Spanish and Portuguese Language and Literature Commons^™

Brazil And Bashō: Negotiating Japanese-Brazilian Hybrid Identity Through Mujōkan In Adriana Lisboa’S Rakushisha, Suzanne Noelle Shibuta

Theses and Dissertations

Hybrid identities occupy a unique space within the field of identity and culture. Due to the instability and transitory nature of hybrid identities, individuals who fall within the category of hybridity often struggle to recognize and accept their identities. Do such individuals identify with one culture, the other, neither, or both? Adriana Lisboa’s novel Rakushisha offers new insight into the realm of hybridity through the exploration of mujōkan, a uniquely Japanese awareness of impermanence that also helps to explain the cycle of suffering, continuity, and regeneration that Lisboa’s characters experience. Although hybrid identities by nature are unstable, constantly in motion …