Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation. London: Routledge. PTI. 2018 (May 23). “Keep Distance of 6 Inches when Together: Pakistan Varsity to Male and Female Students”. Economictimes.indiatimes.com. https://economictimes.indiatim es.com/news/international/world-news/keep-distance-of-6-inches-when-together-pakista n-varsity-to-male-and-female-students/articleshow/64293270.cms. Accessed on 3 July 2018. Puar, Jasbir K. 2007. Terrorist Assemblages: Homonationalism in Queer Times. Durham: Duke University Press. Sen, Amartya K. 2009. The Idea of Justice. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Shamsie, Kamila. 1998. In the City by the Sea. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2002. Kartography. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Shirazi, Quratulain. 2015. “Cosmopolitanism and Nationalism: Redefining Fundament­ alism in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. Journal of Literature, Language and Culture. 1(1): 39–47. Singh, Harleen. 2012. “Insurgent Metaphors: Decentering 9/11 in Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows”. Ariel: A Review of International English Literature. 43(1): 23–44. Skeggs, Bev. 2002. Formation of Class and Gender. Becoming Respectable. London: Sage. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2003. Death of a Discipline. New York: Columbia University Press. Taylor, Charles. 1985. Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. The Express Tribune (Editorial). 2011 (February 14). “Faiz — Poet of All Ages”. Tribune. com.pk. https://tribune.com.pk/story/118723/faiz-%E2%80%94-poet-of-all-ages. Accessed on 24 March 2021. Tölölyan, Khachig. 1991. “The Nation-State and its Others: In Lieu of a Preface”. Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies. 1(1): 3–7. Tuana, Nancy. 2004. “Coming to Understand: Orgasm and the Epistemology of Ignorance”. Hypatia. 19(1): 194–232. Turnbull, Stephen. 2003. Genghis Khan and the Mongol Conquests 1190–1400. London: Routledge. Vitolo, Daniela. 2016. “The Performance of Identity in Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows”. Transnational Literature. 8(2): 1–8. Wilson, Thomas M. and Donnan, Hastings. 2012. “Borders and Border Studies”. In A Companion to Border Studies. Edited by Thomas M. Wilson and Hastings Donnan. 1–25. New Brunswick, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons. Wimmer, Andreas and Glick Schiller, Nina. 2002. “Methodological Nationalism and Beyond: Nation–State Building, Migration and the Social Sciences”. Global Networks. 2(4): 301–334. Yekani, Elahe H. 2011. The Privilege of Crisis: Narratives of Masculinities in Colonial and Postcolonial Literature, Photography and Film. Frankfurt: Campus Verlag. Žižek, Slavoj. 2012. “A Glance into the Archives of Islam”. In God in Pain: Inversions of Apocalypse. By Slavoj Žižek and B. Gunjevic´. 103–126. New York: Seven Stories Press.

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NEW YORK AND MY NAME IS KHAN

In light of the “historical uncanniness”1 of 9/11, the anxieties emerging from the experiences of border-crossing in the novels of Shamsie (2009) and Hamid (2007) entailed the question: How did it come to this? This chapter examines Hindi films that tackle the subsequent seminal questions: What happened after we came to this? And, what could be done if we have come to this? In relation to the cor­ poreal politics and the spatiality of post-9/11 anxieties, it tests whether the films New York (2009) (henceforth, NY) and My Name is Khan (2010) (henceforth, MNIK) confront the ontologies of diasporic identity more explicitly than the novels examined previously. By uncovering the neo-orientalist nature of post-9/11 collective and individual anxieties, the chapter examines the cinematic processes of building new physical and mental spaces of belonging for diasporic South Asian Muslims residing in the USA. Although both films are located within an elite cosmopolitan ethic of popular diasporic Hindi films and shot in the metropolitan areas of the USA, they are contemplative of the post-Partition situation of South Asian Muslims and the state of secular politics in India. As compared to the other diasporic Hindi films of the late 20th century and early 21st century, they mark a significant shift in their disclosure of the gaps in the prac­ tices of multiculturalism in the USA and the turbulent side of transnational migration. They also differ in their cinematographic rendition of the urban landscape and in locating the sites of violence and redemption. The broad aim of the chapter is to study how these differences in cinematic delineation of the post-9/11 diasporic anxieties probe a reimagining of the nation-state and perceptions about transnational migration. By examining the processes of post-9/11 Othering faced by the Muslim protagonists, the chapter initiates a discussion on the labelling tactics deployed in the War on Terror, the resurgence of collective anxieties constituting the neo-orientalist fear of the Other, and the historical marginalisation of Muslims in mainstream Hindi cinema. It then traces the para-context of the selected films including their production and consumption anxieties. Before concluding, the chapter maps five cinematic strategies of representation in the selected films to investigate their role as cultural forms and mediators co-opted by the post-9/11 national sovereignty fantasies of both India and the USA. DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-6

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Terrorism and post-9/11 anxieties in the USA Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them… Certain beliefs place their adher­ ents beyond the reach of every peaceful means of persuasion while inspiring them to commit acts of extraordinary violence against others. There is, in fact, no talking to some people. If they cannot be captured, and they often cannot, otherwise tolerant people may be justified in killing them in self-defense. This is what the US attempted in Afghanistan, and it is what we and other Western powers are bound to attempt, at an even greater cost to ourselves and to innocents abroad, elsewhere in the Muslim world. We will continue to spill blood in what is, at the bottom, a war of ideas. (Harris 2004: 52–53)

Harris’s (2004) proposition,2 about the War on Terror as a war of ideas, is problematic primarily at two levels: it overlooks the socio-political, economic and historical context of “certain beliefs”, and assumes violence to be the sole product of ideology. What seems more appalling is the normative and descriptive tone in describing the act of “ethical killing” by the “tolerant” people of the USA and the West as always-already legitimate and burdened with the task of saving the “innocents abroad” and the “Muslim world”. His statements expose not only a neo-orientalist ideology of the post-9/11 USA in waging the War on Terror based on the construction of the Muslim as the Other, but also the neo-imperialistic strategies or the White man’s burden ideology embedded in its military operations in Afghanistan. More sig­ nificantly, his statements reveal the internal contradictions ingrained in the American state’s “right to use force”3 and its monopoly in claiming “extra­ ordinary violence” as legitimate or illegitimate. As opposed to Harris’s (2004) statements, if we understand terrorism as a strategical mode of operation instead of a mere war of ideas, we may ask under what conditions are such “tactics”4 or strategies adopted, in response to whom, and in what kinds of historical, socio-political and economic circumstances? This chapter traces one of the responses to these questions in Erlenbusch’s (2010) study where he claims that, in times of terror, the state tries to protect its monopoly over legitimate violence by proclaiming emergency measures. However, for Volpp (2002: 1575), in an article titled “The Citizen and the Terrorist”, a long-term legitimising strategy of the state includes racialisation: September 11 facilitated the consolidation of a new identity category that groups together persons who appear “Middle Eastern, Arab, or Muslim”, whereby members of this group are identified as terrorists and disidentified as citizens. While the stereotype of the “Arab ter­ rorist” is not an unfamiliar one, the ferocity with which multiple communities have been interpellated into this identity category suggests there are particular dimensions converging in this racialization. 80

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Thus, Volpp’s (2002) theorisation of post-9/11 Othering and racialisation as “new orientalist”5 ideology indicates that it was not merely a war of ideas, but also a strategic tool used by the state to problematically categorise Muslims as moderate or extreme, and derecognise diasporic Muslim Americans as citizens. According to Jackson (2007, even before 9/11, the discourse on Islamic terror­ ism often functioned as “political technologies” to naturalise and legitimise discreet state projects and reify a particular kind of social, cultural, economic and political order (412, 425). Although Volpp’s (2002) and Jackson’s (2007) views on terrorism as a “tactic” are useful to underline the terror embedded even in state-led violence, their conceptualisations are still insufficient to locate diasporic subjects’ anxieties, and question the “bottom-up assumptions” of the narratives of domestic terrorism feeding into transnational terrorism (Enders et al. 2011: 320). Their views also lack a systematic study of the complicity of the state in harbouring non-state actors to perform acts of domestic and/or transnational violence for local and/or transnational projects. What is also missing in their study is a nuanced understanding of the operating discourses on liberalism, multiculturalism and feminism amongst many others that con­ tinually shape and have been shaped by the changing political scenarios. For instance, in Why the West Fears Islam, Cesari (2013) locates the anxieties of the West concerning terrorism, Islam and Muslim migrants across three axes: immigration, class and economic integration, and ethnicity and multi­ culturalism. Her work suggests that the political and social systems in the West seem to be in a “delusion” that the recognition of the rights of the diasporic Muslim citizen threatens the homogeneity and the unity of the imagined nation. Such systems have false assumptions that the recognition of the dia­ sporic and migrant citizens’ rights will overturn the hierarchies of power in the capitalist structures, and entail the loss of core liberal values like freedom of expression and gender equality. Building on Cesari’s (2013) arguments, I suggest that such nationalist anxieties have pre-dated 9/11, perennially spillover, and proliferated after the 9/11 attacks. Most often, these anxieties have been manipulated by the state as a tool to civilise the falsely perceived extremism in the Muslim subject, ques­ tion the gendered principles of Islam, and rationalise the integrationist6 dis­ course through state policies and citizenship tests. Such insecure and discriminatory acts of the state, in the garb of national security, have only heightened the diasporic anxieties of Muslim citizens of South Asian origin in the West. The “post-9/11” Hindi films are reflective of such diasporic anxieties and the state’s tactics of Othering and legitimising racialisation.

Nationalism, terrorism and post-9/11 anxieties in Hindi films Nationalism—the integrity of the nation-state and the imagined belongingness of its citizens—is predicated on its dreaded Other, namely, the enemy within, the dissident, the terrorist. A nation

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manages a precarious peace by negotiating between its desire to tolerate and even encourage difference and diversity, and setting the limits beyond which claims of difference become unrecogni­ sable. Paradoxically, the cinema foregrounds particularity and resists, as a result, any easy conflation with nationalist agendas. (Chakravarty 2000: 225)

Chakravarty’s (2000) views on the function of cinema in foregrounding, gen­ erating, mediating and resisting nationalist agendas were postulated before 9/11 and in the context of the “terrorism trilogy”7 that appeared in the 1990s in India. However, her study of Hindi cinema’s representation of terrorism and the relation of the nation with its “fragments”8 is relevant to analysing Hindi films produced even in the post-9/11 context. Building on her study, it is pos­ sible to examine the post-9/11 diasporic trajectories and radical acts of violence located beyond South Asia and within a transnational network bearing in mind that national security acts and laws against terrorism have global impli­ cations in a world of porous borders. For Chakravarty (2000), films about terrorism in India reveal the problematic nature of national ideals, and act as a means to evoke the “faces and voices of the estranged who must be brought back into the cultural mainstream” (233). She also claims that a study of national cinema underlines the way a nation deals with the threat of frag­ mentation (ibid.). Such conclusions are noteworthy for three reasons: (i) they enable the questioning of the hegemony of normative nationalism, (ii) they instigate a study of legitimate and illegitimate state violence through cultural imagining, and (iii) they encourage the study of how the cinematic narration of the relationship between the nation and the estranged citizen functions in augmenting other kinds of divisions or building strong ties. In the case of MNIK and NY, these insights are particularly valuable for examining the cinematic articulation of the American and Indian governments’ relationship with their Muslim diasporic and transnational citizens in the post-9/11 context. Further reflection on Chakravarty’s (2000) arguments highlights that the cinematic portrayals of the anxieties of the nation rely not only on the histor­ ical realities of particular ethnic circumstances, but also on the “affective” and the “aesthetic” nature of cinema that is different from other modes of narra­ tion (233). These claims are significant to examine MNIK and NY at three interconnected levels: (i) as pedagogy given that they articulate certain moral and symbolic themes, (ii) as the filmmakers’ performative function, and (iii) as a performative mode itself given its peculiar aesthetic nature.9 Despite the value and relevance of Chakravarty’s (2000) views, in the post-9/11 context of Hindi cinema and the representation of terrorism, some key questions remain: What are some of the strategies that a post-9/11 film incorporates to frame the nation’s transnational and diasporic citizens while resisting a metonymic image of the nation and a narrow conception of terrorism? How do filmmakers deal with the tensions of national inclusion and exclusion considering the

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peculiarities of the cinematic medium and the process of filmmaking in an age of increased transnational flow of people, digital technologies and capital resources? Unlike the novels where characters are picturised in the minds of the readers, what role do national celebrities/star bodies play in shaping the tra­ jectories of migrant or diasporic characters, their consumption, reception and re-absorption in the nationalistic discourses of both India and the USA?

Film production and consumption anxieties Can a serious filmmaker, working in India, afford to shut his eyes to the reality around him, the reality that is so poignant, and so urgently in need of interpretation in terms of the cinema? (Ray 1976: 41)

The Partition in 1947 had rendered the Indian Muslim as “the Other”, “the stranger” whose loyalty to the Indian nation is perceived as “ambivalent” (Bauman cited in Chakravarty 2000: 222). In such a scenario, for any Indian film to take up the task of cultural imagination of the Indian Muslim’s trajec­ tory necessitates distinct political, linguistic and cinematic strategies. In the case of Hindi cinema, dominated by Muslim actors like Dilip Kumar, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan and Saif Ali Khan, one such strategy includes the silencing of discussion on their religious identity in the national media and the manipulation of their cinematic characters’ religious identities10 in the films. After 9/11 and the anti-Muslim pogrom of 2002 in Gujarat, the discussion of the Muslim identity of the star actors and the cinematic narration of their religious identities had become more challenging tasks for Hindi films meant primarily for Indians and Indian diasporas spread across the globe. In such a situation, the cinematic character of the diasporic Indian Muslim appears to be “doubly estranged”, and acts as a metonymy of the Hindu nationalist anxiety both of the fragmentation of the national identity from within and of the imperialistic invasion of the West (Virdi 2003: 197). On making films on minority and unconventional subjects, Ray (1976) further asserts that “in reality, no director can afford to do this, for once the stigma of esotericism attaches to his name, his days in the profession are num­ bered” (40). Thus, the only way an Indian filmmaker may earn reasonable returns is by producing films that reach the larger suburban audience (ibid.). In view of the fact that one of the largest Muslim populations of the world resides in the Indian subcontinent and the young Muslim urban viewership of Hindi films is escalating, Jain (2011) notes that “no commercial filmmaker is going out of his way to make a potential audience of around 160 million Indian Muslims feel uncomfortable at the movies” (358).11 Such a view remains valid, even if, paradoxically, the nation-state continues to marginalise Muslims as the Other in public discourses. Similarly, taking into account the latest UN reports that India has the largest diaspora and transnational 83

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population in the world at around 18 million (PTI 2021), filmmakers are bound to be more attentive to the politics of representation of the lives of Indian diasporas and transnationals. Considering the defeat of the Hindu nationalist party the BJP at the national elections in the years 2004 and 2009, the perceived threat of a burgeoning Hindu nationalist anxiety governing the cultural production might appear to have subsided in India. However, both films MNIK and NY, in their peculiar ways, and the controversies surrounding their release and promotion, indicate that the Hindu nationalist anxieties had perhaps never subsided. Instead, their sediments and the accumulated traces continue to strengthen the forces of Hindutva to extend their socio-cultural bases and infiltrate the popular nationalist fantasies. In the case of Hindi cinema, such an ideological infiltration is often staged through celebrity figures. The proliferation of cinema’s star images in an achievement-based capitalist society of hypercommunication has led to a strong preoccupation with the celebrity culture in India. A cosmopolitan actor, entrepreneur, secular Muslim man who married a Hindu woman, and cinematic icon of “Indianness”, Shah Rukh Khan’s persona has become “an emblem for diasporic and transnational desires in modern India and beyond” (Dudrah et al. 2015: book cover endor­ sement). Through his cinematic roles12 such as Rizvan in MNIK, he has become a mediator and content of both national and diasporic desires as well as anxieties. Such mediation implies that for the audience of his films, every journey he undertakes and all matters concerning his professional and personal life become a spectacle and a matter of public scrutiny. In 2010 (just before the release of MNIK), as an owner of the cricket club “Kolkata Knight Riders” (KKR), Shah Rukh Khan inquired about the absence of Pakistani cricket players in the 2010 Indian Premier League (IPL).13 The members of the poli­ tical party Shiv Sena14 condemned his inquiry as “unpatriotic” and “anti­ national” in the wake of the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai carried out by a militant organisation based in Pakistan (TNN 2010). The party members also provoked the defacing of Shah Rukh Khan’s film posters and staged protests demanding the refusal of the screening of MNIK.15 More controversies sur­ rounded the distribution of MNIK as Shah Rukh Khan faced extra security screening at Newark airport in the USA. His name appeared on the terror alert list of the American immigration officers due to his last name “Khan”. Ironi­ cally, such paranoiac and racially charged incidents, suffused with national security anxieties, have uncanny resemblances with the plot of MNIK, in which Rizvan Khan, like Shah Rukh Khan, is pulled aside for extra screening at an airport due to his Muslim name. In NY, an analysis of the para-contextual meanings of the casting of the Indian Christian-Zoroastrian actor John Abraham in the role of Samir enriches the study of the cinematic take on the national discourse on gendered and corporeal belonging. A survey of his recent films16 and cinematic characters’ narratives reflects the contemporary militant and right-wing religiosity in India, and the debates related to nationalism that 84

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valorise the army and the police. In 2008, a British Asian weekly newspaper Eastern Eye adjudged John Abraham as the “sexiest man alive” (Hindustan Times Staff 2008). His muscular body has been projected exotically in NY, and such a projection has led to the fetishisation of his body, a reimagining of sexual fantasies and reinforcement of muscular nationalism. Evidently, a paratextual analysis of John Abraham’s persona and his earlier cinematic roles provides a more cohesive base to delve into an analysis of NY and Samir’s post-9/11 anxieties where several of John Abraham’s previously performed hypermasculine cinematic roles converge. Relating to the release and reception of the films, both MNIK and NY were screened at several international film festivals and earned above-average com­ mercial success at the box office, especially outside India. Although NY was not as successful at the box office in and outside India as MNIK,17 it is regar­ ded as the “first mainstream Bollywood film” to address the issue of the transnational and diasporic Muslim identity in the post-9/11 scenario (Misri 2013: 157). Both films were shot in several locations18 (Mumbai, Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Jose), and their spatial engagements not only suggest that they deal with transnational and diasporic themes, but also underline that they are transnational travelling products of the changes that accompany globalisation. Based on their global release in phases, it is evident that the filmmakers aimed at reaching out to the South Asian diasporic audience residing not only in the West but also in different parts of the globe—MNIK was first screened in Abu Dhabi, whereas NY was selected for an opening at the Cairo International Film Festival. Ultimately, a paratextual analysis of both films demonstrates that they have been successful in bridging the gaps of structural relationship between the actors, their audi­ ence and the main narrative of the film. Before delving into an analysis of the main narrative, it is useful to consider the title design and the opening and end credits of the film as they act as enticing windows on the post-9/11 context of their production, distribution and consumption.

Post-9/11 cinema and the politics of film credits and title designing Apart from displaying the mandatory certification required by the Central Board of Film Certification19 (CBFC) in India which determines the film’s agelinked viewership, the opening sequence of a Hindi film serves multiple pur­ poses. It introduces the title, the producers and the brand partners, makes cautionary declarations, and expresses gratitude or remembrance statements to individuals or collectives. Finally, it announces the names of actors, directors, and every other individual associated with the filmmaking process. However, the promotional means and the title credits of Hindi cinema have gone through major transformations in the 21st century due to the changing historical con­ ditions, political contexts, arrival of the hypercommunication age of new digi­ tal technologies, changing commercial practices, and the explosion of social 85

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media and visual cultures. A glimpse into the origin and history of the title credits and the opening sequence of Hindi films underlines the changing rela­ tions of political, economic and cultural practices of India. For instance, if we were to compare the opening credits of India’s first silent film Raja Har­ ishchandra (King Harishchandra) (1913) to a recent Hindi film, we may recognise wide-ranging historical, digital, legal and political changes including the transitions in the ruling government and the constitutional Cinematograph Acts (Goswami 2017). Whereas the censorship certificate for Raja Har­ ishchandra was issued by the Bombay Board of Censors in the era of the Brit­ ish colonial rule, today such decisions are governed by the CBFC. In addition, whereas handcrafted slides or neatly bordered title cards with a black back­ ground and white letters suited the roll films, the title credits and opening sequences in contemporary films reflect radical shifts in designing and camera technologies including the use of different fonts, colours, graphics, zooming, panoramic and focus features. In the case of MNIK and NY, a semiotic and new-historicist reading of the title design on the film’s poster and the opening of the film indicates the sen­ sitive subject and the serious tone of the post-9/11 Othering of Muslims and other marginalised narratives. This is especially evident through the film title’s lettering effects—its script, font and colour against a graphic background. In MNIK, the three words in the beginning—“My Name Is”—are rendered in white, whereas the word “Khan” appears in red.20 In NY, the entire title is in red lettering in a font common to thriller and gothic films. In the opening sequence of MNIK, the title appears first in the Roman script (English), then in the Nastaliq script (Urdu) and finally in the Devanagari script (Hindi) against a montage sequence of suspense about Rizvan’s activities in the USA. The semiotic politics of the title exposes the anxieties embedded within the post­ 9/11 racialised discourses that question the loyalties of Muslim citizens and evoke false perceptions of danger. Similarly, the captions of the films not only provide a basic outline of the cinematic narrative, but also draw attention to the historical and on-going trends21 of cultural imagining. On the one hand, MNIK includes a cautionary declaration in the opening sequence regarding the portrayal of Asperger’s syndrome and its right as a work of fiction to take creative liberties. On the other hand, instead of an opening credit, in NY, the end credits display facts about the torture of 1200 foreign individuals in the post-9/11 suspicious USA, and the eventual 2009 executive order to shut down Guantanamo Bay. The major concerns of the film are also disclosed via the positioning of actors’ faces in the posters of the film. The use of such a strategy is more prominent in the title design of Tiger Zinda Hai (2017) in which the positionality of the faces of the protagonists Zoya (left-hand side) and Tiger (right-hand side) is suggestive of their nationalities and affinities as they draw attention to the cartographic locations of Pakistan and India on global maps. Thus, in the case of the selected post-9/11 Hindi films, the title designs and opening sequences disclose a complex matrix of transnational practices of 86

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production and mediation, their thematic and tonal inclinations, and the paradoxical desires for visual excess. By offering audio-visual cues that trigger mythical pasts and confront lived experiences, the chronotope of the title designs and the opening sequences not only frame the cinematic structure but also paint different shades of cultural belonging. In this sense, if the nation is the macrocosm of the changing relations between histories, culture and eco­ nomics, and the opening credits and title design are the microcosm of the nation’s cultural imagining, then we may examine the main narrative of the film as the “mesocosm” that represents and mediates multiple ways of belonging as well as the anxieties of the nation and its diaspora.

Cinematic strategies of representation in post-9/11 Hindi films Examining Bollywood as a site of memorialisation, Tolia-Kelly (2016) suggests, “cultures of the visual are prisms through which iconographies of enfranch­ isement, belonging, and home are refracted” (36). Building on her argument, we may read MNIK and NY as visual cultures engaged with the processes of identification, representation, mediation and memorialisation in the post-9/11 context. As prisms, they also reflect the local dynamics of the nation-state and the transnational flow of capital within global politics. This implies that the study of both films as a site of dialogic co-production of the national and the transnational is particularly useful to understand how it encompasses and reconstitutes post-9/11 cultural conditions and dominant ideologies of India and the USA while upholding a global consciousness for mass commercial appeal. According to Chakravarty (2000), Indian cinema on terror creates a “panoramic” and “visceral” experience of the ethnic atmosphere of the nation for both a mass commercial appeal and to uphold the national values of unity. I argue that the post-9/11 Hindi cinema builds on these themes and conven­ tions of the national cinema on terror by experimenting with different spatio­ temporal scales and mediating multiple subjectivities. By forging transnational connections through cinematic strategies of representation, the films not only display their aesthetic potentials and offer myriad possibilities of global ima­ gining, but also expose the gaps that exclude, repress or conceal social realities of nation-states. In the context of MNIK and NY, these strategies can be broadly divided into the following five categories: (i) delineation of the domestic and the transnational context, (ii) framing Muslim subjectivities, (iii) “interrupting” 9/11, (iv) underlining the processes of post-9/11 Othering and (v) challenging the Othering.

Delineation of the domestic and the transnational context The sequence of events in both films provides the necessary framework to map the turbulent histories of India and the USA, and these countries’ fraught relationship with their Muslim diasporic or migrant citizens. In doing so, they 87

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intersperse the lure and grandeur of an independent secular India, the pre-9/11 American dream and the transnational desires of Indian Muslims. By narrating how and when 9/11 affects the protagonists, the films reconstruct a kaleido­ scopic image of the two nations and bind the viewers to the post-9/11 condi­ tions of South Asian Muslim diasporas and migrants in a perceptible manner. Akin to the novels of Shamsie (2009) and Hamid (2007), both films do not deploy the violent attacks that took place on 9/11 as the direct and starting moment of rupture in the lives of the characters. Instead, to articulate the moments of rupture on a wider spatiotemporal scale, the films deploy the chron­ otope of what Kilbourn (2013) calls “memory in cinema”. It involves the representation of individual memory processes with an emphasis on the flash­ back as a narrative structure, the narration of memory as history, and the notion of film as memory itself (ibid.). As metaphors of individual and collec­ tive memories, MNIK and NY bind the international audience to intertwined national histories right from their opening shots. NY begins with an aerial shot of New York City’s skyline without the Twin Towers in the background, establishing the film’s post-9/11 context. After a series of events, the viewers learn about one of the protagonists Omar through the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) surveillance camera; Omar is detained as per the US Patriot Act due to his links with a potential “terrorist” friend Samir (NY 00:05:13). While this sequence establishes Omar’s margin­ alised position as a migrant Indian Muslim whose activities are constantly being monitored in a suspicious post-9/11 American state, it also suppresses his voice as a minority of the post-independence India. As the FBI officer Roshan asks him to “cut down” details about his Indian life, a flashback takes the viewers to an “all-American” life of Samir studying at a university in New York before 9/11 (NY 00:12:56). Like the viewers of the film, Omar learns about Samir’s American life, his Indian roots and diasporic routes through a song sequence “Hai Junoon” (There is passion) and his friend Maya who describes him as follows: He is just so American in his ways! He has been living here since he was four years old. Uske father professor hai, aur Indian culture par expert, isliye Samir ki Hindi itni achhi hai, nahi toh who bilkul angrez hota (His father is a professor and an expert on Indian culture, which is why his Hindi is so good. Otherwise, he would have been a complete Westerner).22 (NY 00:20:11) Considering that this scene provides no exact information on the diasporic routes of Samir’s Indian Muslim father, it obscures the historical complexities of the socio-political conditions of Indian Muslims after Partition and their lives in a post-Cold War USA. Despite this ambiguity, the film reveals its ideological project to locate the trajectory of the diasporic Indian Muslim 88

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Samir within a global cultural ethic rather than a “regional particularity” (Gabriel et al. 2012: 301). In the song sequence Hai Junoon, immersed in the new ethics of the globalised state of existence, the fully integrated Samir, Omar and Maya explore the cosmopolitan city of New York against the backdrop of the Twin Towers23 (NY 00:18:11–00:24:41). According to Misri (2013), “the towers literally bind the trio together in an improbably idealized pre-9/11 past of perfect racial integration, youthful sexual energy, and hope for the future” in such a way that as long as the towers, the “phallic symbols” of capitalist patriarchy, stay erect, their friendship remains intact (160). However, like many research articles,24 even Misri’s (2013) analysis fails to consider the rob­ bery scene as an important moment of rupture in their friendship even before the 9/11 attacks. Immediately after the song sequence, the film exposes New York City’s underbelly as a thief attempts to rob Maya’s purse and Sam is wounded in the process. Interestingly, a few minutes before the robbery, viewers listen to a tipsy Omar25 singing an old song from the 1956 Hindi film Jagte Raho (Be Awake) (NY 00:28:40–00:29:50). This entire sequence acts as a moment of rupture in the pre-9/11 American context of the film as it stages the dynamics of threat faced by the young diasporic and migrant subjects. On the one hand, for the protagonists, New York (American cosmopolitan context) displays its “first city” elements by offering itself as a transcendent space to achieve individual desires, freedom and jouissance. On the other hand, it also enforces a confrontation with its underbelly or the “second city” that demon­ strates the effects of a particular narrative of progress based on the margin­ alisation and exploitation of the minority body.26 Such a representation is analogous to the Hindi film heroes of the 1950s whose shift from the rural to the urban and the socio-economic struggles in the streets of Bombay (the Indian cosmopolitan context) serves as a significant reminder of the aporias of engaging with the urban narratives of exceptionalism and modernity. In MNIK, homelands are remembered and reconstructed through Rizvan’s memory which is plotted in a travel diary and articulated using the flashback strategy (MNIK 00:08:26–00:09:20). By travelling across locations such as the Borivali suburban area in Bombay, the Banville suburban area near San Fran­ cisco (echoing Danville) and the county of Wilhelmina in Georgia, selected historical accounts of both India and the USA are outlined and the transna­ tional context is delineated in the film. As these multiple locations become the repository of homing desires through which Rizvan recollects his childhood stories and drafts letters in his travel diary to send them to Mandira, a flash­ back takes the film’s viewers to a sequence of events in Bombay. One of the most crucial scenes in this sequence includes the projection of the 1983 Hindu–Muslim riots that eventually serves two representative purposes (MNIK 00:11:20). It acts as a moment of pre-9/11 rupture in Rizvan’s life, and for the film’s Indian audience, as a straightforward reminder of the 1992–1993 Bombay riots. By displaying a montage of horrific images of the riots, the historical scene encapsulates the miseries of the nation’s minorities in one 89

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large image of communal oppression. It also enables the linking of post-9/11 racial attacks on diasporic Muslim citizens in the USA with the post-Partition crimes against Muslim citizens in India. By shedding light on the miseries of the marginalised communities in both India and the USA, the film seems to promote alliances and solidarity between members of multiple minority com­ munities. An attempt at painting a more encompassing picture of the Indian and American historical context is also evident through the film’s strategic minority characterisation: Mr Wadia who is Rizvan’s Parsi teacher residing in Bombay, Mama Jenny and her African-American family in Wilhelmina, and Bobby Ahuja who is a diasporic Indian Sikh reporter. Besides, the politics of the national and the transnational are also explored using the Good–Bad dichotomy that involves de-emphasising the identity markers of race, religion and nationality, and simply labelling people as good or bad depending on their deeds (MNIK 00:12:55). In the post-9/11 context, the cinematic narration of such a dichotomy is tantamount to the ideological tools used by nation-states for determining the coordinates of national and transnational belonging. While these include framing and categorising Muslim subjectivities into moderate and extremist or the threatening Other, in MNIK and NY, it is possible to decipher other cinematic strategies of framing Muslim subjectivities.

Framing Muslim subjectivities: the transnational flirt NY mediates the transnational desires of the protagonists through the con­ struction and privileging of a globalised subjectivity that is synchronous with American modernity and involves repressing one’s religious and ethnic iden­ tity. By relying on “cinepatriotic impluses”27 emulating the “Bollywood buddy genre”,28 and portraying the figure of Samir as a transnational “flirt” (Simmel [1909] [1923] 1984), the film engenders transnational and diasporic desires as well as redrafts nationalist anxieties. In a study on crisis in urban modern culture and the desire for cultural renewal, Simmel ([1909] [1923] 1984) sug­ gests that flirtation is a form of social interaction that is analogous to the Kantian aesthetic experience of “purposiveness without a purpose” and is beyond the mere desire to please someone (144). For him, despite the “dualism of flirtation”, in the moment of “refusing and conceding”, the flirt does not desire a “serious” “assurance” or resolution (139, 140). Instead, the “uncer­ tainty and uprootedness” generated in the flirted with is the “ultimate attrac­ tion of flirtation” (144). This phenomenon should be regarded as a positive mode of social interaction to not make a “virtue” out of instability, but for “pleasure” (151). For Phillips (1994), flirtation is a strategy “to reveal the nature of people’s interest in each other”, and holds the potential to trouble hierarchies as well as spatiotemporal fixities (xviii). Building on both Simmel and Philipps’s observations, Nagel (2015) asserts that the figure of the flirt may also become a “source of terror” (102).29 This is perceptible especially in the case of the woman flirt whose terror lies in her revelation of ambiguities and 90

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the subversion of the ontological fixities that codify patriarchal and hetero­ normative cultures (Nagel 2015). One may also infer that by wearing selfcontradictory masks, the flirt is an expression of “dissident sexualities” in the carnivalesque sense, and generates anxieties by emulating the Benjaminian attitude of the “flaneur”30 who may celebrate nomadic thoughts even without a playful Other (Kaye 2002: 38). Drawing on these postulations, Samir’s flir­ tatious subjectivity can be read as a cinematic tool and an ideological practice to probe not only the possibility of a romantic relationship with Maya, but also a form of soft resistance to his marginalised subjectivity within the nationalist spaces of India and America. Although weak in nature because of its loose definitions, I have adopted the concept of “flirtation” as an approach and a lens to reflect on the contemporary cinematic discourse on transnational and diasporic desires as they involve flirting with the spatiotemporal politics of border-making and border-crossing. For a more nuanced understanding of the flirtatious nature of Samir’s and Maya’s diasporic and transnational desires, it is necessary to attend to the chromatic and onomastic politics of their char­ acters, the establishment of their friendship and the role of games and sports in the film. In the introductory scene of Samir/Sam, viewers see him participating in an annual competitive tradition of his university that involves a footrace to the top of the clock tower to hoist the American flag (NY 00:13:36). The projec­ tion of the winning figure of a transnational Indian Muslim and American citizen Sam raising his fist towards the American flag and cheered by a racial mix of students makes him an “undecidable figure” (Chakravarty cited in Misri 2013: 159) similar to the figure of the flirt discussed above. His assertion of loyalty towards the American flag further obscures the reading of his char­ acter along the lines of “cinepatriotism” or the “tradition of sentimental representations of the Indian Muslim in Hindi cinema” (ibid.). Besides, in Samir’s opening act, shot predominantly during the daylight, viewers see him donning a “pink” T-shirt, playing American football, flirting with women, hugging Omar and photographing White women of his university (NY 12:11–14:58). Considering that the socio-cultural status of pink as a “semiotic resource” is often considered a marker of femininity and homosexuality in visual cultures (Koller 2008: 418), it obscures Samir’s hypermasculine image and generates both sexual attention and anxieties. In addition to pink, viewers only see him in blue, white and/or red outfits symbolic of the American flag’s colours. Such a mise-en-scène is in stark contrast to the post-9/11 period of the film in which Sam wears dark-coloured outfits (brown, black or midnight blue) and his narrative is shot in the night or in dim light. Considering that the materiality and aesthetic experience of colours and lighting during both film­ making and film-viewing have a subconscious impact on the audience, the chromatic story-telling strategy of the film allows for the representation of distinct political and ethnic identities in different lights. It also lends itself to the narration of themes such as colour-related politics, flirtation, pleasure and 91

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sensuality in a way that neither the novel nor a black-and-white film can delineate. In addition to the chromatic details, it is necessary to reflect on the name “Sam” used in the pre-9/11 context of the film, and Sam’s doubly estranged and absent subjectivity in the narration of his past and Indian Muslim heritage. For a semiotic analysis of the onomastic politics of Sam/Samir Shaikh and even Maya, we will turn to Butler’s (1997) views on the act of “naming”, and Ghose’s (2006) semantic study on screen names (specifically those of women characters) in Hindi cinema. According to Butler (1997), the reiterative power of name “sediments” the “positionality” of the subject within a society (29). While names tend to “fix”, “freeze” and “delimit” meanings by substituting complexities, they carry histories and are a repository of characteristics that the subject internalises over a period (35). Bearing in mind the preconceived notions and knowledge of the meaning of a person’s name that the film view­ ers possess, the qualities associated with the name are often transferred onto the character of the cinematic narrative (Ghose 2006: 1). In NY, an obvious reminder of “Uncle Sam” (the popular personification of the USA), the name “Sam” interpellates his character in the dreamy pre-9/11 American context of the film and establishes his assimilation. It also signifies the repression of his original name “Samir Shaikh” and the dissociation from an Indian Muslim migrant identity. Since the society not only names the subject but also con­ structs it through the act of naming, often, a name can even become a “site of injury” when it becomes associated with an offence (Butler 1997: 121). In the post-9/11 context of the film, the name “Samir Shaikh” is restored to underline Sam’s repressed Indian Muslim identity as the viewers realise that the FBI detains him based on his Muslim first and last names. Such a slipperiness within the act of naming adds to the anxious discourse of the film and the ambiguities concerning Sam’s flirtatious diasporic identity. With Maya’s name, such an anxiety becomes even more pronounced due to her missing last name and her unmarked religious and communal identity.31 Interestingly, Ghose’s (2006) analysis also includes a critical reading of the screen name “Maya” accorded to untraditional female characters in Hindi films to connote illusion, lust and greed based on stories of King Mayasura in Hindu mythology. Evi­ dently, in NY, the onomastic politics of Maya’s character firmly situate her flirtations with the two men, the red streaks in her hair and the western outfits within the ambiguous feminist and Hindu ideologies of the Indian and Amer­ ican societies. At the same time, it reiterates the earlier trend in Hindi cinema of using the naming function as a “shortcut tool” to establish the woman character, who is often given less screen time than her male counterpart (Ghose 2006: 11). Such a “shortcut” trend is also visible in Hamid’s description of Erica in his novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007), but not in Shamsie’s feminist portrayal of Hiroko Tanaka in Burnt Shadows (2009). While Maya and Sam’s friendship is pre-established in the film, Omar and Sam’s friendship is structured around the cinematic conventions of the 92

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“Bollywood buddy genre films” that “have never distinguished too sharply between romantic love and friendship” (Misri 2013: 160). After Samir wins the flag tower footrace in his opening act, he begs Maya for a hug. Maya’s response, “Have a shower first”, to a sweaty Samir, could be considered as “the yes and no” of the transnational woman flirt32 (NY 00:14:40). Samir then turns to Omar, “the fresh-off-the-boat” (as Maya refers to him), and hugs him instead. Omar introduces himself to Samir, “I’ve just come”, to which Sam responds, “What? With just a hug?” (NY 00:14:45). This entire sequence and the final joke may be read as “a fabrication” that kick-starts the “homosexual sub-text” and the “impossible desires” of the transnational heterosexual Muslim flirt Samir (Dudrah 2012; Gehlawat 2010; Gopinath 2005). It also encourages the audience to recognise the homosexual elements through the physical gestures of the characters (in this case, the act of hugging Omar instead of Maya) as well as other discursive signs (for instance, Sam’s pink T-shirt). The queer dynamics between Sam and Omar also become explicit in their frequent embraces while partying. For instance, the image of Omar in the manly arms of Sam (after Omar collapses following a party drinking game in a nightclub) (NY 00:21:17) is constructed as a parody of the cinematic hetero­ normative image of party scenes where we often see a man holding a woman in his arms. Maya’s raised eyebrow and a laughing gaze at the two men are indicative of the “winking semiotic play” within the dominant hetero­ normative themes of the film (Waugh cited in Misri 2013: 161). However, I argue that the wink is aimed not only at the queer spectators of the film, but also at other cinematic roles33 played by John Abraham where he overtly generates queer desires. While intertextuality, gender parody and comedy highlight the queer dynamics between Omar and Sam, sports such as American football and chess (NY 00:19:11) serve the purpose of establishing both friendship and the characters’ competing diasporic masculinities in relation to their queer dynamics. The game of chess and the comparison of American football with Indian Kabaddi also remind the audience of the Indian sports culture—a common trope34 used in Hindi cinema to establish a variant of nationalism (Prakash et al. 2017). Thus, whereas the party scenes and drinking games (bluffing, uncertain and limitless) stage the politics of queer dynamics, the controlled and structured game of chess (disciplined and bounded) serves as a trope to re-establish the heteronormative dynamics of friendship and nationalist loyalties. Through such a reading, my book also calls for further research on the nature and role of games and sports in narrating diasporic subjectivities in both visual and literary cultures. Ultimately, in the pre-9/11 context of the film, the portrayal of Samir as a transnational flirt “loitering”35 in the university campus and streets of New York establishes his ambiguous relationship with the hegemonic nationalist and patriarchal discourses on safety, security and gendered identity. In his transnational flirtation, he sus­ tains the possibility of transgression as well as the risks of playing with and 93

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within the intertwined national and diasporic spatio-temporalities. In the 9/11 context of the film, his figure as a transnational flirt does not go well with the FBI as he is perceived as an “anarchist”36 challenging White nativism and Islamophobia, and upsetting the heterosexually structured and sexist power relations. If, in NY, the figure of the transnational Muslim flirt represented by the hypermasculine abled body of Sam generates queer desires as well as nationalist anxieties, in MNIK, the disabled body of the transnational flirt Rizvan questions the dominant post-9/11 ableist, racist and nationalistic practices in both India and the USA.

