ABSTRACT
The paper perceives the study of illustrations exceptional diaspora Gujarati feminist poetry of Panna Naik. Paper focuses on the aspects of how she is a prominent feminine voice of Gujarati diaspora poetry. Poetry has been a healing factor in the process of migration and settlement of Panna Naik in the U.S.A. Poetry is an effective medium for the poetess to express her feminine heterogeneous multi-regional, linguistic, religious and cultural identity. Her poetry reveals how she sustains and develops her feminine self- maintained Indian American identity through her poetry. Some poems are selected for this study keeping in sharp contrast the above mentioned realities. Poetess is thriving and establishing her identity as the voice of women in host land through poetry. The fact of being a woman, woman writer and variance between the two divergent fondnesses – homeland and host land - is clearly evident in the poems of Panna Naik. This study can open new horizons of studying different aspects of Gujarati feminist as well as diaspora literature. Guajarati literature and its flavours are drawn to the Global platform.
Keywords: Born, Dead, Diaspora, Two, Worlds.
INTRODUCTION
Panna Naik has written very significant poetry in Gujarati living in the USA. Her contribution is threefold her work added to feminist literature, diaspora literature and Gujarati literature. Critical evaluation of her work is almost unexplored. This study will open new vistas of study of her poetry. It can also lead to comparative study of PannnaNaik with other diaspora literature, feminist poetry, cultural study so on and so forth.
May it be Amreli or my relationship with America or Australia, or my warm-hearted admiring readers who live around the world, my linkage with them is through my poetry, I keep on writing due to their extended hand of benignity. Though I live in America and I have not left India. Frequently I visit India but I cannot leave America. Had I not continued writing poetry, I couldn't have survived in America. Poetry has retained my Indianness and my Gujarati identity. And yet, I sometimes feel that I am not completely an Indian. After the passage of all these years, I feel that I am not even entirely American. I keep on constantly cleaving by the saw between homeland and foreign land. Therefore I feel I am Videshini- foreigner wanderer of two worlds, one already dead and the other powerless to be born. (http://pannanaik.com)
Panna Naik is an audible and perceptible feminine voice in Gujarati diaspora writing. She was born in 1933 in Mumbai to Dhirajlal Modi and Ratanben. Resourceful creative writing is inherited by her from grandfather Chhaganlal Modi who gave us popular historical fiction, Irawati. Her family was from Surat. Her mother Ratanben had recited her Gujarati and Sanskrit religious and secular poems which made her fascinated with poetry reading and writing. She completed her B.A. in 1954 and her M.A. in 1956 with Gujarati and Sanskrit from St. Xavier's College affiliated with the University of Mumbai). In 1960, she moved to the United States as a bride.
Geographers were the first scholars who observed and explained the phenomenon of migration (Ravenstein, 1885). They used physical laws as analogies to explain migration. By the early 1940s, the theory of spatial interactions had been elaborated. First, the gravity model, replaced the variables of physical gravity (distance and mass) with countries’ population size and the distance between the host and home countries. Second, the entropy model establishes that the relationship, between spatial interactions within regions, maximizes the migration entropy of the entire system of the regions under study (Wilson, 1981). The theory of mobility transition explains changes in migration through demographic transition (Zelinsky, 1971).
Accordingly, social modernization causes a continuous diversification and an increase in human mobility. A decade later, Wilson presented the catastrophe theory of bifurcation. The geographer determines the point where the analyzed dynamic system undergoes quantitative changes in turn associated with slight modifications in some parameters. According to the theories elaborated by geographers, distance, population, social modernization, and environmental disasters represent the main determinants of human migration. Sociologists have also studied the phenomenon of migration. The concept of intervening opportunities as the main determinant of migration (Stouffer, 1960). The idea of the ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors that explain migration. On the one hand, pull factors in the destination country included: higher salaries, employment opportunities, security, welfare, etcetera. On the other hand, push factors in the migrant's home country encompass: humanitarian crises, military conflicts, environmental disasters, poverty, and unemployment (Lee, 1966). Migrant networks represent pull factors that impact people who share friendships, kinships, or just the country of origin with migrants (Taylor, 1986). Recently generalized the idea of ethnic networks and developed the theory of transnational spaces, which identifies the different waves of migration as influenced by links between individuals and groups in home and host countries. (Faist, 2000) In addition to sociological theories, there are two major socio-economic theories that are found in the literature. The theory of cumulative causation considered migration as an evolutionary process that influences the institutional and socio-economic changes in countries of origin and recipient countries alike (Massey, 1990).
