The Buddha of Suburbia, Hanif Kureishi

In Hanif Kureishi’s The Buddha of Suburbia, we see in the first half of the novel an example of how gender affects hybridity in the character of Jamila, Karim’s oldest friend. Jamila’s father, Anwar, becomes suddenly nostalgic for the family values of his homeland and demands that Jamila have a traditional arranged marriage, despite her upbringing in a culture that does not popularly practice such. In addition to the already-existing struggle Jamila faces in maintaining both an Indian familial background and an English upbringing, she must also deal with the contrasting gender roles assigned to each culture. When her father starts to notice the training exercise she puts herself through, he seems to base his decision to wed her to an Indian man based on her apparent independence as a young woman and out of fear for her meeting boys during her workouts.  The contrast in values is heightened by the fact that in order to get Jamila to go through with the marriage, Anwar models his own personal hunger strike after that of the notable Indian figure Gandhi in order to get his family to act as he wishes.  In a brief conversation, Karim tries to explain to Anwar that “it’s old-fashioned, Uncle, out of date… No one does that kind of thing now” to which Anwar replies, “Our way is firm. She must do what I say or I will die. She will kill me”(60).  This conversation reflects the modern English perspective of young women through Karim's explanation, and the traditional Indian view of how young women should behave through Anwar's stubborn reply.  Jamila finds herself caught between the two, desiring the freedom of independence many women have in England while at the same time harboring pride for her roots (she had been known to stand up for her heritage when she felt it was being attacked, by either her beloved teacher or by a complete stranger).  For Jamila, then, going along with her family's traditional gender roles while also keeping up with her studies and strong-willed behavior is not so much a decision, as Karim thinks of it, but a necessity for the maintenance of her hybridity.

In an interview with The Guardian, Hanif Kureishi discusses how he used writing as his own personal means of creating his hybridity as the son of an Indian man growing up in England, as well as a young person growing up in the suburbs. Kureishi describes writing much in the same manner that his character Karim describes moving into the city--it is a way out of his tradition of the suburban life, and "you didn't have to go to work", or it was not a typical nine-to-five job. He claims that writing was also a way for him to stand out as a minority, and that it allowed himself to stand up for his own background and tell about immigrants in the Western world. Whereas in the novel Karim is lacking in a passion calling him in any particular direction, Kureishi seems convinced of his from an early age.  Kureishi shares many of his own experiences of growing up with Karim, including his parents (an Indian father and an English mother), an interest in music and partying, and his strong desire to leave the suburbs.  This is obviously an intentional change, perhaps intended to examine the exploration necessary by immigrants and children of immigrants in order to find where they fit with the new country.  It can serve as an example of how a hybrid identity for one may not work for another, much in the same way that no two characters in the novel settle on the same hybrid identity.