DislocationofSouthAsianFamiliesinaForeignLanda.PDFVIP

South Asian Studies A Research Journal of South Asian Studies Vol. 30, No.2, July – December 2015, pp. 355 - 366. Dislocation of South Asian Families in a Foreign Land: a case of Architectural Anxiety Salma Khatoon Government College University, Lahore Asma Khatoon Government College University, Lahore Abstract Pakistan’s emergence on the literary vault can be noticed through the considerable critical acclaim Pakistani writers writing in English are receiving worldwide. Among such writers with divergent interests and experiences is Nadeem Aslam, one of the most widely acknowledged Pakistani writer writing in English, who from the slums of Pakistan, to the Pakistani immigrant families, has attempted to assess the living standards of the oppressed in his fictional world. This paper explores, on the one hand, how political oppression and colonial anxieties become haunting in the form of ghosts, specters and seething presences and on the other, how the horror of oriented other figures prominently in Nadeem Aslam’s fiction. Pakistani fiction has not been explored from this perspective previously. Every aesthetic, architectural or structural movement has a smear of past on its face. Key Words: Politics of architectural anxiety, South Asian immigrant families, Post-colonial gothic, political anxieties, Pakistani writer writing in English. Introduction Nadeem Aslam’s first novel Season of the Rainbirds centers on a small town in Pakistan. Set during the 1980’s, the narrative explores the political and religious tensions between traditional Islamic ways and those of the secular world. His next novel Maps for Lost Lovers hinges on the large community of Pakistani migrants living in English town of Dasht-e-Tanhaii. In the third novel The Wasted Vigil Aslam narrates the terrible afflictions that have for long plagued South