The eastern philosophies celebrate and represent the feminine in diverse ways. She is Aditi, as she is not dependent (Nirukta, 4/22), Subhdhā, for she is knowledgeable (A.V. 14/2.75), Suyamā, since she is self - disciplined. (A.V. 14/2/18), Syonā, for she is noble (A.V. 14/2/27), Vishrutā since she is learned (Y.V. 8/43), Yashasvatī, for she is glorious (R.V. 1.79.1) Yoşhā, because she is intermingled with man, she is not separate (Nirukta 3/15/1). There are numerous references to the feminine aspects of women in oriental literature. Its known that the early Feminist movement initiated from west. Western literature, too, consists of a number of references to feminism and writings on it. The bible myth of Adam and Eve illustrates the female counterpart narrative in a focused manner. Plato in his literary works state the abolition of social roles determined by sex. Ancient Greek classical comedy, Lysistrata by Aristophanes preached feminist ideals. Mary Wollstonecraft wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792) which is one of the earliest and famous feminist works. The Victorian economist and philosopher, John Stuart Mill gave The Subjection of Women.
DISCUSSION
Woman is necessarily connected to the universe in a way connected to humans/man, child, nature, society, cosmos and almost to all things under the sun. Women attain direct experience of the world as sacred. Women experience the universe and nature as sacred rather than a field of experiments.
Repeated readings of Panna Naik’s poetry reveal what it means to be a ‘woman’ based on how matter exists in space i.e physical reality. The metaphysics of feminism understands and promotes equality to a fundamental level. Man and woman both exist as structures of the universe, as does all life. How we are to live as man and woman is derived from metaphysical foundations of what actually exists ( laws of Nature).
To focus on thinking ‘that is archaic’ such as ‘metaphysics offers to me nothing as a woman’. In fact the contrary is true, metaphysics and its task of correctly describing what exists and its necessary interconnectedness necessarily defines what it means to be both ‘human’ and ‘woman’.
Now coming to diasporas, at the heart of the concept of diaspora resides an imagery of a ‘remembered home’, a place of origin which stands afar at a distance both spatially and temporally. The pain of this displacement forms the memory of that ‘remembered home’, it can still be considered home or can be belonging entirely to the past, one may have left it recently or generations ago, it may still exist in the form of regular ‘home visits’ or may not exist all together. It may be nostalgia of a safe space or a memory of a nightmare, but it is in a way imagined, remembered, recreated and longed for through diasporic imagination. The migrants’ dream of home and perceptions of belonging are grounded in memories of prior home and by the notions of “where ‘we’ have come from” (Stock, 2010: p. 24). This notion of longing and memories for homeland gets reflected in feminine voice of Guajarati poetry of Panna Naik and that structures the core of my paper.
“I leave one place for the other, welcomed and embraced by the family I have left…I am unable to stay…I am the other, the exile within…afflicted with permanent nostalgia for the mud” (Hagedorn, 1993).
Diaspora poetry of Panna Naik basically gives voice to the personal experiences of the poetess which are the results of the clash of two cultures, one Indian and their American. Her emotional experiences are formed with the prominent components such as alienation, assimilation, displacement, adaptation, diaspora, adjustment, embarrassment, nationhood, imagining homeland, identity, ethnicity/culture, eroticization, history/ memory, etc. Panna Naik writes about people and their life which is distinct not only to her homelands but has the fragrance of her host countries.
