Postcolonial Trauma and Identity Crisis: A Comparative Study of Racism, Ethnophobia, and Xenophobia in Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, Mahomed’s Cheaper Than Roses, and Brontë’s Wuthering Heights"

Abstract

This paper examines racism, ethnophobia, and xenophobia as interconnected manifestations of postcolonial trauma and socio-political identity crises, through a comparative analysis of three literary texts from different cultural contexts: A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry (United States), Cheaper Than Roses by Ismail Mahomed (South Africa), and Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (England). Each of these works reveals the enduring psychological and societal repercussions of marginalization, identity fragmentation, and cultural displacement. Utilizing postcolonial, psychoanalytic, and sociocultural theoretical frameworks, the study interrogates how systemic discrimination distorts individual self-perception and disrupts societal belonging. Hansberry’s portrayal of an African-American family in mid-20th-century Chicago illustrates the impact of racial injustice on aspirations and familial cohesion. Mahomed’s satirical narrative captures the post-apartheid identity disorientation among South African coloureds, embodied in the character of Betty, whose existential struggles reflect broader societal disillusionment. Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is reinterpreted through a racialized lens, positioning Heathcliff’s outsider status as a symbol of ethnophobic exclusion and class-based prejudice in 19th-century England. The paper contends that these forms of discrimination are not isolated social issues but deeply entrenched instruments of historical domination and cultural suppression. By juxtaposing these texts, the study highlights literature’s role as a critical mirror of colonial legacies and structural inequalities that persist across time and geography.