• SAYAN MUKHERJEE

An important postcolonial concern revolves around the intricate relationship between home and identity. “Home “as perceived by the postcolonial thinkers, is not merely an objective space of physical reality, but space of the mind, interspersed with a subjective sense of possession/dispossession, belonging/non-belonging. Intrinsically connected to the concept of “home” is the question of identity. According to Stuart Hall “identity” constitutes: ‘what we really are’; or rather – since history has intervened – ‘what we have become’. We cannot speak for very long, with any exactness, about ‘one experience, one identity’, without acknowledging its other side – the ruptures are discontinuities… Cultural identity… is a matter of ‘becoming’ as well as of ‘being’. It belongs to the future as much as to the past. (112) Such “ruptures and discontinuities” define the very basis of the Anglo-Indian community. An Anglo-Indian has a split identity and is a victim of double marginalization. He is an outsider in his European brotherhood and a misfit in the Indian community. This paper attempts to study Aparna Sen’s cinematic representation of the Anglo-Indian community as the “unhomed” subject in 36, Chowringhee Lane. Violet Stoneham, the protagonist, occupies the border zone of socio-historical space, her identity torn between European heredity and her Indian reality. The purpose of this paper is to point out and analyze Aparna Sen’s use of cinematic techniques to bring out the crucial “unhomely moments” in Miss Stoneham’s life. The paper also attempts to explore how the experience of “unhomeliness” is forced upon the minority Anglo-Indian group by the dominant Bengali community in Kolkata, thus severing the former from the mainstream national culture and society. Released in 1981, 36 Chowringhee Lane, based on Aparna Sen’s own story and script, represents the minority Anglo-Indian community in Kolkata with a humanitarian touch. The film revolves around the story of aging and lonely Anglo-Indian school teacher, Violet Stoneham, played by Jenifer Kapoor. The title of the film is lifted from the postal address of her apartment.

Anglo-Indian, Unhomed, Diaspora, Postcolonial, Identity, Marginalization, etc.

"Researching the ‘Unhomed’ Anglo-Indians in India: A Postcolonial study of Aparna Sen’s 36, Chowringhee Lane ", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 9, page no.247-249, September-2018, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1809345.pdf

"Researching the ‘Unhomed’ Anglo-Indians in India: A Postcolonial study of Aparna Sen’s 36, Chowringhee Lane ", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 9, page no. pp247-249, September-2018, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1809345.pdf