Framing Muslim subjectivities: disabled and diasporic [T]he definition of disability must incorporate both the outer and inner reaches of culture and experience as a combination of profoundly social and biological forces. (Snyder et al. 2006: 7)

To understand the disabled body, one must return to the concept of the norm, the normal body. (Davis 2013: 1) By locating an understanding of disability in the above definitions, the aim is to draw attention to the ableist discourse in MNIK, and examine Rizvan’s racialised and disabled subjectivity37 as a form of resistance to the social and biological normative cultures (Davis 2013; Cherney 2011). In the film’s post­ colonial and post-9/11 global capitalism context, the imbrication of colonial immigration laws comprising problematic perceptions of disability and race further complicates a critical reading of the disabled and diasporic trajectory of Rizvan migrating from India and eventually residing in the USA. His transna­ tional journey also reminds us of how disabled and racialised bodies were transported through diasporic routes in the colonial context of both India and the USA.38 Post-independence, for the citizens with disabilities residing in India, there was neither an official recognition system nor the grant of special rights until the adoption of the Mental Health Act 1987. Even in the USA, it was only in the year 1990 that the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed which listed autism as one of the recognised disabilities (Bhattacharyya 2014). In MNIK, these facts explain why Rizvan’s Asperger’s syndrome remains unrecognised in the 1983 cinematic setting of India. Notably, even in the USA, the naming of his disability becomes possible only because he meets his sister-in-law Hasina, a professor of Psychology who takes him to the “Centre for People with Disabilities” (MNIK 00:24:02). On the one hand, Rizvan’s Asperger’s syndrome appears threatening to the hypermasculine abled-bodied characters like Zakir, the FBI officials and Dr. Faisal Rehman; on the other hand, it generates an affect of happiness and curiosity in women 94

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characters like his mother, Hasina, Mandira and Mama Jenny. As the film locates Rizvan’s diasporic trajectory within the normative structures governing performances of gender, race and ability in India and the USA, it raises other significant questions: Who determines and owns disability representation? How is disability addressed and tackled by different agencies in the nationstates? How do national laws think through and beyond the spatio-temporalities of national borders to create spaces for transnational agencies and cultures that can address the global issues of racialised and gendered diasporic citizens with specific disabilities? To address these questions with respect to MNIK, the term “aesthetic ner­ vousness” is borrowed from Quayson (2007) to underline the ableist practices in the film through the prism of disability and examine the other vectors of Rizvan’s diasporic trajectory. Although Quayson’s (2007) work is concerned with literary texts, his concept of “aesthetic anxiety” is useful to consider the cinematic challenges of representing disability within the ableist ethos of the film. It also enables the examination of Rizvan’s disability as a cinematic nar­ rative trope for engendering identification with the corporeal normativity of human life, and as a focal point connecting the spectators, characters and the actors. According to Clini (2015), “Asperger’s makes Rizvan an exception, the ‘unthreatening’ Muslim” as Shah Rukh Khan’s real-life persona compensates for and dominates Rizvan’s disability (9). If the “conflation of Rizvan with the Shah Rukh Khan persona” (ibid.) and his marriage with a Hindu woman mediate a secular message concerning love and interreligious marriages,39 I argue that the “flirtation” with his own heroic persona and with other cine­ matic characters also makes Rizvan’s disability desirable. For instance, in Mandira’s hair salon, Rizvan’s act of complimenting women clients and calling them “sweetheart” not only garners their attention, but also establishes him as a flirt who, in his act of enticing, inflates his transnational and disabled desir­ ability (MNIK 00:26:13–00:30:24). In his efforts to please the other women and tease Mandira, he sustains his ambiguous loyalties and the flirt’s tensions of “the ability and the inability to have something” (Simmel [1909] [1923] 1984: 134). While the compensation of his disability with an extraordinary ability “to repair anything” (MNIK 00:09:35, 00:45:35, 01:33:01) makes him a desirable figure, it reinforces the “supercrip stereotype” (Cheyne 2019: 63), and problematically homogenises experiences of different disabilities. However, the film generates a possibility of deconstructing ableist structures through its visual grammar that includes lighting, the scalar quality of shots, camera angles and the duration of the shots. According to Haller (1995), sometimes, “without even saying a word, a particular camera angle can repre­ sent a person with a disability as someone passive and dependent, as an equal, or as a superhero” (4). In the pre-9/11 setting of the film, the daylight, medium and close-up shots, along with the tilted shots of Rizvan’s disabled body, establish his disability as both endearing and disorienting (MNIK 00:35:56–00:43:59). Such a representation is also evident through the film director’s handheld jerky 95

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shots of Rizvan, and Rizvan’s use of the handheld camera to navigate his ways through the city (MNIK 00:23:30–00:23:55). Later, when Rizvan is on his way to meet the President, the low-angle shots as well as long shots of him establish his heroic nationalism and heighten the desirability of his disabled prowess as compared to the ability privileges of other characters (MNIK 02:10:21). It is possible to conclude that such a “slant”40 desire of his disability has productive potential as it exposes the nationalistic and ableist desire to normalise, civilise, cure, eradicate or exclude disability. His repetitive speech patterns aligned with the good–evil philosophy can also be read as “mimicry” or “a form of mock­ ery” (Bhabha cited in Clini 2015) of the Bush government’s moralistic rhetoric in the discourse on the War on Terror. However, as Rizvan’s disability offers the possibility to imagine alternative ways of building communities, of being, becoming and belonging, the risks of its celebratory nature must be noted. We must also bear in mind that the definition of disability as a deficit and/or dif­ ference depends on multiple factors such as discoveries in medical sciences, global socio-economic conditions, and the disabled body’s changing desires and outlook41 towards disability. Thus, based on the case study of Rizvan’s disabled and diasporic trajectory, I call for the constellation of diaspora, film and disability studies as it serves the following purposes: (i) expose the stig­ matisation, pathologisation and inelasticity embedded within ableist cultural norms and concepts; (ii) map the alternative modes of articulation, representa­ tion, communication and building collectivities; (iii) delineate the diasporic locations of disability and the disabled locations of diaspora; and (iv) stimulate thought processes to accommodate different corporealities, and ways of becoming/unbecoming as well as belonging/unbelonging.

“Interrupting” 9/11 In MNIK and NY, 9/11 is framed as disruptive in the “khushhaal zindagi” (blissful life) (MNIK 01:01:41) of the protagonists using a “constellation of interruptions”,42 a cinematic mode unique to popular Hindi cinema and fun­ damental to the enjoyment of this cinema (Gopalan 2002). These interruptions include the censorship regulations, the song and dance sequences and an “intermission”43 that usually occurs halfway into a film (16). In addition to the three interruptions that “texture the transference between spectator, screen and cinematic duration” (19), I suggest an examination of the “interruptive”44 potential of marketing or other activities as well as the spectators’ disposition in the cinema hall before the projection of the main feature film. In the case of the contemporary cinema-going experience of the public in India, these include the teasers or trailers of new films, product or experience advertisements,45 and the corporal act of standing for the Indian national anthem. While exam­ ining the interruptive potential of all these factors is beyond the scope of this chapter, in the context of MNIK and NY, my inquiry confines itself to under­ standing the framing of 9/11 in relation to the two primary interruptions: the 96

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intermission and the song and dance sequences. According to Gopalan (2002), as the spectators are expected to leave the cinema hall and engage in alter­ native activities, the intermission intertitle appears as a “punctuation mark” directing our anticipation in myriad ways by “opening and closing narrative strands” (20). Thus, it acts as an important narrative device to alienate the audience, generate curiosity and connect the plot of the first-half to the closing second-half. Similarly, the interruptive potential of the song and dance sequences may also be understood in the “experiential realm of the postmodern” or the Brechtian vein of the verfremdungseffekt to examine the innovative ways in which they accelerate the narrative time and plot, and incorporate multiple spatialities in a few minutes (Gehlawat 2010: 32). Ulti­ mately, it is the affect and pleasure-arousing capacities of the interruptions that make Hindi cinema a “cinema of attractions” based on scopophilia as well as temporal-spatial disjunctions (Gopalan 2002: 109). In MNIK and NY, before the intermission, the individualistic and materi­ alistic desires of the characters are intertwined with the liberal values of mod­ ernity and the pleasure potential of American capitalism. Such desires and pleasures are narrated and aroused through the song sequences Hai Junoon in NY and Tere Naina (Your eyes) and Sajdaa (The act of prostrating) in MNIK. These songs do not appear disjointed as they advance the plot, articulate the assimilation of protagonists in the American socio-cultural realm, construct or strengthen friendship in NY and picturise harmonious marriage in MNIK. At the same time, they enable an identification with the Indian heritage of the characters who affirm a sense of belonging to multiple historical terrains and an eternal connection with the place of birth. Thus, “a discursive play” of the local and global contexts is initiated right from the beginning of the film (Gabriel et al. 2012: 301). More crucially, in both films, while the pleasurearousing song sequences take place before the terror attacks on 9/11, the intermission arises much later. Thus, although “9/11” is established as a dis­ ruptive point that brings about an affective turn in the lives of the protagonists, it is not framed as a direct cause of their trauma or the moments of rupture. It is not even framed as the turning point of the film or an interruptive moment for the film viewers that leads to the 15-minute intermission. In NY, the “breaking news” of the 9/11 attacks is projected the day after Maya and Sam express love to each other (NY 00:34:33). Even for Rizvan, the night before 9/11 is a euphoric moment as he realises that he has built a “khushhaal zindagi” with his family based on the promises he makes to his mother (MNIK 01:01:41). In both films, the 9/11 attacks are encapsulated in the image of the falling Twin Towers projected through news clips displayed on television. While the television-viewing scene in NY is situated in a collec­ tive public space (the university student room), in MNIK, Mandira and Samir watch the televised news from the private space of their bedroom. Thus, it is not a matter of coincidence that the film locates one of the reasons for Samir’s post-9/11 detainment in his university architecture project (that of capturing 97

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photos of the World Trade Center building), and envisions Rizvan’s post-9/11 struggles as an extraordinary journey to redeem Mandira’s love. The inter­ mission in both films does not come even at this point. Instead, in MNIK, it takes place after the death of Mandira’s son Sam who falls victim to the racist attacks planned by a group of schoolboys (MNIK 01:27:32). Whereas in NY, the intermission comes about when Omar realises that Samir might have become a potential terrorist after his illegal detention and torture at the hands of the FBI (NY 01:17:54). Thus, instead of 9/11, the films frame the symbolic impact of the American institutions’ underlying racial anxieties and the pro­ cesses of Othering as the interruptive point or the point of intermission that creates anticipation amongst the spectators.

Processes of post-9/11 Othering In the 21st century, globalisation has generated and located fear, anxieties and power in “small numbers” or the minority structures of the nation-state (Appadurai 2006). This is because the wide-ranging support network of glo­ balisation in the form of digital technologies, free trade, hypercommunication and scarcity of resources continually demands openness and an acceptance of the power of the minority Other (ibid.). Therefore, the mechanisms of globa­ lisation constantly challenge the hegemonic racialised notions of citizenship and national sovereignty. Concurrently, the stressful changes emerging from globalisation set forth a series of state actions that frame and stigmatise the minority and diaspora population, making the processes of Othering an acceptable part of both law enforcement and the law itself (ibid.). According to Baudrillard (cited in Han [2011] 2018), enemies in the 21st century are no longer isolated in nation-states, but now live as transnational “viruses”46 among civilians, and are indistinguishable. In the post-9/11 context, Kundnani (2014) observes that, “Islam becomes … the ‘ideal enemy’ against which an America fractured by multiple antagonisms can be bound together, a phan­ tomlike image of external danger to mask the cracks within the social body” (59). In such a scenario, minority and/or diasporic Muslim citizens are per­ ceived with suspicion, alienated, and categorised as moderate or an extremist. In the films, both Rizvan and Samir are racialised and framed as the threaten­ ing Other by the FBI using modern-day surveillance tactics that also create the effect of “spectatorial voyeurism”.47 Samir narrates the pivotal moments of post-9/11 racial Othering to Omar in a long flashback sequence where viewers realise how the FBI contrived a plot against him using his architecture project images of the World Trade Center, and framed his affiliation with Islamic fundamentalist groups based on his South Asian Muslim heritage. When Samir is detained as per the US Patriot Act, he reiterates, “listen to me, this is a mistake. I am an American” (NY 01:20:34). As the film echoes state brutality and racial anxieties through his statement, it also unravels Samir’s underlying post-9/11 insecurities about 98

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his South Asian heritage and Muslim name which he thinks can be mistaken for a terrorist identity, but not his American citizenship. In the cinematic sequence that follows, viewers see a freeze frame of his naked image in a cephalic position confined to a boxed cell and some jerky top-angle shots of his hypermasculine body suffering acoustic and visual torture interspersed with blackouts (NY 01:20:22–01:22:05). Ultimately, the long, medium and close-up shots of his humiliation by prison guards depict a gradual fragmentation of his body and “izzat”48 (NY 01:22:07–01:23:05). Thus, the cinematic representation of the processes of Othering in NY involves varied experiments with narrative styles, camera angles, lenses and diegetic sound to project the rigorous sur­ veillance tactics and systematic violence carried out by the state’s security institutions. In MNIK, the processes of racial Othering and the post-9/11 heightened state of Islamophobia and White exceptionalism manifest through different institutional structures (MNIK 01:04:02–01:07:48). For instance, Mandira’s hair salon faces an economic shutdown because her clients refuse to visit the salon named after her husband’s Muslim name. Similarly, the motel owner Jitesh faces constant threats of violence and loss of business after 9/11 due to his racial and diasporic status in the USA. By using pleonastic sounds, the film also depicts instances of post-9/11 corporal Othering through Pro­ fessor Hasina’s veiled body and the Sikh reporter Bobby Ahuja’s invisibilised turban and beard. Most importantly, post-9/11, Rizvan and Mandira’s son becomes a victim of racial attacks and eventually dies at the hands of school­ boys who are influenced by school lessons that provoke hatred and suspicion towards Muslims and Islam (MNIK 01:16:26–01:17:28). Thus, unlike NY where the processes of Othering are projected mainly in relation to Samir and the FBI, in MNIK, the cinematic narration of the processes of Othering involves delineating multiple perspectives using a wider spatiotemporal scale and tracking shots mainly through Rizvan’s handheld camera and his firstperson commentary. While institutional surveillance through camera empow­ ers the American state forces to legitimise the processes of Othering, the use of cameras by the protagonists Sam, Maya and Rizvan (for architecture photo­ graphy, video recording of the victim’s testimony and videography of travels, respectively) also serves multiple purposes. As it offers the protagonists the possibility to highlight the margins of the city and reimagine the state’s operations of power through individual forms of surveillance, it also provides a constructive possibility of filming the diasporic optic and staging different forms of resistance to the processes of Othering.

Challenging Othering Both Samir and Rizvan’s paths for redemption are reflective of how each of them responds to, challenges and/or succumbs to the processes of Othering. It is possible to elaborate on the dynamics of their post-9/11 diasporic sub­ jectivities by reflecting on an exciting socio-biological question: What happens 99

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when a chameleon looks in the mirror? In The Literature of the Indian Dia­ spora, Mishra (2007) cites Maniam’s remarks on the new Indian diaspora showing capacities of “the chameleon”—“replacing an old skin with a new one through moulting, dispensing with singular narrative forms … multiple, selec­ tive, hybrid and in the end free of nationalist jingoism” (51–52). A surface reading of the chameleon as a trope for the new diasporic consciousness seems celebratory and apt as it explicates the continual deferral of identity that involves no fixed appearances and no essentialist desires of the self. Rather, it implies deriving a sense of security and pleasure out of inhabiting different personas and locations. However, Maniam’s (cited in Mishra 2007) remarks lack an understanding of how one diasporic group relates to itself, the other diasporas, the changing locations and the changing ideological dynamics of the locations through which the diasporas derive their gendered, racialised and abled identities. For instance, both Mishra and Maniam do not ask what happens when a male chameleon meets another male or female chameleon. Or what happens when it looks into the mirror and recognises its own reflection. To trace both literal and metaphorical answers to this question,49 we may turn to the National Geographic study on chameleons summarised by Langley (2016). According to Langley (2016), when a male chameleon looks at another male chameleon or itself in a mirror, in most cases, it “immediately changes colours in response to seeing another male”. This phenomenon also depends on the “emotions” that are aroused as a result of looking in the mirror, and the “temperature” of the surroundings (ibid.). “Males get emotional when they see other males that could be rivals for females or habitat”, and depending on how excited they become on seeing their perceived enemy, they will reflect “hues of green, yellow, orange and/or red”, and the “defeated males will darken in colour” (ibid.).50 Based on Langley’s (2016) observations, it seems that cha­ meleons, as solitary creatures, do not like being around their own gendered species as it creates a “moment of terror”. This moment, in the post-9/11 context of the transnational Muslim neighbour, is comparable to what Žižek (2001) calls, “a moment of transparent clarity, embodying a series of opposi­ tions” (8). It is also “a moment when he comes too near us, when we start to feel his suffocating proximity—at this moment when the neighbour exposes himself to us too much, love can suddenly turn into hatred” (ibid.). Thus, it is in the observation of this tragedy, interpreted as omnipresent and an urgent threat,51 that the hasty and discernible mechanisms of self-preservation emerge and are legitimised. Lacan’s ([1949] 2006) mirror stage also supports the above understanding as he locates the formation of human subjectivity in the moment when a child looks at himself in the mirror and realises a separate existence from his mother. Based on the above arguments, my study suggests that both Rizvan and Samir show chameleon-like capacities in the post-9/11 context since their respective experiences of the American state-sponsored acts of terror lead to the “moment of transparent clarity” and “suffocating 100

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proximity” (Žižek 2001: 8). Their emotional journeys to challenge the post­ 9/11 Othering also begin when their relationships with the female chameleons (Maya or Mandira) appear to be under threat.

Minority radicalisation Shattered after the trauma of the violence that he faces in prison, Samir is depressed and Maya serves as the “positive and unitary point of symbolic identification to which the real of the subject clings” (Žižek 1992: 75). When attached to her, “he is the sublime figure”; if the attachment is broken, “the figure is deflated” (ibid.). Soon after Maya proposes marriage to him, he shows chameleon-like capacity to rebuild his shattered Self, on whatever occasion and in whichever mode that comes his way (NY 01:28:39). However, this capacity for shedding the old skin for a new one is neither for affirmative hybridity nor for celebrating the deferral of identity. Instead, it is a desperate endeavour to retain a sense of Self by denying his own voided subjectivity after having faced the terrifying moment of looking into the mirror. By donning a uniform of construction cleaner, Samir contrives a plot to challenge the post-9/11 radical state politics through an attack on the FBI building (NY 01:35:03–01:36:27). Detached from any religious motives, the undercover mission52 is crucial for his male fantasy of rescuing the Self and other young Muslim men like him who were illegally detained by the FBI in the aftermath of 9/11. It is also crucial as his post-9/11 trajectory provides no space for a dialogue between the hypermasculine figures of authority and him. In the climactic scene of the film, when Samir is about to trigger the planted bombs, the FBI supervisor’s shooting acts become representative of the author­ itative and aggressive side of those national discourses that frame and imple­ ment short-sighted policies that overlook human rights and trigger migrant citizens’ radicalisation (NY 02:20:27). Eventually, although Samir’s radicalisa­ tion confirms the FBI’s suspicion about the minority Muslim youth’s involve­ ment in terrorism after 9/11, the long-duration shots that trace his path to radicalisation in the film implicate the FBI in his transformation from an inno­ cent model minority citizen to a terrorist citizen. Towards the end of the film, as the camera tracks Samir and Maya’s son Danyal (now an orphan) celebrating a match-winning performance with his American school team, Roshan tries to reunite with Omar by justifying the conspired plot against Samir as necessary for the universal good (NY 02:22:04–02:26:13). Roshan’s rationalisation expo­ ses the neocolonial insistence on radical ethics,53 which may entail the sacrifice or erasure of certain citizens for an apparent universal good. It also discloses his singular imagination which imposes a particular model of living for a diasporic Muslim subject residing in the USA in the post-9/11 context. By reading Omar’s, Roshan’s and the White American FBI agent’s narratives in relation to Samir’s radicalisation, it is also possible to address the issue concerning Baudrillard’s (2002) totalisation of the viral violence of terrorism as 101

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the prototype of every form of violence. Although Samir is framed as the “virus”, “immunological” and the “infiltrating” Other in the system who attacks and aims to destroy the system from the outside, in effect, he reflects the inner workings of the system. He underlines the “violence of positivity” rooted in the achievement-based American capitalist and neo-colonialist struc­ ture which on facing an intense and an intimate moment of terror labels the Other as an enemy (Han [2011] 2018: 76). He also embodies the quintessential nationalistic and racial anxieties of the post-9/11 American state concerning its prosperous South Asian immigrants and diasporic subjects. However, in understanding his radicalisation as a challenge to the post-9/11 Othering and as a manifestation of the lurking anxieties of the system, it is necessary to be mindful of the meanings that he makes of his own responsibilities and the repercussions of his radical thoughts.

Heroic nationalism Rizvan’s epic diasporic journey of challenging post-9/11 Othering and Islamo­ phobia is staged using Islamic motifs such as Sufi songs, mosque, hadith, hajar­ al aswad, zakat, namaz and the hijrah.54 By tracing the use of some of these motifs in shaping Rizvan’s heroic nationalism, my analysis aims to understand how any individual religious image “oscillates between encompassing religious, spatial, and historical iconography”, and constructs the material ecologies of citizenship (Tolia-Kelly 2016: 90). MNIK makes elusive references to Islam right from the beginning of the film by establishing Rizvan’s individual image within the backdrop of the 1983 Hindi–Muslim riots and Islamic flag (MNIK 00:11:19). Even the black pebbles that Rizvan plays with since his childhood (a pattern of play common in children with Asperger’s) establish the link with the hajar-al aswad or the black stone placed next to the Kaaba in Mecca. Con­ sidering that the black stone is not worshipped by Muslims, rather only kissed or touched to establish a relation with the Prophet Muhammed, the film indi­ cates that Rizvan’s religious practices are also to be cherished and perceived as ways of establishing relations with his Muslim identity and the other char­ acters in the film. His act of writing a diary is suggestive of the Islamic hadith which gives multiple accounts of the Prophet’s experiences of migration and, unlike the Quran, is not considered as a book of authority or worship. While the diary serves as the metonymical expression of Rizvan’s experiences with different versions of Islam and other religions, it also appears to be a “material artifact of lost landscapes” that he encounters during his migratory journey (Tolia-Kelly 2016: 88). After 9/11, Rizvan’s individual religious image is articulated more explicitly. The viewers see him in a skull cap, performing namaz and paying the zakat (MNIK 01:02:39). Later in the film, like the Prophet Muhammed’s hijrah,55 Rizvan’s travels are planned carefully to bring about a common good for all Muslims. Driven by a sense of heroic nationalism and model minority’s civic 102

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responsibility, Rizvan calls the FBI to report Dr Faisal Rehman, an extremist who preaches fundamentalist sermons concerning the Prophet’s hijrah (MNIK 01:48:44–01:53:22). Rizvan’s act of reporting can be read as a manifestation of his lurking anxieties about the good–evil ideology taught by his mother. It can be also interpreted as the film’s ideological performance of the post-9/11 American and Indian states’ didactic discourse on the model Muslim minority citizen. To further strengthen the heroic image and underline Rizvan’s soli­ darity with other communities, the film portrays Rizvan mourning with Mama Jenny for her son and recalling the post-9/11 prayer service with the White Americans. In doing so, the film generates the possibility of solidarity between the diasporic South Asian, African-American and White Western communities. It also underlines the nexus of colonial histories to locate this solidarity firmly in the post-9/11 neocolonial context. While Rizvan’s heroic impulses initiate a change of perception of the Muslim body in American public spaces, the film also reveals the ideological differences between South Asian diasporic subjects. For instance, initially anxious about airing a Muslim man’s trajectory, the diasporic Indian Sikh reporter Bobby displays the “docile patriotism” exhibited by many immigrants and diasporas who often explicitly disassociated them­ selves from diasporic South Asian Muslim communities in the aftermath of 9/11 (Puar et al. 2002: 136). Ultimately, Rizvan’s diasporic journey and resistance to the American nation’s post-9/11 Othering and Islamophobia can also be analysed in the context of the post-Partition Indian state politics against Muslims. According to Clini (2015), this is possible by reading Rizvan’s trajectory as a metaphor of the Indian secular figure Mohandas K. Gandhi’s migratory journeys. However, her reading of Rizvan’s character as symbolic of Gandhi is problematic as it fails to locate Gandhi’s secular politics in relation to his Hindu body. In the process, her analysis also fails to examine the Islamic tropes that the film uses to generate a particular discourse of secularism and nationalism through a Muslim body.56 Unlike Clini’s (2015) argument, which “tolerates”57 a Westcentric and hegemonic liberal secular perspective of Rizvan’s religion as his “private matter” and disregards the audio-visual grammar of the film, I have called for a close reading of Rizvan’s secular politics interlinked to the Islamic motifs and the sensory capacities of the film. Such a reading might be useful for discussions on the redemptive potentials and the pitfalls of the heroic nationalist and normative secularist discourse. For instance, at the airport, when the FBI police officer is about to release Rizvan, he indicates with two fingers pointing towards his eyes that he will continue to keep a watch on Rizvan. Rizvan reciprocates this gesture to indicate that he will also be keeping a watchful eye on the officer (MNIK 02:04:01). However, as the film tracks this eye-to-eye binarism using the two point-of-view shots, the question arises: Where could we place the camera if the film and its audience were to keep an equal eye on both of them as well as the other characters? The final segment of this chapter examines the narratives of women and children in both films to 103

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examine their redemptive potential and test whether it falls into the trap of state-valorising or state-sacrificing acts.

Legal and voluntary activism In MNIK, both Hasina and Mandira illustrate that diasporic Muslim women or Hindu women who adopt a Muslim last name tend to be the “margins within the margins” (Mishra 2007: 145). Their racial marginalisation and, in most cases, even submission to the patriarchal and religious structures make it difficult to locate their politics of resistance against an oppressive state. How­ ever, a close reading of all those events that take place in the life of Mandira in the absence of Rizvan (or his absence-presence) uncovers her individual acts of resistance against the patriarchal nationalistic structures that valorise the masculine nation. These include the ways in which she builds her life after her divorce and raises her new-born son as a single mother in the suburbs of San Francisco. It also includes her decision of doing voluntary work within a con­ stitutional framework to find the murderers of her son. As she goes door-to­ door with Hasina to remind the White neighbours of her son’s loss, she sheds light on the larger social problem of the misinterpretation of religion in edu­ cational structures and youth radicalisation. While both Mandira and Hasina indicate some redemptive potentials in their politics of resistance by building collectivities for resisting the oppressive systems, it is clear that the film’s main interest lies in orchestrating the masculine heroic journey of Rizvan rather than allotting enough screen time to reflect on the women’s trauma. In NY, we see a similar trend where, despite being aware of Samir’s radi­ calisation, the screen time and the patriarchal framework in which Maya’s character is embedded leave her with no possibility to generate a dialogue. However, it is possible to trace her redemptive potential in the role of a human rights activist in a two-shot scene where Maya and Zilgai are video-recording Zilgai’s testimony concerning his illegal detainment and torture at the hands of the FBI (NY 01:01:19–01:02:39). The position of the camera in this scene reminds us of what Spivak (2004) suggests in outlining the politics of listening: “[we] must listen to the other as if it were a self, neither to punish nor to acquit” (83). However, even this potential of speaking and of being heard fails in the end as she dies at the hands of the FBI officers. Thus, although the women protagonists in both films appear to open up spaces of dialogue between the state and its estranged citizen through their legal and voluntary activism, they ultimately fail to escape the post-9/11 institutional structures of White patriarchal nationalism.

Conclusion In MNIK, the racial attack on the child Sam and his resultant death can be read in light of the murder committed by those children who are instigated and 104

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supported by the American empire’s post-9/11 nationalist anxiety. It may also be interpreted as the ultimate violence that the state can inflict upon its min­ ority citizens and their lineage. In NY, the deaths of Maya and Samir and the consequent orphan status of their child Danyal stands for the bleak future of a minority community in a state, for whom there is no possibility of redemption other than complete assimilation or expulsion. Despite the “long-distance hatred”58 of the post-9/11 American state’s security discourse in both films, Rizvan and Samir do not reveal any desires of leaving the USA or rebuilding connections with India. While the films may remind the spectators of postPartition Indian state politics and the exploitation of the Muslim citizens, nei­ ther of the protagonists discover redemptive possibilities within the political structures of India. Their concerns are confined to achieving a sense of belonging only within the USA. Thus, more than the novels examined pre­ viously, the films seem to be invested in reinforcing the American exception­ alism, and the hegemonic tendencies of naming state-sponsored violence as legitimate and the non-state actor’s violence as illegitimate. However, by deli­ neating the protagonists’ post-9/11 diasporic anxieties of representation, assimilation and expulsion, the films are successful in questioning the processes of racialisation and Othering of the Muslim citizens. They also underline how the American state’s post-9/11 legal amendments concerning citizenship acts and national security continue to shape the discourse on a migrant’s precarity in a globalised world. While both films discussed in this chapter depart from the questions concerning the post-9/11 anxieties of second-generation South Asian diasporic children, the next chapter will pick up on a related issue: What are the complexities of the life of the second-generation diasporic child and an orphan growing up in a post-9/11 globalised White Western society with a history of a diasporic South Asian Muslim father labelled as a terrorist?

Notes 1 Based on Knittel’s (2014) concept of “historical uncanny” which refers to the his­ torical relatedness of the past and present events to explore state mechanisms of inscribing and repressing memories on its people. 2 It must be noted that his proposition has roots in some of the most radical ideas propounded by anti-totalitarian theorists of the Cold War period. See Kundnani’s (2014) Chapter Three, “Roots of Liberal Rage” in The Muslims Are Coming! (88–112) where he offers a detailed critique of Harris’s views and other propositions of the anti-totalitarian theorists of the Cold War period. 3 The chapter borrows from Walter Benjamin’s (1920) declaration “The Right to Use Force” and Erlenbusch’s (2010) study which builds on Benjamin’s theoretical claims in the “Critique of Violence”. 4 This is based on Blakeley’s (2007) argument: “Because terrorism is a tactic and not an ideology, states of any kind can be perpetrators of terrorism”. She further states, “Equally, the tactics that states use to combat terrorism can themselves resemble terrorism, as the cases of British, US and French counter-terror and CI [counter-insurgency] efforts show” (234).

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5 The term is borrowed from Gabriel et al. (2012). By extending Volpp’s (2002) arguments, Gabriel et al. (2012) underline the discourse on “new orientalism” to understand terrorism as a tactic. 6 Cesari (2013) explains that the “new integrationist” discourse is defended by many countries in the West and disputably even promoted by left-wing activist groups based on the perception that it protects liberal values like gender equality and the rejection of religious authority. 7 The trilogy comprises the Indian film director Mani Ratnam’s films Roja (1992), Bombay (1995) and Dil Se… (1998). 8 It refers to the terrorist Other who resides in South Asia in Chakravarty’s (2000) study. 9 This is also based on Bhabha’s (1994) distinction between “pedagogic” and “performative” functions of nationalism which involves forging a certain mythic past or an imagined community, and the acting out of the received symbols of such pedagogies in “performative” ways (145). 10 A study of Shah Rukh Khan’s filmography suggests that he has predominantly played the role of Hindu characters. In an interview with a staff member of Rediff. com (2004), he also talks about being a “walking-talking secular example” through his persona and films. 11 In the 1980s, young and unemployed Muslim men were often called the “repeat audience”—the people who made a film successful by watching it multiple times (Kesavan 2009). 12 An examination of his cinematic career before MNIK (for instance, films like Main Hoon Na (2004), Swades (2004) and Chak De! (2007)) exposes an obsession with the politics of national identity and belonging, wherein his persona is projected as a prism to observe the fear of fragmentation of the secular Indian nation. See Consolaro’s (2014) essay “Who is Afraid of Shah Rukh Khan? Neoliberal India’s Fears Seen through a Cinematic Prism”. 13 The IPL is the professional cricket league in India that annually holds Twenty20 matches. KKR is a franchise cricket team that is part of the IPL and Shah Rukh Khan is its co-owner. Shah Rukh Khan made this inquiry through Indian news media channels (TNN 2010). 14 Shiv Sena is a right-wing regional political party with its headquarters in Mumbai. It had lost dominance in the Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly elections held in 2004 and 2009, the same period when MNIK was produced and distributed in India. 15 Notably, even at the time of Shah Rukh Khan’s production house film release Raees (2017) (in which he plays the role of a Muslim businessperson opposite a Pakistani actress Mahira Khan), he had to proclaim that he would not work with Pakistani celebrities anymore to refrain from tarnishing his national affinity. Such a procla­ mation was mandated by the right-wing Indian Hindu political groups due to the rising military tensions between India and Pakistan in 2016. A similar incident also took place with MNIK filmmaker Karan Johar relating to his other film Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (2016) starring a Pakistani actor Fawad Khan. For a detailed discussion on these controversies, refer to Bhatia (2016). 16 These include Kabul Express (2006), Dhoom (2004), Force (2011) and Satyameva Jayate (2018). His production house’s recent spate of films includes Madras Café (2013), Rocky Handsome (2016), Force 2 (2016) and Parmanu: The Story of Pokhran (2018). 17 MNIK was regarded as the top-grossing Indian film abroad by Box Office India (2010). Here, it is important to note that the filmmakers of MNIK chose the Indian Hindu actress Kajol, a critically acclaimed and popular celebrity in Hindi cinema,

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18 19 20 21

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to play the role of Mandira in MNIK. Kajol had earlier played the roles of “Simran” and “Anjali”, the quintessential Hindu diasporic characters who are rooted in “Indianness”, in the early celebratory and diasporic Hindi films Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995) and Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham (2001), respectively. Interestingly, in both these films, Kajol is paired with Shah Rukh Khan, and their onscreen pairing is cherished highly by the Hindi film audience. I suspect that this is also one of the paratextual reasons that affected the immediate and large-scale reception of MNIK in India. In addition, my book aims to point out that, while there are several research volumes (Shiekh 2006, 2009; Dudrah et al. 2015; Khan et al. 2017) published solely on Shah Rukh Khan and his cinematic global pre­ sence, what we lack is a critical academic study on female star bodies like Kajol and their contribution to diasporic Hindi cinema. The book has drawn attention to this tendency in order to question the marginalisation of women in star culture, diaspora and film studies amongst other social, cultural and academic disciplines. This has been revealed by both directors in special video footage on the respective official DVDs of the films. The amended Cinematograph Act of 1952 of the Indian constitution lays down the provision and functions of the CBFC. To draw a comparison with literature, one could turn to the 2006 Nobel-prize-winning novel My Name is Red (Pamuk 1998) that explores the nature of art in an Islamic society using the colour red as a narrative device to connote both sublimity and sin. The title design of MNIK was also commodified, marking a “narrative of diver­ sion” and “commoditization” which involves “the coming together of an aesthetic impulse and an entrepreneurial link” (Mazumdar 2003). For instance, coffee mugs are sold on Amazon.in displaying a pun on the title “My Name is Khan Market and I am not a mall”. Khan market, here, refers to the high-end market street in India’s capital city New Delhi. “Angrez” literally means English but it is important to draw attention to the metonymic use of the word to describe the White population residing in the West. Such homogenising tendencies are indicative of the gaps even within the Indian postcolonial and cultural discourse. Interestingly, although the film was shot after 9/11, such a pictorial tableau is made possible using digital technologies to attain historical verisimilitude. If we were to trace the history of the use of cinematic tools in Hindi films to physically or digi­ tally reconstruct particular landscapes and ethnoscapes, we may gain a nuanced understanding of nation-building projects, the political and economic history of mobilising resources as well as the architectural and technological advancement routes of India. These include the studies of Gabriel et al. (2012) and Nijamodeen (2013). Omar is played by the actor Neil Nitin Mukesh who is the grandson of Mukesh, one of the most famous playback singers of the post-independence Hindi film industry. His act of singing one of Mukesh’s song compositions is relevant not only because of the biographical paratext, but also because it underlines the film’s attempt to tie in his trajectory with the urban heroes of the Hindi films of the 1950s. This argument is borrowed from Gabriel et al. (2012) who postulate that the first city is the “groomed cosmopolis of the urban elite”, and the second city “houses the refuse of the first city: the slum, the mohalla, the poor migrant, the destitute and the prostitute” that ultimately serve the first city “to fuel the machinery of global economy” (306). According to Misri (2013), the post-9/11 “cinepatriotic” genre of Hindi cinema labels and “sorts good Muslims from bad Muslims via the figure of the Muslim terrorist” and uses the secular heterosexual family as a “template for citizenship” (158).

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28 According to Misri (2013), the Bollywood buddy genre has “simmered with homo­ erotic potential” and “entails an idealization of male homosocial bonds or dosti, combined with marginal heterosexual pursuit and palpable misogyny” (160). How­ ever, what distinguishes this genre from Hollywood buddy films is its “situatedness in conventions that historically have never distinguished too sharply between romantic love and friendship” (ibid.). 29 According to Nagel (2018), Simmel’s (1984) observation about women as flirts who say “yes and no”, “surrender and refuse to surrender themselves”, is relevant to understanding the “terror” that a flirt generates in heteronormative and patriarchal societies. She also builds on Benjamin (1920) to argue that flirtation, as a form of practice, is useful to resist the lure of capitalism because it resists commodification and “full” enjoyment as well as encourages only brief encounters with acts of consumption. 30 The Benjaminian (Benjamin 1920) flaneur is not the same as the flirt because a flirt needs the response of the playful Other to persist whereas the flaneur is content with mere observation and no response (Kaye 2002). Such an observation unlocks some urgent questions for reflection: Does this mean that a flirt can only flirt with another flirt? Or that the other becomes a flirt in the act of one’s flirtation? 31 Even in MNIK, Mandira’s last name is concealed throughout, and viewers learn about her Hindu last name “Rathod” only towards the climax of the film. In addi­ tion, reading her name as a metonym for the Hindu place of worship that is “mandir” opens up the possibilities of reading her Hindu communal identity that is in constant rift with her newly adopted Muslim last name Khan in the post-9/11 context. 32 Interestingly, Maya, played by the Hindi film British actress Katrina Kaif, uses the British English expression “have a shower” instead of the North American way of saying “take a shower”. In another instance, when Maya asks Omar if he thinks she had become American like Samir, he responds, “dikhti toh tum angrez ho lekin Hindi acha bol leti ho” (you look like a White Westerner [although angrez literally means British as already explained before] but you speak good Hindi) (NY 00:19:25). On the one hand, such an instance in the film reminds the audi­ ence of the actress’s British identity, and on the other hand, it interpellates her character within the diasporic Indian and American context, thereby interweaving the complex colonial discourse shared by England, the USA and India. Most importantly, it exposes those hegemonic ways of perceiving subjectivities that cannot comprehend the overlapping of diverse racial, ethnic, national, linguistic and religious identities. 33 For instance, we could compare Samir to Kunal’s character (played by John Abra­ ham) in Dostana (2008), a popular Hindi film interpreted as “hyper-text” (Gehlawat 2010) as it comes out of the closet more explicitly to discuss queerness than earlier films such as Kal Ho Naa Ho (2003). 34 Such a pattern is evident in other Hindi films where Indian Muslim actors have played the cinematic characters of Indian athletes to demonstrate national loyalty. These actors include Shah Rukh Khan in Chak De! (2007), Aamir Khan in Lagaan (2001) and Dangal (2016), Farhan Akhtar in Bhaag Milkha Bhag (2013) and Salman Khan in Sultan (2016). 35 This term is borrowed from Phadke et al.’s (2011) Why Loiter? Women and Risk on Mumbai Streets. Although their study elaborates on the politics of loitering in the context of women’s right to move freely in the male-dominated and masculinised spaces of Mumbai streets, this chapter is interested in extending their argument to call for the migrant’s right to loiter or move freely across geographical spatio-temporalities with or without any specific purpose or the aim to settle.

