Quest for Identity and Dignity of the Women in Bharati Mukherjee’s Jasmine and Desirable Daughters

Abstract

This research article explores the intertwined themes of identity, dignity, and female agency in Bharati Mukherjee’s novels Jasmine (1989) and Desirable Daughters (2002). Through a comparative literary analysis, the study examines how Mukherjee articulates the struggles of her female protagonists as they navigate cultural displacement, patriarchal expectations, and the complexities of diasporic existence. The paper foregrounds the protagonists’ evolving subjectivities and investigates their attempts to assert selfhood in foreign and often alienating socio-cultural environments. In Jasmine, the eponymous protagonist undergoes a series of transformative identities—from Jyoti to Jasmine to Jane—reflecting a fractured yet resilient pursuit of autonomy and dignity in the face of trauma, migration, and gendered oppression. Similarly, in Desirable Daughters, Tara’s journey from tradition-bound Indian daughter to independent woman in America highlights the tensions between inherited values and individual freedom. Both narratives showcase the protagonists’ resistance to static definitions of womanhood and cultural identity, advocating instead for fluid, self-determined modes of being. The study argues that Mukherjee’s fiction reconfigures the immigrant woman not as a passive subject of cultural assimilation but as an active agent in redefining selfhood. By tracing their quests for identity and dignity, the research underscores the centrality of female voices in contemporary diasporic literature and contributes to broader discourses on gender, migration, and postcolonial identity formation.