Tainted Through Transfer: Dis/connective Residues in Mohsin Hamid's Contaminated Fiction

Abstract

Given the profusion of negative terminology ascribed to non-Western migrants generally, coupled with Mohsin Hamid's extensive and recurring implementation of ecological and biological collapse in his first three published novels, this thesis will foreground scientific concepts which undermine Eastern representation. I argue that while Hamid illustrates real-world ecological, biological, political, and ideological contamination, he does so by employing an historic use of metaphors and imagery which highlight an inevitably poisoned, infected, or contagious Pakistani people. This emotionally inciting device ultimately reduces his characters' vitality and agency, thereby transferring a tainted impression onto his Western readers, one which denies visions of cultural and political equality between the East and West. His work problematically rearticulates a disconnected, ethnically subordinate image of Pakistani society at a time when cultural sensitivity and global connectivity is paramount to peaceful multicultural and international relations.