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36 Nagel (2018) puts it succinctly in a lecture: “flirtation does not go well with people who want to dominate as flirts are perceived as anarchists”. 37 My analysis does not assume any linearity here in Rizvan’s disabled and racialised experiences as it argues that the politics of corporeality must be interpreted in its entirety even if there are situations where one dimension of the corporal identity is highlighted or appears to dominate over the other. 38 See Kraut’s (1995) Silent Travelers: Germs, Genes, and the Immigrant Menace for the history of the relation between immigration laws and disabilities in the USA. One such example includes the Immigration Act of 1882 that gave the American authorities the right to exclude and deport any immigrant who appears “lunatic” or an “idiot” (ibid.). In the context of India, Jha (2017) gives a brief history of Indian laws concerning the representation of people with disabilities in India. The title of Jha’s article itself hints at the situation in India: “India Has a Long Road Ahead to Combat Challenges Faced by Persons with Disabilities”. 39 “Love” marriage and its cinematic representation is still a sensitive matter, a source of anxiety and a potential threat to the nationalistic, classist, ableist, racist, patri­ archal, heteronormative, fundamentalist and casteist ethos in many parts of India. Popular Hindi films such as Dhadkan (Heartbeat) (2000), Namastey London (2007) and NH10 (2015) exemplify such an ethos. 40 This is based on Myers’s (2004) understanding of Žižek’s “anamorphic frame” that functions as a “slant with which we are enabled to look at reality” (101). In MNIK, the slanting camera angles hint at new ways of desiring and imagining the liberatory potential of such desires. 41 In a recent film Andhadhun (2018), the protagonist reveals the complex politics of desiring disability (in his case, blindness) for a nuanced aesthetic experience (to improve his musical sense). In the end, the protagonist sustains the masquerade of blindness by wearing unseeing prosthetic eye lenses, thereby generating an array of possibilities to establish relations with different kinds of disabled communities. 42 It is important to note that Gopalan (2002) explains these interruptions in specific reference to the action genre in Indian cinema. However, she also opens up this model as a critical tool for the reading of popular Hindi cinema because of its inextricable link with the dominant national culture. See also Gehlawat (2010) who reframes theory of popular Hindi cinema based on Gopalan’s “interruptions”. 43 It refers to the 15- to 20-minute break in the middle of the film-viewing experience. See Wroot et al. (2017) for an in-depth study on the incidental origin and role of the “intermission” as a cliff-hanger in Hindi cinema, and its impact on the content shaping of Bollywood DVDs. 44 This also echoes Minh-ha’s (1999) conception of “intervals” in relation to the inner space of films where she talks about different sizes of intervals and their role in between the dualistic and hierarchal relations of two images. Her claim that the interval is a space of possibility creates a hybrid space for an alternative nest of desires and imaginings to emerge. 45 Although Gopalan (2002) does not shed light on the relation of these activities with the aesthetics of cinema, an in-depth analysis of each of these collective and individual activities in the intermission also holds rich possibilities to understand their peculiar interruptive nature in film production, mediation and consumption in relation to the capitalist machinery of the nation. For instance, what is the impact of a shot of a character drinking Coca-Cola on the spectator just before the intermission or the effect of an advertisement of a product before the film begins? 46 According to Han ([2011] 2018), Baudrillard describes the viral violence of terror­ ism as the exemplary form of violence in which the terrorist (a product of the

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47

48

49

50 51

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system itself) is the immunological other in the system, which it infiltrates and destroys (76). The term spectatorial voyeurism is borrowed from Miller et al. (2004). For them, “cinema installs the spectator in a situation in which his gaze is inoculated from reciprocal awareness”, and such voyeurism is “promoted by using the key-hole effect of the screen” (130). Here, we may also recognise the links between the framing of the virus in post-9/11 Hindi films and the figure of the “Gothic zombie” in popular post-9/11 horror culture that serves to display the fears and anxieties of terror seen largely as American problems (Bishop 2015: 24). Izzat means reputation and dignity. A brief history of pre-9/11 Hindi cinema shows that the notion “izzat” is often employed to describe the role of women in “embodying the honour of the clan” (Ram 2004: 125). However, I suggest that in post-9/11 Hindi cinema, it denotes fractured hypermasculinities and becomes a cinematic strategy based on which radicalisation is enabled and, sometimes, even desired for recovering the lost izzat as we see in the case of Samir in NY. It must be noted that the study lacks information on the possibilities of experiments with different types of mirrors. For instance, what happens when a chameleon ends up in a hall of mirrors? Or in front of different types of mirrors that may not reflect all the colours of the light? In the case of female chameleons, there is not enough research but it is assumed that their reaction could be subtler than the male reaction (Langley 2016). During my research for this book, while tracing the post-9/11 discursive shifts in a variety of disciplines, I have observed that there seems to be an increasing fascina­ tion in astrophysics with studying the nature of the “chameleon particle” as a trope to understand non-linearity, unpredictability, self-interaction, adaption and unrest­ rained energy. However, crucial to this association is the fact that, ultimately, most of these studies consider the figure of the chameleon as lethal and possessing some kind of “dark energy” that attends to the violence of acceleration across the globe/universe (Khoury et al. 2004; Young 2015). This also recalls the popular post-9/11 Hindi cinema’s long tradition of undercover missions undertaken by the protagonists in films like Fanaa (2006), Kurbaan (2009), Ek tha Tiger (2012), Phantom (2015) and Tiger Zinda Hai (2017). This chapter draws from Basu Thakur’s (2010) understanding of the differences between the ethical and the moral subject: “The ethical subject as the one who remains true and invested in his/her own desire in complete ignorance of others; while the moral-unethical subject as one who sacrifices his/her desire for the col­ lective” (77). FBI Agent Roshan’s radical ethics reveal an anxiety of “excess” or “anxiety of a social collapse” that is based on Žižek’s argument: “what if everyone pursues his/her own ethical stance by not giving up their desires [or] what if everyone pursues their individual desires” (Žižek cited in Basu Thakur 2010: 77). Hadiths are a multiple collection of records of the Prophet’s sayings and day-to-day activities. Hajar-al Aswad refers to the black stone located in the eastern corner of the Kaaba in Mecca. Zakat refers to the 2.5% of one’s annual income mandated for charity. Namaz is a mandated religious duty of prayers. Hijrah/Hegira refers to Prophet Muhammed’s epic journey / routes of migration from Mecca to Medina (Hamidullah 1974; Lippman 1982). Hijrah is a carefully planned migration of the Prophet Muhammed in Islam, after which the organisational principle of the Muslim community changes from mere blood kinship to a greater form of brotherhood. It is not to be confused with the usage of the Hindi/Urdu term hijra in the Indian subcontinent. Hijras are referred to as transgender individuals in the Indian subcontinent, with a distinct culture. They are a marginalised minority, and queer community in India who are often portrayed

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as “figures of fun” pronouncing blessing to newborn babies and mothers in Hindi cinema (Kalra et al. 2015). In the Indian social and cultural context, the term is also used to make a derogatory remark to a person who causes “discomfort” and “irri­ tation”, for instance, someone with a disability (ibid.). I have brought this issue to the fore because in the first scene of the Bombay suburb, the film establishes Riz­ van’s link with the hijra community when a man, irritated with the young Rizvan’s incessant repair work, tells him “jao, jaake jhak maro” (MNIK 00:09:17). Jhak maarna is a phrase in Hindi which, if literally translated, means “go and catch the small fish” or “go and sit idle”. In an endearing scene that follows, Rizvan, the child unaware of the phrase’s meaning, asks his mother to teach him jhak maarna. Viewers then see both Rizvan and his mother clapping their hands in a distinct manner recalling the hijra community’s distinct clap to seek attention and/or protest. 56 For instance, Rizvan’s narrative may also be read in the light of the historical tra­ jectory of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, a secular Muslim man, often regarded as the Frontier Gandhi or Islamic Gandhi for his secular leanings at the time of Partition. His journey may also be read, in line with the para-textual awareness of the film, in the light of the trajectory of Shah Rukh Khan’s father Taj Mohammed Khan, another secular activist at the time of Partition. See Rowell’s (2009) critique of the hege­ monic histories of Partition that valorise secularism only in Hindu bodies. His study also cautions us against falling into the pitfall of the binaristic Hindu–Muslim understanding of the Indian religious and ethnic-communal scenario for a broader understanding of the discourse on secularism. 57 This is borrowed from Žižek’s (2007) essay “Tolerance as an Ideological Category” where he describes tolerance as the “post-political ersatz” (660). 58 This hatred refers to the global animosity towards the USA for projecting the Amer­ ican culture as superior by way of globalisation and carrying out neoimperialistic missions in economically weaker nation-states (Appadurai 2006: 87–101).

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Miller, T. and Stam, R. (Eds.). 2004. A Companion to Film Theory. Vol. 18. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. Minh-ha, Trinh T. 1999. Cinema Interval. London: Psychology Press. Mishra, Vijay. 2007. The Literature of the Indian Diaspora: Theorizing the Diasporic Imaginary. London: Routledge. Misri, Deepti. 2013. “Queer Resolutions: 9/11 and Muslim Masculinities in New York”. South Asian Popular Culture. 11(2): 157–167. Myers, Tony. 2004. Slavoj Žižek. Routledge Critical Thinkers. London: Routledge. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Nagel, Barbara. 2015. “Three Terrors of Flirtation”. In Flirtations: Rhetoric and Aes­ thetics This Side of Seduction. Edited by Daniel Hoffman-Schwartz, Barbara N. Nagel and Lauren S. Stone. 101–106. New York: Fordham University Press. Nagel, Barbara. 2018 (April 12). “The Terror of Flirtation from Critical Theory to #MeToo”. [Lecture]. John P. Birkelund Lecture. Berlin, Germany: American Acad­ emy Berlin. https://www.americanacademy.de/event/terror-flirtation-critical-theory-m etoo/. Accessed on 15 May 2018. Namastey London. 2007. Dir. Vipul Amrutlal Shah. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Rishi Kapoor, Clive Standen, Upen Patel and Javed Sheikh. India: Vipul Amrutlal Shah. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. NH10. 2015. Dir. Navdeep Singh. Perf. Anushka Sharma and Neil Bhoopalam. India: Phantom Films and Clean Slate Films. Nijamodeen, Chapparban S. 2013. “The Muslim Experiences in America and Bolly­ wood Discourse after 9/11”. Galaxy International Multidisciplinary Journal. 2(2): 1–10. Pamuk, Orhan. 1998. My Name is Red. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Parmanu: The Story of Pokhran. 2018. Dir. Abhishek Sharma. Perf. John Abraham, Diana Penty and Boman Irani. India: JA Entertainment and Zee Studios. Phadke, Shilpa, Khan, Sameera and Ranade, Shilpa. 2011. Why Loiter? Women and Risk on Mumbai Streets. New Delhi: Penguin Books. Phantom. 2015. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. Saif Ali Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Nadiadwala Grandson Entertainment. Phillips, Adam. 1994. On Flirting. London: Faber & Faber. Prakash, K. Raghav and Satyanarayana. 2017. “The Role of Cinema in the Develop­ ment of Sports Marketing and Sports Culture in India”. Imperial Journal of Inter­ disciplinary Research (IJIR). 3(4): 693–699. https://www.onlinejournal.in/IJIRV3I4/ 107.pdf. Accessed on 22 January 2018. PTI. 2021 (January 16). “At 18 Million, India Has Largest Diaspora in the World: UN”. Hindustantimes.com. https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/at-18-millio n-india-has-largest-diaspora-in-the-world-un-101610780174277.html. Accessed on 16 January 2021. Puar, Jasbir K. and Rai, Amit. 2002. “Monster, Terrorist, Fag: The War on Terrorism and the Production of Docile Patriots”. Social Text. 20(3): 117–148. Quayson, Ato. 2007. Aesthetic Nervousness: Disability and the Crisis of Representation. New York: Columbia University Press.

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Raees. 2017. Dir. Rahul Dholakia. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Mahira Khan. India: Red Chillies Entertainment. Raja Harishchandra. 1913. Dir. Dadasaheb Phalke. Perf. Dattatraya Dabke and Anna Salunke. India: Phalke Films. Ram, Anjali. 2004. “Memory, Cinema and the Reconstitution of Cultural Identities in the Asian Indian Diaspora”. In Communicating Ethnic and Cultural Identity. Edited by Mary Fong and Rueyling Chuang. 121–134. Oxford: Rowman and Littlefield. Ray, Satyajit. 1976. Our Films Their Films. Bombay: Orient Longman. Rediff. 2004 (April 30). “The Rediff Interview/Shah Rukh Khan”. Rediff.com. https:// www.rediff.com/news/2004/apr/30inter.htm. Accessed on 25 March 2021. Rocky Handsome. 2016. Dir. Nishikant Kamat. Perf. John Abraham, Diya Chalwad, Shruti Haasan, Nishikant Kamat and Sharad Kelkar. India: JA Entertainment and Azure Entertainment. Roja. 1992. Dir. Mani Ratnam. Perf. Arvind Swamy and Madhoo. India: K. Balachander Films. Rowell, James. 2009. “Abdul Ghaffar Khan: An Islamic Gandhi”. Political Theology. 10(4): 591–606. Satyameva Jayate. 2018. Dir. Milap Milan Zaveri. Perf. John Abraham, Manoj Bajpayee, Aisha Sharma and Amruta Khanvilkar. India: Emmay Entertainment and T-Series Films. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shiekh, Mushtaq. 2006. Still Reading Khan. New Delhi: Om Books International. Shiekh, Mushtaq. 2009. Shah Rukh Can: The Story of the Man and Star Called Shah Rukh Khan. New Delhi: Om Books International. Simmel, Georg. [1909] [1923] 1984. “Flirtation”. In Women, Sexuality and Love. Translated by Guy Oakes. 133–152. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Snyder, Sharon L. and Mitchell, David T. 2006. Cultural Locations of Disability. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2004. “Terror: A Speech after 9–11”. Boundary 2. 31(2): 81–111. Sultan. 2016. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan, Anushka Sharma, Randeep Hooda and Amit Sadh. India: Yash Raj Films. Swades. 2004. Dir. Ashutosh Gowariker. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Gayatri Joshi. India: Ashutosh Gowariker Productions. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. Tolia-Kelly, Divya P. 2016. Landscape, Race and Memory: Material Ecologies of Citizenship. Farnham: Ashgate Publishing. TNN. 2010 (February 3). “Pak IPL Row: Shah Rukh Refuses to Back down”. Time­ sofindia.com. http://m.timesofindia.com/articleshow/5529565.cms. Accessed on 25 March 2021. Virdi, Jyotika. 2003. The Cinematic ImagiNation: Indian Popular Films as Social History. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Volpp, Leti. 2002. “The Citizen and the Terrorist”. UCLA Law Review. 49: 1575–1600. Wroot, Jonathan and Willis, Andy. 2017. Cult Media: Re-packaged, Re-released and Restored. New York: Springer. Young, Monica. 2015 (August 24). “Is Dark Energy a Chameleon?”. Sky & Telescope.com. https://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/is-dark-energy-a-chameleon-0824 201523/. Accessed on 29 March 2016.

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Žižek, Slavoj. 1992. Looking Awry: An Introduction to Jacques Lacan through Popular Culture. October Books. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. Žižek, Slavoj. 2001. Enjoy Your Symptom!: Jacques Lacan in Hollywood and out. London: Psychology Press. Žižek, Slavoj. 2007. “Tolerance as an Ideological Category”. Critical Inquiry. 34(4): 660–682.

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Part III EXPANDING THE NEXUS: THE SECOND DECADE AFTER 9/11

Migrants1 Waiting at the door Flock of migratory birds Eager for magic

Fig. 4 Starling Murmuration (III) in the countryside of Milan

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-7

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Note 1

This haiku is written in response to Faiz’s (cited in Kiernan 1971: 197) translated verse “A Prison Daybreak”. Written in burnt coal on the walls of a prison, his poem is an expression of not only his experience of confinement, but also the ruthlessness of the state’s regime that conspires against its dissident citizens. Considering that, in 1951, Faiz was arrested based on the charges of treason against the Pakistani state, and later refused entry into the USA under the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, the poem serves as a relevant analogy to examine the post-9/11 trajectory of Parvaiz in Home Fire. Suspended between a state of hope and hopelessness, Faiz’s poem also reflects an “adolescent anxiety” full of heightened sensations (Kiernan 1971: 25). In the prison, since the spatiotemporal senses related to the external world are denied, the differences between yesterday and tomorrow, and here and there become blurred. As a result, there emerges an extraordinary imagination comprising sensory images that challenge both the fixities of time and distance. Parvaiz’s sonic resistance in Home Fire as well as the migrants Saeed and Nadia’s spatiotemporal crossings through the magic doors in Exit West (examined in Chapter Five) are reflective of Faiz’s protest imagination. The latter part of this section (Chapter Six) examines the Hindi films AirLift and Tiger Zinda Hai.

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5

THINKING PAST ‘POST-9/11’ The discourse of insecurity in Exit West and

Home Fire

past /pɑːst (Adjective) Gone by in time and no longer existing, belonging to a former time; (of a specified period of time) occurring before and leading up to the time of speaking or writing. (Noun) The time before the moment of speaking or writing; the his­ tory of a person or place; (informal) a part of a person’s history that is considered to be shameful. (Preposition) To or on the further side of; in front of or from one side to the other of; beyond in time; later than; no longer capable of. (Adverb) So as to pass from one side of something to the other; used to indicate the lapse of time. (Oxforddictionaries.com)

“Passing” “post-9/11”

1

After the 9/11 attacks and the subsequent War on Terror, a series of responses have emanated from academic scholars across boundaries to frame and cate­ gorise those literary and visual cultures that have addressed the long-lasting local and global implications of the 9/11 discourse for human lives. By experi­ menting with punctuation marks like the hyphen and quotation mark, scholars have coined labels such as ‘post’-9/11 or post-post9/11 to draw the boundaries of their critical discourse and investigate the cultural framing of 9/11. To examine some of the semantic and categorical imbrication and shifts in their conceptual assumptions about the 9/11 attacks and the related literary and visual representations, it is necessary to pass through or survey the primary objective and spatiotemporal scales of the scholars’ critical frameworks. Such a DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-8

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passing through is necessary for departing from our “post-9/11” political understandings and academic frameworks that sustain the dominant framework of “9/11” as a point of rupture. In a study on American literature published after 9/11, Gray (2011) uses the term post-9/11 (with hyphen and without the quotation marks) to underline 9/11 as a watershed moment or an exceptional point in American literature and history having major implications on Americans residing in the USA. Liao (2013) coins the term ‘post’-9/11 (with hyphen, and where only the word post is inserted between the quotation marks) in her monograph on South Asian diasporic fiction to investigate the temporal, spatial and corporeal pluralities in experiences related to 9/11. She defends the punctuation of the word post using single quotation marks to underline how the past and the future are imagined within it. For her, texts included in the ‘post’-9/11 literature category should neither be geopolitically contained nor be limited to the spatiotemporal experience of only White American lives. Corresponding to Liao (2013), in a study on South Asian Muslim fiction, Clements (2016) considers the spatio­ temporal and corporeal plurality of the experiences related to 9/11 by using the term post-9/11 (with the hyphen and without any quotation marks). However, unlike Liao (2013), she does not highlight the meaning or implication of the word post in her usage. In an article on Pakistani diasporic fiction, Aamir (2016) uses the term post 9/11 (without the hyphen and without quotation marks) to underline 9/11 as an exceptional moment in American history that had rippling effects across geographical borders. While she considers spatial and corporal plurality in the diaspora’s experiences related to 9/11, the excep­ tionality of the 9/11 attacks in the American context is retained. Garrido (2018) uses the term postpost-9/11 (with one hyphen and without quotation marks) in her study on contemporary US television to consider the temporal, corporeal and spatial plurality of experiences in relation to 9/11. Her work defends this coinage based on an assumption that there exists a singularity in modes of spatiotemporal engagement in the texts included in the post-9/11 literature and visual cultures category. In a conference paper on contemporary Pakistani fic­ tion, Sadaf (2018) coins the term post-post-9/11 (with two hyphens, without quotation marks and the first post is italicised) to describe the discourse on anti-immigrant sentiment and global insecurities in the second decade after 9/11. By considering the spatiotemporal pluralities in experiences related to 9/11, she also uses post-post-9/11 as a temporal marker and category to distinguish new Pakistani anglophone literature of the second decade after 9/11 from those works of the first decade after 9/11. It is evident that whenever the term post-9/11 is used to classify literary and visual cultures, “9/11” implies the overt or covert representation of the Sep­ tember 11 terror attacks and “post” (with or without the hyphen) implies adhering to a strict chronology in terms of the publication of the work. How­ ever, in its philosophical use, the “post” in post-9/11 also denotes going beyond the 9/11 attacks to probe the global implications of the Bush administration’s 122

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discourse on the War on Terror. In this sense, it may also include those works published after 9/11 where the protagonists’ trajectories are historicised and traverse across borders both before 9/11 and for several years after 9/11. Thus, the punctuated “post” denotes “an ambiguous locus of continuities and dis­ continuities” (Shohat 1992: 106) across distinctive historical, ideological and spatial scales, and not merely a temporal one. However, as the scholars’ works differ mainly in their struggle to punctuate, and define the meanings of the past within the rupture implied in the post, we need to deconstruct the implications of their punctuated terms based on an understanding of the past in all its possible forms: an adjective (former times), a noun (history of the nation), a preposition (beyond in time) or an adverb (lapse of time). Such a semantic analysis of the post through the multiple meanings of past and the associated punctuation marks is necessary to situate the understanding of “post-9/11” in a wider spatiotemporal and institutional context while questioning its essentiali­ sation tendencies and frequent political appropriation. This is to say we need to attend to the politics of how past is recalled, constructed, mediated, appropriated or hegemonised in the present in the framing of both 9/11 and post-9/11 discourses within literary, visual and academic cultures. Even Shohat (1992) suggests that, in relation to the prefixes “post” and “neo”, we should consider how past is conceptualised to enable the question­ ing of the hegemonic and homogenous narratives of national history, and the way discourses are framed for both mobilising a particular community and destabilising another. If we conceive past as “fragmented sets of narrated memories and experiences” rather than a “pre-lapsarian nostalgia” which is “homogenous” in nature (Shohat 1992: 109), then it is possible to avoid the spatiotemporal essentialisation of experiences and ask some pertinent ques­ tions: “who is mobilizing what in the articulation of the past, deploying what identities, identifications and representations, and in the name of what political vision and goals?” (110). Although the term “post-9/11” or “post-post-9/11” used as an intellectual practice or a description of the contemporary global scenario involves the momentary deferring of the 9/11 attacks to expose its political appropriations, there lies an implicit and unclarified meaning of a “pre-9/11” global condition and an internalised assumption of 9/11 and the War on Terror as moments of rupture primarily responsible for the presentday anti-immigrant sentiment and state authoritarianism. As Toros (2017: 212) rightly points out: much of today’s “War on Terror”—from domestic counter-radicalisation strategies, to western and non-western alliances to defeat the so-called Islamic State, to state policies towards refugees and migrants—are more connected to the war in Iraq and its subsequent ramifications than they are to the al Qaeda which carried out the 11 September 2001 attacks […]. Thus, the terrorism/counterterrorism landscape that we are in today is arguably far more of a “post-2003 world”, 123

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including the near-15 years of insurgency experience for both state and non-state actors and the recent question of returnees, than a “post-9/11 world”. Such an internalisation of the “9/11” narrative as temporal rupture […] risks making our research ahistorical and risks at least partially exonerating the very state violence we have spent 10 years exposing. For Sadaf (2018), a term like post-post-9/11 is useful to study novels such as Hamid’s (2017) Exit West (henceforth, EW) since it is published in the second decade after 9/11 and concerned with the long-lasting implications of the War on Terror tactics. However, based on my analysis about the multiple meanings of past embedded in the “post” and Toros’s (2017) call for “forgetting” such categories, I have refrained from using “post-post-9/11” as both a category for literature and the label for our contemporary scenario. This is also to avoid the reinforcement of the centrality of 9/11, assumptions of uniformity in the cultural modes of engagement in the first decade after 9/11, and presupposi­ tions about temporal and conceptual fixities between the shifts in the modes of engagement within the post-9/11 discourses. Instead, I argue it is perhaps more useful to think past the post-9/11 to examine the changing representation of the global discourse in novels such as Shamsie’s (2017) Home Fire (henceforth, HF) and Hamid’s EW. A mode of critical engagement, “thinking past” in the title of the chapter denotes a pun on post to think through, about and beyond the multiple meanings of past embedded within the rupture implied in the “post”. Such a critical engagement comprises passing through the contradictions in the definitions of the “past” and “post” as well as the specific, discursive and contradictory hegemonic dynamics between and within different temporalities and spatialities. It involves passing by or departing from the hegemonic nationalist ideological engagements and adopting multiple cultural-geo-political lenses to examine global insecurities, precarities of refugees and transnational migrants as well as their agencies and resistance. By adjusting the scale through which instances of the past are particularised and perceived, it is possible to underline, for instance, the historical, economic and political links between the 1947 Parti­ tion, the Cold War politics, the militaristic intervention of the USA in West Asia in the 1990s, 9/11, the War on Terror, the invasion of Iraq, discriminatory state policies towards refugees, immigrants and diasporas, and the present-day state violence and authoritarianism in India, Pakistan, the USA and the UK. Since literature operates through the ambiguous nature of the language and form, it provides ample opportunities to constellate seemingly unrelated spa­ tiotemporal trajectories of migrants that are often lost in the nationalist pro­ cesses of boundary-making. Therefore, like “teleopoiesis”2 (Spivak 2003), thinking past in the context of this book involves a close reading of the selec­ ted novels by distancing from the political appropriations of 9/11 and labels such as post-9/11 or postpost-9/11, underlining the aesthetic encryptions of the 124

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past, and moving towards a politics of flirtation and friendship to imagine the possibilities of building intimacies in our migratory or cosmopolitan desires through the literariness of the text. Therefore, by critically reading the past or fragmented memories encrypted in the selected novels, the chapter’s primary aim is to underline how the diasporic and migrant trajectories of the protago­ nists in HF and EW represent and mediate the contemporary global discourse on insecurity and precarity.

Locating Exit West and Home Fire In both novels, the conditions of insecurity and precarity emerge due to false perceptions of an idealised version of the nation’s past based on nativity and racialisation, and the failure to imagine multiple modalities of being and belonging. Addressing the nativist anxieties towards immigrants across con­ tinents by “picking up on currents that seemed to be going back a decade or more” (Travers 2018), Hamid asks: In this world where the whole notion of being a migrant has become incredibly politically charged, is there a way to move beyond this migrant-native dichotomy? Is there a way for us to recognize each other as similarly human? And, if so, how can a story reveal that? (Hamid cited in Travers 2018) For Hamid, these questions are the starting impulse for constructing the moments of magic realism in EW and challenge the nativist politics to out­ line the interconnected nature of humans across borders. In the case of HF, by rewriting the Greek tragedy Antigone, Shamsie reimagines the diasporic journeys of the characters and sheds light on the processes of radicalisation of the Muslim youth to challenge the contemporary nationalistic and Isla­ mophobic impulses of Britain. In juxtaposing the real and the fantastic through their democratic narrative structures and deploying the mode of intertextuality, both novels seem to narrate the experiences of the margin­ alised minority in a way that demands different forms of “waiting”. To inspect these concerns in detail, it is important first to outline the narrative structure of both novels and its engagement with the contemporary global discourse on insecurity, precarity and growing xenophobia. The chapter will then address the different forms of “waiting” articulated through the moments of magic realism in EW and the sonic subtext in HF. It will also consider the intertextuality embedded within these tropes and the use of cyberspace as a “transgredient” (Todorov 1984) element to build fluid iden­ tities. Considering the novels’ discussions on nation, home and transnational desires, the last segment of the chapter exposes the state’s scalar politics to measure human precariousness through which the rights of life and rights after death of the protagonists are perceived. 125

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EW is narrated from an omniscient point of view3 and begins in an unnamed city where a militant force is trying to establish control and replace democratic governance. The literary strategy of not naming the starting point in the novel subscribes to the broad themes of building unimagined connections, emphasising interdependency and locating sites of violence by equally implicating all nationstates. Although it may appear that the novel forces this onto-epistemological diversity and interdependency by further marginalising the particularities of the experiences of refugees, diasporas and immigrants, it encourages the cri­ tical imagining of what Anna Tsing (2000) calls the “rhetorics of scale” in the globalisation “projects”.4 Tsing (2000) suggests that we pay attention to the “ideologies of the scale, that is the cultural claims about locality, regionality and globality”, “networks and strategies of proliferation”, and the “units of culture and political economy through which we make sense of events and social processes” (347). In EW, the narrative structure of the novel delineates the rhetorics of the scalar politics of globalisation by randomly interspersing multiple stories of migrants crossing magic doors spread all over the globe. Although the aesthetic strategy of narrating border-crossing experiences using magic doors fails to encourage the reader to imagine the refugees’ or migrants’ actual and physical predicaments and aporias in crossing land boundaries or sea routes, it questions the micro and macro politics of framing geopolitical borders between nation-states. Like the migrant and diasporic subjects examined in the previous chapters, the protagonists Saeed and Nadia in EW embark on their migratory journeys to escape state brutality and in search for a better life. However, unlike Changez in The Reluctant Fundamentalist (Hamid 2007), Rizvan in My Name is Khan (2010) and Samir in New York (2009) who face the violence of sur­ veillance while waiting at airports to traverse within the nation-states or across nation-states, Saeed’s and Nadia’s journeys are rendered instantaneous and short-lived in the presence of the magic doors. This also suggests that the novel’s primary motive is to trace what happens after the protagonists reach a particular destination and not elaborate on the experiences that occur while crossing the borders. As Saeed and Nadia cross the magic doors, the reader waits to find out not only where their next journey will be, but more sig­ nificantly, where the next journey will take them in relation to the other migrant characters and how their routes will converge. Initiated through the magic doors, Saeed’s and Nadia’s travels across Mykonos, London and Marin in Northern California expose both individual and collective insecurities and the precariousness of a migrant’s life. At the syntactic level, the novel’s attempt to collectivise diverse stories and engage the local with the global is articulated through long sentences which like enjambments create the effect of meanings spilling over from one to another. In Shamsie’s HF, the novel’s epigraph, “The ones we love… are enemies of the state”,5 relocates the Greek tragedy Antigone and embeds it within the contemporary global discourse on insecurity that constantly struggles with the 126

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dichotomies of the Self–Other, Friend–Enemy, Us–Them, State–Non-State and Native–Migrant. The epigraph also sets the stage for the novel’s five sections that resemble the five-act structure of the Western tragedy, but are distributed equally to each of the five characters’ voices: Isma, Aneeka, Parvaiz, Eamonn and Karamat Lone. Set in five locations, Amherst, London, Istanbul, Raqqa and Karachi, the novel begins with the narration of Isma’s experiences of extensive verbal surveillance that involves Islamophobic interrogation at the airport. Reminiscent of the surveillance experiences of the protagonists in the novels and films examined earlier, Isma’s instance differs in its aesthetic nar­ ration as the location of the airport remains unspecified for one entire page in the novel, thereby implicating the reader in the scalar and spatiotemporal pol­ itics of the novel. Although the epic-like structure in Burnt Shadows (Shamsie 2009) (henceforth, BS) provides Shamsie with the required global scale for outlining the post-9/11 diasporic narratives of Hiroko and Raza, the structure of the Greek tragedy in HF enables the orchestration of intrapersonal, inter­ personal, inter-societal and historical dimensions of the contemporary dis­ course on global insecurity and precarity of migrants. Before examining the nativist and racialised constructions of the past and the rhetoric of the rising insecurities in both novels, I will turn to a brief etymological journey and the semantic history and politics of the concepts “insecurity” and “precarity” to understand their manifestation and processes of operation in the novels.

Frames of insecurity and precarity Derived from the Medieval Latin insecurus, the earliest use of the term “inse­ cure” dates to Sanderson’s (1658) volume based on the English King Charles I’s life and his trial for treason where he claims, “arguments were urged pro and con, unsafe, unreasonable, insecure, because of the rancour left by the last par­ liament” (285). Thus, the earliest semantic context of “insecure” suggests that it was meant to describe the political unrest amongst diverse religious groups which thrived after the execution of Charles I and the Interregnum in England. Later, after the restoration of Charles II in 1660, the term “insecure” appeared again in the context of the Presbyterians for whom “their native country had, by the prevalence of persecution and violence, become as insecure as a den of rob­ bers” (Mackintosh 1835: 100). In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, there came about a shift in the semantic politics of “insecurity” as scholars6 primarily deployed it to indicate concerns of material and capital security necessary for the organisation of private life and building wealth for one’s nation. According to Cameron et al. (1954), a systematic and conceptual study of insecurity began only in the early 20th century, and such a study coincided with research on the meanings and practices of “security” traceable in the works of the psy­ chotherapist Alfred Adler, psychologist Abraham Maslow, and William Isaac Thomas, one of the first sociologists to study migration. Based on their psy­ chological and sociological approaches, Cameron et al. (1954) suggest some key 127

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ideas related to insecurity: a “basic drive”, an “emotional response” to “sudden external threats”, “relatively constant threatening external situations” and “competition or inferiority” (557). Insecurity may also refer to “a feeling from within”, “a function of beliefs like religious beliefs”, “a drive inimical to the sound development of personality”, a “cause of pathological behaviour or cause of certain attitudes”, or “a behaviour rooted in unpleasant early life experiences or other odd circumstances” (557–558). Based on their loose categorisation of both terms, it appears that insecurity is interlocked with meanings of security and refers to a “feeling”, “act” and “behaviour” that is both a cause and an effect of individual and/or social experiences. In the early 21st century, the rhetoric of insecurity has transcended the causal and effectual categorisation. Rather, it comprises a “lack” within both the Self and the Other (Gambetti et al. 2013: 10–11). This “lack” which manifests as a want of safety and confidence is socially constructed, and is always based on a threat emanating from the Other and the threat of the Self’s inability to combat against the Other. This perception of the proximity of the threat (both in space and time) also affects the production, sustainability or elimination of insecurity (ibid.). Building on Reguillo’s definition of the “rhetorics of secur­ ity”,7 Gambetti et al. (2013) argue that the insecurity/security binary is best articulated in terms of spatial and temporal dimensions to comprehend “the practices, rhetorics, and agendas of security as both reactive to and productive of rapidly expanding cartographies of insecurity” (11). Thus, a brief study of the etymological journey and the semantic politics of insecurity suggests that the diverse contexts in which it has emerged, and has been deployed as a strategy, have political, social, economic, cultural and per­ sonal ramifications. The discourses on both security and insecurity have not only led to the reconsideration of territorial and cultural boundaries, but have also shaped personal and national identities. The question arises—what hap­ pens when this feeling of insecurity persists and/or is made to persist strategi­ cally in implementing particular laws? Nearly all individual or collective measures that have been taken to combat issues of personal and national insecurity in any age indicate that violence (given its various manifestations) and border-making are the fundamental modes to attain a sense of security. This is evident in the case of the execution of Charles I, the wars that followed it, partitions of nation-states, the bombing of cities, riots, surgical strikes and, recently, the Trump administration’s 2017 Executive Order 13769. Although the temporal setting of EW does not encompass a vast historical period, it is concerned with national acts of (in)security that have further inhibited mobility and migration in the 21st century. In HF, the Home Minister Karamat Lone’s hamartia comprises his nation­ alist insecurities concerning Britishness and citizenship laws. Right from the start, both Isma and Aneeka despise the (in)security politics of Karamat Lone and he is even labelled as “Lone Wolf” by the two sisters (HF 34). Hira Shah, the Kashmiri lecturer of Isma in Amherst, talks about “Control Orders and 128

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their impact on civil liberties”, and writes a book called the “The Insecurity State: Britain and the Instrumentalisation of Fear” (HF 39). Soon after the news of Karamat Lone’s appointment, and a conversation with Hira Shah, Isma observes: If you look at colonial laws you’ll see plenty of precedent for depriv­ ing people of their rights; the only difference is this time it’s applied to British citizens, and even that’s not as much of a change as you might think, because they’re rhetorically being made unBritish. The 7/7 ter­ rorists were never described by the media as “British terrorists”. Even when the word “british” was used it was always “British of Pakistani descent” or “British Muslim” or “British passport-holders”. Always something interposed between their Britishness and terrorism. (HF 38) Isma’s statements underline not only the historical continuities and racial anxieties within the discourse on terrorism and insecurity in Britain, but also the semantic politics and the linguistic strategies of the ideological state appa­ ratus in framing citizenship laws and state sovereignty. At the end of the novel, Karamat Lone’s decisions to deny Parvaiz a chance to return to London and later, forbid the burial of his body, specify how the rhetoric of national security is intertwined with the notions of precarity and nativism. For Butler (2009a), precarity refers to those conditions “that appear to be outside one’s control” and “as a result, social and political institutions are designed in any nation-state to minimise the conditions of precarity by which life can be secured” (ii). Building on her study that recommends understanding precarity beyond the economic plights of the individual, I will focus on those frames of perception and state operations through which certain lives are represented, mediated and apprehended as valuable and “grievable” (Butler 2009b: 41). Both EW and HF are useful cultural and literary frames to understand how we have come to face the heights of insecurity at this particular moment in history and what are its long-term implications. In an interview published in The New Yorker, Hamid states: I wanted the world of the novel to be the world we all live in [but] I wanted the starting point […] that might belong to anyone or at least to many people facing the prospect of violent unrest around them. (Hamid cited in Leyshon 2016) Such a representation underlines what Butler (2009b) calls “the politics of moral responsiveness” (41) or, in other words, the human obligations that arise from the realisation of the fact that we are always-already interdependent beings right from the start of life and what appears to affect only some individuals has many global ramifications. 129

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In EW, the protagonists’ diasporic trajectories are not conceived with any singularity as their lives are intertwined and dialogic with other minor char­ acters. Therefore, Saeed’s and Nadia’s precariousness during the war and interdependency are relevant frameworks for thinking broadly about how state operations render some human groups more precarious than the others. By examining the factors underlying the shared precarity and global insecurity, it is possible to expose the complicity of state agencies in the unequal distribu­ tion of survival necessities and growth opportunities. In EW, war is both an intimate and a shared experience as it takes place on or at the “street one took to work, school one’s sister attended, the house of one’s aunt’s best friend, the shop where one bought cigarettes” (EW 68). It also exposes the relative nature of the affect of both space and time as the erosion of the facade of the city buildings accelerates time in such a way that a day’s toll outpaces that of a decade (EW 11). Most importantly, war exposes the violent, uncanny and unpredictable nature of humans as the narrator in the novel affirms: “For one moment we are pottering about our errands as usual and the next we are dying” (EW 3). However, despite this interdependency and the shared pre­ carity, the question arises: Why is it that certain lives begin to matter more when lost in certain conditions than others? According to the narrator in EW, “the times of violence” appear “evisceratingly real” only after it affects our first acquaintance or intimates, but until then it is just a “bad dream” (EW 31). Thus, the novel seems to implicitly claim that a life’s worthiness is measured and determined based on the following factors: one’s own perception of its importance, others’ perception of one’s life, the frames through which life is perceived, and the duration until which such a perception lasts. In a world where “people were constantly slipping away” (EW 213), Saeed and Nadia realise the impending doomed state of their city and the illusory nature of borders. While they begin to question their role as humans leading a pre­ carious8 life in a world of uncertainty, it is only after a traumatic incident (the death of Saeed’s mother) that Saeed and Nadia contemplate alternative ways of living. In HF, the state’s discourse on precarity is based on the notion of the dif­ ference between Us vs Them leading to new forms of xenophobia that shape and are shaped by national (in)security policies. In an article examining “new xenophobia”, Khair (2015) argues, “xenophobia has been part of the human condition, though the stranger we fear is not just any stranger, but a ‘parti­ cular kind of stranger’” (45). These are strangers whose differences are visible but for whom the exhibition of their differences is no longer a possibility. Whereas in the old xenophobia, there are no fantasies of assimilating stran­ gers, in the new xenophobia, the official fantasy is that of assimilating stran­ gers by paradoxically conforming and erasing the differences (ibid.). In such conditions, it is possible to investigate how and why both Parvaiz and Aneeka (although having shared a common culture and heritage with Karamat Lone) find themselves pushed into the position of the stranger and the nation’s enemy 130

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Other. The next section outlines in detail how the discourses on insecurity and precarity are delineated through the sonic subtext in HF. By comparing this representation with the moments of magic realism in EW, the section will examine the different forms of “waiting” as political modes of engagement with the multiplicity embedded in our shared past.

