Motif of Otherness

Menon includes this motif of otherness, or feeling different than the majority of a group of people, to show that as teenagers struggle to understand and accept their own identities, in the end they will make themselves happier, and others happier around them if they accept their own differences and others.

The motif of otherness plays a large role in the identities of the children of immigrants. These particular children struggle with carrying on the traditions and expectations of their parents, while trying to fit in with the broader American culture. Dimple and her mother fight over this principle, her mother pushing her to embrace her Indian heritage, and Dimple pushing her mother to let her live as an American, not as an Indian-American born of Indian parents. Hari, one of the Aberzombies, completely rejects his Indian heritage to avoid his own otherness. Over...