White Teeth Thesis

CHU HAI COLLEGE OF HIGHER EDUCATION

Department of English

Name : Ling Wai May (ID:201212009H)

Lecturer : Professor Michael Yee

Date : 30 September 2015

Assignment : Final Year Project Proposal

Project Title

Cultural identity and space in the postcolonial London: ‘White Teeth’ by Zadie Smith

Background

White Teeth is a debut novel by Zadie Smith that is highly praised as an epitome of multicultural London by many critics. Just from the story characters: the three families of immigrants- Jones (Anglo-Jamaican), Iqbal (Bangladeshi) and Chalfen (Jewish) show the cultural and ethnic diversity of the novel. White Teeth presents a London-based story of these families across the time periods of WWII, post war years, the 80’s and the 90’s.

From the statement, some may find it problematic. In order to decide which ethnic group need to be defended and given support to, one need to sort people into groups first. The way this cultural discourse talking about revaluing certain ethnic groups and elating their status for equality suggest that our society is grouping population into groups by ethnic origins, which is defined by presumed cultural essence. They sort people this way because they have the assumption that culture is a community of original identity, to which individual belong, and people born into their community will absorb its customary

Irie Jones, Millat and Magid Iqbal, Joshua Chalfen are the example of cultural hybridity.

They experience alienation since they neither feel belonged to their "homeland", where they have never been nor accepted by the western society where they are now living in. They are torn between the traditional and modern western mindset, dealing with double consciousness. By analyzing them in detail, I hope I can find out how four of them shape and look for their identity and comes to term with their multicultural experience in London.

Expected results

From all my research and analysis, I hope to find out how the characters can create and negotiate with their identity in London.

Schedule Plan

Phrase 1: Research and study on the novel in great detail

(Sep-Nov)

Phrase 2: Familiarize myself with Literary and Cultural theories related to the topic

(Dec-Jan)

Phrase3: Adopting theories to analysis the novel

(Feb-April)

Phrase4: Revising and finalizing the report