Waiting as such9 According to Davis (2017), the act of “waiting as such” lies in the interstices “between hope and resignation, boredom and desire, fulfillment and futility” (394). In the politics of tarrying, the distinguishing features of “waiting as such” lie in the perception of time as “slow” and “thick” where “time must suddenly be endured rather than traversed, felt rather than thought” (ibid.). Although waiting is mainly sensed as frustration10 in the immigrant’s experi­ ence before, during and after traversing borders, it involves an acceptance of the “enduring” nature of time (ibid.). In “waiting as such”, time is no longer understood as “money”, and one may even experience a “temporary libera­ tion” from the violence of positivity in an achievement-based capitalist society (Davis 2017: 394–395). This is because it is not waiting for a purpose or something to happen and a dénouement, rather it is a form of “dwelling” without any insecurities or anxieties (ibid.). It is also different from Eamonn’s schedule articulated in HF or an instrumental waiting where “the divided days seem to suggest structure in place for content” (HF 32). Instead, the “waiting as such” carries the potential of Heidegger’s “meditative thinking” that “requires a greater effort” and “demands more practice” (Davis 2017: 395–396). While it generates “pleasure” and “openness”, it creates possibilities for understanding the mechanisms of power and prompts the thoughts of revolution or change (ibid.). In EW, the state’s rhetoric of waiting11 and patience in building sustainable plans for refugees and migrants crossing magic doors is linked to its operations of power and hegemonic discourses on national security and sovereignty.12 As the state expects the refugees and migrants to wait for everything, they “heed this injunction to wait because it is rooted in their reality [,] [a]fter all, they are always waiting” (Davis 2017: 398). It is in such an expectation of patience that “everyday political domination” happens, that is, the time when “nothing apparently happens, when people just wait” (ibid.). Building on these argu­ ments about the politics and potential pleasures of waiting, I suggest that the moment of “waiting as such” also recalls the moment of “terror” discussed through the chameleon anecdote in Chapter Four. For instance, the terrible and unfit physical conditions in which migrants, refugees or citizens-in-waiting must form queues and wait for nearly 10–20 hours outside the foreigners’ registration offices after arriving, are a moment of both the realisation of estrangement and ironically a possibility of building new connections. Since waiting may involve coincidental meetings with strangers and meditative 131

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thinking about one’s identity or purpose in life, it generates a mutual gaze that involves reflection and “potential”13 of recognising the terror in the real.14 In other words, it generates the prospects of recognising one’s own deep-rooted horrors, those of the others, and the similarities even within the apparent dif­ ferences between oneself and the stranger. The articulation of the politics of waiting that may induce both terror and pleasure takes place through different modes of narration in HF and EW. By creating spaces for recall and under­ lining the politics of waiting, the following sub-sections will test if the literary strategies in the novel encourage a mode of thinking that teases any singularity in constructing the notion of the “past” and the “post”. Waiting for magical15 moments Although “magic realism” is a “disputed critical category” considering the “uncertainty surrounding its formal qualities” (Smale 2004: 1), the wandering nature of its definition and form has helped many writers and artists to explore the phantasmagorical nature of life and its repressed horrors. Franz Roh (cited in Smale 2004) locates the origin of “magic realism” as a concept that emerged in post-war European art, and as a response to the “search for an alternative to the limitations of an overly rational and technological society” (4). His argu­ ment encourages the understanding of “magical realism” as a realist narrative mode on a “sharp edge” that “will exist on a middle ground not through weakness but, on the contrary, through energy and awareness of its strength […] between two chasms on the right and the left” (ibid.). Considering the subtle differences between the two terms, this section uses Bowers’s (2004) “catch-all term” “magic(al) realism” to underline the disruptive and creative potential of this strategy in conflating the elements of the “improbable” with the “mundane” (Rushdie cited in Bowers 2004: 3). Such an understanding of magic(al) realism also helps to decode the uncanny sounds in HF and the magic doors in EW that respectively enable Shamsie and Hamid to challenge the market insecurities about categorising their literature into real, fiction or magic realism. In a broad sense, it enables them to probe an inquiry into the hegemonic discourses on the cultural forms of nation-states where literary realism enjoys its privileged position and authority. Within such a framework, if we assume both novels as symbolic of the cul­ tural moments of magic(al) realism within the vast array of world literature itself, then it is possible to largely examine the changing roles of literature in relation to the totalitarian turns in global politics. Considering that magical realism became a “popular narrative mode” to address and resist the funda­ mentalist and purist ideologies in racial politics within the postcolonial context (Bowers 2004: 4), this analysis locates the moments of magic(al) realism within the two novels as interconnected to the cultural and literary contexts in South Asia and the Global North. These moments also underline the experiences of “in-betweenness” of diasporic and migrant characters, and attend to the 132

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politics of waiting by lending an ear to the migrant voices that are margin­ alised and framed as undesirable. As they outline the wide-ranging implications of the War on Terror and nationalistic discourse on insecurity, they reflect the intertwined historical, political and cultural pasts of the nation-states. In HF, Shamsie intersperses the extraordinary and the real, and creates the moments of magic(al) realism by adapting the mythological Greek tragedy Antigone, deploying other forms of intertextuality and delineating an uncanny “aural map” (HF 172). For instance, when Isma sees a parachute, she imagines “surveillance satellites wheeling through the sky” and compares them to “angels, gods and demons descending from the sky” or “Icarus hurtling down, his father Daedalus following slowly to catch him” (HF 9). By alluding to Greek mythology and constructing a moment of fantasy, Shamsie reminds the readers of her earlier novel BS and Hiroko’s experience of the aerial bomb that drops from the sky. As the novel makes intra- and intertextual references, it appears to recall recent moments of terror such as the aerial attack on the Twin Towers on 9/11 and the 2018 airstrikes by the American, British and French forces in Syria. Shamsie also exposes the “mirage of democracy and freedom” through Farooq and Parvaiz’s conversation about the Caliphate (HF 145–146, 148). As Farooq shows him the “fantastic” images of the Cali­ phate on his phone, Parvaiz encounters an image of a bloodied corpse of a three-year-old child16 (HF 146). Their utopic visions about the Caliphate based on the “ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity” of the French revolution interrupted by a miserable reality implicate state-sponsored acts of terror in both the domestic and the global context. Thus, by interspersing myth with references to physical reality, HF creates the moments of magic(al) realism to underline how both the non-state and state actors are responsible for creating precarious conditions relating to human survival. Wait, listen to me! Sound-escape in Home Fire An untold story are the only obstacles between you and him. (HF 41)

Although HF begins with Isma’s “frustration” concerning the waiting times at the airport,17 and ends with Aneeka and Parvaiz’s hopeless wait for the British and Pakistani states to offer some solution, it indicates the potential of waiting as resistance and/or pleasure through the minor incidents in the middle of the novel. One such instance is situated in Aneeka and Parvaiz’s childhood when they are listening to the sounds of the trains running on the tracks nearby and “waiting for those moments when their hearts were synchronised first with each other and then with the sound of the train” (HF 44). Building on this pairing of listening and waiting, it is necessary to amplify the soundscape in the novel to elaborate on the politics of listening as a form of “waiting as such”. From early childhood, Parvaiz spends most of his time on his “sound 133

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projects” and “aural diaries” composed of ordinary and everyday sounds heard across London (HF 25, 131). By placing Parvaiz’s artistic aural practices out­ side the realm of conventional music, Shamsie not only challenges the West’s hegemonic models of music composition, but also draws the reader’s attention to think about everyday mundane sounds as a drum of unheard stories. While Aneeka motivates Parvaiz’s sound projects, Isma does not regard it as a lucrative career option despite the public recognition of his award-winning sound reel called “Shoes on a wet grass” (HF 122). These descriptions of their auditory behaviours foreground how listening manifests as a form of “waiting as such” that becomes essential for building deeper interpersonal connection within the siblings. Before Parvaiz goes to Raqqa to work as a sound engineer, his friend Farooq gives him lessons on “how to be a man”, a lesson that involves inflicting physical pain and sonic torture on Parvaiz (HF 129–130, 137). This incident reverberates not only the terrorising and deafening noises enforced on Rizvan in My Name is Khan and Samir in New York in the 9/11 context of the films, but also the power dynamics of “sonic patriarchy” that exercises surveillance on gendered bodies via sonic interventions (Lentjes 2019). Eventually, the sonic torture inflicted on Parvaiz further ruptures his fragile masculinity and renders his voice inaudible. When Parvaiz goes to Raqqa, sounds become a trope to narrate the sub­ altern voices of the novel that demand empathetic ears. In Raqqa, the power generators act as aural maps through which he hears loud repeated cries of a woman who is punished for taking off her face veil. In the sound studio, Par­ vaiz’s work involves improvisation of the sound effects of videos of beheading, crucifixions, whipping and dying screams (HF 178). While all of this makes him want to lose his hearing sense, it generates a desire to run a sword through Farooq’s throat only to hear his “gurgle of blood” (ibid.). Amidst the cacoph­ ony of these sounds, Parvaiz dreams of escaping to resume his “ordinary” life with his sisters in London (ibid.). By intermixing uncanny and jarring sounds with Parvaiz’s vivid dreams of the ordinary, Shamsie challenges the hegemony of the visual discourses, and the dominant epistemological orientations that govern who should speak and hear, as well as when, how and what should be spoken or heard in the global insecurity and precarity discourse of the novel. HF also abounds with examples of everyday sounds that have become verbal violence in the world of internet and populist digital politics, a world that seems to boost selected voices, but discourages “waiting as such” and listening to voices of dissident citizens. The everyday sounds in the novel include the cacophony of tweets, message alert sounds on WhatsApp and fake news alerts (HF 89, 45–46, 192–197). The offensive and simplistic narratives of the cyberspace are also underlined through the typography of the novel that includes the interplay between fonts and symbols used on social media (HF 190–197). What follow are fragments of two kinds of newspaper columns, one that seems to sensationalise and manipulate Aneeka’s tale, and the other that vocalises her concerns and demands an acute sense of hearing (HF 197, 204). These fragments also reflect, 134

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mediate and shape collective anxieties and uncertainties underlying Aneeka’s narrative, especially in the face of the novel’s third section which sketches her character in detail. The short poem on the next page (HF 205) recalls Seamus Heaney’s (2010) poem “Miracle” in his collection Human Chain, thereby redir­ ecting the reader’s attention to diverse voices that bind literary cultures, and the extraordinary intricacies that bind the human chain. Such sonic and intertextual strategies not only blur the lines between the ordinary and the miraculous to create moments of magic(al) realism, but also draw attention to the discourse on the “ethics of precarity” (Ruti 2017) and the questions about human relationality within which lies the decision to mourn human death. Apart from the bleak sounds, HF also creates an aural map for arousing plea­ sures by synchronising ordinary sounds to compose a distinctive melody—the “clinking” of bracelets, the low “humming” from the refrigerator, the “voices of drunk English lovers”, and the “tones of the rain clattering against the windows” (HF 117, 32). By tapping on popular music from India, Pakistan and the UK (HF 29) as well as Hindi and/or Urdu colloquial terms such as “yaar” (friend/buddy), “jigari” (dear) and “baytakalufi” (feeling at home) (HF 134), the novel creates a deictic effect of both familiarity and disorientation for its global readers. Such a blend of the harmonious and the dissonant voices in HF orchestrates a unique soundscape full of contrapuntal noises. Like the soundscape in HF, the chronotope of magic doors in Hamid’s EW also underlines the insecurities of nation-states and precarious lives of the migrants. Waiting at the door Borrowing from Bakhtin’s (1981) concept of “chronotope” where spatial and temporal indicators fuse into one concrete whole and become responsive to plot and history, I suggest that the chronotopic frame of the symbolic magic doors in EW both limits and provides the characters and readers with the space of freedom to engage in metaphorical visual endeavours. Such an endeavour becomes fundamental to the act of thinking past as it involves blurring of the boundaries between interiority-exteriority to narrate the shared human precarity. By focusing on the relationship between characters and the spatiotemporal frames they inhabit, it is possible to trace the connections between various layers of territorialisation within the chronotope of the magic doors. Before encountering the magic doors, Saeed, his father and Nadia shared an apartment or a space they called home, and “intersected” with one another across “varied and multiple streams of time” (EW 81). The ordinary doors within such a familial and well-defined space did not create anxiety or insecurity as they accorded the power to open and close to its users. However, they limited the possibilities of Saeed’s and Nadia’s migratory journey as they did not offer the prospect to venture into the unknown. As soon as they heard the possibility of the normal door turning into a magic door, there emerged a sense of mystery and the desire to explore. The doors did not reveal what was 135

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lying on both sides and it felt “like a beginning and an end […], it was like both dying and being born” (EW 103). Since there was no possibility to shut the magic doors, new ones would continue to open. Thus, they turned into symbolic agencies that possessed the power to play with the desires and fan­ tasies of the subjects. The first magic door in the novel that opens in Australia is described as “dark, darker than night”, and “out of this darkness, a man was emerging” (EW 8). This instance outlines the intertextual relationship between EW and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (Conrad [1899] 1990) in a way that challenges Conrad’s text where only the European colonisers had the right to movement and exploration. By providing no details regarding the national or social background of the man emerging out of darkness, and enabling his unobstructed movement through doors, Hamid creates a democratic space even for his minor characters. For Saeed, Nadia and several others in the novel, the magic doors signify the possibility of not only “securing passage” (EW 87) but also to reach places in the realm of the imagined and unimagined. The act of traversing through such doors implies negotiating with the Self’s internal desires, its corporeal bound­ aries and the collectivities one associates with. In Mykonos, as days pass by “full of waiting and false hopes”, Nadia suggests to Saeed that they should explore the island “as if they were tourists” (EW 133). By claiming this “wait­ ing” time for discovering pleasure through exploring, just like Hiroko in BS who explores Delhi with Sajjad, Nadia challenges the masculinist colonial sphere of discovery and exploration. Although Nadia and Saeed are “waiting, waiting, like so many others” in London, they are not waiting for a legal status of residence or some form of national assurance of belonging, instead they constantly look for alternative forms of belonging (EW 137). These alternative forms are articulated in the next few pages of the novel that divert the readers’ attention to random images of a “thousand fantasies” that include “cherry gardens”, “monkeys”, “dragons” and “foxes” (EW 138–140). Unlike Shamsie who evokes the moments of extraordinary or fantasy through aural maps and mythological tragedy, Hamid’s novel invests in drawing examples from chil­ dren’s literature18 and using elements of magic(al) realism with a purpose similar to those writers19 who are considered as the forerunners of magical realism. The sheer number of magic doors also renders the fights and various forms of violence useless in the insecure world of EW, and it becomes a matter of intense discussion for world leaders who declare the doors a “major global crisis” (EW 88). By demarcating geopolitical boundaries and guarding national doors by employing militants as the doorkeepers, the power struggles between nation-states underline the scalar mechanisms of human perception. As a measuring scale itself that frames and perceives such power struggles, the novel encourages the readers to ponder over a situation: What would it be like to find the borders of the nation-state with no door-stoppers, unguarded and open for all? What if nation-states adopted doormats welcoming everyone? 136

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Recalling William Blake’s (1868) argument on “doors of perception”,20 the doors in EW indicate a cleansing of arbitrary boundaries for exploring infinite possibilities to anticipate a future that minimises human precariousness. Thus, as a metaphor of opportunity, healing and provision, the magic doors in the novel not only serve to measure the scalar politics that determine human pre­ carity, but strongly influence the understanding of national histories and global predicaments labelled as the “migration problem” and the “refugee crisis”. Although the chronotope of doors serves as a useful lens to frame and view the multi-layered trajectories of Saeed and Nadia, they dwell on the binaries of inside and outside, thereby inhibiting the physical possibility to explore beyond. Therefore, it is necessary to examine other narrative tropes through which transitions and human connections are traced and built across doors.

Keeping in touch: technology and transgredience According to Todorov (1984), the term “transgredient” owes its present-day use to the German school of aestheticism suggesting that an element may be called transgredient when it designates “elements of our conscience which are exterior to it, but nonetheless essential to the process of its perfection, to its constitution as a totality” (101–103). For Bakhtin ([1920–1923] 1990), humans have an absolute need for the other, for the Other’s seeing, remembering, gathering and unifying self-activity. He calls the Other a “transgredient” ele­ ment of the Self’s conscience, where one constantly perceives oneself under another referent. Since at the time in which humans meet each other, it is not possible to “perceive everything in the space”, “transgredience” is the enabling factor that allows certainness in dialogue as a key to human understanding in everyday lives (Bakhtin [1920–1923] 1990: 14). In a way, transgredience is the necessary touch the self establishes with its alterity and its own multiple self-understandings (Guillaume 2011). In both HF and EW, such a transgredient touch is generated by digital technologies that provide an alternative understanding of social interaction and the ways in which migrants organise themselves into groups and communities. In EW, digital technology is used as a tool that functions like the magic carpet of the story in One Thousand and One Nights (Dawood 1973). At the touch of the screen, it transports humans to other countries, connects them to other bodies to establish an identity, draw connectivity and explore the realm of possibilities. When Nadia and Saeed are deprived of their online portals due to curfew, they feel marooned and afraid (EW 41). More than Saeed, for Nadia being online implies “sex”, “security” and more “freedom” as the “opaque usernames” and “avatars” serve as the online equivalence of her black robes (ibid.). In addition to building connections, digital technology is also used as a motif to demonstrate the disparities that make certain people and nations more vulnerable and precarious. By narrating how unfed children could see on small screens “the feasts of opulence” in foreign lands, the novel underlines the 137

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disparities in the global distribution of resources in our current neoliberal and economic practices (EW 42). Later, when the operation “Britain for Britain” begins in London to clear the “migration ghetto”, Nadia and Saeed argue about who has the right to reside, belong and for how long (EW 162). Their debates highlight the issues of nativism, the refugee “crisis” and economic security while encouraging the reader to think of the new forms of violence that emerge due to the misuse of digital technology. However, by underlining how technology can also be used to expose and resist different forms of vio­ lence, the novel locates technology as a collective site for meditative thinking or “waiting as such”. While Hamid’s EW seems to be hopeful concerning the kind of touch that technology can generate, Shamsie reveals her scepticism in relation to technol­ ogy and cyberspace through the trajectories of the siblings Isma, Aneeka and Parvaiz. Like the magic doors of EW, the Skype window in HF serves as a narrative medium to trace the transgredient connections between the char­ acters. After going to Amherst, Isma uses Skype to “keep a check” on her sib­ lings (HF 30); however, later in the novel, instead of rebuilding lost connections with her brother Parvaiz who wishes to escape from Raqqa, she ignores his calls on Skype. Although Isma and Aneeka promise to be in touch with one another through Skype, the omniscient narrator in the novel laments, “touch was one thing modern technology did not allow” (HF 13). By high­ lighting the undependability of cyberspace as a dominant mode of trans­ gredience, Shamsie insists on the constellation of different modes of communication to establish connections. Even though modern communication technology is filled with touchscreen gadgets that signify “keeping in touch”, the novel laments that they do not create the “physical closeness” required to maintain relationships (HF 13). Besides, digital technologies also generate anxieties and insecurities in the novel as the three siblings are always conscious about “GWM” (Googling while Muslim) (HF 65), and paranoid about the fact that their private messages and internet history are being monitored every day (HF 94). Despite the novel’s hesitation and scepticism concerning the state’s use of digital technologies for Islamophobic surveillance, the experimental mode (interspersed with opinion articles, tweets, poems and letters) in the latter half of the novel indicates how communication technologies such as news media delineate multiple voices and forge connections across national boundaries. To further understand the implications of desiring such transnational and cosmopolitan connections, the next section will inspect the narrations of home and nation in both the novels.

Home, nation and migratory desires In EW, for Nadia, even if there are moments when she prefers being alone for some physical comforts (EW 132), home is situated not in the house but in her relation to the community as a meeting with “people of different colours” gives 138

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her a “relief” (EW 159). Like Hiroko in BS, home is Nadia’s “traveling self” or a feeling that travels with her, and this union of her own migrant identity with the ideas of home and nation “lies at the intersection of dwelling and travel­ ing” or a “claim of continuity within discontinuity” (Minh-ha 2011: 27, 31). Saeed’s feelings of being at home deepen in the streets of his city of birth and the farther he moves away, through space and time, the more he seeks to strengthen connection only with his “fellow countrymen” (EW 160). Unlike Nadia, as Saeed’s homing desires conflate with his idea of the Self and the nation, it reflects what Morley (2000), in his study on the nexus between home terri­ tories, nationalism and narcissism, calls “self-enclosure” or the “belief, that no one else can understand you but your own group, there is no point in listening to strangers” (221). Thus, Saeed’s social antagonism can also be perceived as a form of “nationalistic narcissism” in which he is “so trapped inside his own mythology” that he shows “no communicative empathy”, ultimately corre­ sponding to the “devaluation” of other communities and even their “minor differences” combined with the “exacerbation of intolerance” (Morley 2000: 221). Thus, in such a scenario, for Saeed, the construction of home involves the exclusion of the perceived otherness as much as engaging in the processes of domestication with Nadia and fellow countrymen (EW 160). An analysis of how and where other minor migrant characters locate home indicates that it is associated with not only the needs from the physical environment, but also the promises made with other communities in the refugee camps: “not so much of different goods, exactly, but of time—the promise of something to eat tomor­ row” (EW 133). Ultimately, even if all the characters in EW are aware that “life and its end are unpredictable” (EW 160), it is possible to conclude that they learn how to be “at home” even in the “thin edge of barbwire” (Anzaldúa cited in Minh-ha 2011: 8). Like Saeed, in HF, Isma locates her home in her childhood experiences and the surroundings in which she resides with her family. However, for the twin siblings Aneeka and Parvaiz, the homing desires lie in the conversations and the silences between themselves. It is as Minh-ha (2011) puts it simply: “Home is not only in the eye, the tongue and the nose, but it is also […] acutely in the ear” (12). Their notion of home shatters after Isma leaves them and fails to engage in long conversations with them, and it is in these feelings of the unheard and the unsaid that the title of the novel “home fire” takes on its meaning. The juxtaposition of “home” with the “fire” imagery is indicative of passion, compassion, destruction, the possibilities of regeneration in the homing desires and the politics of belonging in the novel. In consonance with the soundscape of the novel, Shamsie’s strategy of titling Home Fire also resonates with Ivor Novello’s (1915) First World War song called “Keep the Home Fires Burning”. Such a sonic strategy is in harmony with that of inter­ textuality as HF recalls the fire imagery of the earlier novel BS, the historical context of A God in Every Stone (Shamsie 2014) and the theme of rage in Antigone. Considering the lack of warmth in a nation in “distress” and the 139

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failure to “keep the home fires burning”, Parvaiz “dreams of home” (Novello 1915), and realises his feelings of baytakalufi21 with his “jigari dost” Farooq (HF 29, 134). Through Parvaiz’s radicalisation, the novel ignites the fiery or destructive potential of the unhomely as well as the narcissistic homely feel­ ings. Such acts of distancing from the others and self-enclosure to confine the boundaries of one’s home and identity, further complicate the discourses on nation and nativism in the novel. EW investigates the discourses on nation and nativism through the political understandings of “refugee” and “foreignness”. In the novel, the term refugee indicates a more extreme circumstance than a migrant, and foreignness demands a more capacious view than mere questions of one’s nationality. In the American city Marin, the narrator realises, “there were almost no natives, these people having died out or been exterminated long ago” (EW 197–198). And yet, he states that it is not entirely appropriate to claim that there are no natives as “nativeness is a relative matter” (ibid.). Such duality is suggestive of the political claims in the nativity discourse that do not consider migration as an essence of human nature. Although Saeed mediates ideologies of religious nationalism and isolation when he meets people of his city of birth, he realises that the “only divisions that mattered now were between those who sought the right of passage and those who would deny them passage” (EW 155). As he grapples with these contradictions and the unreliability of the magic doors, he interweaves the precariousness of his migrant life with the painful journey of the slaves transported through the Middle Passage. According to Bakhtin ([1993] 1999),22 “the major responsibility of humans is to connect the things that we encounter in the world as ‘an architectonic whole’ that would otherwise remain alien to one another” (57). For him, everything acquires meaning and importance only in relation to one another in an architectonically structured world. I argue that EW best demonstrates this architectonic structure through the everyday experiences of the migrants in the refugee camps (EW 106). By linking seemingly disparate people, time zones and spaces, the novel questions the idea of a nation based on ahistorical logics of divisions. It calls for building connections by postulating that each character and place is like a “dialectical image” disrupting the idea of linear history within which the interrelations and tensions exist simultaneously (Benjamin 1999: 462). Saeed narrates to Nadia an experience of a French photographer who captures city skies from deserted places at the same latitude but at dif­ ferent times (EW 56). In another instance, he compares Ireland to Shikoku based on their physical and geographical appearance on a world map (29). Even Britain is compared to any other nation with multiple personalities where skins of different colours are dissolving into one another due to the increasing number of migrants (158). This kind of a blurring of boundaries between and within the nations and individuals emphasises the novel’s motive of advocating a rethinking of the borders we have inscribed on both human bodies and the globe. Towards the end of the novel, for Saeed, building a road seems like 140

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remodelling the Earth (EW 177–179) whereas Nadia thinks people “like pipes connect without requiring them to move” (EW 181–182). By shedding light on their ecologically oblivious projects, the novel exposes how in the foreground­ ing of economic priorities, the racial and nativist visions of national security policies are the real threat to people and our environment. As they forge the precarious conditions of living, such policies exacerbate “the epoch of global fear” by leaving migrants “neither here nor elsewhere” (Minh-ha 2011: 1). In EW, for Nadia, even when “millions” arrived in their city of birth due to nearby wars, it “didn’t matter” because their country was poor and they “didn’t feel they had much to lose” (EW 164). However, in HF, Isma feels discomforted by the “new tenants” of their house in London who buy a “BMW” and “replace net curtains with expensive blinds” (HF 24). As she cri­ tiques the systemic crisis of wealth accumulation and the rising global eco­ nomic inequalities, she unveils how neoliberal capitalism breeds new insecurities amongst nations. Her belief that “occupying other people’s terri­ tory generally causes more problems than it solves” (ibid.) reflects her ambivalent position concerning the War on Terror discourse on nations’ sovereignty, nativism and migration that often manipulates the logics of colo­ nialism to shape immigration policies. The quest to belong to a nation and the insecure feeling of being nowhere in HF are also articulated through discus­ sions on religious identity. While Eamonn and Karamat Lone attempt to assimilate into the White Christian British society, they suppress or deemphasise their Muslim identity. In contrast, although Isma, Aneeka and Par­ vaiz are comfortable with their Muslim identity, they constantly face questions about their “Britishness” through different forms of state surveillance. By jux­ taposing their problems of identification and affiliation, the novel resists the linear alignments between nation and religion, and questions the unidimensional image of Islam and the racial profiling of Muslims. Even through the contextual narrative of Parvaiz, the novel delinks youth radicalisation from religion to demonstrate how his radicalisation is not only a result of social, economic and cultural alienation, but also the discriminatory nature of the state’s counterterrorism policies that consolidate prejudices and phobias, and fracture the migrant, racialised and gendered identities (HF 117, 122–123). In delineating these concerns, the novel calls for a mode of thinking that provokes an investigation into the dynamics of “cultural oblivion” (Plate 2016) or those technologies of forgetting that simplify the narratives about the nation’s past. The final segment explores Karamat Lone’s politics of cultural oblivion that intensifies the migrant citizens’ conditions of insecurity and precarity, and determines their rights after death.

Migrant citizens’ rights after death No day shall erase you from the memory of time Virgil

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The quote23 from Virgil’s Aeneid (translated by S. Lombardo in 2005), also an inscription at the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York City, serves as a rele­ vant starting point for a nuanced reading of the historical and cultural oblivion of Karamat Lone and other characters in HF. By examining the mourning anxieties surrounding the discussions corresponding to the inscribed quote, this section examines how HF is positioned in relation to the historical and cultural oblivion ingrained in the War on Terror tactics, the discourse on insecurities related to national belonging, and the ethics of mourning. With reference to the inscribed quote at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, Helen Morales suggests: If we take into account its original context, the quotation is more applicable to the aggressors in the 9/11 tragedy than those honored by the memorial … So my first reaction is that the quotation is shockingly inappropriate for the U.S. victims of the 9/11 attack. (Morales cited in McQuade 2014) While Morales’ initial “shock” is ascribable to her realisation of cultural oblivion on the part of the Memorial’s makers, she recognises the “productive irony” in the quote as she adds, “the quotation makes us remember the suici­ dal killers of 9/11 as well as their victims” (cited in McQuade 2014). This remembrance may manifest as “horror, anger, disbelief” but it asks us to “remember them nonetheless” (ibid.). Although she advocates a collective act of mourning for the suicidal killers and “U.S. victims”, her statement unveils a variant of historical obliviousness24 underpinning the War on Terror rhetoric that proclaims American exceptionalism and supremacy and de-politicises the history of “suicidal killers” and terrorism. Although in a different yet inter­ related spatiotemporal context, I suggest that both Karamat Lone and Anee­ ka’s trajectories serve as useful lenses to trace the peculiar obliviousness reflected in Morales’ response to Virgil’s quote. Karamat Lone is what Aneeka calls him: “Mr. Strong on Security and Mr. Striding Away from Muslimness” (HF 51–52). Like King Creon in Antigone, Karamat Lone’s politics of national belonging and homeland security are both parochial and discriminatory. Despite being warned by his wife Terry and daughter Emily (perhaps like the Chorus in Antigone) that he was doing a “contemptuous thing” by not allowing the repatriation of Parvaiz’s dead body to Britain (HF 214), Karamat Lone’s adamant attitude is reflective of a nation­ state’s tactic of tight securitisation of borders to restrict migratory movements. Later, in his tireless efforts to defend the borders of the nation from “enemies”, he revokes the citizenship of all dual nationals who have left Britain to join “terrorist groups” (HF 188). Considering the changing citizenship laws and nationality discourse in Britain and France, Mantu (2018) argues, “[w]hile home-grown terrorists and foreign ‘terrorist’ fighters pose a threat to national security, the use of nationality legislation to deal with them as security threats encroaches upon their human right to nationality” (28). Echoing Mantu’s 142

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propositions, the novel interrupts Karamat Lone’s views by highlighting other marginalised perspectives that challenge the state’s bigoted response. Karamat Lone’s statement that “citizenship is not a right but a privilege” is strongly condemned in the novel by amplifying the voice of a human rights liberty group who claim, “statelessness is a tool of despots, not democrats” (HF 198). Lost between the duality of fire and ice—“a man needed fire in his veins to burn through the world, not ice to freeze everything in place”—the novel indicates how Karamat Lone’s ideas of citizenship and human rights are both infuriating and frozen in time and space. Echoing the 9/11 rhetoric of the Bush administration in the USA and the Blair government’s (2006) Preventing Vio­ lent Extremism (PVE) policy, the novel challenges the racialised and biopoli­ tical lenses of the state that have exacerbated the precariousness of the Muslim migrant’s life. Aneeka’s resentment against statements like “terrorist attacks involving European victims” (HF 90) denotes her resistance against the state’s language that solicits a hierarchal and hegemonic mode of speaking and listening about terrorism and victimisation in relation to race, religion and nation. Her awareness of the capacities of language and its intrinsic power of general­ isation, categorisation as well as multiplicity reiterates the idea articulated by Minh-ha (2011): “Language remains this inexhaustible reservoir from which noises, proverbs and stories continue to flow when water is scarce” (233). Later in a discussion with Eamonn, Aneeka points out the lack or unavailability of reports in Britain and in other parts of the West about the tortures faced by Muslims in the form of illegal detentions, airport interrogations, everyday surveillance of their digital and religious activities, and so on (HF 118). Unlike her sister Isma, her radical ideas of love and hope become the weapons in her battle against the state and for justice for her brother Parvaiz (HF 194). Even when she is told that “ladies don’t go for burial” (HF 203), she goes to Karachi to claim her brother’s body and assert her right to mourning (HF 207). Her decision demonstrates that in denying the rights of a proper burial and mourning, the state seizes both the living and the dead migrants’ subjectivity and agency. Ultimately, while the novel exposes the cracks in Karamat Lone’s racial, religious and biopolitical lenses that frame the exceptionalism in his nationa­ listic politics, it draws attention to the hopelessness and short-sightedness in Aneeka’s suicidal and radical individualism. Contrary to the dialectical images we see in EW that bring about synthesis between disparate entities to portray a scene of loss that is universal to humans, in HF we see no such synthesis between the responses of characters suggesting any common solution. Instead, the novel advocates that even if the rules of justice or law are framed democra­ tically, they cannot become a universal standard to frame an all-encompassing set of rights related to human life and death. Instead, the solutions perhaps lie in an examination of the historical and cultural oblivion, and the pre­ carious circumstances of the migrant that demand changing and multiple 143

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visions of both justice and law. Moreover, in our acceptance of the differ­ ences in the precarity of human lives, the novel suggests that we pay attention to “grief” in the formulation of refugees’ and migrant citizens’ right to mourn and perform rites after death as “grief was what you owed the dead for the necessary crime of living on without them” (HF 193). Thus, unlike the classicist interpretations of the inscribed quote at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, the reader of HF is not left in a position to decide between two extreme stances. In other words, the reader does not face the dilemma of whether the question of rites/rights after death should be based on decisions of politicians who proclaim to be the voice of law, or the other extreme, that is, the subjective particularities or individual convictions that point out the unjust sides of law. Instead, the dynamics of fluid identities and the precarious position of all characters, articulated through a democratic narrative structure of the novel, offer multiple viewpoints. At first, the novel questions the scales through which we view the extremity of the two responses. It then invites the reader to adopt a practice of listening that recognises plural voices, and finally, it asks the readers to accept the existence of multiple interpretations and implications of past in law, justice and history.

Conclusion Often, in the case of migrants stranded between borders, “the bodies of the dead are literally lost in a fog of bureaucratic ambiguity, unmourned and uncounted” (Kovras et al. 2016: 49). Within such a morbid and miserable sce­ nario, I suggest that while we pay attention to “grief”25 as a basis for estab­ lishing commonality in humans, we need to be mindful of what is remembered, forgotten and established in this grief to implicate ourselves. This is because in our selective memory and obliviousness to the multiplicity and connectivity in the pasts of nation-states, we may end up reiterating models of “white inno­ cence” and “imperial precariousness” (Danewid 2017) resonating the “shock” reactions to Virgil’s quote inscribed on the wall in the 9/11 Memorial Museum.26 In times where the “dangerous delusion”27 that all international disputes can be settled by military means hovers around us, this chapter has argued that Hamid’s EW and Shamsie’s HF defy a nationalist cartographic reading of the world and call for “planetary” mourning from all human sub­ jects (Spivak 2003: 72). However, what sets apart EW from HF is Hamid’s affinity to “interventionist literature”.28 In EW, there is the utopian alternative in the form of magic doors suggesting that it will be easier to challenge the inse­ curities we face today if everyone realises, “[e]veryone migrates, even if we stay in the same houses our whole lives, because we can’t help it […] [w]e are all migrants through time” (EW 209). However, HF does not offer any utopian alternatives but calls for practices of listening and ethics of testimony that do not involve binaristic judgments and extremist responses. Despite the differ­ ences in the mediation of migrant trajectories, both novels speak to what 144

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Barthes ([1953] 1968) writes about the role of literature: “History confronts the writer with a necessary option between several moral attitudes connected with language” (2). By translating the hopeless state of contemporary issues29 into a language of fiction that is relevant to the insecure times we live in, the novels call for “waiting as such” to critically reflect on our shared precarity.

Notes 1 In this section, I have consciously avoided the use of quotation marks with refer­ ence to the post-9/11 labels coined by scholars. To avoid any confusion and mis­ representation related to their coinage of the labels, I have relied on parentheses to further clarify and describe their use of punctuation marks. 2 “Teleopoiesis” refers to “looking for our definition in the eyes of the other, as fig­ ured in the text” (Spivak 2003: 25), implying that we pay attention to the literari­ ness of the text rather than merely performing a distant reading of the text and its context that simplifies, homogenises or totalises our interconnected past and overlooks its implications in the future. 3 This narrative strategy already sets apart EW from Hamid’s previous novels like The Reluctant Fundamentalist (Hamid 2007) and How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia (Hamid 2013). 4 Here the “projects” refer to “coherent bundles of ideas and practices as realised in particular times and places” (Tsing 2000: 347). While Tsing calls for addressing the “cultural specificities” in globalisation projects, she stresses investigating their travelling routes and interactions with other projects (ibid.). 5 From Sophocles’ Greek tragedy Antigone, adapted and translated by Seamus Heaney (2004) in his The Burial of Thebes. 6 See Birch (1756), Imlac (1817), Thompson (1824), Upton et al. (1833), Carvell (1863), Knight (1866), Malabari (1889) and Balzac (1897). 7 It refers to the “set of eloquent arguments that seeks to persuade and provoke emotive responses through tropes (reasonings and judgments) anchored in a principle of generalized insecurity” (Reguillo cited in Gambetti et al. 2013: 2). 8 For Lorey (cited in Puar 2012), “If we say, ‘we are all precarious’, then the pre­ cariousness that is shared with others is always something that separates us from others, and at the same time it is something we have in common with them”. She further states that, “We are different in our common precariousness […] the ambivalence between the relational difference and the possibilities of what is in common in difference can be a starting point for political arguments” (172). 9 The title is based on Glynn Davis’s (2017) essay on “Waiting as Such: The Politics of Tarrying”. 10 Here, I would like to point out some diverse instances of waiting as “frustration” for migrants: (i) “The long wait at ‘Horror affairs’” in Durban (Rondganger 2015). (ii) “The horror of the German Foreigners Registration Office” (Marian 2016). Significantly, this article also illustrates how some Foreigners’ Registration offices in Germany have all their signboards in German, except for the one signboard in their office which states in English: “Exit”. Such an approach towards the “foreigners” (who wait for nearly half a day in such offices after their new arrival in a nationstate and without a firm grounding in its dominant language) exposes the state’s lingual politics of exceptionalism and the “ethics of hospitality” (Derrida 2000). (iii) “Knocking at the Gate: Flawed Access to the Asylum System due to the Influx of Applicants from the Ukraine and Georgia” (Mishli et al. 2017).