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is a thinker and theorist from India, an immigrant scholar, at present settled in the USA. She has been one of the important theorists of the subaltern studies and the feminist postcolonial critics. In her studies, she has made a critical analysis of the non-western culture status and the cultural experience of the newly decolonized community. In her book The Postcolonial Critic, she identifies herself as “a postcolonial intellectual caught between socialist ideals of national independence movement in India and the legacy of colonial education system” (Morton, 2003: p.2) Spivak has inquired the conception that the western world is advanced in the context of civilization, democracy and development than the non-Western world. About the ‘Third world women,’ Spivak has posed an argument that “the everyday lives of many ‘Third world’ women are so complex and unsystematic that they cannot be known or represented in any straightforward way by the vocabularies of Western critical theory” (Morton, 2003: p. 50).
In her significant essay “Can the Subaltern Speak?” Spivak deals with the problems regarding the subaltern and concludes that the subaltern cannot speak, highlighting the silence of the subaltern. About the silence of subaltern, Spivak explains that the term ‘silence’ doesn’t suggest literal meaning. Spivak says, “It doesn’t mean that subaltern did not speak, but rather that others did not know how to listen and enter into a transaction between speaker and listener” (Sawant, 2012). The subaltern cannot speak because their words cannot be properly interpreted; therefore it is a failure of interpretation rather of articulation. Let us examine Panna Naik's poem Two Malas in similar light.
Two *Malas
In our Vaishnav family a string of beads or knots is used for prayer and meditation
The *Thakorji's mala
And the flower inlaying necklace given by mother
gets mixed up.
It was my daily routine
To bow down to mother and father in morning,
After bath
I use to pick flowers of *mogra, *jasmine and *paarijat
from the garden surrounding the house
And make garland for Thakorji.
With orange stem of paarijat in middle
And on both sides white mogra flowers
When mother use to rise
After offering the garland to the Thakorji
She use to pat my back and Say :
"Be happy my child"
Mother passed away
And four decades have passed by.
The flower inlayed beaded necklace
Today before wearing it.
While seeing Shrinathji's Photo
Given by mother, When I came to America
I question myself:
"Am I happy ?"
__________________________________________________________________
*In Hinduism, a mala is a string of beads or knots/ rosary, used for prayer and meditation.
*Form of Hindu god Krishna
*Mogra Scientific name: Jasminum sambac
*Jui Scientific name Jasmine Molle
*Paijaat Scientific name: Nyctanthes arbor-tristis
In the above poem the poetess is answerable to her own being. At the end of the poem she interrogates self, I question myself : " Am I happy ? '' She writes in her mother tongue in a male dominated sphere, at times missing the warmth of her motherland. She asserts herself in twofold ways, one as a woman writer, second as writing in her own language Gujarati and asserting identity in mainstream literature. She kept her voice clear and her style of writing unique and lucid which was always worthy of being noticed.
In the poem 'Be Saher'/ 'Two Cities' she draws a fine comparative picture of two cities one Mumbai the lively city of her homeland and second Philadelphia the city much cherished by her in her host country.
When the poetess is dislocated from the home society, she tries to adjust to the realities of life in the settled land with the help of being nostalgic by relocating themselves in the past: Nostalgia, by its very nature, often produces a romanticized perspective of the homeland. Indulgence in these illusions evokes a pseudo comfort and security which sustains the individual away from home…the motherland reconfigures into a phantom of displaced paradise. (Sheik, 2004: p.189)
Here a twofold or dual identity of the poetess is exhibited, as she is tossed between two different cultures and societies. Though she believes the country in which she is born and brought up as her own country, the society still perceives her as foreigner and sometimes discriminates her which leads her to a hyphenated identity. Therefore, torn between two divergences physically as well as spiritually, she develops a sense of in-betweenness, which results sometimes into the loss of identity or hybrid identity, which means adopting both the cultures of home and host country in bits to her convenience.
