Read the short essay, "East Indian" that I gave out in class on Monday by V.S. Naipaul (who wrote our next novel) for Wednesday's class. There are no questions, but we'll do an in-class writing when you come to class over it. Here are some ideas to think about that dove-tail with our discussion on Monday:
* What is the difficulty with being an "East Indian"? Why is it a hard identity to carry around with someone? And why is it so hard to understand?
* What is the problem with the word "Indian" even today? What does it say--and what doesn't it say? Why do we still use it?
* Why were the Indian immigrants to Trinidad called both "West Indian East Indians" and "East Indian West Indians"? Do we have examples of such slippery racial descriptions even today in America?
* Are Indians in the West Indes still "Indian"? Are they Trinidadian? Carribean? African? What would someone be who grows up in Trinidad, speaks English with a Trinidadian inflection, but is still Hindu or Muslim?
* What does he mean when he says "to be a colonial is to be a little ridiculous and unlikely"? What might he, as someone with a colonial identity, feel "ridiculous"?
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