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11 One of the most common statements within this rhetoric includes “we are sorry for keeping you in waiting!” 12 See for instance, Auyero’s study (cited in Davis 2017) that explores the model of patience for citizens in the Argentinian government’s planning of sustainable development goals. 13 Here, the meaning of the term “potential” is based on Sangari’s (1987) “Politics of the Possible”. It refers to “a compound of the desired and the undesirable” in the context of describing the brutality of the real as the “terror” of what is “immanent, conceivable, potentially possible” (163). 14 This recalls an instance from Coetzee’s (1980) Waiting for Barbarians. When the Colonel and the girl are waiting, the Colonel contemplates, “with the buck before me suspended in immobility, there seems to be time for all things, time even to turn my gaze inward […]” (39). I argue that this “time for all things” is the “waiting as such” (Davis 2017) or the suspended time which enables the Colonel to make meanings of his own reflections as seen in the girl’s eyes. 15 The title is based on the discussion of the subtle differences between magic realism and magical realism in Maggie Ann Bowers’s (2004) book Magic(al) Realism. 16 Shamsie seems to draw on several popular news accounts of the Western media at different points in her novel (HF 8). Two of these include the news accounts on the image of the dead Syrian child at the beach, and the reference to the quote of the Statue of Liberty plaque to oppose Trump’s Islamophobic travel ban. See Ensor’s (2016) report, “‘Photo of my Dead Son Has Changed Nothing’, Says Father of Drowned Syrian Refugee Boy Alan Kurdi”, and Mandell’s (2017) report, “Ronda Rousey Quotes Statue of Liberty Plaque to Protest Immigration Policy”. 17 In his study, Davis (2017) also sheds light on Sarah Sharma’s study of the post-9/11 waiting politics at airports, especially at the ones located in the West. Sharma’s study indicates that airport waiting time is a sign of the nation-state’s insecurity concerning immigration, and its claim to dominance for an assertion of the super­ iority complex (398). In addition, her study is also useful to understand the class dynamics in the different waiting experiences of travellers, for instance, frequent travellers versus those who are financially and socially marginalised from the elitist and classist sphere. 18 In an interview with Corbie Hill (2017), Hamid admits he was inspired by the Chronicles of Narnia while reading it to his children. 19 Both Hamid’s and Shamsie’s purpose of using magic(al) realism recalls Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s (1978) use of magical realism to depict a world of people unset­ tled by violence in One Hundred Years of Solitude. It also resonates with Salman Rushdie’s ([1981] 2003) aim to create a hybrid world in Midnight’s Children, and Toni Morrison’s ([1987] 2004) use of magic realism in Beloved for enabling the subaltern character to articulate the politics of speaking and listening. 20 This is borrowed from William Blake’s (1868) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell where he advocates the cleansing of the “doors of perception” so that one may discover beyond the “narrow chinks of his cavern” and “everything would appear to man as Infinite” (Plate 14). 21 It refers to the feelings of being at ease or at home. 22 Bakhtin ([1993] 1999) uses the term “architectonic” to describe how art relates to life in its composition of two value centres that are fundamentally and essentially different, yet are correlated and dependent on each other (61). 23 Here, it is necessary to reflect on Dunlap’s (2014) suggestion concerning the several meanings of “you” in Virgil’s quote: “You are not nameless. You are Nisus and Euryalus. You do not number in the thousands. You are two. You are not civilians. You are Trojan soldiers. You have not been thrown together by cruel chance. You

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24

25

26 27 28

29

are a loving pair. Your deaths are not unprovoked. You have just slaughtered the enemy in an orgy of violence, skewering soldiers whom you ambushed in their sleep. For this, the enemy has killed you and impaled your heads on spears.” According to Plate (2016), “What is not remembered is not only unavailable or inac­ cessible psycho-cognitively, it is also unavailable in language”. She wonders, “Why do we know so little about forgetting? Why do we not even have a word for that which is forgotten? Why do we make so little use of the words we do have—‘Lethean’, for instance, but also verbs such as ‘to oblivion’ and ‘to oblivionize’?” (146). According to Murava (2018), while death causes grief, “it becomes even heavier when economic circumstances contrive to worsen the situation”. Since the cost of a funeral has inflated in the last decade, the situation has become more intense for the relatives of those dying in diaspora. She reveals that relatives are expected to fork out about £2,500 in the UK, about $20,000 in the USA and R25,000 in South Africa to repatriate the remains of a loved one. In most cases, families fail to raise such huge sums of money, resulting in them seeking loans or donations from friends or other familial members. Although she writes in the context of the Sahiwara Inter­ national Plan, an investment plan for Zimbabweans in diaspora, I argue that her revelations are useful in the context of the discourse on economic insecurities and precarity that shape the laws concerning the rights of refugees, migrants and diasporas both before and after death. According to McQuade (2014), ironically, “Virgil’s line better reflects the violence and brutality of 9/11, and the years that have followed, than some classicists or museum officials would care to admit”. The chapter borrows the term from Einstein’s ([1947, 1952] 2010) essay “The Military Mentality”. Fredric Jameson (1981) refers to the term “interventionist literature” to describe those novels that not only unravel the ideological missions in legitimating a given power structure and specific forms of ideology, but also present a utopian alternative to the status quo (291). One of the contemporary issues that has been a matter of concern for me since the time I started researching for this book is an encounter with “The Genographic Project” of the National Geographic Society, a multi-year research initiative that was launched in 2005 by geneticist Dr Spencer Wells and led by anthropologist Dr Miguel Vilar. The project aims at using cutting-edge genetic and computational technologies to analyse historical patterns in DNA from participants around the world to better understand our “shared genetic roots” (Wells et al. 2005). Although the project promises forging global connections by helping people learn their “own deep ancestry”, I am sceptical of the concealed motives and possible narcissistic consequences of such projects within the ongoing discourse on nativism, indigenous identities and nationalism.

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Garrido, Lea E. 2018. “Luke Cage as Postpost-9/11 TV: Spatial Negotiations of Race in Contemporary U.S. Television”. Current Objectives of Postgraduate American Studies. 19(1): 1–20. Gray, Richard. 2011. After the Fall: American Literature since 9/11. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons. Guillaume, Xavier. 2011. International Relations and Identity: A Dialogical Approach. Abingdon: Routledge. Hamid, Mohsin. 2007. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. London: Hamish Hamilton. Hamid, Mohsin. 2013. How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia. London: Penguin. Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. Exit West. New York: Riverhead Books. Heaney, Seamus. 2004. The Burial at Thebes: Sophocles’ Antigone. Translated by Seamus Heaney. London: Faber & Faber. Heaney, Seamus. 2010. Human Chain. London: Faber & Faber. Hill, Corbie. 2017 (March 3). “Pakistani Author Says it’s Time to Imagine a Future with Hope”. Newsobserver.com. https://www.newsobserver.com/entertainment/ books/article136267508.html. Accessed on 21 March 2018. Imlac. 1817. Insecurity of the British Funds: Essay on Public Credit: by David Hume …: with Observations on the Sound and Prophetic Nature of Its Principles: Shewing from Indisputable Facts, that a Perseverance in the Pitt and Paper System Must Eventually Produce a National Bankruptcy […]. UK: T. Keys. Jameson, Fredric. 1981. The Political Unconscious: Narrative as Socially Symbolic Act. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. Khair, Tabish. 2015. “Capital and the New Xenophobia”. Economic and Political Weekly. 50(46–47): 44–49. Kiernan, Victor G. 1971. Faiz Ahmad Faiz. London: Vanguard Books South Publication. Knight, Charles. 1866. Knowledge is Power: A View of the Productive Forces of Modern Society and the Results of Labor, Capital and Skill. Alexandria, Egypt: Library of Alexandria. Kovras, I. and Robins, S. 2016. “Death as the Border: Managing Missing Migrants and Unidentified Bodies at the EU’s Mediterranean Frontier”. Political Geography. 55: 40–49. Lentjes, Rebecca. 2019. “Sonic Patriarchy in the Neoliberal University.” #MeToo in the Humanities Round Table on Gender & Sexual Politics in the Humanities. New York: Stony Brook. http://www.rebeccalentjes.com/?p=788. Accessed on 10 December 2019. Leyshon, Cressida. 2016 (November 7). “This Week in Fiction: Mohsin Hamid on the Migrants in All of us”. NewYorker.com. https://www.newyorker.com/books/pa ge-turner/this-week-in-fiction-mohsin-hamid-2016-11-14. Accessed on 3 April 2018. Liao, Pei-chen. 2013. ‘Post’-9/11 South Asian Diasporic Fiction: Uncanny Terror. London: Palgrave. Mackintosh, Sir James. 1835. A View of the Reign of James II. From his Accession, to the Enterprise of the Prince of Orange. UK: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown & Green. Malabari, Behramji M. 1889. Gujarat and the Gujaratis. New Delhi: Mittal Publications. Mandell, Nina. 2017 (January 29). “Ronda Rousey Quotes Statue of Liberty Plaque to Protest Immigration Policy”. FTW.usatoday.com. https://ftw.usatoday.com/2017/01/ ronda-rousey-trump-immigration. Accessed on 3 February 2017.

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Mantu, Sandra. 2018. “‘Terrorist’ Citizens and the Human Right to Nationality”. Journal of Contemporary European Studies. 26(1): 28–41. Marian, Jakub. 2016. “The Horror of the German Foreigners Registration Office”. Jakub­ marian.com. https://jakubmarian.com/the-horror-of-the-german-foreigners-registratio n-office. Accessed on 9 January 2017. Márquez, Gabriel García. [1967] 1978. One Hundred Years of Solitude. London: Pan Books. McQuade, James. 2014 (April 7). “Classicist Says Quote of Virgil’s Inscribed on 9/11 Memorial is ‘Shockingly Inappropriate’”. MHPBooks.com. https://www.mhpbooks.c om/classicist-says-quote-of-virgils-inscribed-on-911-memorial-is-shockingly-inappropri ate/. Accessed on 12 January 2018. Minh-ha, Trinh T. 2011. Elsewhere, within Here: Immigration, Refugeeism and the Boundary Event. Abingdon: Routledge. Mishli, Neta, Guthmann, Anat and Rozen, Sigal. 2017. “Knocking at the Gate: Flawed Access to the Asylum System due to the Influx of Applicants from the Ukraine and Georgia”. Hotline for Refugees and Migrants. Tel Aviv. https://il.boell.org/sites/defa ult/files/hrm-knocking-at-the-gate-eng-web-2017.pdf. Accessed on 6 January 2018. Morley, David. 2000. Home Territories: Media, Mobility and Identity. New York: Routledge. Morrison, Toni. [1987] 2004. Beloved. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Chelsea House. Murava, Patience. 2018 (July 19). “When Death is Costly…Diaspora Must Plan for Repatriation”. Thepatriot.co.zw. https://www.thepatriot.co.zw/old_posts/when-dea th-is-costly-diaspora-must-plan-for-repatriation/. Accessed on 19 July 2018. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Novello, Ivor. 1915. Keep the Home Fires Burning. New York and Toronto: Chappell & Co. Ltd. Plate, Liedeke. 2016. “Amnesiology: Towards the Study of Cultural Oblivion”. Memory Studies. 9(2): 143–155. Puar, Jasbir K. 2012. “Precarity Talk: A Virtual Roundtable with Lauren Berlant, Judith Butler, Bojana Cvejic´, Isabell Lorey, Jasbir Puar, and Ana Vujanovic´”. TDR/ The Drama Review. 56(4): 163–177. Rondganger, Lee. 2015 (July 20). “The Long Wait at ‘Horror Affairs’”. IOLnews.za. https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/kwazulu-natal/the-long-wait-at-horror-affairs­ 1888001. Accessed on 6 January 2018. Rushdie, Salman. [1981] 2003. Midnight’s Children. New York: Modern Library. Ruti, Mari. 2017. “The Ethics of Precarity: Judith Butler’s Reluctant Universalism”. In Remains of the Social: Desiring the Post-Apartheid. Edited by Maurits Van Bever Donker, Ross Truscott, Premesh Premesh Lalu, Gary Minkley, Derek Hook, Mari Ruti, Jaco Barnard-Naude, Annemarie Lawless, Aidan Erasmus and Helena Pohlandt-McCormick, 92–116. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. Sadaf, Shazia. 2018 (January 9). “Of Borders and Magic Doors: New Directions in Pakistani Fiction”. South Asian Literary Association (SALA) Annual Conference 2018. New York City. Sanderson, William. 1658. A Compleat History of the Life and Raigne of King Charles from his Cradle to his Grave. UK: Moseley.

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Sangari, Kumkum. 1987. “The Politics of the Possible”. Cultural Critique. 7: 157–186. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2014. A God in Every Stone. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Shohat, Ella. 1992. “Notes on the Post-Colonial”. Social Text. 31/32: 99–113. Smale, David J. 2004. Magic Realism: Transformations and Migrations of a Disputed Critical Category. PhD Dissertation. Liverpool: John Moores University. Spivak, Gayatri C. 2003. Death of a Discipline. New York: Columbia University Press. Thompson, William. 1824. An Inquiry into the Principles of the Distribution of Wealth Most Conducive to Humane Happiness Applied to the Newly Proposed System of Voluntary Equality of Wealth. London: Longman. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. Todorov, Tzvetan. 1984. Mikhail Bakhtin: The Dialogical Principle. Translated by Wlad Godzich. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Toros, H. 2017. “‘9/11 is Alive and Well’ or How Critical Terrorism Studies Has Sustained the 9/11 Narrative”. Critical Studies on Terrorism. 10(2): 203–219. Travers, Andrew. 2018 (June 18). “Novelist Mohsin Hamid Discusses Aspen Literary PrizeWinning ‘Exit West’”. AspenTimes.com. https://www.aspentimes.com/entertainment/ novelist-mohsin-hamid-discusses-aspen-literary-prize-winning-exit-west/. Accessed on 18 June 2018. Tsing, Anna. 2000. “The Global Situation”. Cultural Anthropology. 15(3): 327–360. Upton and Roberts (messrs.). 1833. Important Information … The Insecurity of Sir H. Davy’s Lamp Demonstrated … and the Perfect Security of Upton and Robert’s New Safety Lamp Proved. Oxford: University of Oxford. Virgil. 2005. Aeneid. Translated by Stanley Lombardo. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub. Co. Wells, Spencer and Vilar, Miguel. 2005. “The Genographic Project”. The National Geographic Society. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/pages/article/genographic. Accessed on 26 March 2021.

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6

LONG-DISTANCE NATIONALISMS

AND POPULIST POLITICS IN AIRLIFT

AND TIGER ZINDA HAI

Understanding nationalism bound within religio-ethnic identity—not new to the Indian experience or other parts of the world—has gained new urgency in global geopolitics after the events of September 11, 2001. Feting the cultural “other” that gained cur­ rency in cultural studies requires careful reconsideration. The thin line between nationalism and fascism, insurgent freedom fighters and “terrorists,” calls for a case-by-case judgment of the genealogy, cause, class, and bloc such movements represent. (Virdi 2003: x)

The resurgence of right-wing populism in the face of Modi’s “New India” narrative that has often been perceived as a kind of techno-fascism and mili­ tant Hindu nationalism, is profoundly imbricated in larger global discourses on terrorism and counterterrorism. Its reach beyond the borders of India and the confluence with White Nationalist extremisms reveal the “mutual com­ plementarity” that exists between the local and global xenophobic construc­ tions and Islamophobia that have intensified in the last two decades (Thobani 2018).1 As an integral part of the “New India” narrative, the Modi government has extensively been reaching out to Indian migrants and diasporas residing in different parts of the globe. Not only is it tapping diasporic resources, but it is also manipulating national visual cultures to promote and negotiate national interests based largely on Hindutva ideologies on a transnational scale. The Indian migrants’ and diasporas’ identifications with such a narrative of “New India” and their support for or resistance to the political projects of Modi have fostered new variants of “long-distance nationalism” (Glick Schiller 2005). Despite the permeation of Modi’s populist rhetoric of Hindutva nationalism in India’s socio-political and popular visual cultures, con­ temporary Hindi films, especially the ones about Indian migrant and diasporic experiences, mediate new variants of long-distance nationalisms that value secularism and forge cosmopolitan desires. Located at the interstices of the local and the global, the transnational circuits of these films problematise the 152

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-9

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interpretation of patriotism and nationalism as confined and circulating only within territorial boundaries. By analysing the two Hindi films AirLift (2016) (henceforth, AL) (directed by Raja Krishna Menon) and Tiger Zinda Hai (Tiger is Alive) (2017) (henceforth, TZH) (directed by Ali Abbas Zafar), this chapter aims to trace the cinematic staging of the shifts in the cynicism of Indian migrants, diasporas or transna­ tionals towards the nationalist politics in India, and the mediation of nation­ alisms and homing desires that manifest based on the processes of globalisation and experiences of terror. Since the discourses on populism and long-distance nationalism are central to the analysis of the films, I will delib­ erate on their meanings, implications and cinematic rendering through the migrant trajectories of the films. By inspecting some of the political and jur­ idical turns in India that echo in the films as well as the strategic use of “imperso-nation”, I will underline the projections of class dynamics, heroic masculinities and variants of feminisms. Finally, I will consider the role of song and dance sequences in generating, reflecting and shaping transnational desires.

Modi, populist nationalism and rescue politics According to Laclau (2007), “[p]opulism is, quite simply, a way of constructing the political” and there are three preconditions to it (ix). At first, the recogni­ tion of an unfulfilled demand, its accumulation, and an antagonistic frontier separating the “people” from the elitist power. Secondly, the establishment of an “equivalential” relation between the demands and their articulation, making the emergence of the “people” possible. And finally, the unification of demands that transforms a vague feeling of unity to perform a totalising and a stable function, thereby establishing the logic that any populist unification takes place not due to an ideological reason but on a “heterogeneous social ground” (74). Another question that emerges in Laclau’s (2007) theory of populism is related to the role of the representative of such a unified group, in other words, the leader of the nation-state. Extending Pitkin’s (cited in Laclau 2007) notion of representatives and their representation, Laclau (2007) suggests that the leader is a “means of homogenising a heterogeneous mass” and “a single dramatic symbol” which can achieve the unifying task with a greater efficacy than the “whole legislature of representatives” (169–170). However, Laclau (2007) cau­ tions that such a representative is neither preselected nor a passive agent, rather, the leader is “constituted through the structure of representation itself” and adds something more to the interest than what one represents (154). Before the 2014 Indian elections, Modi’s rhetoric and agendas exhibited some of these characteristics of populism. At the outset, this rhetoric attemp­ ted to define and defend an Indian national culture based on two assertions. These include a sharp rebuttal to the corrupt national project of the previous political parties, and the rhetoric of urgency demanding a heroic leadership that could rescue people from the unacceptable conditions of oppression, 153

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poverty and unemployment. By framing Modi as a metonymic symbol of the Indian populist fantasy, the Indian media played a vital role in both con­ structing and facilitating his party’s political projects. Chakravartty et al. (2015) describe the Modi-led BJP variant of populism as follows: while elections across the globe today are mediated in the sense of being pervaded by the ambient presence and explicit deployments of varied media, the Indian national elections of 2014 showcase a specific logic that has become globally influential of late. This is the logic of “mediated populism,” whose dynamics and effects while potentially widespread (i.e. Berlusconi to Bush) have a particular resonance in postcolonial-mediated democracies across the global South. (313) Considering the expansion of the commercial media and the rise of postmodern technologies such as touchscreen mobile phones in India, people came into “dangerously close proximity” to the “sublime object” (Žižek 1989) or Modi’s populist rhetoric even at odd hours and in less imagined spaces. Since ideology requires such proximity to maintain itself as a frame within which the subject’s fantasies are organised and managed (ibid.), Modi’s social media election campaign successfully created and facilitated a public welfare motive despite the underlying opposing political forces in his populist logic. Although the Hindutva ideologies (based on the marginalisation of Indian minority groups such as Muslims) underpinned his campaigns, what paternalised his voters was the all-encompassing masculine figure of Modi as an orator unchallenged by any other political alternative. These categorisations rein­ forced the image of Modi as a leader of the nation or the people, and drew sharp antagonism between Modi supporters (national) and opponents (anti­ national), thereby strengthening the us-versus-them narratives that underpin most populist logics. According to Žižek (2009), “Populism is ultimately sustained by the fru­ strated exasperation of ordinary people, by the cry ‘I don’t know what’s going on, but I’ve just had enough of it! It cannot go on! It must stop!’” (61). Rehearsing such exasperated feelings and provoking the conviction that there must be somebody responsible for the mess, populist politics creates the terror of a corrupting agent to which we need to react. During the election campaign of Modi, it always seemed that somebody had ruined the values that India truly stands for. This somebody could be an enemy within the nation (the ruling party then) or an external threat from another nation-state (such as Pakistan and China). Besides, the messages in Modi’s campaigns on social media were replete with hyperbolic, nationalistic statements that appealed to the glorious history of the nation, and reconstituted modern-day India as a technocratic and militaristic power that may rescue the world from the shackles of terrorism and poverty. While both films do not comment overtly 154

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on Modi’s populist logics and Hindutva politics, their fictional narratives, based on real-life incidents that took place during the Modi-led governance in India, reveal the inextricable link with mainstream nationalist ideologies as well as contemporary global discourses on war and terrorism. In June 2014, journalists reported that 46 Indian nurses were stranded in a hospital in Tikrit due to a civil war between the ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) militants and the Iraqi army (TNN 2014). The nurses were rescued and brought back to India in an Indian aircraft after negotiating with the Iraqi government. Although few news articles gave a thorough report on how the rescue operation was conducted, it was hailed as the “Modi government’s first diplomatic win” after coming to power (DD News 2014). The interest in this news arose only in 2017 at the time of the first premiere of TZH considering its plot is based on this rescue operation. Newspaper articles were updated and published with titles such as “The actual Tiger Zinda Hai story” with a detailed report on the operation (Economic Times Staff 2017; Rediff Staff 2017). In early 2018, in a speech addressing Christians residing in Meghalaya and responding to the accusations of discrimination against Indian minorities, Modi asked his opponents to recall the rescue mission of the nurses. He declared that under his governance, Christians and women are “safe” in India (Outlook Web Bureau 2018). His speech sounded ironic considering the actual stories of some female nurses who preferred going to war-torn zones like Iraq due to the lack of employment opportunities and meagre salaries in India (Qureshi 2014). Later in 2015, at the orders of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, the Indian armed forces carried out a rescue mission called “Operation Raahat” (Operation Relief) that involved the evacuation of nearly 4000 migrant Indians and more than 230 foreign nationals (including Pakistanis) who were stranded in the war-zone in the Yemeni Crisis (TNN 2015). Significantly, a Pakistani navy ship also evacuated 11 migrant Indians from Yemen, a diplomatic gesture that was appreciated on few media platforms (ibid.) and suppressed by the Modi government. In 2016, the diplomatic relations between India and Paki­ stan deteriorated due to the Uri Attack and the controversial surgical strikes involving the armies of both nation-states (Datta 2016). The plots of the selected films, TZH and AL, are reflective of such rescue operations, global geopolitical conditions and diplomatic relations of India. In AL, the protago­ nist Ranjit Katyal’s migrant narrative is situated amidst the 1990–1991 Gulf War when Kuwait is invaded and annexed by Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army and the American army. The film projects how Ranjit, with the support of India’s Ministry of External Affairs and the Indian airlines, carries out the evacuation of his fellow migrant and diasporic Indians from war-afflicted Kuwait and brings them safely to India. TZH is about the rescue operation of 40 Indian and Pakistani migrant nurses working in Iraq during the ISC (Iraqi Syrian Caliphate) insurgency and the 2003 American army-led invasion of Iraq. The rescue operation is carried out by the protagonists Tiger, a transnational 155

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spy of Indian origin, and Zoya, who is a transnational spy of Pakistani origin, along with the two foreign intelligence services (RAW and ISI) of India and Pakistan. Thus, both films are embedded in the global War on Terror context and the post-2014 political turns in India, and their close reading involves the excava­ tion of the underlying nationalist and masculinist discourse in which the films have been produced, mediated and received. It must be noted that the pro­ duction of the images of heroic nationalist masculinity in relation to Modi’s Hindutva politics and the populist logics of rescue are not new for the Indian cinema-going audiences given the traces or the meta-text of the epics Mahab­ harata and Ramayana in Hindi films (Mishra 1985). However, what sets the films apart is that the migrant trajectories of the protagonists belong to an emerging era of global capitalism, and both films are products of transnational conglomerates and consumed by a large national and international audience. Corresponding to the theme of nationalism and considering profitable release strategies, the film trailer of TZH was released on the day of the Hindu festival of Diwali, whereas AL was scheduled for its first premiere just a day before the Republic Day of India—both occasions being national holidays in India. Despite a massive reception for both films,2 they were surrounded by con­ troversies. TZH remains banned by the Pakistan Censor Board due to the “demeaning” portrayal of Pakistan (Indian Express Staff 2017a). Moreover, the theatrical release of TZH also faced protests provoked by the Shiv Sena poli­ tical party in Mumbai citing that, instead of Hindi films, the regional (Maharashtrian) films must be given at least one prime-time slot in the cinema hall (Indian Express Staff 2017b). AL faced criticism after its theatrical release in India from the Indian Ministry of External Affairs for the misrepresentation of the government’s efforts (Hindu Staff 2016). Also, AL remains banned in Kuwait for unknown reasons. Bearing in mind the films’ reception or con­ sumption anxieties and their political context, I will now turn to the analysis of the cinematic narration of long-distance nationalisms mediated through the migrant characters.

Long-distance nationalisms The global movements of people and connections that have been disrupted since World War I, the War on Terror and most recently the COVID-19 pan­ demic, are incessantly being reimagined in an age of digital technology and hyperconnectivity. Such reimaginations have fuelled long-distance nationalisms as, globally, migrants and diasporas seek to maintain home ties in a variety of ways and for multiple reasons. Extending Anderson’s (1998) arguments on “long-distance nationalism” as a migrant’s nostalgic desire to recreate ancestral homes within the place of settlement, Glick Schiller (2005) clarifies the two separate meanings attached to long-distance nationalism: “nationalism as dis­ course whereby people frame their aspiration by identifying with a nation”, 156

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and “nationalism as project that consists of social movements and state poli­ cies through which people seek to act in terms of the nation with which they identify” (571). Based on the belief that nation consists of geopolitical borders and a population who share a “common history, identity, and territory”, longdistance nationalism differs from the nationalism of a diaspora who may or may not be actively involved in a set of practices that influence the political situation of the homeland (ibid.). While the long-distance nationalists may live anywhere around the globe and even hold citizenship in the nation of settlement, they still “maintain some kind of loyalty to the homeland”, and based on such loyalties, they take whatever social, political and economic actions the homeland requires (Glick Schiller 2005: 571). As their ways of identifying and imagining ties with a homeland are multiple and ambiguous, their practices of loyalties also differ and depend on a host of factors such as the political and economic demands of the ancestral state, the diplomatic relations with the migrant’s place of settle­ ment and other nation-states, the survival conditions in the place of ancestry and settlement, and the geopolitical stance of the nation-states in global poli­ tics. Considering that the processes of globalisation, hyperconnectivity and variations in migratory human experiences constantly pose challenges to the meanings accorded to terms such as expatriate, diaspora, exile, homeland and hostland, I have used the term “long-distance nationalisms” to indicate a plurality and deferring of meanings embedded within and signified by its lin­ guistic usage. Such an approach will also enable us to expand the term’s meaning to encompass a variety of long-distance nationalisms that go beyond their referential meanings vis-à-vis geographical distance. Thus, “long-distance nationalisms” in the context of this chapter imply the nature of the protagonists’ attachment to the land of origin as well as the varied ways in which their nationalist practices are co-opted, embodied, performed, articulated and represented in the films and mediated to the film-watching audience. They are also “structure[s] of feeling and cultural expression” (Moorti 2003: 357–358) that coincide with Modi’s populist logics of “spectacular” nationalisms (Hegde et al. 2017) but differ in their performance depending on the protagonists’ secular beliefs, transnational desires and experiences of violence. In the films, feelings of long-distance nationalisms heighten only due to an underlying need for identification with the homeland “in the face of status loss” and/or “a loss of political significance in the lands to which they have been dispersed” (Glick Schiller 2005: 577). In a study on nationalism, Gal et al. (2010) argue that one of the most cru­ cial factors determining the diaspora and/or migrant’s variant of nationalism includes the points of convergence and departure between the host country and the homeland: frequently, the greater the contrast between the modernity of the host country and relative backwardness and conservatism of the country of 157

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origin, the weaker the attachment. By the same token, when the homeland is relatively developed and dynamic, and somehow attuned to the emigrants’ destination, the diaspora tends to consistently sustain the homeland and cherish its call. (xviii) Thus, in their study, the nation is assumed to be confined within a territory as well as beyond the imagining of a geographical terrain in such a way that the distinctions between nation as territory, ideology, people and state blur. Although this is a useful insight, it risks conflating diverse historical and sub­ jective experiences of diasporas and migrants to produce a single narrative. Moreover, it assumes that the hostland is predisposed to a particular vision of “modernity” whereas the country of origin lacks it and is always geared towards achieving the same vision of modernity as the hostland’s. In AL, these primary determinants may hold true in the case of the initial projections of Ranjit as a shrewd businessman who values “profits over friendships” in the “developed” Kuwait rather than in an “underdeveloped” and “corrupt” India (AL 00:05:20). However, towards the end of the film, viewers realise his longdistance nationalism and the decision to return to India are primarily based on the life-threatening experience in the war-zones of Kuwait. His feelings of nationalism heighten due to the less viable alternatives of movement around the globe, a renewed faith in the power of collectivity with his factory’s migrant Indian workers, and confidence in the operations of the Indian state authorities. His reasons for returning do not lie merely in assumptions of some vision of “modernity” in India as he mentions at the end of the film that he remains as “cynical” about India’s “conservatism” as he was even while living in Kuwait (AL 01:58:50). In the case of TZH, the primary determinants of Gal et al. (2010) do not hold true because although the protagonist Tiger is disapproving of the con­ servatism of Indian Hindutva nationalists who do not accept his love for the transnational Pakistani Muslim agent Zoya, his long-distance nationalisms are not tied to the ideas of “modernity” in the hostland. Instead, they strategically take a variety of forms depending on his masquerade as a transnational spy or an ex-agent of the Indian intelligence services who is deeply concerned about the security of civilians in times of terror residing in or outside India. Besides, his long-distance Indian nationalism is also related to the soundscape, smellscape and historical-cultural heritage of India. In his hostland, he maintains home ties with India by appreciating and listening to only Indian music, read­ ing stories of anticolonial struggles of Indian freedom fighters to his child, and relishing Indian curries made of “kaali daal” (black lentils), “tinde” (apple gourd) and “shalgam” (turnip) (TZH 00:27:31, 00:35:52). Ultimately, both Tiger and Ranjit display “strategic nationalism” (Watson 1990) in their assertion of pluralism as well as political and civil rights by piloting the rescue mission of Indian migrant civilians along with citizens of 158

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other nation-states. Their nationalism cannot be classified as a form of “min­ ority nationalism” which was displayed and embodied by Samir and Rizvan as discussed in Chapter Four. This is because in the cinematic articulation of their migrant subjectivities, there is no clear mention of their minority status.3 The films create these gaps, a style recalling Hamid’s (2017) Exit West, to encou­ rage the multiple imaginings of Ranjit’s past and his identity, thereby ques­ tioning the way we normalise the history of a nation and the movements of any migrant groups. Similarly, Tiger is perhaps “Avinash Rathore” as revealed in one of the scenes in the film in a conversation with an Iraqi child (TZH 01:02:08), or he could be “Manish Chandra” as revealed in the prequel Ek Tha Tiger (2012). His constant affiliations to Hindu names and Hindu cultures indicate that he could be a Hindu but there is no direct mention of his ethnic and religious identity in the film. As the film uses the trope of impersonation to uncover multiple layers of his identity, the only stable aspects about him that the audience realises are the name Tiger and his job as a transnational Indian spy. The long-distance nationalisms of the protagonists of the films also do not fit into Tölölyan’s (cited in Gal et al. 2010) model of “the new diaspora transnationalism” which is “marked by a commitment to the survival and security of the homeland” (xviii). In TZH, Tiger and Zoya are not migrant civilians in the films as they live in hiding, and consider themselves as detective agents and combatants. They work as non-state entities but for state-author­ ised counterterror or rescue missions. They have no expectations of citizenship from any state, yet have a strong affiliation with their country of origin. Based on humanitarian principles, they work for collective projects but only when the state authorities inform them about a crisis and request their help. Tiger and Zoya hear the televised news about the nurses who are held as captives by the ISC, but decide to act only when the Indian and Pakistani state authorities ask them to intervene (TZH 00:36:13, 01:14:55). However, later, they do defy some of the state orders as they carry out the mission as per their own visions of justice. Such a defiance reflects a form of “constructive patriotism”4 that involves demonstrating critical loyalties based on “universal humanistic values” rather than ethnic exclusion or identification with the metanarratives of history of the nation (Staub 1997). However, a close cinematic reading of Tiger’s masculinist chauvinism exposes his nationalistic sentiments that coin­ cide with a patriarchal stance and a form of derogation and exclusion common to the affective structures of nationalisms. Similarly, although Tiger’s and Zoya’s long-distance nationalisms reflect Fanon’s ([1961] 1968) views on internationalist tendencies within nationalism where “at the heart of national consciousness, international consciousness lives and grows” (247), the cine­ matic projection of their sporadic migratory movements (underlined by using the trope of masquerade) troubles such a simplistic and binaristic interpreta­ tion of the national and the international as they constantly fold into one another in their trajectories. 159

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In AL, Ranjit’s long-distance nationalism emerges after an experience of a “displaced sense of being” (Cho 2007: 15) in war-torn Kuwait where he wit­ nesses the death of his car driver Nair and feels guilty about not being able to save his life. In the death sequence of Nair, it is important to note the function of irony and multiple lingual utterances as it underlines the discourse on lin­ guistic politics in India (AL 00:18:24–00:18:58). While the act of speaking Hindi and proclaiming an Indian identity saves Ranjit from the ISC’s violent attack, Nair’s failure to do so leads to his death. In the next scene, the viewers are informed that Ranjit was not killed by the militants for two reasons: he proclaimed an Indian identity by speaking Hindi and his affluence or monetary power could be used by the ISC militants to secure funds for their operations (AL 00:22:58). The cinematic projection of this sequence of events exposes a pernicious variant of nationalism that coincides with Modi’s right-wing Hin­ dutva populist logics corresponding to the performance of a particular ethnic­ religious-linguistic identity and expectation from the affluent Indian diasporas to contribute towards his political party’s economic projects in India. Unnerved by the devastating effects of war in Kuwait, Ranjit considers moving to the USA or the UK but finds himself helpless amidst the growing geo-political instabilities. After the experience of some terrifying incidents, Ranjit’s long-distance nationalism drives him to do something for the migrant Indian workers of his factory and reconnect with India. As he decides to lay out alternative plans to escape Kuwait and move to India with the migrant workers, he echoes Tölölyan’s (cited in Gal et al.’s 2010) proposition about nationalism: Nationalism can enable exceptional moments of effort and upheaval in the life of the collective, but it also minutely and variously infuses the ordinary, quotidian views, actions, and self-conceptions of individuals. (27) Ranjit’s long-distance nationalism gradually shifts towards a variant of spec­ tacular nationalism as he decides to lead an exceptional collective effort that brings about the evacuation of thousands of migrant workers and the return to India for political belonging. Thus, akin to any form of nationalism, his longdistance nationalism is “polysemous, carrying simultaneously multiple and conflicting meanings” (Glick Schiller 2005: 579). Ultimately, by juxtaposing the cinematic narration of Ranjit’s nationalisms with that of Tiger and Zoya, it is possible to discuss and extend Glick Schiller’s (2005) findings about the four different yet interconnected political stances adopted by long-distance nation­ alists towards their homeland: “anticolonialism”, “separatism”, “regime change” and “participation” (574–576). Since the late 20th century, the chan­ ging global politics on terrorism and the neoimperialistic tactics of the USA and some European nations have led to renewed forms of long-distance nationalisms as displayed by Ranjit’s and Tiger’s narratives. Inspired by 160

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anticolonial struggles and freedom fighters, the long-distance nationalists Tiger’s and Ranjit’s rescue operations expose the American exceptionalism embedded in the War on Terror discourse and reinstate the visions of liberat­ ing those nations which become the battleground for imperial agents. Whereas Ranjit’s long-distance nationalism implies no separatist demands, Tiger and Zoya’s decision of dwelling in the secluded areas of the globe and maintaining both an autonomous lifestyle and an anonymous identity reflects the politics of seclusion and self-isolation comparable to the separatist stance of long-distance nationalists cited in Glick Schiller’s (2005) study. The ideological rifts of the protagonists with respect to the state authorities of both the hostland and homeland also stimulate conditions that demand socio-political changes, and an accomplishment of long-distance nationalist activities that involve partici­ pation in transnational missions of rescue and/or counterterrorism. The next section will examine the participatory long-distance nationalist activities of the protagonists that underscore a critique of American exceptionalism and the global discourse on terrorism/counterterrorism through the film’s visual and aural excess to activate different forms of empathetic listening across borders.

