Title:   MIGRATION AND DISILLUSIONMENT: A PSYCHOANALYTIC READING OF ADICHIE'S AMERICANAH

Abstract
This paper studies the main characters in Adichie's Americanah psychoanalytically. Adichie's Americanah is a novel that deals with contemporary issues of global concerns, such as, racism, sexism, gender, and migration. In the narrative text, Americanah, Adichie presents the reader with a story that encompasses love, race, identity and migration. Set across Nigeria, the United States of America and the United Kingdom, the novel presents a multifaceted perspective on the experiences of the characters that face these contemporary issues and how they subsequently transform through such experiences. Americanah belongs to the diasporic African literature genre. It can also be classified as a bildungsroman novel as it “traces the spiritual, emotional and mental growth of its eponymous heroine, Ifemelu, while describing her journey from Nigeria to the United States and back” (Krishnamurthy 54). These developments affect her self-definition, how she initially tries to change her identity, and how she finally comes to the acceptance of her identity to the point that she realizes that her return home will bring the desired solace. This study examines the psychological growth of the major characters and how they shape their identities while sojourning overseas. It will also uncover the various defense mechanisms they unconsciously employ when faced with anxiety or threats, and the driving force that motivates them. To achieve this, this critical inquiry aims to do a study of the main characters in the novel; Ifemelu and Obinze using Sigmund Freud's theory of psychoanalysis. Attempts have been made in this paper to give form to the “shifting ambiguities and complexities of unidealized existence” (Frye, 223).
Keywords: Psychoanalysis, Bildungsroman, Migration, Racism, Racial profiling

Citations:

Publication Date: 2022-03-03