White Teeth

Setting Physical: There are not many instances in White Teeth that demonstrate physical setting. White Teeth takes place indoors and outdoors. It also takes places it all different types of buildings at different times in the day. Geographical: The story White Teeth takes place in London, England. Specifically, in the suburban areas of Willesden and Killburn near the northern part of London. These places are moderately populated. White Teeth also has many flashbacks to places such as Jamaica, Europe and a couple of other places. Cultural: In the neighborhood where White Teeth takes place, it is extremely diverse. There are many people with different beliefs. Most of the people in this community are considered middle-class citizens. The…

“The people in White Teeth are immigrants” (“An Interview With Zadie Smith”). Before introducing the topic of this paper it is important to understand a few terms and the history behind the novel White Teeth. Said herself; Zadie Smith claims that the characters in White Teeth are immigrants. With the topic of immigration comes the idea of assimilation, which is the “process by which a person or a group 's language and, or culture come to resemble those of another group” (PowerPoint). Characters…

In Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, the characters all have various backgrounds and characteristics that make them very diverse; however, everyone shares a commonality: teeth. As hinted by the title, teeth play a significant role in Smith’s novel and make appearances throughout the novel. I argue that Smith uses teeth to represent one’s identity and their history. Through this identity, teeth show the conflict the characters have with having control over their identity and the fate their pasts have…

Zadie Smith’s White Teeth is a novel that explores friendship, love, and war in the postmodern world from the views of three different families over three different generations. Everyday we live in a world with people of different religions and social classes and don’t even notice. White Teeth explores, in depth, the influences that religion and social class have on personal relationships. Whether they are romantic or simply friendly these two aspects actually play an extensive role in the…

Childhood Trauma to a Problematic Adulthood Zadie Smith portrays Samad Iqbal as troubled man. With all the life changing events that could put Samad’s life on hold, Samad chooses to let the little things dominate him. Samad has the idea that he is the head of the family, but with all of his decisions there comes big consequences. In White Teeth, Samad Iqbal distracts his family’s “destiny” by his selfish actions impact Magid and Millat’s psychological behavior into different paths following into…

White Teeth by Zadie Smith is a satirical glimpse chock-full of characters grappling with their identity. Samad Iqbal and his twin sons, Millat and Magid, are just three of the characters to convey the theme of identity within Smith’s Novel. However, Samad, Millat, and Magid are three obvious characters who’s cultural and familial expectations are major obstacles as they each struggled to establish their identity. Samad Iqbal is an example of a man who struggled with his identity his entire…

The Black Album and White Teeth are both set in the diverse society of London and have in common that the protagonists are teenager or young adults whose problems may in some ways correspond with the supposed reader/student of a language classroom. These fictional texts not only represent issues of non-belonging, stereotyping, and identity formation, they also have the quality to uncover, through their form, the multiplicity of meanings manifested within a text, owed to an absent authoritarian…

Double-Consciousness Essay After relocating to a new country, immigrants are faced with a plethora of issues surrounding their identity. The incoming pioneers are at a crossroad between their native culture and the culture of their new home. This tends to make immigrants either remain unchanged, acculturate themselves into the new culture while preserving the old one, or change their whole image as a person. In Zadie Smith’s novel White Teeth, Samad deals with his double-consciousness by…

been said that the present is what matters most. Resolve to live in the now. While that may be true, we often shed importance of our past. Our past dictates who we are and who we will become. For example, take a look at the inspirational Malala Yousafzai, a seventeen year old women’s rights activist. As an adolescent, she was an advocate for girls’ education, which culminated in the Taliban issuing a death threat against her. On October 9, 2012, she was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman. And…

Moving to a new country comes with a choice, a choice to embrace a foreign culture or alienate oneself with their own culture. In a world that encourages multiculturalism, it is difficult to believe that immigrants face social alienation. In Zadie Smith’s novel White Teeth, the consequences of multiculturalism and assimilation among immigrant communities gives her readers the opportunity to empathize the feelings of social alienation felt amongst immigrants in the world today. Many immigrants…