Questioning the War on Terror and exceptionalism In understanding the long-distance nationalisms of the migrant protagonists and their critique of exceptionalism, it is crucial to reflect on the transnational origins and desires of nationalisms practised within the territorial boundaries of the nation-state. The idea of the nation as ethnically and culturally homo­ genous served as an absolute model for many anticolonial nationalists to free India from the shackles of British colonialism. Apart from the local factors, this model was based on the assumptions of Western nationalisms and their “benign effects” of “modernizing, unifying [and] democratizing” (Lazarus 1999: 69). It also involved categorising the alternative and minority ethnicreligious movements in India as threats “under the rubrics of atavism, anarchy, irrationality” (ibid.). Ultimately, the doctrine of nationalist exceptionalism based on assumptions of homogeneity and superiority led to a violation of democratic ideals, the marginalisation of various minority groups and a form of internal colonisation. Furthermore, the global discourse on terrorism after the 9/11 attacks and the rationalisation of populist Islamophobic and antiMuslim right-wing nationalisms are indicative of the exacerbation of the old exceptionalist tactics governing the doctrines of normative nationalisms in different parts of the world. AL and TZH, in their moments of transnational confrontation with the neoimperialistic tendencies of the West as well as with the problematic assumptions of Modi’s populist rhetoric of nationalist excep­ tionalism, serve as popular cultural sites from where alternative nationalisms may emerge and be desired. In AL, after the Iraqi army led by Saddam Hussein attacks Kuwait, the authoritative voiceover of Ranjit reveals how all the tensions between Iraq, 161

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Kuwait and the USA in the 1990s revolved around “oil” and “money” (AL 00:14:32). Such a simplification and unification of the multifaceted tensions of global capitalist politics reflects how imperialist tactics were rationalised in Western discourses as well as in the populist logics of Modi by staging eco­ nomic warfare within and across national borders. In another scene behind closed doors in a supermarket, an annoyed Ranjit and his group of friends discuss the army’s attacks and the worsening situation of civilians in Kuwait (AL 00:39:58–00:42:17). The camera follows Ranjit and his friends who parti­ cipate in the casual discussion, and the screen time allotted to each of them reveals the democratic nature of the discussion. On the one hand, such a pro­ jection encourages curiosity and an empathetic listening on the part of the audience relating to all the minor characters’ viewpoints; on the other hand, the sarcastic tone underpinning the discussion reveals how the normalised violence of the American army in Iraq (both in the 1990s and after the 9/11 attacks) went unexamined. Ultimately, their casual conversation reflects the film’s democratically voiced discourse on how the counterterrorism strategies of the USA were framed and mediated to the public based on the ideologies of benevolence and protectionism, whereas, public discussions about the causes of terrorism were largely curtailed by offering “no explanatory account of ter­ rorism beyond the evil mind-set of the perpetrators” (Kundnani 2014: 112). In TZH, such striking revelations are discernible in three instances. The first instance is the introductory scene of the film where the viewers witness a discussion between Usman, the leader of the ISC army, and an Amer­ ican Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agent James. The caption of the scene informs the viewer that it is taking place “somewhere in northeast Syria at 4 am” (TZH 00:02:26). After a painstakingly slow-motion shot of an aerial view of the empty dark streets in Syria accompanied with uncanny sound effects, a voiceover directs the attention of the viewers to a message that James types on his computer: “They are all coming! Dressed in black! Using faith as cover to protect their identities. They are…” (TZH 00:04:46). His message is disrupted as the audience hears a thud, followed by Usman narrating a story to James: “Once Uncle Sam came to our land. Saying Middle East needs a new world order. And the real reason behind it was business and imperialism” (TZH 00:06:26–00:07:03). The second instance comprises a discussion between the migrant nurse Poorna (held as a captive by the ISC army) and Usman who nar­ rates to her a chronicle of his life experiences before becoming the ISC leader. As Poorna is baffled by the contradictions in Usman’s acts of reading the compas­ sionate poems of Ghalib and Iqbal “while holding guns”, Usman describes how he was illegally detained and tortured by American agents in the Guantanamo Bay prison after the 9/11 attacks (TZH 00:53:01). What make this sequence more revelatory and affective for the audience are the unstable movements of the camera as it mediates the close-up shot, wide shot, two shot and point-of­ view shot of Poorna and Usman, and interspersed shots of the two captive nurses who devise an escape route (TZH 00:52:13–00:55:21). The mixing of the 162

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diegetic sound of the dialogue between Poorna and Usman with the non-diegetic sounds of the fast-paced beats of the parallel escape narrative amplifies the sen­ sational and disorienting mood of the sequence. The third instance includes a telephonic conversation between the Indian RAW officer Shenoy and the American CIA officer Adam about the rescue mission of the nurses. Through their conversation, it is also established that the two officers are engaging in a diplomatic dialogue once again after the 1993 Gulf War (TZH 00:16:09). All three instances not only shed light on the ethics of testimony, but also challenge the “white innocence” narrative of the American state agents’ inva­ sions and diplomatic missions in Iraq and Syria. It is evident from the personal narrative of Usman that neither is he motivated by any fanatic ideas inherent in a religion nor has he any psychological disorders. His socio-historical background suggests that he was neither poor nor less-educated, and was not even a part of any larger pool of extremists. Instead, his radicalisation stems from the consequences of the War on Terror surveillance tactics, and the cor­ poral and racial politics of the USA which, in the guise of combating home­ grown and international terrorism, engages in multiple forms of internal and external colonisation. Thus, Usman and Poorna’s discussion underlines how a government’s understanding of political violence directed at them and the practices of exceptionalist nationalism “tell us as much about the nature of that government as it does about the nature of its violent opponents” (Kund­ nani 2014: 115). Even in the case of the Indian agent Shenoy, he is concerned only about the captive migrant Indian nurses and not the Pakistani nurses, thereby emulating the exceptionalist model of the American officer Adam (TZH 00:16:12–00:16:35). The voiceover tactic in both films is also attuned to the purpose of mediating an exceptionalist model of national history. While it establishes a hierarchy in the narrative by imposing the dominant voice of the male protagonists Ranjit in AL and Tiger as well as the Indian agent Shenoy in TZH, the voiceovers compress the long span of time and alternative histories into a unified whole to hasten the plot. Such a strategy of mediating the nation’s past reinstates the exceptionalist discourse on nationalisms that sim­ plify colonial histories and postcolonial struggles and categorise alternatives as threats. It also rationalises the state’s official history that functions as a metanarrative to repress the alternative voices of the nation’s fragmented minorities, and validate new technologies of monitoring or managing them. The next section will focus on the gendered long-distance nationalisms of the protagonists to display how Modi’s spectacular and masculinist national­ isms are embodied, mediated, accepted and/or resisted in the films through the trope of “imperso-nation” (Chakravarty 2000). Since our ways of imagining men and women in terms of gender are greatly determined by the affect produced through their cinematic representations, its mise-en-scène, for analytical pur­ poses, once again, I am setting up two sub-sections to focus on the distinctions and overlapping elements between the masculine and feminine modalities of imagining and performing long-distance nationalisms. 163

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Messiah, masculinities and masquerade In a study on nationalism in post-Independence Hindi cinema, Chakravarty (2000) argues that the “self-imposed ideological task” of managing tensions between the minority narratives, and incorporating them into a unified body politic has been achieved through the cinematic process of “imperso-nation”. Such a process involves encapsulating “ethnic or religious differences as a kind of lived masquerade which when peeled off […] reveal[s] an essential Indian­ ness comprised of a core of fraternal or civilisational and patriotic values” (Chakravarty 2000: 224). Unlike the novel where readers are free to imagine their characters impersonated by any body, the decision of casting actors to play the role of a cinematic character is highly influential in the reception of the film and is never outside the terrain of economic, caste, racial, religious, corporal and gender politics. Therefore, it is necessary to underline how the mediation of the actors’5 different facets of identity as well as their popularity and celebrity status interacts with the impersonation of the cinematic char­ acters and the staging of their long-distance nationalism in the film. In the case of TZH, the complexities of analysing such impersonations are manifold as the protagonist Tiger (played by the Hindi cinema star actor Salman Khan) takes on multiple identities as a transnational spy. Popularly called “bhai/bhaijaan” in Hindi/Urdu, meaning brother, the title conferred to Hindi cinema’s Muslim star actor Salman Khan evokes feelings of both a patriarchal protectionist who is a member of some high-ranking mafia and a brotherly endearment. Such connotations concerning his title reflect the varied roles he has played in his film career and the paradoxes of his off-screen images. Deviating from the 1980s and 1990s screen persona of the upper-class Hindu charming hero or a brotherly figure in films like Maine Pyaar Kiya (I fell in love) (1989), Love (1991) and Hum Aap Ke Hain Kaun (Who am I to you) (1994), Salman Khan’s post-2003 filmography unveils an attempt to rein­ vent his screen persona as the man of the masses and the pride of the nation. The audience sees him in the role of a cop, army officer, bodyguard, sportsman or “Hanuman”6 in his films like Garv (Pride) (2004), Partner (2007), Veer (Brave) (2010), Bajrangi Bhaijaan (Brother Bajrangi) (2015), Sultan (2016) and Tubelight (2017). Such attempts at refurbishing his screen persona by playing Hindu patriotic characters may also be understood in the context of the heightened right-wing Hindu nationalist anxieties that permeated India’s cul­ tural discourse after the anti-Muslim pogrom in the 2002 riots in Gujarat, and his maligned reputation given the pending court cases concerning accusations of hit-and-run and blackbuck poaching.7 Based on a systematic study of Salman Khan’s cinematic career, Shields (2017) suggests that while his filmography serves as evidence of his attempts at constructing an “altruistic character” and “connection with populace” through his star-body, “the launch of his educa­ tional and healthcare-focused Being Human Foundation (2007) also appears to reinforce this image” (358). In TZH, the role of Tiger played by Salman Khan,

164

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if understood within such a context, enables an analysis of the multiple impersonations in both the diegetic and non-diegetic structures of the film. It allows for underlining the implications of the fabrication of Salman Khan’s Indian Muslim identity and its placement in the transnational hypermasculine body of Tiger where the name “tiger” itself takes on multiple meanings. In the introductory sequence of Tiger and his son Junior that takes place “somewhere in the Alps of Innsbruck” (TZH 00:17:54), the audience listens to Junior narrating a fable in English from a reading device followed by Tiger’s insistence that Junior must narrate it in Hindi as he believes a man’s language determines his identity. As a pack of wolves suddenly appear in front of them, Tiger asserts that although many animals hunt, no one hunts better than a tiger, implying he will save his son from the attack of the wolves (TZH 00:18:34–00:19:30). Such an act of masquerading the identity of Salman Khan’s body through Tiger and an allegorical reference to the animal tiger in this scene not only enables an easy getaway with the act of hunting but also sig­ nifies a “tiger” outlook as described by Mishra (2007) in his study on Indian diasporic and transnational subjectivities. As opposed to the diaspora’s cha­ meleon outlook which entails masquerading multiple identities for an easy assimilation with new surroundings, the tiger outlook of the diaspora implies an identification with a “nationalist consciousness, a move that really replaces one monolithic ideology (the colonial) with another that simply repli­ cates its totalizing agenda” (Mishra 2007: 51–52). While Salman Khan’s screen image fortifies his off-screen image to prove that he is innocent in the blackbuck poaching case, it also brings the transnational spy Tiger’s easy assimilation within the Indian consciousness as he appears to embody the tiger, India’s national animal in danger of extinction. A meta-textual reading of this sequence also makes it possible to unmask the politics of English, the linguistic hegemony of Hindi and the marginalised status of linguistic minorities whose voices are in danger of extinction or repressed as “anti-national” within the dominant practices of nationalisms in India. In AL, the role of the Indian migrant businessman Ranjit is played by the star actor Akshay Kumar8 who, in India, is popularly known as “khiladi” implying not only the title of his most popular film (Khiladi in 1992) but also his hypermasculine body as an expert in martial arts. In a report on his recent films, Ramnath (2018) argues that Akshay Kumar “has made a remarkable journey from body building to nation building” where his hypermasculine muscular “body has always worked harder than the rest of him”. Whereas in earlier films, his “chameleon”9 natured cinematic characters dared to transgress national borders, his recent spate of films on nation-building and a popular interview with PM Modi underline that his star image as an international khiladi is gradually being replaced by a “sanitised”10 image of a national khi­ ladi. In addition, bearing in mind Akshay Kumar’s renouncement of his Indian passport in 2011, subsequent application for Canadian citizenship and, recently, re-application for an Indian passport have been a matter of public 165

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scrutiny in the Indian media (India Today Web Desk 2019), his impersonation of the migrant character Ranjit, who eventually returns to India, allows for the play of a variety of nationalisms. In AL, although the leader of Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army offers Ranjit and his family a chance to escape to another country by demanding a hefty price (which Ranjit can afford), he chooses to stay in Kuwait for his employees, and for this decision, he is even called a “messiah” by his wife Amrita (AL 00:36:18). Ranjit and Amrita’s conversation is followed by a slow-motion pan shot of the activities of hundreds of migrant workers and their families seeking refuge in Ranjit’s office. The panning camera stops at a point where the audi­ ence listens to a petty argument between two migrant workers who are arguing about some space to sleep. Soon after, the camera focuses on a third employee who states sarcastically that there are enough geopolitical battles already out­ side the office so they should rather adjust in whatever little place they can find to sleep (AL 00:36:53–00:37:39). This sequence is interspersed with a still shot of Amrita and Ranjit in a large office cabin with ample empty space around them. The cinematic rendering of these instances reinstates that no phenom­ enon or experience of traumatic events like war affects every migrant subject alike. Class and related facets of an individual’s identity play a major role in altering the nature of experience, and although capitalism promotes the priva­ tisation of individuals, these individualised escapes are not above the matrix of history, nation, gendered expectations and the changes that globalisation entails. As Ranjit recognises the differential precariousness of human lives and the devastating effects of war, he realises his renewed affinities to India and the Indian migrant workers as he believes it is in the “nature of man” that when­ ever he is “hurt”, “the first person he recalls is his mother and motherland” (AL 00:42:02). Towards the end of the film, when Ranjit and thousands of other migrant and diasporic Indians are on their way to the Indian embassy in Jordan for their “airlift”, his car is stopped by an Iraqi militant at the checkpost while the other migrant Indians watch from the bus. When Ranjit is attacked by the militant, the viewers see an aerial shot of a mass of people getting off the bus and running towards Ranjit to save him (AL 01:49:11). This moment in the film reveals how Ranjit’s image of the “messiah” itself is a masquerade as he realises the precarious nature of his life despite its economic privileges. It also recalls a moment of the starling murmuration as the mass of starlings (migrant workers) gather to prevent an individual bird (Ranjit) from being targeted by the predators (the militants). In TZH, while rescuing the female migrant nurses and before killing the ISC leader Usman, Tiger tells him that for the sake of “humanity”, it is his “duty” to send him to God (TZH 02:26:22). Tiger’s statements are articulated using a close-up shot allowing no space for any other perspective to emerge. Such a national fantasy of rescue based on the victimisation of female bodies, the deification of the Self and the demonisation of the Other recalls the discourse of paternalist right-wing nationalism in Modi’s campaigns as well as the War 166

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on Terror. In addition, the articulation of such a “cinematic imagi-nation” is not just a “treatise” on changing masculinities, but also indicative of the discourses on law, human rights and just and unjust violence in India (Virdi 2003: 109). Thus, Tiger’s imperso-nation serves not only as a narrative device, but also as a metaphorical container or the embodiment of the paradoxes of nationalisms, national fantasies and desires. In this sense, it also evinces the contami-nation and reimagi-nation of discourses on nationalisms, national identity, security and human rights. Based on the above instances, it is possible to conclude that the impersonation staged by both films underlines that nationalist exceptionalism impersonates alternative histories; nations imperso­ nate myths; films impersonate social histories and national fantasies; characters impersonate the actors’ multiple identities; and normative nationalisms imper­ sonate a variety of interconnected migrant, gendered, class-conscious, ethnic, religious, age-related and (dis)abled nationalisms. Moreover, impersonation not only “subsumes a process of externalization by its constant disavowal of fixed notions of identity”, but its liminal nature blurs the borders of its own definitions which are based on the dichotomies of true and false or real and fantasy (Chakravarty 2008: 84). Such an understanding of impersonation in cinema demonstrates its functions to both limit as well as create the “politics of the possible” (Sangari 1987) in delineating the long-distance nationalisms of the protagonists.

Feminism and long-distance nationalism: Beti, Bahu aur Bhabhi 11 In the Hindi popular socio-cultural context, both “bahu” and “bhabhi” may be regarded as liminal figures whose insider-outsider positions are a source of anxiety as well as possibilities. This is because by trying to be the “beti” and “behen” even after marriage, and fitting into the roles of “bahu” and “bhabhi”, they find themselves looking for a third space to navigate through and negotiate with two homes and two roles. Considering the aporias and ambiguity embedded in a migrant’s consciousness, it is possible to assume that the border crossings of the Indian migrant (Amrita in AL) and Pakistani migrant (Zoya in TZH) married women from one home to another, from one nation-state to another, and sometimes even from one religion to another, place them in a liminal position at several levels. While such border-crossings lead to their own aporias, they also hold possibilities of dissent and alternative subjectivities that enable the audience to perceive the women characters owning their individuality outside the familial relations and corresponding representations. Before delving into an analysis of Zoya’s and Amrita’s gendered and reli­ gious long-distance nationalisms in TZH and AL respectively, it is necessary to draw attention to some juridical turns and political events that took place in India after the Modi-led BJP party came to power in 2014. I consider these events as relevant meta-texts and pertinent tools to understand how the 167

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representation of Hindu and Muslim female bodies in popular cultures is the primary “conduit through which concerns of national stability and economic globalization are performed” (Moorti 2005: 49). These events or turns include the “Bahu Lao Beti Bachao” campaign, the “Padmavati” controversy and the “Triple Talaq” judgment. The “Bahu Lao Beti Bachao” refers to the political campaign run by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the Hindu Jagran Manch and the Bajrang Dal (all being affiliates of the BJP) that asks Hindu men to marry Muslim girls, and deters Muslim men from marrying Hindu women or com­ mitting “love jihad” (Verma 2014). The “Padmavati” controversy refers to the disputes between the Rajput Karni Sena12 and the Hindi film director Sanjay Leela Bhansali concerning the portrayal of the Rajput queen Padmavati in the film Padmaavat (2018). The protest by the Karni Sena was staged on the pre­ text that the film was glorifying the alleged cruelty of the Muslim ruler Allau­ din Khilji and his lust for the Rajput Hindu woman Padmavati. This claim resonated with the heightened anti-Muslim men rhetoric in the “love jihad” campaign of the BJP affiliates (HT Correspondent 2018). The “Triple Talaq” case refers to the 2018 judgement by the Supreme Court of India declaring the “triple talaq” regulation13 as unconstitutional and a violation of fundamental rights. Critical of the BJP government’s subsequent proposal of a new law declaring the triple talaq practice as a cognisable crime, in an article titled “The Triple Talaq Bill and BJP’s Selective Concern for Muslim Women”, Flavia Agnes (2018) states: Demonising Muslim men either as jihadis (terrorists) or love jihadis, beef eaters or cow baiters, or as being “anti-national”, has been an important political plank for the Modi government. Incarcerating Muslim men for pronouncing triple talaq fits in perfectly with this master plan. […] Muslim women campaigners need to remember that Modi is not just the brother of Muslim women, he is the “Big Brother” of all Muslims. According to Hussein et al. (2015), although Hindi cinema attempts to project female Muslim characters as the “new age girl” who challenges the con­ servatism of societal norms, the “strategic deployment” of Muslim women in Hindi cinema becomes a “discursive apparatus” of ultimately reiterating a Hindu patriarchal structure as the unifying social structure for the entire nation (285). This is practised at “three inter-connected levels”: “among the genders (ordering of women by men); among communities (bordering between Hindu and Muslim communal identities), and inter-state othering between Indian and Pakistani identities” (286). The casting of the Hindi film actress Katrina Kaif in the role of the transnational Pakistani Muslim woman agent Zoya and the wife of the transnational Indian agent Tiger, enables the film to reiterate a Hindu patriarchal structure at the three interconnected levels and reinforce a dominant variant of normative nationalisms within the dynamic 168

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realm of globalisation. Born in Hong Kong, the transnational actress Katrina Kaif is proud of her Indian and British ancestry and at present lives in Mumbai.14 In a study on “item girl”15 and Katrina Kaif’s cinematic roles, Kumar (2017) asserts that Katrina “would not strictly qualify as an ‘item girl’”, even though she has featured in several “item numbers”, as she manages to “negotiate the slippery boundary” by doing many kinds of films (339). More­ over, each time she has performed an “item number”, her dance sequences are “packaged” and “heavily deployed in marketing the films”, thereby rendering her an “intimate outsider” even though she has extended roles16 in the main narrative (Kumar 2017: 339). Apart from her role in New York (2009) (henceforth, NY) as Maya, it is important to underscore two films where the viewers have seen her playing significant roles to negotiate with issues concerning nationalisms, globalisation and postcolonial Indian politics. These include her role as Jasmeet/Jazz in Namastey London (2007) and Indu Pratap in Rajneeti (Politics) (2010). Jasmeet/Jazz is the videshi beti who is born and brought up in Britain and is forced by her Indian father to be rooted in “Indian” values (mostly rendered as upper-caste, upper-class and Hindu patriarchal values). Although Jazz tries to resist, the film ultimately leads to a point where she desires the Indian values which at first she recognised as oppressive. Indu Pratap in Rajneeti can be compared to the videshi bahu17 who grows up with Western values (rendered as dominant American values of neoliberalism) and, after her marriage, finds herself trapped within the patriarchal family structures in India. Zoya’s char­ acter in TZH demands scrutiny bearing in mind the earlier cinematic roles of Katrina Kaif and the recent political turns in India. The establishing shot of Zoya in a supermarket immediately follows the sequence of Tiger and Junior’s encounter with a pack of wolves, suggesting that while Tiger and Junior were busy exploring the Alps and fighting the wolves, she was buying groceries in a department store. At the billing coun­ ter of the supermarket, while a White woman asks Zoya about India, the Taj Mahal, vaccination and viruses, Zoya observes a group of muggers robbing the store through a surveillance mirror. In the next scene, the audience sees Zoya fight and injure all the muggers. This is followed by a close-up shot of the White woman’s face as she points her gun at the camera and says, “now that’s what we call women empowerment” (TZH 00:26:54). Such a shot provides hardly any space for Zoya’s face or her body to appear, so the “we” in the White woman’s statement about “women empowerment” underlines the White supremacy and the homogenising tendencies of White Western feminisms that often neglect and marginalise feminist narratives emerging from Women of Colour residing in other parts of the globe. In the case of the film, it results in the marginalisation of Zoya’s voice as it enfor­ ces a particular reading of “women empowerment” that demands legitima­ tion by a White woman with little space for asserting collectivities with men and other racialised women.18 169

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Later, when Zoya arrives in Iraq and goes to the city council building to steal a map of the hospital where the Indian and Pakistani nurses are held as captives, she learns that Iraqi women are also held as captives by the ISC Iraqi militant men. She decides to avenge the militants and contrives a plot with the Iraqi women to kill them. The entire sequence of their act of killing is a visual-aural excess set in the majestic city council building and narrated by deploying a non-diegetic Sufi track called “Noor” (Light of God) (TZH 01:46:56–01:50:42). While the viewers see the Iraqi women kill the militants using small knives (in sharp contrast to the Kalashnikovs of the militant men), Zoya performs action stunts after taking off her veil that she strategically used as garb to enter the building. She unveils her perfectly toned figure in tight black attire that makes her act and body desirable, and at the same time, appear robotic like Lara Croft from the popular video game series Tomb Raider (Core Design 1996). Virdi (2003) argues that women-oriented Hindi films and scenes con­ cerning the “avenging heroine” are spaces of “resistance and unintended leaks” urging us to look closely in the margins to “extricate women’s resistance” (123). Based on her arguments, it is possible to read Zoya’s killings of the ISC army as her “avenging position” which articulates her resistance but appears to be a no man’s land, especially no Muslim man’s land and with no space for reforms. Besides, the threat of rape in the scene not only reflects “male gaze and desire” but also naturalises the myths of vulnerability of the veiled woman’s body (Virdi 2003: 174). The veil as a trope of impersonation leads to the “identification” as well as the “nullification” of her role as the videshi bahu. Her impersonation as a transnational spy also underlines the multi­ plicities in her liminal position that have “long plagued the Indian psyche”, thereby allowing several variants of long-distance nationalisms and “the self­ questionings of Indian nationhood” to emerge (Chakravarty 2008: 84). Even­ tually, the robotic movements of her body in the action stunt not only lead to her hypersexualisation and objectification, but also justify the dehumanisation in her act of killing, especially as the Sufi track guides the viewers to believe there is “noor” in her that is the light of God. While the film allows enough screen time for such a discourse to emerge, at the end of the rescue mission, Pakistani nationalism is tolerated only after the Indian RAW agents paternalise the Pakistani ISI agents who are able to hoist the Pakistani flag only after pleading with the Indian agents. In the end, even Zoya is captured by the ISC leader Usman, and is ultimately dependent on the Indian Tiger for her rescue along with the nurses. In relation to the climax of the film, it is necessary to underline two more aspects. At first, during the entire rescue mission, apart from the killings of all the ISC militants (the majority being Muslim men), the only Indian RAW agent who accidentally gets killed is a Muslim. He is also the one whose nationalism is exaggerated and mediated through his associations with the Indian flag. Secondly, at the time of rescue, as certain events unfold, the Indian and Pakistani nurses are asked to wear orange jumpsuits19 by Tiger so that they could escape by 170

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disguising themselves. While masquerading enables situating the narratives of the nurses in the global War on Terror context of the film, it also brings about their escape from the war-torn zone of Iraq only to reveal how their escape/ freedom itself is a masquerade as they will be returning to India as captives of paternalist, patriarchal and neoliberal nationalisms. I suggest that these climactic scenes and Zoya’s action sequence in the city council building are indicative of the discourse on nationalism that emerges from the “Bahu Lao Beti Bachao” campaign, the “Padmavati” controversy and the “Triple Talaq” case. This is because, on the one hand, the scenes and the political events indicate agency of both Hindu and Muslim women in a way that appears as “women empowerment”; on the other hand, they also homogenise the narratives of all women in India by interpellating them within the Hindu patriarchal structures. Moreover, by paternalising and sexualising the voices of women, the film and the political events make them a case of “rescue”, and eventually maintain the class, caste, ethnic-religious and gendered hierarchal power structures of the nation-state. Besides, throughout the film, the Indian RAW agents refer to Zoya as “bhabhi”. Even when the film indicates the possibility of collective political efforts by bring­ ing together both Indian and Pakistani state and non-state entities to forget their grievances and initiate a cultural dialogue,20 their conversations are gendered, domesticated and simplified in the end. Their collective efforts are summarised as the unity between “sasural and maayka” to solve “paarivaarik” issues (TZH 01:19:37). Eventually, for Zoya, the third space for staging an alternative narrative is located in her migratory movements as a transnational spy navigating from one country to another. Even if, for the Indian audience, the film conceals her foreignness, that is, the image of the ISI Pakistani spy, by gendering and domesticating her role (as she is repetitively referred to as bhabhi), her longdistance nationalism makes it possible to accept the collation of her identity of a Pakistani Muslim beti as well as the Indian bahu. When Tiger wonders why Zoya had landed up in Iraq in the first place, her responses conflate the rescue mission of Indian and Pakistani nurses with the izzat (honour) of the Pakistani nation (TZH 01:14:58). She also reminds the audience of the terrorist attacks that took place in Pakistan and the number of Pakistani civilians who died as a result of such attacks, thereby interweaving the vulnerabilities of Pakistanis with the citizens of other nation-states in the world. By underling how the world isolates Pakistan and homogenises its diversity, she calls for a planetary imagining of human precarity by linking the life of an ordinary Pakistani citi­ zen to the citizens of all other nation-states “who stand for progress and peace” (TZH 01:15:03). In AL, the filmmaker hardly allots any screen time to Amrita’s character; however, when the audience hears her voice, it is always in relation to her husband Ranjit. Although she expresses her discomfort with Ranjit’s neo­ liberal capitalist outlook and his authoritative tendencies, the film only 171

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allows this dissent to appear momentarily through the close-up shots of her facial expressions. Besides, her hesitations concerning Ranjit becoming the messiah stem not from her resistance to his authoritarianism, but from her own anxieties of the blurring class boundaries due to the precarity that the war heightens. Ultimately, her longest verbal statement in the film concerns taking a stand for her husband by suppressing the voices of the employees’ dissent. She asks them to cooperate with Ranjit who is making “sacrificial” efforts for the “nation” by “leaving aside his duties toward the family” (AL 00:17:40–00:19:47). This is the most significant moment in the film with respect to Amrita’s character as the viewers see Amrita’s transformation21 from a videshi bahu to a swadeshi bahu who, as per the patriarchal norms, is expected to assist her husband in discharging his duties towards the nation while suppressing her own voice and preventing other pluralities or collectivities from emerging. Ultimately, both Zoya’s and Amrita’s trajectories underline a “cartographic anxiety” (Krishna 1996) pertaining to their long-distance nationalisms and the Hindu paternalising Lakshman rekha for the beti, bahu, bhabhi and above all the pati parmeshwar patni in Modi’s populist patriarchal politics.22 An analy­ sis of their trajectories has revealed that the melodramatic question that sur­ rounds most Hindi films and Hindi daily soaps, “kya ek bahu beti ban sakti hai?” (Can a daughter-in-law take the place of the daughter?), is not just a “paarivaarik” (familial) issue about the role of Indian Hindu women within the normative patriarchal structures. In the Indian political context, the com­ plex nexus of global and national discourses underpinning this one melodra­ matic question has perhaps been enough to induce some major political turns, maintain hierarchal power relations, and suppress the narratives of dissent by labelling them as “anti-national” through a woman’s body. This section has argued that all questions concerning beti, bahu and bhabhi in the films are linked to discourses on nation-building and nationalisms that often fail to imagine women outside their familial roles.

Staging long-distance homing desires through song and dance In TZH, after the rescue mission is accomplished, the viewers realise that the spies Tiger and Zoya go into hiding, after Tiger leaves a message, “Sare jahan se accha” (“the best in the world”), with Mr. Shenoy (TZH 02:32:17).23 In AL, the first line of the song “Vande Mataram” (Hail Motherland!) is played repetitively at high volume after the last airlift takes place and the film rolls out its dedications and end-credits corresponding to the real-life 1990 airlift of Indians from Kuwait. The patriotic songs “Sare jahan se accha” (also called Tarana-e-Hind) penned by the Urdu poet Muhammad Iqbal and “Vande Mataram” penned by the Bengali poet Bankim Chandra Chatterjee were adopted by many Indian nationalists as anthem songs before India’s indepen­ dence and even after Independence for nation-building. Even if the songs 172

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displace their historical and contextual origins in the film, they arouse a var­ iant of nationalism in the popular imagination of India and are reflective of the state’s nationalist politics.24 Given both films’ mass appeal and popularity, the songs serve not only as an assemblage of desires and pleasures (Deleuze 1997), but also as a “complex rhetorical strategy” of historical reference to India’s Independence in order to disseminate identification with the metanarrative of nationalist sentiments25 (Bhabha 1990: 297). Apart from alluding to the popular patriotic songs, both films project their song and/or dance sequences that serve as vessels of personal and collective national fantasies containing traces of the protagonists’ transnational migra­ tions. While the meticulous choreography in the fast-beat polyphonic song “Swag se karenge sabka swagat” (We shall welcome everyone with swag) in TZH reflects the sporadic migratory movements of Tiger and Zoya, the beats of the slow song “Tu bhula jisse” (The one you forgot) in AL are synchronous with the gradual movement of the migrant Indians who gather and form a queue at the Jordan airport to receive their new Indian passports (AL 01:53:39). The slow drumbeats in the song act as an oscillating force that evokes a biorhythmic connection amongst all the migrant Indian work­ ers waiting for their airlift. Even the lyrics of the song establish a sonic sovereignty in such a way that their migrant Kuwaiti sensibility is subdued to narrate a unified sense of Indianness and shared precarity. As Ranjit smiles and watches the migrant Indians receive their passports and proceed towards the Indian aircraft, the next shot projects the Indian national flag flying at the Jordan airport (AL 01:54:57). Such a reawakening of flag patriotism reinstates the Indian nationalist context of the film in which it is the cos­ mopolitan setting of the Jordan airport with the metaphors of globalisation like the airplane where nationalist sentiments are evoked. This also marks a significant shift from the earlier Hindi films such as My Name is Khan (2010) (henceforth, MNIK) and NY where viewers see the American flag and not the Indian flag even though the films respond to a particular variant of Indian nationalism. Apart from disseminating the migrants’ desires for the nation, the dream song and dance sequence “Soch na sake” (You can never imagine), timed in between the main narrative in AL, unravels how Ranjit recreates “home” every time he migrates. His “homing desires” (Brah 1996) dwell in his yearning for pleasant and stable moments with his wife where he imagines himself kissing her forehead, dancing in their bedroom and puffing on a hookah against the backdrop of a well-furnished house with a collection of family photographs (AL 01:05:55–01:06:35). Such a mise-en-scène harps on the familiar territory of homing cultures of the youth in Kuwait and urban areas of India. Their ador­ ing gestures as well as the interior decoration in their house represent the aes­ thetics which not only activate the desire to consume this “jouissance” (Žižek 1989), but also reconnect the migrant and non-migrant viewers of the film with one another and to their homing desires. 173

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In TZH, the song “Swag se karenge sabka swagat” projects how homing desires inhabit the dialectic of the Indian culture and the global geopolitical scenario in a way that creates both pleasures and anxieties. By narrating fantasies of countercultural hipness through rap, Tiger’s “swag”, Zoya’s choreographed sexuality and their dance with people of different ethnicities in the song, the film attempts to build solidarities by disseminating new forms of international nationalisms but with the Indian nation as its epicentre. Zumkhawala-Cook (2008) elaborates on the interlocking relations between globalisation, nationalisms and cultural products: globalization produces differences, localities, and marginal spaces, not as part of the market, but as the very market itself. Culture is thus constituted within this rationality, always proliferating and con­ structed by market forces. In the margins lay new differences, new cultures, and new combinations of them for new consumers and new markets, all of which form the constantly shiftable boundaries of capitalism’s global landscape. (318) Interestingly, due to the easy availability and exchange of visual cultures through the internet, “Swag se karenge sabka swagat” has received more than 500 million views on YouTube and the song is also being deployed in various social events like marriages, school annual days, housing societies’ annual meetings and fun­ draising organisations for collective celebration, and organisational efforts for ecological, cultural and political campaigns. Besides, the orchestration of the song generates and reflects transnational dancing desires by incorporating an erratic mix of choreography composed of several dance forms such as Hip-hop, Tango, Belly dancing, Tap-dance, Latin-dance and Freestyle. The choreography also comprises gestural greetings of Hindu (Namaste) and Muslim cultures (Adab), and a charade of shooting a Kalashnikov. Towards the end of the song, viewers see Tiger doing an Adab while pointing two fingers at his eyes to denote that his spying eyes are watching everybody. While the rap at the beginning of the song recalls American racial politics, the Hindu and Muslim gestures as well as the charade of the Kalashnikov expose the tenuous relationship of the USA and India with their Muslim citizens in the War on Terror context of heightened surveillance. Moreover, although the song is shot in different nation-states, Greece appears as a dominant backdrop reminding the viewers of the 2015 Greece Bailout referendum and the precarious position of nation-states within the global capitalist landscape. Ultimately, Tiger’s gesture of the Adab followed by his surveillant gaze along with the lyrics, “We shall welcome everyone with a swag”, reveal how even within the dialectics of globalisation and a reimagining of geopolitical landscapes, there is no withering away of nationalisms. The nation is necessary because it has become a “habit” and is reconfigured as the “embracing” culture with a “swag” (TZH 02:33:31–02:37:06). 174

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Conclusion Unlike the migrant or diasporic subjects in the novels and films examined in the earlier chapters, the protagonists in AL and TZH are not suspects of ter­ rorism living in the USA or the UK. They have not migrated to a nation-state located in the Global North or the West, a preferred place of residence for most South Asian diasporas and migrants. Instead, both before and after the 9/11 attacks, the South Asian migrant workers in AL and TZH are living a life of self-sufficiency and “izzat” (dignity) without any “ilzaam” (suspicion and accusation) in the Gulf. They become victims and/or agents of resistance only after the unity between the local and global structures of the nation-states begins to crumble and a state of unrest emerges due to foreign invasions and the wars between state and non-state entities. Besides, the dissatisfying experiences in the country of origin do not lead the Indian or Pakistani dia­ spora to migrate only to the West. While the discernible effects of the global terrorism/counterterrorism landscape hover around the South Asian migrants (with or without a Muslim identity) in the films, they are not framed as sus­ pects of terror by the Iraqi or Kuwaiti state authorities. Instead, the diplomatic relations between the nation-states, and the migrants’ nationality, race, ethni­ city, class, gender, ability, age and professional dynamics act as important determinants of the precarious conditions of their lives defining both individual and state agency. By locating the trajectories of the Indian and Pakistani migrants in nation-states like Iraq and Kuwait, the films are also able to question the “White innocence” and the schemes of “counterterrorism” and “humanitarian” missions in the dominant Western discourses on war and precarity. Besides, unlike the films and novels discussed in the previous chapters, the migrant individuals in both AL and TZH expect redemptive measures from the state authorities of the country of origin (India or Pakistan), and their expec­ tations are fulfilled. This seems to mark a significant shift from the earlier South Asian diasporic texts corresponding to the 9/11 attacks and the War on Terror where there is no projection of hope to secure support from the state authorities of the country of origin after an experience of crisis or terror in the country of residence. In The Reluctant Fundamentalist (Hamid 2007), Changez returns to Pakistan after his disappointment with the American state autho­ rities but there is no effort to work with Pakistani state agencies or other nation-states of the Global South to end the state-sponsored racial dis­ criminatory acts against South Asian Muslims residing in the West. Similarly, in MNIK and NY, the migrant and diasporic subjects do not imagine the possibility of intervention by the Indian state authorities to rescue them from torture and illegal detainments in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Although Rizvan calls for a global imagining of his moralistic philosophy of “good people do good deeds” where good people could be from any part of the world, he endorses the American president with the duty to spread the message

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that all Muslims are not terrorists. In Burnt Shadows (Shamsie 2009), Hiroko navigates her way from one nation-state to another, and after every cata­ strophic event, there is a call for planetary mourning after the failure of state authorities. In Home Fire (Shamsie 2017), even if Aneeka and Parvaiz find themselves in Pakistan for a dignified burial of Parvaiz’s dead body marked by the global War on Terror angst and trauma, their appeal for justice is medi­ ated through news channels to the Home Secretary of the British government and not the Pakistani High Commission. In Exit West (Hamid 2017), both Nadia and Saeed believe in the power of magic doors, and their hope lies in recognition of the fact that all humans are migrants and not in the power of any nation-state institutions. In this regard, both AL and TZH seem to be making some critical and aspiring shifts concerning the need for nation-state authorities and the multiple ways of performing long-distance nationalisms through their respective plots. However, bearing in mind the historical and geopolitical nexus between the nation-states and attending to the films’ grammar, it is possible to underline the risks of the politics of repression in generating and disseminating the desires of nationalisms.

