Muslimness in the United States and Spaces of Individual Identity: Scrutinizing Mattu and Maznavi’s American Muslim Characters

Muslimness in the United States and Spaces of Individual Identity: Scrutinizing Mattu and Maznavi’s American Muslim Characters

The present study examines the dynamics of a few representative stories from the collection Love, Inshallah (2012) by Ayesha Mattu and Nura Maznavi. Previous studies on the collection lack specific focus on identity from a poststructural perspective. The present study implements Derrida’s concept of différance and his discussion of the conjunction “and” to show that identity is not something which an individual can comfortably have access to or possess. Any possible tension that might come from perceived differences between the aspects of identity can not be reconciled in the strict sense of that term. Furthermore, identity, even in its most strictly individualistic understanding, can be far from individualistic, and flows into and from the communal. Through the aforesaid concepts, it is demonstrated that Muslimness and Americanness are subject to an eternal interplay of the individual and the communal.