Uprooted from Roots: Narrative of Identity in Diaspora in Hala Aylan’s Salt Houses

Abstract

The issues of belonging and identity are the main focus of the postcolonial discourse, where the culture and subjectivity of the postcolonial world are still defined by the legacy of migration, colonialism, and displacement. This study aims to examine the narrativization of uprooted identity in Hala Alyan's Salt Houses in terms of diaspora. It scrutinizes the way the novel depicts the disintegration and bargaining of identity among the various generations of the Palestinian Yacoub family as they are displaced one after another by war, political upheaval, and migration. Based on the postcolonial theory within diaspora domain, complemented by Bhabha’s conception of identity, the study highlights how Salt Houses reflects the conflict between the memory of the homeland and the adjustment to the new cultural settings, showing that identity is constantly redefined in exile. The themes of loss, nostalgia, intergenerational trauma, and the changing definition of home are analyzed as the characters find their place in transnational spaces. By critically examining the structure of the novel and the character lines, this study shows how Salt Houses expresses the intricate relationship between cultural origins and diasporic identity, and how uprooting ironically becomes the key to the characters developing new, hybrid identities. Findings of the study indicate that Alyan’s selected novel does not only represent the lived experience of the Palestinian diaspora, but also adds to the wider discourses of diaspora, memory and identity reconstruction.