Notes 1 In a study titled “Alt-Right with the Hindu-Right: Long-Distance Nationalism and the Perfection of Hindutva”, Thobani (2018) demonstrates how the complex con­ figurations of long-distance nationalisms of Hindu supporters of Modi and Trump are rooted in a Hindutva movement and actively involved in the alt-right project to “Make America Great Again”. 2 TZH is considered to be one of the most expensive Hindi films, as well as one of the highest-grossing Hindi films in India (around $87,320,000 worldwide) (Box Office India 2017). AL also earned profits at the box office amounting to $9,323,484 (Box Office India 2016). 3 Certain scenes reveal that Ranjit Katyal is from Punjab, therefore, he could be a minority Sikh whose migratory movements may have initiated after the 1984 Sikh riots in India, which perhaps explains his initial repugnance towards the Indian gov­ ernment and his decision to move away from India. But these are mere speculations comprising the dangers of generalisation. 4 In a study on the floating borders between nationalism and patriotism, Latcheva (2010) argues, “nationalism and patriotism are referred to as individual attitudes that differ in type and strength of affection for the nation and in their relation to ethnic exclusion” (192). Whereas blind patriotism resembles nationalism that is characterised by “blind support for the nation and feeling of national superiority”, “constructive patriotism” as a “counter-concept to nationalism is based on republican values and includes critical loyalty towards the in-group (nation)” (ibid.). 5 A brief survey of Salman Khan’s and Akshay Kumar’s filmography reveals that both have often played roles of uniformed men denoting normative nationalist masculi­ nities, where their narratives reflect right-wing populist religiosity and militant ideologies in India. However, the cinematic formal conventions, journey of the character, and socio-political and historical contexts of their films differ, thus, the nation and performance of nationalisms are reimagined accordingly. For instance, if the Hindi films of the 1970s and 1980s like Deewar (1975) and Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro

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6 7 8

9 10

11

12

(1983) projected the common man’s disappointment, hopelessness and anger with state entities such as the police and politicians, then in the 1990s, in films like Mohra (1994) viewers recognise the new masculinist hero Amar Saxena (played by Akshay Kumar) performing the role of the police officer who realises the inefficiency of the governing structures of the state. Post-2001, we see another trend in Hindi cinema as the police officers or other uniformed men draw sharp distinctions between militant masculinities, law, justice, and the corrupt politicians of the nation-state. For instance, the police officer Chulbul Pandey (played by Salman Khan) in Dabangg (2010) sheds light on the authoritative politics of state-sponsored illegitimate violence and the discourse on normative masculinist nationalisms in India. Hanuman is the devotee of Ram and a commander of the Vanara army in the epic Ramayana. In the Hindu religious idiom, Hanuman stands for militaristic masculinity, national loyalty, physical strength and security. Refer to Venkataramakrishnan’s (2018) report about the pending case. Although his actual name is Rajiv Bhatia, he is recognised and known as a star actor of the Hindi film industry by the name Akshay Kumar. In an interview, Akshay Kumar reveals that he adopted this name from one of the screen names of his films (Mathur 2017). While this fact not only complicates any analysis of impersonation with respect to his roles in Hindi cinema, it also challenges some of the dominant views in Indian film studies concerning the religious politics of naming and screen-naming of actors. For instance, not all actors change their names because of certain ethnic-religious political conditions. Although post-Independence, many Muslim actors working in the Hindi film industry sensed a pressure to change their names to fabricate their ethnic-religious identity in the milieu of Hindu– Muslim communal tensions, it is necessary to underline the other intertwining interpersonal, cultural, economic and socio-political factors in the examination of onomastic politics. Ramnath (2018) describes him as a “true karma chameleon” and his filmic journey as “Mr.Bond to Mr.India”. This, of course, refers to his Hindi films on sanitation like Toilet Ek Prem Katha (Toilet: A Love Story) (2017) which is about the journey of a man who wishes to build hygienic toilets in his village and Padman (2018) (a pun on hypermasculine films like Superman or Batman) which traces the extraordinary efforts of a man who wishes to create a sanitary pad machine and provide inexpensive sanitary pads in rural India. This section’s title is inspired by Singh’s (2017) study on the 4Ps of Modi Politics: “Power, Populism, Pakistan and Padmavati” as it plays on the acronymic and reiterative strategy of Modi’s rhetoric during election campaigns and parliamentary debates in India. The use of the Hindi words in this section is deliberate because they carry their own baggage and meanings in the popular Hindi cultural and Indian social contexts in which the films are embedded. It is not possible to indicate the complexity of these contextual meanings by using the substitute English words. However, I have attempted a translation for clarification. Beti: daughter; Bahu: daughter-in-law; Bhabhi: brother’s wife/sister-in-law; Behen: sister; Maayka: the home of a married woman before marriage, that is, the beti’s paternal-maternal home; Sasural: the home of a married woman after marriage where she lives with her husband and his parents or the bahu’s parents-in-law’s home; Paarivaarik: familial (mostly used in the context of the joint-family system); Swadeshi: Indian (in the context of this section); Videshi: foreign (in the context of this section). It refers to an organised group of people who work for the mobilisation and security of the Rajput clan in the state of Rajasthan in India.

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13 It refers to a declaration of divorce pronounced three times as per the Islamic divorce law. 14 On being asked about her personal life and her views on religion, she states, “I have always been religious. While my father was a Kashmiri Muslim and my mom is a British Christian, we have been brought up to practise all faiths. We have a mandir at home. And while I don’t do puja, I do light a jyot sometimes” (Kaif cited in Gupta 2015). 15 Kumar (2017) explains: “An ‘item girl’ […] is a female person whose personhood has been itemised towards a particular role—that of a seductress who could make one exclaim ‘kya item hai!’ (‘what an item!’)” (338). Therefore, the term also cor­ responds to the women who perform “item numbers” (dance routines) in Hindi films. The “item” in the term “item girl” should be understood as a “playful spin over the routine act of objectification”, especially because many of the actresses have reclaimed the term to assert their “transgression outside their popular image” or “re-assert their glamourous possibilities” (ibid.). 16 These include her roles in films like Race (2008), Tees Maar Khan (2010), Ek Tha Tiger (2012) and Agneepath (2012). 17 The ex-President of the Indian National Congress (INC), Sonia Gandhi is an Indian politician of Italian origin. She is referred to as the “videshi bahu” by members of the BJP. Modi has referred to her as “Italy ki beti” (the daughter of Italy) in his speeches, thereby alienating, domesticating and patronising her image, while the INC members have insisted on “Bharat ki bahu” (the daughter-in-law of India) (PTI 2003; TNN 2002). 18 This incident recalls the discourse on the “Triple Talaq” case, where one powerful group (BJP) claims to speak for a section of a marginalised group (Muslim women) in a way that leaves no space for dialogue with another section of society (for instance, Muslim men). It also serves as a reminder of the Padmavati controversy where alternative histories are curtailed and voices of Rajput women are paternalised, hegemonised and mediated by Rajput men. 19 These jumpsuits look like the uniform of the prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. They are meant for the Americans who were held as captives and whose execution was planned by Usman and the ISC army (TZH 02:31:36). 20 For instance, in one scene, the ISI Pakistani agents and Indian RAW agents talk about their shared past histories, cultural heritage, love for cricket and music. They even imagine possibilities for the reunion of India and Pakistan to solve global issues (TZH 01:17:17–01:18:29). 21 Interestingly, this transformation is also visible through her outfit as we no longer see her in Western dresses. 22 In the rhetoric of Modi’s Hindutva politics concerning women in India, the figure of Sita from the Indian epic Ramayana is often cited and idolised as the “pati par­ meshwar patni”, that is, a woman who worships her husband like a god. “Laxman rekha” refers to the boundary that Sita’s brother-in-law Laxman demarcates in order to warn Sita against any transgression. However, Sita crosses over when caught between refusing a Brahmin (disguised as Ravana) and being cursed. The helplessness of Sita’s position demonstrates the sheer perversity of patriarchal injunctions which seem to either restrict transgression or make her downfall inevitable, thereby reducing Sita’s agency to an option between punishments (Jain [Punamiya] 2018: 280). 23 A scene in the beginning of the film establishes that whenever Tiger goes into hiding and reaches a place where there are not many Indians around, he will leave a mes­ sage “Sare jahan se accha” to make it easier for Shenoy to track him if the nation needs him (TZH 00:35:21).

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24 For instance, it is possible to find links between the deployment of the national song Sare Jahan se Acha and the politics of screen names in TZH vis-à-vis Indian poli­ tics. One of the Indian RAW agents who is depicted as the “technology-man” is named “Rakesh Sharma”. Interestingly, in 1984, the squadron leader and the first Indian citizen to travel in space Rakesh Sharma was asked by the then Prime Min­ ister Indira Gandhi how India looked from outer space, to which he replied, “Sare jahan se accha”. Their conversation which took place over a live TV broadcast in 1984 was uploaded by the YouTube channel of the Indian National Congress (2017) just a few months before the release of TZH. 25 Another such rhetorical strategy of arousing and disseminating nationalist senti­ ments includes the Supreme Court of India’s modification of its 2016 regulation on the playing of the Indian national anthem before screening films in cinema halls in India. Whereas the 2016 order made it mandatory to play the national anthem to invoke feelings of nationalism, the 2018 order has ruled out any such compulsions.

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Dabangg. 2010. Dir. Abhinav Kashyap. Perf. Salman Khan, Arbaaz Khan, Sonakshi Sinha, Sonu Sood, Vinod Khanna, Dimple Kapadia and Anupam Kher. India: Arbaaz Khan Productions. Datta, Saikat. 2016 (September 29). “Behind the Scenes: How India Went about Planning ‘Surgical Strikes’ after the Uri Attack”. Scroll.in. https://scroll.in/article/817807/ behind-the-scenes-how-india-went-about-planning-surgical-strikes-after-the-uri-attack. Accessed on 23 December 2017. DD News. 2014 (July 4). “Modi Govt’s First Diplomatic Win; Rescues 46 Indian Nurses from Iraq”. YouTube.com. [Video File]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= jB1SBtvcyaM. Accessed on 17 May 2015. Deewar. 1975. Dir. Yash Chopra. Perf. Shashi Kapoor, Amitabh Bachchan, Nirupa Roy, Neetu Singh and Parveen Babi. India: Gulshan Rai Productions. Deleuze, Gilles. 1997. Desire and Pleasure. Translated by M. McMahon. Unidentified Publisher. http://www.artdes.monash.edu.au/globe/delfou.html. Accessed on 17 July 2019. Economic Times Staff. 2017 (December 23). “How India Got back 46 Nurses from ISIS in 2014”. Economictimes.indiatimes.com. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/p olitics-and-nation/how-india-got-back-46-nurses-from-isis-in-2014/the-actual-tiger-zin da-hai-story/slideshow/62220934.cms. Accessed on23 December 2017. Ek Tha Tiger. 2012. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif, Ranvir Shorey and Girish Karnad. India: Yash Raj Films. Fanon, Frantz. [1961] 1968. The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press. Gal, Allon, Leoussi, Athena and Smith, Anthony. 2010. The Call of the Homeland: Diaspora Nationalisms, Past and Present. Leiden and Boston, Massachusetts: Brill. Garv. 2004. Dir. Puneet Issar. Perf. Salman Khan, Shilpa Shetty, Arbaaz Khan, Amrish Puri and Farida Jalal. India: Sunil Mehta. Glick Schiller, Nina. 2005. “Long Distance Nationalism”. In Encyclopedia of Diasporas: Immigrant and Refugee Cultures Around the World. Edited by Melvin Ember, Carol R. Ember and Ian Skoggar. 571–580. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers. Gupta, Priya. 2015 (March 29). “Katrina Kaif: We Have a Mandir at our Home”. Time­ sofindia.indiatimes.com. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/hindi/bolly wood/news/Katrina-Kaif-We-have-a-mandir-at-our-home/articleshow/46726227.cms. Accessed on 7 April 2017. Hamid, Mohsin. 2007. The Reluctant Fundamentalist. London: Hamish Hamilton. Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. Exit West. New York: Riverhead Books. Hegde, Radha S. and Sahoo, Ajaya K. (Eds.). 2017. Routledge Handbook of the Indian Diaspora. London: Routledge. Hindu Staff. 2016 (January 30). “Airlift Spreads Misinformation”. TheHindu.com. http s://www.thehindu.com/news/national/Airlift-spreads-misinformation/article14028625. ece. Accessed on 23 February 2017. HT Correspondent. 2018 (January 2). “After Rajputs, Muslims Want Ban on Padmavati for Showing Them in ‘Negative Light’”. Hindustantimes.com. https://www.hindusta ntimes.com/jaipur/now-padmavati-hurts-muslim-sentiments/story-t4nSqsLwkxMgBR iMjNFogL.html_. Accessed on 3 January 2018. Hum Aap Ke Hai Kaun. 1994. Dir. Sooraj R. Barjatya. Perf. Madhuri Dixit, Salman Khan, Mohnish Bahl, Renuka Shahane, Anupam Kher, Reema Lagoo and Alok Nath. India: Rajshri Productions.

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Hussein, Nazia, and Hussein, Saba. 2015. “Interrogating Practices of Gender, Religion and Nationalism in the Representation of Muslim Women in Bollywood: Contexts of Change, Sites of Continuity”. Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal. 2 (2): 284–304. India Today Web Desk. 2019 (December 7). “Akshay Kumar: I’ve Applied for an Indian Passport but I’m Hurt that I Have to Prove my Nationality”. Indiatoday.com. https:// www.indiatoday.in/movies/celebrities/story/akshay-kumar-i-have-applied-for-an-india n-passport-but-i-am-hurt-that-i-have-to-prove-my-nationality-i-am-indian-to-resume-i ndian-citizenship-netizens-react-1626096-2019-12-07. Accessed on 8 December 2019. Indian Express Staff. 2017a (December 14). “Tiger Zinda Hai Banned in Pakistan, CBFC Chief Objects to ‘Demeaning’ Content”. NewIndiaExpress.com. http://www.n ewindianexpress.com/entertainment/hindi/2017/dec/14/tiger-zinda-hai-banned-in-paki stan-cbfc-chief-objects-to-demeaning-content-1727453.html. Accessed on 23 December 2017. Indian Express Staff. 2017b (December 21). “Shiv Sena and MNS Take on Salman’s Tiger Zinda Hai, Says our Tiger is ‘Zinda’ too”. IndianExpress.com. https://india nexpress.com/article/entertainment/bollywood/tiger-zinda-hai-salman-khan-maharasht ra-navnirman-sena-shiv-sena-marathi-cinema-4991285/. Accessed on 23 December 2017. Indian National Congress. 2017 (May 9). “Conversation between Indira Gandhi and Rakesh Sharma”. YouTube.com. [Video File]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m 4bWUIIo3qg. Accessed on 11 January 2018. Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro. 1983. Dir. Kundan Shah. Perf. Naseeruddin Shah, Ravi Baswani, Bhakti Barve, Satish Shah, Om Puri, Pankaj Kapur, Satish Kaushik, Neena Gupta and Ashok Banthia. India: NFDC. Jain [Punamiya], Jayana. 2018. “Filming Gendered Fantasies of Border Travels in Selected Contemporary Hindi Films”. In Diaspora Studies Series: Beyond Borders and Boundaries: Diasporic Images and Re-presentations in Literature and Cinema. Edited by Nilufer E. Bharucha, Sridhar Rajeswaran and Klaus Stierstorfer. 1: 267–284. Mumbai: Khandelwal Publishers. Khiladi. 1992. Dir. Abbas Mustan. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Ayesha Jhulka, Deepak Tijori, Sabeeha, Prem Chopra, Anant Mahadevan, Johnny Lever and Shakti Kapoor. India: Venus Records and Tapes, and United Seven. Krishna, Sankaran. 1996. “Cartographic Anxiety: Mapping the Body Politic in India”. In Challenging Boundaries: Global Flows, Territorial Identities. Edited by Michael Shapiro and Hayward R. Alker. 193–219. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Kumar, Akshaya. 2017. “Item Number/Item Girl, South Asia”. Journal of South Asian Studies. 40(2): 338–341. Kundnani, Arun. 2014. The Muslims Are Coming! Islamophobia, Extremism, and the Domestic War on Terror. New York: Verso. Laclau, Ernesto. 2007. On Populist Reason. London and New York: Verso. Latcheva, Rossalina. 2010. “Nationalism versus Patriotism, or the Floating Border? National Identification and Ethnic Exclusion in Post-Communist Bulgaria”. Journal of Comparative Research in Anthropology and Sociology. 1(2): 187–216. Lazarus, Neil. 1999. Nationalism and Cultural Practice in the Postcolonial World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Love. 1991. Dir. Suresh Krishna. Perf. Salman Khan and Revathi. India: Shyam Bajaj.

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Maine Pyaar Kiya. 1989. Dir. Sooraj R. Barjatya. Perf. Salman Khan, Bhagyashree Patwardhan, Laxmikant Berde, Alok Nath, Reema Lagoo and Mohnish Bahl. India: Rajshri Productions. Mathur, Yashika. 2017 (June 9). “Akshay Kumar Reveals Why he Gave up his Original Name Rajiv Bhatia”. Hindustantimes.com. https://www.hindustantimes.com/bolly wood/akshay-kumar-reveals-why-he-gave-up-his-original-name-rajiv-bhatia/story-Q0 JM4Ta78pvus4Q0Gg3bEJ.html. Accessed on 9 January 2018. Mishra, Vijay. 1985. “Towards a Theoretical Critique of Bombay Cinema”. Screen. 26(3): 133–146. Mishra, Vijay. 2007. The Literature of the Indian Diaspora: Theorizing the Diasporic Imaginary. London: Routledge. Mohra. 1994. Dir. Rajiv Rai. Perf. Naseeruddin Shah, Akshay Kumar, Sunil Shetty, Raveena Tandon, Poonam Jhawer, Paresh Rawal and Gulshan Grover. India: Gulshan Rai. Moorti, Sujata. 2003. “Desperately Seeking an Identity: Diasporic Cinema and the Articulation of Transnational Kinship”. International Journal of Cultural Studies. 6(3): 355–376. Moorti, Sujata. 2005. “Uses of the Diaspora: Indian Popular Culture and the NRI Dilemma”. South Asian Popular Culture. 3(1): 49–62. My Name Is Khan. 2010. Dir. Karan Johar. Perf. Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. India: Fox Searchlight Pictures, Dharma Productions, Red Chillies Entertainment, Image Nation Abu Dhabi. Namastey London. 2007. Dir. Vipul Amrutlal Shah. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Rishi Kapoor, Clive Standen, Upen Patel and Javed Sheikh. India: Vipul Amrutlal Shah. New York. 2009. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irfan Khan. India: Yash Raj Films. Outlook Web Bureau. 2018 (February 23). “We Rescued Christian Nurses, Mis­ sionaries, says Modi in Poll- Bound Meghalaya”. Outlookindia.com. https://www. outlookindia.com/website/story/we-rescued-christian-nurses-missionaries-says-modi-i n-poll-bound-meghalaya/308684. Accessed on 23 February 2018. Padmaavat. 2018. Dir. Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Perf. Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh and Shahid Kapoor. India: Bhansali Productions and Viacom 18 Motion Pictures. Padman. 2018. Dir. R. Balki. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Sonam Kapoor and Radhika Apte. India: Columbia Pictures, Hope Productions, KriArj Entertainment and Mrs Funnybones Movies. Partner. 2007. Dir. David Dhawan. Perf. Govinda, Salman Khan, Lara Dutta, Katrina Kaif and Deepshikha. India: Sohail Khan and Parag Sanghvi. PTI. 2003 (November 17). “‘Swadeshi Bahu’ Joins BJP to Take on ‘Videshi Bahu’”. Hindustantimes.com. https://www.hindustantimes.com/india/swadeshi-bahu-joins-bjp­ to-take-on-videshi-bahu/story-89tktptTuPtXgNtFl8YDUI.html. Accessed on 7 April 2017. Qureshi, Imran. 2014 (June 20). “Why Indian Nurses Want to Go back to Iraq”. BBC.com. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-27917521. Accessed on 23 December 2017. Race. 2008. Dir. Abbas-Mustaan. Perf. Anil Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Akshaye Khanna, Bipasha Basu, Katrina Kaif and Sameera Reddy. India: Tips Music Films.

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Rajneeti. 2010. Dir. Prakash Jha. Perf. Ajay Devgn, Ranbir Kapoor, Nana Patekar, Katrina Kaif, Arjun Rampal, Manoj Bajpayee, Sarah Thompson and Naseeruddin Shah. India: Prakash Jha Productions and Walkwater Media Ltd. Ramnath, Nandini. 2018 (January 20). “From Taming Women to Saving the World, Akshay Kumar is Bollywood’s True Karma Chameleon”. Scroll.in. https://scroll.in/ reel/865751/from-taming-women-to-saving-the-world-akshay-kumar-is-bollywoods-tr ue-karma-chameleon. Accessed on 1 February 2018. Rediff Staff. 2017 (November 7). “The Real Story of Tiger Zinda Hai: How India Got 46 Nurses back from ISIS”. Rediff.com. https://www.rediff.com/news/report/iraq-isis -how-india-got-the-nurses-back-from-iraq/20140704.htm. Accessed on 23 December 2017. Sangari, Kumkum. 1987. “The Politics of the Possible”. Cultural Critique. 7: 157–186. Shamsie, Kamila. 2009. Burnt Shadows. London: Bloomsbury. Shamsie, Kamila. 2017. Home Fire. London: Bloomsbury. Shields, Amber. 2017. “Salman Khan: Counteracting Offscreen Transgressions with Onscreen Heroism”. Celebrity Studies. 8(2): 355–358. Singh, Arnav. 2017. “The 4Ps of Indian Politics: Power, Populism, Pakistan and Pad­ mavati”. Youthkiaawaz.com. https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2017/12/the-4ps-of-in dian-politics-power-populism-pakistan-and-padmavati/. Accessed on 30 December 2017. Staub, E. 1997. “Blind versus Constructive Patriotism. Moving from Embeddedness in the Group to Critical Loyalty and Action”. In Patriotism in the Lives of Individuals and Nations. Edited by D. Bar-Tal and E. Staub. 213–228. Chicago: Nelson-Hall Publishers. Sultan. 2016. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan, Anushka Sharma, Randeep Hooda and Amit Sadh. India: Yash Raj Films. Tees Maar Khan. 2010. Dir. Farah Khan. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Akshaye Khanna and Arya Babbar. India: Twinkle Khanna, Shirish Kunder and Ronnie Screwvala. Thobani, Sitara. 2018. “Alt-Right with the Hindu-Right: Long-Distance Nationalism and the Perfection of Hindutva”. Ethnic and Racial Studies. 42(5): 745–762. Tiger Zinda Hai. 2017. Dir. Ali Abbas Zafar. Perf. Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif. India: Yash Raj Films. TNN. 2002 (September 25). “Italy ki Beti, Bharat ki Bahu”. Timesofindia.indiatimes. com. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ahmedabad-times/Italy-ki-beti-Bharat-ki-ba hu/articleshow/23299121.cms. Accessed on 7 April 2017. TNN. 2014 (July 6). “10 Things to Know about How 46 Nurses Returned Home”. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/10-things-to-k now-about-how-46-nurses-returned-home/articleshow/37845071.cms. Accessed on 23 December 2017. TNN. 2015 (April 8). “India Appreciates Pakistan’s Gesture of Evacuating its Nationals from Yemen”. Timesofindia.indiatimes.com. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ india/India-appreciates-Pakistans-gesture-of-evacuating-its-nationals-from-Yemen/art icleshow/46852396.cms. Accessed on 23 December 2017. Toilet Ek Prem Katha. 2017. Dir. Shree Narayan Singh. Perf. Akshay Kumar, Bhumi Pednekar, Anupam Kher and Divyendu Sharma. India: Viacom 18 Motion Pictures, KriArj Entertainment, Friday Filmworks, Plan C Studios and Cape of Good Films LLP.

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Tubelight. 2017. Dir. Kabir Khan. Perf. Salman Khan, Sohail Khan, Om Puri, Matin Rey Tangu, Zhu Zhu and Shah Rukh Khan. India: Salman Khan Films and Kabir Khan Films. Veer. 2010. Dir. Anil Sharma. Perf. Jackie Shroff, Mithun Chakraborty, Salman Khan, Sohail Khan and Zareen Khan. India: Eros Entertainment. Venkataramakrishnan, Rohan. 2018 (April 6). “The Daily Fix: Why Did it Take 20 Years for Salman Khan to Be Convicted in the Blackbuck Case?”. Scroll.in. https:// scroll.in/article/874617/the-daily-fix-why-did-it-take-20-years-for-salman-khan-to-be­ convicted-in-the-blackbuck-case. Accessed on 6 April 2018. Verma, Lalmani. 2014 (December 27). “Another Idea from Hindutva Lab: ‘Bahu LaoBeti Bachao’”. Indianexpress.com. https://indianexpress.com/article/india/india -others/another-idea-from-hindutva-lab-bahu-lao-beti-bachao/. Accessed on 3 March 2015. Virdi, Jyotika. 2003. The Cinematic ImagiNation: Indian Popular Films as Social History. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Watson, Michael. 1990. Contemporary Minority Nationalism. New York: Routledge. Žižek, Slavoj. 1989. Sublime Object of Ideology. London: Verso. Žižek, Slavoj. 2009. First as Tragedy, then as Farce. New York: Verso. Zumkhawala-Cook, Richard. 2008. “Bollywood Gets Funky: American Hip-Hop, Basement Bhangra, and the Racial Politics of Music”. In Global Bollywood: Travels of Hindi Song and Dance. Edited by S. Gopal and S. Moorti. 308–330. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

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Refugees Crawling on the fence Waiting for nations to melt We carry our homes

Fig. 5 Metal fences in the snow-clad Þingvellir National Park, Iceland1

DOI: 10.4324/9781003172321-10

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We have entered the third decade of the 21st century, and for all of us, across the world, the start has been a terrifying one. 20202 has been a year of unim­ aginable trappings and renewed vulnerabilities for many sections of our society. As the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns have severely affected the migrants and refugees, there has been a massive rise in the reports of state brutality and violence at the borders, and the worsening conditions of human survival. Considering the economic precarity, lack of adequate shelter and lack of access to appropriate health care, refugees and many other migrant groups are the most prone to facing the devastating effects of the pandemic and the emerging vaccine nationalism. Revisiting the past of South Asian migrants, refugees and diasporas in the start of the 21st century from the present-day catastrophic context has been no easy task. Throughout the book, I have tried to avoid the intellectual hysteria that 9/11 has changed the world. Instead, I have argued for the exploration of the nexus between patterns of human migration, colonisation, the uneven distribution of material resources in the world, the energy wars, changes in ecology, the increasing number of climate refugees, national securitisation policies, xenophobia and the politics of ter­ rorism. However, this does not imply that in thinking about the historical traces of 9/11, we should overlook the destruction that took place on 9/11 and in its aftermath. The human loss on that day is irreparable, and we need to consider from various angles how the strategic representation of the two-hour terror attack on 9/11 provoked many democratic nation-states to rationalise racist and Islamophobic policies, tighten national border controls and deploy military means to justify the killing of human lives. The narrative and representational impact of 9/11 is also evident from the ways in which it has generated a global discourse and managed to not only become a main subject of thousands of films, documentaries, novels, academic conferences, edited volumes and special issues of journals, but also secure sev­ eral grants from some of North America’s and Europe’s research councils, the richest in the world. Often, a million here for tracing the links between religion and terrorism, several million there for researching Muslim youth’s radicalisa­ tion, another few million for researching the post-9/11 interventions of EU nations and the USA in generating “peace” processes in “developing” regions of the world, and so on. Having received a few thousand myself from the EU’s Initial Training Networks (ITN) Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) to conduct research for this book, I have tried not to restate the White innocence and exceptionalism of 9/11 in the context of the USA and the EU nations. Rather, I have attempted to underline its wide-ranging temporal, spatial and corporeal traces and implica­ tions with the help of those hybrid novels and films that have taken up the systematically marginalised political issues seriously. My book has foregrounded that Hindi films concerning the 9/11 attacks and the War on Terror are not merely scripts of the Indian society emulating national politics with a populist logic. They comprise their own visual and 186

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aural excess or interruptions that have peculiar effects on the viewers. The analytical sections on films have also noted that the protagonists are inclined to privilege collectivities based on affection for their respective partners, shared national and cultural affinities, and/or a universalised notion of morality that forges the dichotomy of good versus evil. While the viewers see cinematic shifts (as compared to earlier Hindi films) in the portrayals of Muslim sub­ jectivities and gender roles, under the current regime of a Modi-led Hindutva culture in India, there seems to be a resurgence of heroic and militant mascu­ line identity, and renewed prescription of patriarchal, religious and nationalist ideologies that limit the agencies of India’s minorities. Reflecting on the dia­ sporic Pakistani English novels, Chapters Three and Five have demonstrated the implications of narrative tactics, such as intertextuality, magic realism and sonic vocabulary, in constructing spaces for listening to alternative historical accounts that de-centre the normative readings of “difference” and “past”. Such tactics have also assisted the novelists to uncover the politics of memor­ ialising 9/11, deconstruct the hegemonic neoliberal structures, destabilise the neo-imperialistic ideologies and question Islamophobia. Although both the novels and films demonstrate their own stylistic capacities in resisting the homogeneous representation of home, nation and diasporic belonging, they project the nation-state as the only possible site of resistance. Through such a vision, the diasporic subject turns inward or to a variant of nationalism for reinscribing the Self and home within a nation. By centralising the differences and drawing borders between the Self and the rest, they deemphasise their own subjectivities. This results in some of the protagonists rein­ stating the borders of their diasporic and migrant identities, and rationalising the brutal geopolitics of the nation-states against the vulnerable migrant groups like refugees and asylum seekers. It is perhaps not the argument of the diasporic Pakistani English novels and certainly not of the Hindi films to renounce the nation or question the stabilities that the notions of home and belonging carry with them. However, like the novels, my book has sought to argue that we need to be mindful of the political appropriation of terms such as nation and migrants in times of terror, and be wary of any attempts of repression that homogenise and hegemonise the understanding of home and transnational homing desires.

The way forward: confronting the “unthinkable”3 My interest in drawing attention to the “unthinkable” or the neglected domains of energy and ecology in relation to contemporary diaspora and migration studies stems from an accidental confrontation with two sources while writing this book. These include a descriptive catalogue of an academic course titled “Ocean Worlds” in the category “Special Topics in Geography 2017 Fall Courses in UC Berkeley” (Chari 2017), and Amitav Ghosh’s works Sea of Poppies (Ghosh 2008) and The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable (Ghosh 2016). The “Ocean Worlds” course description 187

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reveals, “while oceans comprise about 71% of the surface of our planet, our imaginations of the world remain landlocked in continental and national frames” (Chari 2017). The course calls for an exploration of the “oceanic processes” in literature to investigate the imperial sovereignty over the seas, the politics of the vast oceanic dumping, and the impact of continental drifts on migrants. By shifting the focus from the terrestrial to the ocean politics of nation-states, it advocates an inspection of the worsening survival conditions of the Muslim diasporas across the Indian Ocean and the precarity of South Asian migrant communities involved in fishing. As in the discipline of geo­ graphy, such a confrontation with the nexus between ocean and terrestrial politics is much needed in contemporary diaspora and transnational studies to dive into a deeper understanding of how sea imagery is invoked to narrate the historical dynamics of human migration.4 Located in the midst of the Opium Wars in the 19th century, the trajectory of Deeti in Ghosh’s (2008) Sea of Poppies reveals three significant realities: acts of terror like the Opium Wars affect at the level of the corporeal, wars do not take place merely as a result of a political or religious ideology, and most importantly, in the historical context of the book, migration and exile are also a result of ecological changes in land and their impact on inhabitants.5 Reflecting on Ghosh’s (2008) novel, I call for an analysis of the ongoing global politics of the heroin and opium trades in relation to American neo-imperialism and the wars for energy resources in nation-states like Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. It is crucial to examine how gaining control of oil, water, food products and other necessities empowers nation-states to use energy resources as war weapons, thereby forging precarious conditions for the terrestrial inhabitants and framing migration as the only possible option in such situations. Considering that the energy politics in the 21st century has led to a rise in opium-producing nations, uncultivable barren lands that affect at the level of the corporeal and the mass migration of nutritionally deficient bodies, we need academicians, novelists and filmmakers to rethink how we may enunciate the intertwined ecologies and energies of power politics. For instance, what methodologies should we adopt to enable literature and films to think through the questions about global warming, food production and animal life affected due to human wars, and in turn, what are the repercussions of energy wars on human trajectories? Even Ghosh (2016) indicates the need for a vibrant cultural imagination to examine the predicaments and persecu­ tion of boat refugees by shedding light on the repercussions of global warming and religious terrestrial and oceanic politics in the Indian subcontinent. Almost two decades after 9/11, we are still nowhere close to understanding the interplay between security-heavy, counter-extremism policies, racist citi­ zenship laws and the prevention of radicalisation in the long run. Often, we even lack an alternative research and literary acumen that can critically articulate such interplays without conflating or juxtaposing the words Islam, violence, migration, radicalisation and terrorism in a single sentence. At the 188

CONCLUSION

same time, we are nowhere close to understanding the nexus between violence, energy wars, ecology, climate change and the intensifying precarity of the lives of many living beings. However, such a task is necessary to understand not only the oceanic and terrestrial politics that lead to mass deportation of humans6 (for instance, four million Rohingyas from Myanmar), but also the role of education, art, literature and audio-visual cultures in promoting alter­ native ways of belonging and a sense of planetarity. Since a primary humani­ tarian drive of enriching the human condition underpins the motivation of most young students to enter academia and specialise in respective fields, we need to be vigilant of the rigid divisions within the teaching-reading structures that often end up mirroring the political structures we aim to question. While it is convenient to argue that one lacks interdisciplinary, cultural or linguistic proficiency in comprehending the material conditions as well as the ideologies that shape different human cultural forms, this also means not taking our own agencies seriously to confront the complexity of human thoughts and practices.

Notes 1 I clicked this snapshot at the rift valley located in Þingvellir National Park in Iceland in 2016. It is the only valley above sea-level that is located between the North American tectonic plates and the Eurasian plates. While capturing this image, I positioned my camera in such a way that if I were to look upon one side of a cliff, I would be looking at Eurasia and the other side would be North America. Þingvellir National Park is a historical site considering it sheltered the world’s oldest (930 AD) parliamentary assembly. As a symbol of democracy, lawful and collective decisions, it is a site remi­ niscent of resistance against many forms of absolutism. Despite the tectonic plates’ movements and challenging climatic conditions, the Icelanders’ convening every year is a metaphor for humans’ indomitable spirit of democracy and survival. In the snapshot, the protective fences on the rift valley remind me of the barbed wires and metal fences where we often spot refugees and asylum-seekers with their pieces of luggage. Deployed as geopolitical border-making tools, the fences, wires and walls on every continent of our planet are symbolic of present-day nation-states’ brutal methods of control used on the pretext of protecting the sovereignty of the nation from external invasion. The haiku attached to the snapshot is inspired by Faiz’s (cited in Kiernan 1971: 145) translated verse “If a cage’s corner must be our home”. 2 For the publishers of the Oxford Dictionaries, 2020 has been such an overwhelming year that, for the first time in the past two decades, they have forgone the selection of the “word of the year” which as a term of cultural significance reflects the domi­ nant ethos and the long-lasting effects of the most prominent concerns of the year (OxfordLanguages 2020). Interestingly, if we were to survey dictionaries across con­ tinents and map their routes of the “word of the year” since the start of the 21st century (for instance, “9/11” as selected by the American Dialect Society in 2001), it is possible to uncover the impact of colonial legacies, neocolonial leanings and the exceptionalist optics in the construction of language and embodied knowledge in the current global political scene. Considering the large and rising numbers of English speakers in the Indian subcontinent (probably even outnumbering the combined totals of English speakers in the USA and UK) and its linguistic diversities, there is an urgent need for local dictionary projects stemming from the Global South and their collaborations with other regions of the world. Such a project of decoloniality

189

CONCLUSION

3

4

5 6

is necessary not only to recognise the invisible and naturalised hierarchies that deter heterogenous experiences, but also to deconstruct the crystallised paradigms of decontextualised teaching-learning in academia. Here, the term “unthinkable” is borrowed from Ghosh’s (2016) The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable. In addition, the natural phe­ nomenon of the “aurora borealis” or the “northern lights” (a marvel I witnessed in Iceland) is invoked to suggest that its mechanism holds potential to confront the “unthinkable” and/or that which we do not want to think about. The aurora bor­ ealis occurs when the charged particles in the rays of the sun strike the atoms on the Earth’s atmosphere. Dancing between the two states of higher-energy and lowerenergy orbits, the electron within these atoms moves away from the nucleus to emit a particle of light or a photon. The primary literary and cinematic texts in this book may also be considered in this dancing state of in-betweenness as they explore mul­ tiple modalities of belonging even if they appear to be co-opted into nationalist structures. By locating the texts in such a state, it is possible to discover and explore how the archives of human ideas emerge, can belong to something bigger than merely themselves, and seek to constellate with various living cultures on the planet. For instance, in Schmitt’s ([1942] 1997) Land und Meer (Land and Sea), the “floating” and “unpredictable” character of the sea is appropriated to frame the “disorientat­ ing” and “chaotic” consciousness of the Jewish diaspora, and rationalise the Holo­ caust as for a nation’s terrestrial sovereignty (6–9). In contrast, in Derek Walcott’s (1979) poem “The Sea is History”, the chronotope of the sea serves as a reminder of the history of forced human migration via the Middle Passage. See McCoy (2018) who traces the history of opium politics between the USA, the UK and Afghanistan since the Cold War until the contemporary era. See Yusuf’s (2018) report which elaborates upon the Rohingya “crisis” and calls it “one of the world’s worst refugee crises”.

References Chari, Sharad. 2017 (Fall). “Ocean Worlds” [Academic Course]. Berkeley, California: UC Berkeley. https://classes.berkeley.edu/content/2017-fall-geog-170-002-lec-002. Accessed on 19 September 2018. Ghosh, Amitav. 2008. Sea of Poppies. New Delhi: Penguin.

Ghosh, Amitav. 2016. The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Kiernan, Victor G. 1971. Faiz Ahmad Faiz. London: Vanguard Books South Publication. McCoy, Alfred. 2018 (January 9). “How the Heroin Trade Explains the US-UK Failure in Afghanistan”. TheGuardian.com. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jan/09/how­ the-heroin-trade-explains-the-us-uk-failure-in-afghanistan. Accessed on 9 January 2018. OxfordLanguages. 2020. “Word of the Year 2020”. Languages.oup.com. https://langua ges.oup.com/word-of-the-year/2020/. Accessed on 11 January 2021. Schmitt, Carl. [1942] 1997. Land and Sea. Norwalk, Connecticut: Plutarch Press. Walcott, Derek. 1979. “The Sea is History”. In The Star-Apple Kingdom in Collected Poems. 25–28. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Yusuf, Abdullah. 2018 (August 18). “One Year after the World Took Notice of the Rohingya Crisis, Has Anything Changed for the Refugees?”. Scroll.in. https://scroll. in/article/890466/one-year-after-the-world-took-notice-of-the-rohingya-crisis-has-anyt hing-changed-for-the-refugees. Accessed on 17 September 2018.