This has also been termed as plural identity. Kwame Dawes’ words as quoted in Weedon’s article “Migration, Identity, and Belonging in British Black and South Asian Women’s Writing” substantiates this issue, “They were born there or have grown up there all their life. They are uncomfortable with the notion of a home elsewhere for they have no sense of exile. Their sole exile is the exile within their own home country” (Weedon, 2008).
Two Cities
More years than Mumbai
I am living in Philadelphia
Even then
Don't Believe Mumbai
That
I have forgotten you
Or
I love you less now.
Mumbai is my motherland
what it has given to me
Is my intact treasure
Which I have stored
In one corner of my heart.
Philadelphia's
Very dear cherry blossoms
And the Importance of Daffodils
similar to Gulmohars of Andheri extend to the eyes.
Here it is rainy all twelve months
It constantly reminds me
Of Mumbai's first shower of rain
And the sweet smelling dust of the earth.
There is no snow fall there
But I always had a longing to see the snowfall.
The snowfall here is like teeth of negro
It makes me write poetry.
People are seen on roads in Mumbai
It's not so in Philadelphia
Crowd like there
do not dangle here on the train.
On the road
And
At the corner of the house
Pan* squirts are not visible here.
In the traffic light
Around the road
Children carried by women
Sometimes traded
Are not seen.
Here everything seems to be decorous refined
Still it is not that
Here there is no poverty.
Garbage bag left by on Friday morning
I have seen those searched by homeless people
From my window often.
Here there are people
That work for minimum wages
In their backyards
There is no garden or
Even a tree.
And if there is by chance a tree
Then it does not bear fruits of dollars.
Here
That pleases the heart
Sound of cuckoo is not heard day and night.
Here
The birds are so trained
That
The granivorous birds nosh from feeder
At fixed time
They feed themselves and fly away.
Here around the houses
The systematically trimmed lawn
by the lawn mowers
Is not watered
Day and night
By the gardener
But at the set time
It is watered by the water sprinklers.
Here
There is no Versova sea.
All twelve months flooding the coasts
In the midst of the city
Is the river named Schuylkill
In the river
Naturally there is no boat floating
So there is no scene
Of Sailor
Singing while going home.
Here
There are taxis
But no yellow clutter of Mumbai.
In Summer
Similar heat like that in Mumbai annoy but
It is swallowed by the air conditioners.
When I came to Philadelphia
In those days
I said
Here there is everything, still there is nothing. If possible
I want to withdraw this sentence.
Like Mumbai
Philadelphia
is also my dear, dear city.
In my heart are breathing simultaneously
Two cities
Mumbai and Philadelphia
___________________________________
*Paan - Betel leaf
Paan from Sanskrit parṇa meaning "leaf" is a preparation combining betel leaf with areca nut widely consumed throughout South Asia and Taiwan. It is chewed for its stimulant and psychoactive effects. After chewing it is either spat out or swallowed. Paan has many variations. Slaked lime (chunnam) paste is commonly added to bind the leaves. Some South Asian preparations include katha paste or mukhwas to freshen the breath.
The two domains where the inquiry lies to be examined are the relationship of the migrants or descendants of migrants to the/ an ‘originary Home’ and to the ‘feeling at Home’ at the new home. The former deals with the focus on the material and symbolic notions of transnational ties or on the dreams of returning to Home, while the latter traces the (im)possibility of making oneself at Home or integrating in the different spaces diasporic subjects inhabit in the place of residence (Ibid). In other words, the link between these two conceptions of Home is the relationship between the ties to the homeland and successfully making Home in the new land. (Stock, 2010: p. 25)
The conflict between the two divergent fondness – homeland and host land -- is noticeable in the above poem written about two cities Mumbai and Philadelphia. The narration is about common experiences of life, which are noticed by deviating and seldom contrasting situations acquired by the poetess in community life. These struggles resolve when the poetess readily adjusts to the new surroundings, disregarding the either roles and selecting the third space: the hybridized in-betweenness. In other words, “the experience of migration acts as a catalyst and conduit for nascent feelings, a re-conception of our sense of self and our relationships with others” (Jacobs, 2011)
Debt
You and I
Two separate bodies
But a single soul-
A million efforts have been made
to see this ideal come alive
but somehow deep somewhere
rings a perennial echo
of separateness
of each other's non - acceptance.
