Language, Loss, and the Third Space: Hybridity in Sujata Bhatt's "Search for My Tongue"

Abstract

The present study is going to analyze the themes of linguistic displacement, cultural loss, and hybrid identity in Sujata Bhatt's poem "Search for My Tongue" in light of postcolonial theory, particularly Homi K. Bhabha's notions of the third space and hybridity. Bhatt's poem is observed as a touching consideration of the expressive and mental consequences of living between languages and cultures, exemplifying the struggles of upholding one's native tongue in a diasporic situation. The investigation shows how Bhatt uses metaphor and imagery in order to transport the intricacies of identity development in a postcolonial background, where the loss of language is indistinguishably connected with the loss of cultural legacy. By drawing from Bhabha's concept of the third space, this article emphasizes how Bhatt's work goes beyond binary oppositions of home and exile, self and other, thus forming a deeper vision of identity that includes diversity and flexibility. The poem's investigation of hybrid identity is underlined by the strain between the familiar and the foreign, as Bhatt utters the struggle to regain one's voice in the middle of the burdens of integration and cultural expurgation. This research eventually contends that "Search for My Tongue" not only echoes Bhatt's individual journey of linguistic and cultural negotiation but also acts as a larger clarification of the experiences of relegated voices dealing with the complications of postcolonial identity. Via this inspection, the present paper leads to the continuing discourse on language, identity, and the transformative potential of hybridity in the present literature.