CULTURAL ENCOUNTERS AND IDENTITY CRISES IN SAMUEL SELVON’S THE LONELY LONDONERS

Abstract

Culture and identity are two notions that are almost inseparable. Identity is embedded in culture and the latter reveals itself through identity. The idea of culture is more elusive than physical and so accompanies the individual regardless of his/her destination. Consequently, migrants encounter new cultures in their host land which in turn pushes them to be caught up in a web of cultural clash and identity. Usually, a cultural shock is better understood when one moves to a new cultural setting. It is within this framework that John Macionis and Linda Gerber in Sociology remarks that cultural shock is also the personal disorientation a person may feel when experiencing an unfamiliar way of life due to immigration or a visit to a new country, a move between social environments, or simply transition to another type of life. This paper sets out to examine the clashes that come up as characters struggle to project their identities in Samuel Selvon’s The Lonely Londoners. Informed by psychoanalysis and new historicism the study reveals that cultural relativism is a bridge towards other cultures and plays an important role in resolving culture clash.