We are nothing else
just two pages of a book
facing each other
bound but separate
just sewn together by predestined debts
of mortal ties.
(Translations from Gujarati by Naik & Peeradina, 2011 )
Ceiling
Lying in the bed
staring at the ceiling
I felt like reaching out:
it seemed so close.
After an unsuccessful attempt,
I put chair on chair upon chair
on my bed, stood atop this pyramid
like an acrobat
but still could not touch the surface
that had seemed so close.
I cannot figure out
whether the ceiling is much too high
or my arms are much too short.
(Translations from Gujarati by Naik & Peeradina, 2011)
In the poems like Debt and Ceiling one can feel the pain and examine how her expression in poetry is catharsis for the poetess. She talks of juxtapositions like non acceptance and mortal ties. She stares at the ceiling and articulates her inability to touch it even though it seems to be very close. The courage of trying and realizing / analyzing the limitations is seen in the poem Ceiling.
Blood
Engrossed in meeting
of day and night
I do not realize
my foot hit a stone.
The wound was much deeper than I felt.
Before i could put my foot
under running water
the sky-blue bath tub
was sprinkled with twilight colours.
I managed for a while
to forget the pain,
put on a bandage
which would not dam the blood.
Flowing blood is nothing new to me:
I lose blood every month.
(Naik, Panna., 1986, pp. 61)
This poem is loaded with the intricacy and intensity of being a woman. It is not about menstruation but it communicated the vacuum of a woman longing for motherhood. The thirst and quench to be with the child, the divine feel of mother. Some other poems like are very remarkable with feminist overtone Monsoon, Mother, Flowers, Echo, Family photograph, The Living Room, Family Potrait, Winter Sunlight. Panna Naik needs to be explored through kaleidoscopic, manifold facets of feminism, keeping in prospect the various theories propounded by feminism as a branch of research and study.
CONCLUSION
Poetesses tend to touch contemporary phenomena such as self-consciousness. The quest for understanding the (feminine) self and not reclaiming the selfhood as if lost and found. Finding a grasp as a feminist voice and finding one’s place in the world through poetry. Searching for HER place in the world she lives, she first defines the world in which she lives, a continuous process in itself endless rescheduling and the distinction between life and art. She depicts reality and imagination, the blankness of suburban life. A syndrome of aimlessness and spiritual emptiness, that came about from unwarranted comfort and monotonous routine as a female counterpart of total social, professional, personal, economic, political etc set up.
There is a notion of empowerment in Panna Naik’s writings it enables her to gain insight and have an awareness of what is undesirable and unfavorable about her current situation, perceive a better situation, the possibilities of attaining it and realizing what is within her reach and what she could do to get to a better situation. She is constantly in a process that could involve a change of perceptions about the self, the environment, and the relationship of the self and her ecosystem. While she writes she is in a process that involves the creation of images, the generation of a "push" to act or what psychologists call motivation. As a woman writes her poems it enables women to generate choices and as an outcome of having such choices, she acquires bargaining power. She chooses not to follow the pressures and demands of the more authoritative social structures; she dares to question herself and negotiate with the rest of the world to change the situation and make it more acceptable. She sets alarm for the women with lack of awareness and insight into their circumstances that aggravates their powerlessness. She sends messages through her poems to women who remain in a state of blissful ignorance and most survive in the belief that they cannot change their reduced situation. Her poems reflect that as a woman she nurtures her creativity herself. She wants everybody to understand that, as a human being, she is entitled to happiness in the same way that others are. She has a zest for life with acceptance of all harsh facts and realities of life.
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