Abstract
In an era shaped by migration, displacement, and cultural entanglement, the humanities offer critical frameworks for understanding how communities are imagined and reshaped. This paper explores how Zadie Smith’s White Teeth (2000), a landmark of contemporary British fiction, interrogates fixed ideas of community, identity, and nationhood through its portrayal of multicultural North London. Centering on three interwoven families of Jamaican, Bangladeshi, and English descent, the novel presents a generational narrative that reveals how history, memory, and migration intersect in complex ways. Drawing on postcolonial theory—particularly Homi Bhabha’s concept of hybridity and Paul Gilroy’s notion of the Black Atlantic—this paper argues that White Teeth dismantles essentialist notions of cultural purity. Instead, it envisions community as a dynamic, negotiated space shaped by difference and historical entanglement. Through its use of humor, irony, and narrative polyphony, the novel becomes a literary act of “border-crossing” that reflects the plural, sometimes conflicting, realities of urban life in post-imperial Britain. By situating White Teeth within broader debates on multiculturalism and transnationalism, the paper emphasizes literature’s ability to foster ethical reflection and inclusive models of belonging. The novel’s form and content together demonstrate how the humanities—through narrative, voice, and imagination—can illuminate and reimagine the structures that bind or divide us. Ultimately, White Teeth affirms the continuing relevance of literary narratives in negotiating the fractures and solidarities of contemporary human experience.
Presenters
Ana Clara BirrentoAssistant Professor of English Literature, Linguistics and Literatures, University of Evora, Évora, Portugal
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
Beyond Borders: The Role of the Humanities in Reimagining Communities
KEYWORDS
Hybridity, Multiculturalism, Memory, Community, Identity
