In the Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri, through the course of it’s twelve chapters establishes a
fundamental plot line that illustrates the dynamic relationships shared by the different characters
introduced in it’s composition. The key plot of the novel primarily circles around the day- to- day
situations endured by an Indian- immigrant family settled in the U.S, specifically that of the
principal protagonist Gogol Ganguli. It matures to guide the reader through 30 years of his life
while he simultaneously navigates his journey in search of his true identity. Despite the simplicity
of it’s essential storyline, the construction of each segment develops to highlight more complexly
rooted backgrounds on a microscopic level in the sequence of their encounters with Gogol. This
essay seeks to focus on the characters of Ashima and Gogol as first and second generation
immigrants respectively, aiming to parallely spotlight the differences and similarities between the
core effects of their individualistic cultural disparity.
The aspect of Gogol’s identity, in the confined sense of its definition, narrows down to a Bengali
child growing up in Massachusetts. The novel concretely points him out to exhibit three
significant stages of character transformation with respect to self-identity that are centrally
foreshadowed by his cultural background in terms of his namesake and with contradiction to the
culture that surrounds him. The reader is pointedly made aware that Gogol's name was only
supposed to be temporary and for the sole purpose of documentation, (‘For they learn that in
America, a baby cannot be released from the hospital without a birth certificate’).The name
essentially coins a link between the character and his cultural roots eventhough the origin of the
name itself comes from a third party community. The gamble between the more familiar western
conformities and his primary Indian background with the additional oddity of his name contribute
in his growing estrangement to identify with a particular community.
Ashima’s character is written to be the family member most attached to the traditions of her birth
country. Her marriage to Ashoke factors greatly into her transition as a first- generation
immigrant. Ashima’s character plays an important role in holding her family together, mainly to
their cultural roots. She appears to remain static throughout the course of the novel, but her
slow development is revealed only after the death of her husband. “Identity, however, ought to
be looked at from a broader perspective
