The idea of the metanarrative is one in which all stories are essentially universal, and can represent the story of anybody in an overarching manner. This is an idea that has been proliferated — the idea of the “immigrant’s tale”, or other stock stories or plot lines.
Yet the reduction of stories to a single story inherently involves losing too much individuality within those stories. They are not the same. They cannot all be explained by one story, or one idea.
Why?
Because the immigrant experience is not universal.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, an author who moved as a youth from Nigeria to the USA and has spoken publicly on this topic before, portrays the differences in immigrant experience in her novel “Americanah”.
Americanah portrays a sprawling love story about teenage lovers Ifemelu and Obinze, across continents and years (decades) as they follow different paths in their lives. Drawn together in Nigeria, circumstance drives them apart — a wedge further driven by time and lack of shared experience. After continuing lecturer strikes become an ongoing problem in Nigeria, Ifemelu applies for and is granted a visa to study in the USA. Obinze, who has always had a fascination with all things American, stays in Nigeria longer but when the time comes he applies and is knocked back. It is implied that world events at the time have influenced the visa process to prevent him from joining Ifemelu. Ifemelu suffers from depression following her move to America and has a traumatic experience after which she cuts contact with Obinze. She eventually builds a career as a blogger but continues to yearn for Nigeria. In place of America Obinze gains a visa for the UK, however overstays and is soon caught and deported. He becomes successful in Nigeria and is surrounded by the trappings of this success, marries and starts a family. Ifemelu eventually decides to move back to Nigeria, where she and Obinze find each other once again.
Americanah is an attempt to deconstruct the American Dream from an immigrant’s perspective. The romance of Ifemelu and Obinze is a layer over the discussion of more complex issues within American society. Adichie uses Ifemelu (often through her blog posts, which are sprinkled throughout the text) to break down and comment on issues such as the dishonesty inherent in the way Nigerians act around those with (or with perceived) power and influence, the way many Africans value Western cultures more than their own, the inconsistencies in questions of social class and the strangeness of racial identities, hierarchy and prejudices in the USA from an outsider’s perspective. The contrast within liberal white Americans is commented on multiple times, with the criticism of their own country in conflict with the idea that theirs is still superior to others, shown through the use of charity — they give charity, rather than receive.
The issues Adichie covered that primarily interested me were those relating to immigration and identity.
Why do people migrate?
In the novel Obinze identifies the prevalent idea of the “better life”. Young Africans migrate in hopes of a better life, an idea driven by Western culture (television, books etc).
Is this is the case with all migrants?
Are all of their stories essentially the same?
There is an established literary trope of the “immigrant’s tale”, wherein the story of an immigrant, sole youth, family or refugee, must learn how to cope with life in a new country. This story is commonly paired with the traditional ideal of the American dream, but can work across many nations. This story will typically include overcoming language barriers, amusing situations created by lack of understanding of cultural context, and perspective changes throughout successive generations.
But does this truly represent an accurate picture of all immigrants?
Adichie herself has spoken about these issues in her TED talk, The Danger of a Single Story, in which she warns against reducing groups of people to a single story through stereotypes as this eliminates the detail and difference, and these assumptions can be entirely incorrect. The issue of choice — the choice to migrate — is one that immediately rings untrue with respect to the idea that the immigrant’s tale is a story with several typical traits — a “single story”.
I also have migrated to Australia alongside my parents, though most would not know it from a first impression. After all — I’m white and speak with a reasonably neutral-Australian accent. But I came to this country as a boy, born in New Zealand to Irish parents. I never had a choice, and my parents? They weren’t looking for a better life. They left Ireland (individually) for a holiday, met each other and kept putting off going home, staying far longer than they had ever expected to.
I like to call them accidental immigrants.
Clearly, they do not fit a single story, the common immigrant trope.
Nor is the idea of “home” universal when it comes to migrants. Home to me is still New Zealand, though I have soft spots for Sydney and Brisbane. The idea is even split between my parents — one (who is remarried — but not to an Australian) refers exclusively to Sydney as home. The other? Ireland will always be home — this is just where she lives at the moment. A family friend who also migrated from Ireland has made a different choice, to consider himself Australian rather than Irish.
Ideas of home and self-identity are inherently linked, and change as a result of choice. In Americanah, Ifemelu struggles with her identity as “black” yet also existing outside of that as an “African-American”. Relaxing her hair and making the choice to change her accent is an attempt to become more comfortable within her new environment, yet when she does become confident she reverses these decisions, embracing her identity as Nigerian while blending American cultural identity with this.
Ifemelu’s yearning for home eventually drives her to make the choice to go back to Nigeria — yet she finds it very different to the home she left years ago. Ifemelu meets with long lost friends yet finds their attitude to men and contemplation of the ideal marriage jarring. Ifemelu finds that her home has changed, but so has she — she is no longer simply a Nigerian, nor is she wholly American — she has become an “Americanah”. Yet even here the category is not a catch-all, as Adichie specifically separates Ifemelu from other Americanahs such as those in the “Nigerpolitan” club through her observation of (and subsequent blog posts regarding) their arrogance and the unwillingness they have to accept Nigerian ways despite making the choice to return.
Ifemelu’s characterization shifts in some ways quite noticeably throughout the novel. The early, purely Nigerian version of Ifemelu comes off as much more likeable than the untitled, capricious version we see in America, particularly from the mid-to-late section of her American experience. She throws away relationships seemingly at a whim, apparently regarding them very little until after the fact. In this way, her change has become evident through her self-centredness, which becomes more and more evident — particularly in the final chapters, back in Nigeria with Obinze, as a contrast to her earlier time in Nigeria.
Adichie shows the reader further difference in immigrant experience through the likes of Obinze, Uju, Dike, Emenike and Ginika. Obinze’s experience is significantly different to Ifemelu in that he does not choose to go home — he is forced home, as his circumstances are different. He finds that Emenike has assimilated to British culture while still retaining some of his Nigerian culture — but this is kept hidden. Ginika has likewise assimilated to her new environment in America in a way that Ifemelu finds inaccessible. Uju and Dike show yet another variation on the immigrant experience where Uju does not assimilate at all, taking on the bare minimum of cultural difference and remaining, at her core, Nigerian. Uju is perhaps the most stereotypically Nigerian character of those that move, as while there she finds herself a “big man” to take care of her — she is also essentially forced to leave, rather than going by choice. Her son Dike provides the counterpoint, growing up as the typical American within a “good” community — yet his identity within that as “black” still sets him apart.
The idea of the single story narrative smacks too much of structuralism for my liking — one basic plot component follows another to create the story that is attached to a particular group of people.
Yet experiences of different people are not easily broken down into simple analysable chunks. Given above is example after example of the important and significant differences between different immigration tales. Reducing them to a single story devalues the ability of people to act — to make choices upon which their experiences will shift. This overarching theme sees a small amount of many, but no large amounts of any one person — as such it can be a dangerous thing to base assumptions upon.
This is the inherent problem with the idea of a metanarrative; it claims to represent all, yet it never can. There is too much difference, too many things lost in the streamlining of stories into the singular.