190

INDEX

9/11 attacks xiii, xv, 23, 25–6, 28, 30–1, 34–6, 67–8, 81, 89, 97, 121–3, 161–2, 175, 186; and media xiii–iv, 23–4, 27–8, 30, 35; Memorial and Museum xii, 142, 144; memorialisation of xiii–v, 8, 10; as prism xvii, 23–4; and South Asia 25–8; as trace and tracing xvii, 22–5; and US response 25–8, 35; see also Bollywood, India, Pakistan, post-9/11, US, War on Terror 1947 Partition of India and Pakistan xiv, xvii, 10, 25, 31, 47, 52, 54, 59, 83, 88, 124; post-Partition 35, 63, 79, 90, 103, 105 1987 Mental Health Act 94 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) 94 1992–1993 Bombay riots xiv, 89 1998 nuclear tests xiv, 25 1999 Kargil War xiv 2001 terror attacks on Indian Parliament xiv 2001 US Patriot Act 26, 35, 61, 88, 98 2002 riots in Gujarat xiv, 164 2014 Indian Elections 8, 153–4 Aamir, Rabiya 122 Abdullah (character) 55, 61–2, 64–7, 70 Abel, Elizabeth 66n34 ableism xviii, 16 activism 104 Addison, Joseph 64n30 Adorno, Theodor 9n4 Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (film) 84n15 aesthetic nervousness 95 Afghanistan 10, 25–7, 31, 47, 54–5, 61–2, 80, 188 Agneepath (film) 169n16

Agnes, Flavia 168 Ahmad, Jamil 31 Ahmed, Manan 54 AirLift (film) xv, xviii, 33, 153, 166, 172–3; see also Akshay Kumar, Amrita, Menon, Ranjit Akshay Kumar (actor) 164n5, 165 Al-wazedi, Umme 56–8, 69–70 Alavi, Hamza 12 Amburgey, Rick 30n12 American xv, 25–7, 45, 48–50, 56–7, 61, 66, 88–94, 98–101, 173–74; army 54–55, 155; capitalism 97, 102; dia­ sporic Muslim 81; dream 22, 31, 35, 88; films 35; government 25, 26n4, 80, 82, 98; imperialism 54, 57, 188; media 23–4, 30, 35; see also USA Americanness 48, 58 American exceptionalism xiv, 10, 31, 46, 68–70, 105, 142, 161–3 Amrita (character) 166–7, 171–2 Anderson, Benedict 156 Andhadhun (film) 96n41 Aneeka (character) 10, 127–8, 130, 133–5, 138–9, 141–4 Anthias, Floya 14, 61–3 Antigone 125–6, 133, 139, 142 anxiety, 4, 9, 32, 35, 56, 66, 79, 131, 134–5, 138, 167; adolescent 120n1, aesthetic 95; cartographic 172; con­ sumption xviii, 83–6, 156; diasporic 79, 87, 92, 105; gendered 58–60, 91; mourning 142; nationalist 90, 94, 164; nativist 125; of excess 101n53; of social collapse 101n53; post-9/11 xvii, 26–7, 79–82, 105; racial 98, 102, 129 Anzaldúa, Gloria 14, 51 Appadurai, Arjun 98, 105n58

191

INDEX

Architectonic 140

Armstrong, John 4

Aslam, Maleeha 57, 59, 62

Aslam, Nadeem 30–1

Asperger’s syndrome 86, 94–5, 102

Aumeerally, Naseem 46n7

Bahu Lao Beti Bachao campaign 168, 171

Bajrangi Bhaijaan (film) 164

Bakhtin, Mikhail 67, 135, 137, 140

Balzac, Honoré de 127n6

Banash, David 28

Bandhak (film) 35

Barnett, Marc xivn2

Barthes, Roland 65, 145

Basu Thakur, Gautam 35, 101n53

Baudrillard, Jean 68n36, 98, 101

Benjamin, Walter 9n4, 24, 80n3, 90n29,

91, 140

Bergner, Gwen 59n21

beti, bahu aur bhabhi 167–172

Bhaag Milkha Bhaag (film) 93n34

Bhabha, Homi 50, 58, 61, 82n9, 173

Bhatia, Sidharth 84n15

Bhattacharyya, Rajib 94

Birch, Thomas 127n6

Bishop, Kyle W 98n47

BJP (Bharatiya Janta Party) 8, 23, 26, 28,

34, 84, 154, 167–8, 169n17–18, see also

Modi

Blake, William 137

Blakeley, Ruth 80n4

Bloodsworth-Lugo, Mary K. et al. 26

Bobby Ahuja (character) 90, 99, 103

body 28, 45; dead 129, 142–3, 176; dis­ abled 15, 94–6; Hindu 103; hypermas­ culine 85, 99, 165; minority 89; Muslim

103; star actor 164–5; terrorist 27, 36;

veiled 11, 99; woman 63, 67, 169–170

Bollywood 30, 32–6, 85, 87, 96n43; see

also Bollywood’s 9/11, Bollywood

buddy genre

Bollywood’s 9/11 35

Bollywood buddy genre 90, 93

Bombay 89–90; see also 1992–1993

Bombay riots

Bombay (film) 82n7

Bombay Board of Censors 86

borders xvi, 8 44n1, 45–6, 55, 68–70, 82,

122–3, 125, 128, 130–1, 136, 140, 142,

144, 152, 161–2, 185n1, 186–7; blurring

of 46, 167; cartographic 29n9; cultural

xvi 7, 64; gender 63; literary 29; of dif­ ference 48, 50, 54; spatiotemporal xiii,

xvi, 63, 91; see also geopolitical bor­ ders, crossing borders, national

borders

Borradori, Giovanna 24

Bowers, Maggie Ann 132

box office 34–5, 85

Box Office India 85n17, 156n2 Boyce-Davies, Carole 58n20 Brah, Avtar 7, 11, 14, 47, 173

Braziel, Jana 3, 5

Brennan, Timothy 64

Broken Verses (novel) 22, 29n9 Broude, Gwen 61

Buck-Morss, Susan 9

Burnt Shadows (novel) xv, xvin4, xvii, 9,

29, 44n1, 45–7, 92, 127, 176; see also

Abdullah, Elizabeth/Ilse, Farooq,

Harry, Hiroko, James, Kim, Raza,

Sajjad, Shamsie

Bush, George W. 24–7, 54, 96, 122, 143,

154

Butalia, Urvashi 63n29 Butler, Judith 14, 45n2, 49n12, 63, 92,

129

Butler, Kim 3

Cameron and McCormick 127

Campbell, F.K. 16

Carvell, Henry de Wolfe 127n6 Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) 85–6 Cesari, Jocelyne 81

Chak De! (film) 84n12, 93n34 Chakrabarty, Dipesh 50

Chakravartty, Paula et al. 154

Chakravarty, Sumita 32–3, 36n17, 82–3,

87, 163–4, 167, 170

Chaliand, Gérard et al. 6 chameleon outlook, 11, 165, see also

diaspora, tiger outlook

Changez (character) 10, 14–15, 31, 45–6,

48–50, 53–62, 64, 67–70, 126, 175

Chari, Sharad 187–88 Chaudhvin Ka Chaand (film) 34n14 Cherney, James 94

Cheyne, Ria 95

Cho, Lily 160

Chodorow, Nancy 62

chronotope 9n4, 45, 55, 87–8, 135, 137,

188n4

192

INDEX

cinema xvi, 66n34, 82; European 34n14; function of 82; Hindi 30, 34, 79, 82–5, 91–3, 96–7, 164, 168; Indian 33, 87; memory in 88; national 82; star images in 84; World 34n14; see also Bolly­ wood, constellation of interruptions, Hollywood cinematic: aesthetics 33; cultures xvi, 23, 32–3; delineation 79; discourse 91; imagi-nation 167; politics xviii; pro­ cesses 79, 83; projection 159–160; roles 84–5, 93, 169; setting 94; shifts 187; strategies 79, 83, 87–104; tropes 35, 95; see also cinematic character, cinematic narration, cinematic representation cinematic character 83–4, 92, 93n34, 95, 164–5 cinematic narration 82–3, 86, 90, 99, 156, 160 cinematic representation xviii, 7–8, 34, 95n39, 99, 163 cinepatriotism 91 citizenship xiii, 16, 29, 32, 64, 90n27, 98–9, 142–3, 157, 159, 165; amendments 28, 105; laws 128–9, 142, 188; material ecologies of 102; tests 16, 81 Civil Rights Congress (CRC) 61 Claridge, Laura P. et al. 67 Clements, Madeline 122 climate change 53, 187, 189 Clini, Clelia 95–6, 103 Coetzee, J.M 132n14 Cohen, Mark 59n22 Cohen, Robin 6, 13, 15 COINTELPRO (1956–1971) 61 Cold War 25, 80n2, 88, 124, 188n5 comedy 93 Connell, Robert 58, 62n26 Connell, Robert et al. 62 Connor, Walker 5 Conrad, Joseph 136 Consolaro, Alessandra 84n12 constellation of interruptions 96–8 constructive patriotism 159 cosmopolitan: context 89; desires 125, 152; feminisms 46, 65–6; masculinity 56; memory 68n37; sensibility 54 cosmopolitanism xvii, 59, 64, 66, 70 counterterrorism xiv–v, 25–6, 68, 123, 141, 152, 159, 161–2, 175

Covid-19 156, 186 Cox, Jeffrey 53n18 crossing borders xvii, 46–50, 53, 61, 64–6, 79, 91, 126, 167 Curran, James 23 Cvek, Sven 24, 27 cyberspace 125, 134, 138 Dabangg (film) 164n5 dandelion xiii, xvii Dangal (film) 93n34 Danyal (character) 101, 105 Datta, Saikat 155 Davis, Glyn 131, 132n14, 133n17 Davis, Lennard 94 Dawood, Nessim 137 DD News 155 de Beauvoir, Simone 46n5 De, Sanchari et al. 33, 35 Deeti (character) 188 Deewar 164n5 Deleuze, Gilles 66, 173 DeLillo, Don 30n12 Derrida, Jacques 22, 24–5, 45n1, 47, 131n10 Desai, Jigna 14 Desai, Shweta 53n16 desire(s) xvi–vii, 6–8 2n1, 16, 33, 36, 47–8, 56, 60, 64n30, 65, 70n39, 89–90, 131, 134–6, 156, 167, 169–170; ableist 96; diasporic 84, 90–91; essentialist 105; flirtatious xv; impos­ sible 93; materialistic 97; migratory 138–141, nationalistic 34, 52, 161; perverse 35; queer 56, 93–4; slant 96; see also cosmopolitanism, homing desires, transnational desires Dhadkan (film) 95n39 Dhoom (film) 84n16 dialectical image 9n4, 140, 143 Diamond, Michael 60 diaspora xvii–viii, 1, 3–7, 28, 31, 46–7, 50, 83, 87–8, 96, 98, 100, 103, 122, 124, 126, 157–8, 187–8; as chameleon 11, 100–1, 131, 165; and class 12–13; and disability 15–16; and gender 13–14; and generation 14–15; Jewish 5n1, 188n4; and melancholia 9–12; modern 4–5; new 100, 159; women in 64 diasporic imaginary 7 diasporic Indian xv, 33–4, 83, 88, 90, 93n32, 103, 155, 166

193

INDEX

diasporic Pakistani xvii, 22,29–31, 36n16, 187

diasporic Pakistani English novels

xvii–viii, 30n10, 34, 44n1, 122, 187

diasporic South Asian Muslim xvii, 16,

34–5, 88, 175, 186, 188

diasporic subjectivities xvi, 5, 7–11, 15,

62, 93, 99

difference(s) xvi, 9–11, 16, 22, 30, 33,

45–52, 55–7, 59, 63–4, 69, 82, 130,

132, 174, 187; borders of 48, 50, 54;

cultural 48, 49, 64; disability as 96:

desires of xvii; hegemonic 70;

hierarchy of 45, 48; ideological 30,

50, 103; minor 139; old world 50;

politics of 49, 56

différance 47

differentiation 50, 54, 68

Dil Se… (film) 36n17, 82n7 Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (film) 33,

85n17

Dimitrova, Diana 32n13 Dirks, Debra L. et al. 64n32 disability 94–6 disabled subjectivities 16; see also supercrip stereotype Dostana (film) 93n33 Dudrah, Rajinder 93

Dudrah, Rajinder et al. 84, 85n17 Dwyer, Rachel 34n14 Dwyer, Rachel et al. 33

Dyer, Richard 61

Eamonn (character) 127, 131, 141, 143

Eckstein, Susan 14

Ecology 186–7, 189

Einstein, Albert 144n27 Ek Tha Tiger (film) 101n52, 159,

169n16

Elizabeth/Ilse (character) 58–60, 63,

65–6

Enders, Walter et al. 81

energy wars 186, 188–9 Ensor, Josie 133n16 Equator Memorial Project xix

Erevelles, Nirmala 15–1 6 Erica (character) 54, 56–7, 67–8, 70, 92

Erlenbusch, Verena 80

Erll, Astrid 68n37 Eurasia 56, 185n1 European Union (EU) 28, 186

Ewart, C. 16, 46

exceptionalism xviii, 89, 99, 131n10, 143,

161–3, 186; nationalist xiii, 47, 161,

167; see also American exceptionalism

Exit West (EW) xv, xviii, 11, 28, 120n1,

124–6, 128–132, 135–141,

143–44; see also Hamid, Nadia, Saeed

experimental literary practice 53

Faiz, Faiz Ahmad xvii, 2n1, 44n1, 56,

120n1, 185n1

Fanaa (film) 101n52 Fanon, Frantz 59n21, 159

Farahani, Fataneh 55–6 Farooq (character) 133–4, 140

female nomadism 62, 65

feminism xvii, 62–3, 81, 153; and long-

distance nationalism 167–172; dormant

65; shadow 68; White Western 169; see

also women on the move

Fernandez, Jane 3–5, 12

fire imagery 66, 139–140, 143

Fishwick, Carmen xiii

Fitzgerald, Edward xiin1 flirtation xvi, 90–1, 94n36, 95, 125;

transnational xvi, xviii; see also desire,

terror of the flirt, transnational flirt

Fludernik, Monika 7n2 Foer, Jonathan Safran 30n12 Force 84n16: Force 2

Fortier, Anne-Marie 54

Foucault, Michel 16n7 Freud, Sigmund 10

function of characters 55; see also Lynch fundamentalism 67–8, 70

Gabriel, Karen et al. 81n5, 89, 97

Gal, Allon et al. 157–160 Gamal, Ahmed 30n11, 46n7, 46n8, 46n9,

57

Gambetti, Zeynep et al. 128

games and sports 91, 93, 164

Ganti, Tejaswini 32

Gardner, Renee 68

Garrido, Lea E. 122

Garv (film) 164

Gehlawat, Ajay 93, 96n42, 97

gender xvi–vii, 6, 11–14, 48, 163–4,

168, 175, 187; see also feminism,

masculinities, transgender, queer

gendering 55, 171

gendered anxiety 58

194

INDEX

gendered (dis)belonging 63 gendered identity 33, 46, 93, 95. 100, 141 gendered nationalism 163, 167 geopolitical borders xvi, 7, 25–6, 61, 64–6, 126, 157 George, Rosemary 11 German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) 186 Ghose, Anindita 92 Ghosh, Amitav 45n3, 53, 187–8 Gilroy, Paul 4 Glick Schiller, Nina 152, 156–7, 160–1 global warming 53, 188 Gopal, Sangita et al. 33 Gopalan, Lalitha 96–7 Gopinath, Gayatri 93 Goswami, Manash 86 Gramsci, Antonio 13 Gray, Breda 13–14 Gray, Richard 122 Gregory, Frederick 9n4 grief 12, 144 grief-eaters 53 Guantanamo Bay 26, 35, 86, 162, 170n19 Guillaume, Xavier 137 Gul, Nabiha 25 Gupta, Charu 59n22 Gupta, Priya 169n14 Hai Junoon (song) 88–9, 97 haiku xvi–vii, 1, 2n1, 43, 44n1 119, 120n1, 185n1 Hall, Stuart 12 Haller, Beth 95 Hamid, Mohsin xv, 7, 10–11, 28–31, 45–6, 49, 51, 53, 56–7, 67–9, 79, 88, 92, 124–6, 129, 132, 135–6, 138, 144, 159, 175–6 Hamidullah, Muhammad 102n54 Hamill, Pete 30n12 Hammarén, N. et al. 62 Harris, Sam 80 Harry (character) 59–62, 66, 69 Hartnell, Anna 46n9, 50 Haselsberger, Beatrix 52, 70 Hasina (character) 94–5, 99, 104 Hassam, Andrew 35 Hayati, Daryoosh 46n6 Heaney, Seamus 126n5, 135 Hegde, Radha S. et al. 157 Hegel, Georg 46n5

heteronormative 52, 57–8, 66, 90n29, 91, 93, 95n29 Hewitt, Marco 6 hijrah 102 Hill, Corbie 136n18 Hindi films: popular 33, see Bollywood, cinema, post-9/11; see also nationalism, song and dance Hindutva xiv, 26, 28, 33–4, 84, 152, 154–6, 158, 160, 172n22, 187 Hiroko (character) xvin4, 9–10, 14–15, 46–8, 50–3, 58–70, 92, 127, 133, 136, 139, 176 Hiroshima bombing xvin4; and Nagasaki 47, 50n14, 62–3, 68 historical uncanniness 79 history xiii, 4, 5n1, 6, 13, 22, 24–5, 28, 30, 33, 46, 49, 61, 63, 88, 89n23, 121–2, 129, 135, 144, 154, 157, 166, 190; American xv, 122; challenging 51–5; colonial 29; global xv; internet 138; linear 140; of a nation 159; of film title credits 86; of Indian laws and disability 94n38; of pre-9/11 Hindi cinema 99n48; of “suicidal killers” 142; national 123, 163; pre- 27n8; semantic 127; thickness of 47; world 24 see also memory Hobbs, Alex 62 Hollywood 35, 90n28 home xv, xvii, 3, 7, 10–12, 28, 46, 48, 51–5, 59–60, 63, 66, 87, 125, 135, 138–141, 156, 167, 173, 185, 187 homeland 5–9, 65, 89, 142, 157–161 Home Fire xv, xviii, 10, 28, 120n1, 124–7, 133–5, 139, 176; see also Aneeka, Eamonn, Isma, Karamat Lone, Parvaiz, Shamsie homing desires 7, 9–12, 52, 54, 57, 89, 139, 153. 172–4, 187 homosociality: hierarchal and horizontal 62 Hooper, Charlotte 56 Horvat, Ksenija 62, 63, 65 Howie, Luke 23 Hua, Anh 4 Hum Aap Ke Hai Kaun (film) 164 Hurd, Sam 23 Hussein, Nazia et al. 168 Hussein, Saddam 155, 161, 166 hypermasculine 57, 85, 91, 94, 99, 101, 165 hypersexualisation 170

195

INDEX

I am Singh (film) 35

identity xv, xvii, 3, 6–8, 11–12, 28, 30,

32–3, 45, 50–2, 58n20,59n22, 60, 80,

90, 100–1, 132, 137, 140, 157, 159,

164; and class 12, 166; and disability

15; children’s 15; communal 92;

corporal 94n37; diasporic 6, 15, 54,

79, 92; difference 48; ethnic 90;

migrant 92, 139; personal 29; racial 12;

relational 48; religious 51, 83, 141,

159–160, 165n8; sexual 61; terrorist 99;

transnational 6

Ilott, Sarah 46–7

immigration xiv, 27n8, 64, 81, 84,

94n38

Imlac 127n6

imperso(-)nation 36, 159, 164–7, 170

India xiv, xvii– viii, 5, 8, 13, 23, 25–6,

28, 30–5, 48, 54–5, 58, 60, 62–3, 66,

69, 79, 82–91, 94–6, 105, 124, 135,

153–6, 158, 160–1, 165–9, 171,

173–5, 187; New India narrative 8,

152; see also 2014 Indian Elections,

1947 Partition of India and

Pakistan

India’s 9/11 xiv

Indians 34–5, 83, 155, 166, 172–3

Indian migrant nurses 155, 163

Indian state authorities and officials xiv,

158, 175

Indianness 33–4, 84, 164, 173

Indian Ministry of External Affairs

155–6

Indian National Congress 169n17

Indian Premier League (IPL) 84

insecurity xiv, xviii, 9, 22, 125–131,

133–5, 141

intermission 96–8

intertextuality 93, 125, 133, 139, 187

Islam 22, 46, 51, 64, 67, 81, 98–9, 102,

141, 188

Islamic motifs: hadith 102; hajar-al

aswad 102; hijrah 102–3; mosque

102; namaz 102; Sufi songs 102, 170;

zakat 102

Islamophobia 28, 30–1, 34, 69, 94, 99,

102–3, 125, 127, 138, 152, 161, 186–7

Isma (character) 127–9, 133–4, 138–9,

141, 143

Itakura, Gen’ichiro 46n7

item girl 169

item numbers 169

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro (film) 164n5 Jackson, Richard 81

Jagte Raho (film) 89

Jain, Pankaj 83

Jain [Punamiya], Jayana 172n22 James (character) 52, 56, 58–60, 62–3,

65

James (CIA Agent) (character) 162

Jameson, Fredric 144n28 Jha, Martand 94n38 Johar, Karan (director) xv, 84n15; see alsoAe Dil Hai Mushkil, Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham John Abraham (actor) 84–5, 93

Joshi, Manoj xiii

Jouissance 89, 173

Junior (character) 165, 169

Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham (film) 85n17 Kabul Express 35, 84n16 Kajol (actor) 106–7 Karamat Lone (character) 127, 128,

129–30, 141–3

Katrina Kaif (actor) 93n32, 168–9 Kay, Joseph 70n39 Kaye, Richard xv, 91

Keefe, Anne xiin1 Kertzer, David 14–15 Kesavan, Mukul 83n11 Keyes, Scott et al. xviin7 Khair, Tabish 130

Khan, Gohar 46n7, 63

Khan, Kabir (director): xv, 27, see also

Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Ek Tha Tiger,

Kabul Express, Phantom, Tubelight

Khan, Samar et al. 85n17 Khan, Sobia 46n6 Khatibi, Abdelkébir xvi

Khiladi (film) 165

Khoury, Justin et al. 100n51 Khuda Kay Liye (film) 36n16 Kiczkowski, Adriana 46n9 Kiernan, Victor G. xvii, 2n1, 44n1, 120n1, 185n1 Kilbourn, Russel 88

Kim (character) 65–70 King, Russel et al. 15

Kingsbury, Karen 30n12 Kishore, Vikrant et al. 33

Knight, Charles 127n6 Knittel, Susanne 79n1

196

INDEX

Koller, Veronika 91

Kovras, I. et al. 144

Kraut, Alan 94n38 Krishna, Sankaran 172

Kugelman, Michael xiii

Kumar, Akshaya 169

Kundnani, Arun 26–7, 80n2, 98,

162–3

Kurbaan (film) 36, 101n52 Lacan, Jacques 100

La Capra, Dominick 10, 70

Laclau, Ernesto 153

Laclau et al. 9

Lagaan (film) 93n34 Langley, Liz 100

language xv, 24, 45–6, 48, 53, 55, 64–5,

67, 124, 143, 145, 165, 186n2; and

disability 16; capacities of 143; Hindi

34

Latcheva, Rossalina 159n4 Laxman rekha 172n22 Lazarus, Neil 161

Lee-Potter, Charlie 29–31 Lentjes, Rebecca 134

Levy, Daniel et al. 68n37 Leyshon, Cressida 129

Liao, Pei-chen 30, 46n7, 122

liberal multiculturalism 70n39 Lichfield, John xiii

liminal 61, 167, 170

Lippman, Thomas 102n54 loitering 93

Loizos, Peter 14

long-distance hatred 105

long distance nationalism: see nationalism love 10, 56–7, 59, 63, 70n39, 93, 97–8,

100, 126, 143, 158; and friendship

90n28, 93; jihad 168; marriage 95,

109

Ludewig, Alexandra 11n5 Lynch, Deidre 55

Lyon, Arabella 69

Mackintosh, Sir James 127

Madhoshi (film) 35

Madras Café (film) 84n16 magic doors 120n1, 126, 131–2, 135–8,

140, 144, 176

magic realism 125, 131–2, 187

magical realism 132, 136

Mahabharata 32n13, 156

Maine Pyaar Kiya (film) 164

Main Hoon Na (film) 84n12 Malabari, Behramji 127n6 male gaze 170

Mama Jenny (character) 90, 95, 103

Mandell, Nina 133n16 Mandira (character) 15, 85n17, 89, 92n31

95, 97–9, 101, 104

Maniam, Krishnan S. 11, 100

Mantu, Sandra 142

marginalisation xviii, 8–9, 33, 57, 70, 79,

85n17, 89, 104, 154, 161, 169

Marian, Jakub 131n10 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions 186

Martin, Biddy et al. 11

Martin, Jane 58

masculinist xviii, 11, 136, 159, 163

masculinity xvii, 31, 164–66: alternative

62; colonial 59, 63; emasculated 57;

entrepreneurial frontier 56; fragile 134;

hegemonic 62; heroic 153; hierarchy of

58; migratory 46, 55–62; militant 187

militaristic 164n5; nationalist 156,

164n5; protest 57, 61; see also

hypermasculine

masquerade 27n7, 96n41, 158–9, 164–6,

171

Mathur, Yashika 165n8 Maya (character) 15, 88–9, 91–3, 97, 99,

101, 104–5, 169

Mazumdar, Ranjani 86n21 McCoy, Alfred 188n5 McDonald, Samuel Miller xiii

McQuade, James 142, 144n26 media xiii, 23, 27–8, 35, 69, 83, 84n13,

86, 129, 134, 138, 154–5; American

23n3, 24; Euro-American xiv; Indian

23, 26n4, 30, 154, 166; Western

133n16

mediation 30, 47, 84, 87, 96n45, 144, 153,

164

Mehta, Rini B. et al. 33

melancholia 9–11 memories xii–iii, 5, 68, 79n1, 88; and his­ tory 52; as past 123, 125; of home 54,

66

Menon, Raja Krishna (director) xv, 153

messiah 164–7, 172

Metropolis (film) 56

Michaelsen, Scott et al. 48

Mignolo, Walter 46n10

197

INDEX

migration xvii, 3–4, 5n1 7, 15, 46–8, 50, 58n20, 102, 127–8, 140–1, 186–8; ghetto 138; policies xiv; post- 14; pro­ blem 137; transnational 79, 173; see also immigration Miller, T. et al. 98n47 mimicry 58, 96: mimic man 58 Minh-ha, Trinh T. 53, 61, 64, 96n44, 139, 141, 143 Minturn, Leigh et al. 11 mise-en-scène 91, 163, 173 Mishli, Neta et al. 131n10 Mishra, Sudesh 4–6, 8 Mishra, Vijay 7–10, 50, 100, 104, 156, 165 Misri, Deepti 35–6, 85, 89, 90n27, 91, 93 mobile female 63 Modi, Narendra 8, 13, 26n4, 28, 34, 152–6, 162, 165, 167–8, 169n17, 187 Mohanty, Satya 51–2 Mohra (film) 164n5 Moorti, Sujata 14, 29, 157, 168 Moretti, Franco xv Morey, Peter 46n9, 61 Morley, David 139 Morrison, Toni 136n19 Mouriño, José M. 11 mourning 9–10, 53, 63–6, 103, 142–4, 176; mourner’s sorrow 53 Mughal-e-Azam (film) 34n14 Mummery, Ruth 65 Munos, Delphine 46n6 Murava, Patience 144n25 Muslim: identity 51, 83, 85, 92, 102, 141, 165, 175; subjectivities xviii, 34, 87, 90–6, 187 Myers, Tony 96n40 My Name is Khan (film) xv, xviii, 15–16, 35, 44n1, 79, 82, 84–90, 94–99, 102–4, 126, 134, 173, 175; see also Johar, Hasina, Kajol, Mama Jenny, Mandira, Rizvan, Sam, Shah Rukh Khan, Zakir Márquez, Gabriel García 136n19 Nadeem, Sabeen et al. 46n9, 66 Nadia (character) 11, 120n1, 126, 130, 135–141, 176 Nagarkar, Kiran 30n10 Nagel, Barbara xvi, 90–1, 94n36 Namastey London (film) 95n39, 169 Naqvi, H. M. 31 Nasta, Susheila 11

nation; xiii–viii, 3, 7–9, 11, 13, 16, 28, 30, 32, 46, 48, 51–5, 57–8, 63, 65–6, 68, 81–2, 87, 104, 123, 127, 138–142, 154, 156–9, 161, 164–6, 168, 172–4, 187; see also imperso(-)nation Nation Thing 7–8 national borders 6, 14, 31, 36n16, 95, 159n4, 165, 186 National Geographic 100, 145n29 national identity 31, 48, 55, 83, 84n12, 167 nationalism xviii, 63, 65, 67, 93, 139–140, 145n29, 152, 187; American 67–9; exceptionalist 163; function of 82n9; heroic 96, 102–4; Hindutva 152; in Hindi films 81–2; Indian 158, 173; long-distance 152, 156–161, 164, 167–172; methodological 69; minority 159; muscular 84; normative 82; Pakistani 170; patriarchal 104, 171; and patriotism 159n4; populist 153–6; religious 24, 140; right-wing 166 spectacular 160; strategic 158; vaccine 186 nationalistic narcissism 139 nativism 129, 138, 140, 141, 145n29; White 129 nativist: anxieties 125; policies xviii; politics 125; rhetoric 26 nativeness 140 neo 123; -colonialist 102; -imperialistic 57–8, 67, 187–8; -orientalist 79–80 Neil Nitin Mukesh (actor) 89n25 new age girl 168 Newell, Stephanie 58, 62n27, 63 New York (film) xv, 8, 15, 27, 36, 79, 82, 84–99, 101, 104–5, 169, 173, 175; see also John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Khan (Kabir), Maya, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Omar, Roshan Samir/Sam, Zilgai nexus approach xvi–viii NH10 (film) 95n39 Nijamodeen, Chapparban S. 89n24 Nir, Sarah Maslin xiii Nora, Pierre 52 Novello, Ivor 139–140 objectification 46, 169n15, 170 oblivion xiii, 28; cultural 141–3; obliviousness 30, 61, 64, 142, 144 ocean politics 188

198

INDEX

Olson, Greta 46n7 Omar (character) 15, 27, 88–9, 91–3, 98, 101 Operation Raahat (Operation Relief) 155 Opium Wars of the 19th century 188 Othering xvii, 9, 34, 44n1, 46, 70, 79, 81, 86–7, 98, 105; challenging 99–104; see also post-9/11 Padmaavat (film) 168 Padmavati 167n11, 168, 169n18, 171 Padman (film) 165n10 Pakistan xiv, xvii, 8, 10, 25–6, 28–31, 48–9, 52, 52, 55, 57, 59–60, 62–3, 68–9, 84, 86, 124, 133, 154–6, 159, 171, 175–6; see also 1947 Partition of India and Pakistan Pakistani identity 60, 63, 168, 171 Pakistani migrant nurses 155, 163, 170 Pakistani military 25–6 Pakistani Muslim diaspora xiv, 8, 22, 30, 49, 70, 175 Pamuk, Orhan 86n20 Pandurang, Mala et al. 7 Papastergiadis, Nikos 11 Parmanu (film) 84n16 Partner (film) 164 Parvaiz (character) 10, 15, 69n38, 120n1, 127, 129–130, 133–4, 138–143 Passerini, Luisa et al. 62 patriarchy 13, 65, 67, 89; see also sonic patriarchal protectionist 164 patriotism 153: cine- 91; constructive 159; docile 103; flag 173; see also nationalism Phadke, Shilpa 57 Phadke, Shilpa et al. 93n35 Phantom (film) 101n52 Phillips, Adam 90 planetarity 9, 66, 70, 189 planetary: imagining 171; mourning 63, 144, 176; vision xv politics of listening 104, 133 politics of moral responsiveness 129 politics of resistance 104 Ponzanesi, Sandra et al. 62 Poorna (character) 162–3 populism 153–4; mediated 154; right-wing xviii, 152; see also nationalism post-9/11 xiv–xvii, 10, 26, 104–5, 186; American centrism 57; American

novels 30, 46–7, 122; cinematic strategies of Hindi films 87–104; discriminatory acts 61; Hindi cinema 32–36; Muslim subjectivities xviii; nationalist projects 9; Othering 9, 79, 98–9, 102–3; Pakistani English Novels 29–31; passing 121–5; political nexus xiv; politics of Hindi film credits and title design 85–7; racial discourse 16, 69; representation of Muslims xiv; sonic politics 10; waiting politics 133n17; see also American exceptionalism, anxiety, Islamophobia, post-post-9/11, surveillance post-9/11 context 9n4, 11, 25, 28, 45–6, 54, 67, 88, 90, 92, 100–1, 103 post-migratory 46 post-post-9/11 122–4 postcolonial 29, 31, 46–7, 51, 62, 88n22, 94, 132, 154, 163, 169 Prakash, K. Raghav et al. 93 Prasad, Madhava 32–34 Pratt, Mary L. 50n13 precarity xviii, 105, 127–131, 134–5, 137, 141, 144–5, 171–3, 175, 186, 188–9 Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE) policy 143 prism; xvii, 23–4, 84n12, 95; prisming 23n2; restricted prism 23 Puar, Jasbir K. 67, 130n8 Puar, Jasbir K. et al. 103 Quayson, Ato 95 queer 13, 46, 56, 60, 93–4, 102n55 Qureshi, Imran 155 race xvi–vii, 8, 11–13, 16, 46, 48, 50, 54, 57, 61, 65, 90, 94–5, 143, 175 racialisation xvi, 26–7, 31, 57, 80–1, 105, 125 Radhakrishnan, Rajagopalan 13 radicalisation 16, 27, 99n48, 125, 140–1, 163, 186, 188; minority 101–2; youth 104, 141 Raees (film) 84n15 Rajadhyaksha, Ashish 32, 34 Raja Harishchandra (film) 86 Rajneeti (film) 169 Ram, Anjali 99n48 Ramayana 32n13, 156, 164n6, 172n22

199

INDEX

Ramnath, Nandini 165

Ranjit (character) 155, 158, 160–3, 165–6,

171–3

Ray, Satyajit 83

Raza (character) 15, 27, 52–3, 55, 59–62,

64–6, 70, 127

refugee 139–140; crisis 137–8, 189n6 Refugee (film) 2n1 Reign Over Me (film) 35

rescue missions, see also Operation Raahat rescue politics 153–6 resistance 4, 11, 30, 33–4, 68–9, 94, 99,

103–4, 124, 133, 143, 152, 170, 172,

175, 185n1, 187; anti-colonial 62;

diasporic 9; diasporic arts of 3;

epistemic xvi, soft xvi, xviii, 91; youth

xiin1; see also sonic

rights after death 69, 125, 141–4; ethics of

mourning 142; right to mourning

143–4

Rizvan (character) 15–16, 84, 86, 89–90,

94–100, 102–5, 126, 134, 159, 175

Rocky Handsome (film) 84n16 Rohingyas 189

Roja (film) 36n17, 82n7 Rondganger, Lee 131n10 Roshan (character) 15, 88, 101

Rowell, James 103n56 Roy, Anjali G. et al. 33

Roy, Arundhati xiii–xiv rubaiyat xviii

Rushdie, Salman 30n10, 132, 136n19 Ruti, Mari 135

Sadaf, Shazia 122, 124

Saeed (character) 11, 120n1, 126, 130,

135–140, 176

Safran, William 5–6, 13

Sajdaa (song) 97

Sajjad (character) 15, 51–3, 58–63, 136

Salaam Namaste (film) 35

Salecl, Renata 9

Salman Khan (actor) 83, 93n34, 164–5 Sam (child character) 15, 98, 104

Samir/Sam (character) 89, 91–4, 97,

99 Sanderson, William 127

Sangari, Kumkum 132n13, 167

Sare jahan se accha/ Tarana-e-Hind (song) 172, 173n24 Satyameva Jayate (film) 84n16

Scheiner, Corinne xv

Schmitt, Carl 188n4 Seidler, Victor xiii

Sen, Amartya 48

Sethi, Ali 31

Shah Rukh Khan (actor) 83–4, 93n34, 95,

103n56

Shamsie, Kamila xv, xvin4, 9–10, 22,

27–9, 31, 45–7, 51–4, 58, 60–1, 64, 67,

69, 79, 88, 92, 124–7, 132–4, 136,

138–9, 144, 176

Shamsie, Muneeza 29

Sheffer, Gabriel 4–6, 13

Shiekh, Mushtaq 85n17 Shields, Amber 164

Shirazi, Quratulain 46n6 Shohat, Ella 123

Shuval, Judith 6, 15

Simmel, Georg xv, 90, 95

Singh, Arnav 167n11 Singh, Harleen 46n7 Skeggs, Bev 56

Smale, David J. 132

Snyder, Sharon L. et al. 94

Soch na sake (song) 173

song and dance 32–3, 96–7, 153, 172–4; see also item numbers sonic: subtext 124, 131; patriarchy 134;

resistance 120n1; sound-escape 133–5;

see also post-9/11

spectatorial voyeurism 98

Spivak, Gayatri C. xv, 9, 24–25, 63, 66, 70

104, 124, 144

starling murmuration xvi–vii, 1, 43, 119,

166

Staub, E. 159

Steinmetz, George 27

suicide 68

Sultan (film) 93n34, 164

supercrip stereotype 95

surveillance 31, 35, 49, 64–5, 88, 98–9,

126–7, 133–4, 138, 141, 143, 163, 169,

174

Swades (film) 84n12 Swag se karenge sabka swagat (song) 173–174 Sánchez, Jorge D. 14

Taylor, Charles 9, 64n31

Tees Maar Khan (film) 169n16

Tere Bin Laden (film) 35

Tere Naina (song) 97

200

INDEX

terrestrial politics 188–9 terror of the flirt xvi, 90n29 terrorism xiv, xv, 23–7, 30, 46, 67–70,

80–3, 101, 123, 129, 142–3, 152, 154–5,

160–3, 175; see also counterterrorism,

flirtation, viral violence

Thakur-Basu, Gautam 35

The Reluctant Fundamentalist xv, xvii, 7,

10, 14–15, 31–2, 44n1, 45–9, 53–4,

56–61, 67–70, 92, 126, 175; see also

Changez, Erica, Hamid

thinking diaspora 3; see also diaspora thinking past xv, 121–4, 135

Thobani, Sitara 152

Thompson, William 127n6 Tiger/Avinash Rathore/Manish Chandra

(character) 14, 86, 155, 158–161,

163–174

tiger outlook 165

Tiger Zinda Hai (film) xv, xviii, 8, 14,

16, 33, 86, 101n52, 120n1, 153,

155–6, 158–9, 161–7, 169–176;

see also James (CIA Agent),

Junior, Katrina Kaif, Poorna,

Salman Khan, Tiger, Usman, Zafar,

Zoya

Todorov, Tzvetan 125, 137

Toilet Ek Prem Katha (film) 165n10 Tolia-Kelly, Divya P. 87, 102

Tomasula, Steve 23, 28

Tomb Raider (film) 170

Toros, H. xv, 123–4 transgredient 125

transgredience 137–8 translocational positionality 62

transgender 102n55 transnational desires xv, 84, 87–8, 90–91,

125, 153, 157

transnational flirt 90–5 trauma xv, xvii, 10, 12, 47, 53, 58, 61, 64,

66–7, 97, 101, 104, 176; and diaspora 5,

31; and nation 8; reimagining 46,

68–70; writing 10, 70

Travers, Andrew 29, 125

Triple Talaq (2018) judgment 168–171 Tsing, Anna; rhetorics of scale 126

Tuana, Nancy 65

Tubelight (film) 164

Tu bhula jisse (song) 173

Turnbull, Stephen 56

Twin Towers 22–3, 88–9, 97, 133

Tölölyan, Khachig 3–4, 55, 159–160

United 93 (film) 35

Unthinkable 1879

Updike, John 30n12 Upton et al. 127n6 USA xiv, 5, 12, 22, 26n4, 29–31, 34, 48–9,

53, 57, 60–2, 64, 79, 83–4, 86–91, 94–5,

99, 101, 105, 122, 124, 143, 160, 162–3,

174–5, 186; and South Asia 25–8;

hegemony xv; migration in xviin7;

post-9/11 anxieties in 80–1; Uncle Sam

92

Usman (character) 162–3, 166, 170

Vande Mataram (song) 172

Vasudevan, Ravi 33

Veer (film) 164

Venkataramakrishnan, Rohan 164n7

verfremdungseffekt 97

Verma, Lalmani 168

Vertovec, Steven 8

viral violence 98n46, 101

Virdi, Jyotika 33, 83, 152, 167, 170

Virgil 141–2, 144

Visweswaran, Kamala 12

Vitolo, Daniela 46n9

Volpp, Leti 80–1

waiting 58, 69, 119, 126, 173, 185; and

listening 133–4; as such 131, 138, 145;

at the door 135–7; for magical

moments 132–3; forms of 125; politics

of xviii

Walcott, Derek 188n4 War on Terror xiv, 22, 24–5, 26–8, 30–1,

34–6, 47, 61, 79–80, 96, 121, 123–4,

133, 141–2, 156, 161–3, 171, 174–6

Watson, Michael 158

Wells, Spencer et al. 145n29 Werbner, Prina 28

White American 10, 25–6, 29, 46, 67, 103,

122

Wilson, Thomas M. et al. 45 Wimmer, Andreas et al. 69

women on the move 62–70 Wroot and Willis 96n43 xenophobia 125, 130, 186

Yekani, Elahe 62n26

Young, Monica 100n51

Yun Hota Toh Kya Hota (film) 35

Yusuf, Abdullah 189n6

201

INDEX

Zafar, Ali Abbas xv, 153; see also Sultan Zakir (character) 94 Zero Dark Thirty (film) 35 Zhang, Benzi 11 Zilgai (character) 104

Zoya (character) 14, 86, 156, 158–61, 167–74 Zumkhawala-Cook, Richard 174 Þingvellir National Park 185n1 Žižek, Slavoj 7–8, 10, 16, 25, 51, 100–1, 154, 173

202