Cultural Conflict and Emotional Politics in Betty Mahmoody Novels

This paper explores the cultural conflict as well as the politics of emotions in the novels of Betty Mahmoody’s Not Without My Daughter and For the Love of a Child. She has given in her novels the emotional conflict of bi-cultural marriages and their children’s identity. Betty detailed her relationship with an Iranian American Doctor and a journey from a patience to become an Iranian man’s wife. For the Love of a Child explored the stories of several couples are entrenched in bi-cultural marriages. Betty’s has analyzed about such tragic marriage lead her one of the causes is the emotional conflict and politics of emotions. Emotions are collective and universal phenomena, though affected by culture. Some emotions are general and are experienced in parallel ways as a reaction to similar events across all cultures, other emotions demonstrate extensive cultural differences in their forerunner events, the way they are experienced, the response they bring about and the way they are perceived by the surrounding of society. Novels serve as an indication against intercultural relationships and features cultural differences between America and Iran.