The Malayali Diaspora in the US: A close reading of Mira Jacob

It is indeed paradoxical that Kerala, with its long history of immigration, has very little to show as immigrant writing. This paper examines Mira Jacob, a Keralan woman writer who grew up in the U.S, Her parents had migrated to the US from Kerala in the late 1960s. The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing (2014) narrates the life of an Indian immigrant family in New Mexico and the dilemma of two generations of immigrants who resist assimilation. In contrast, Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations (2019) explores the writer's inner life as an American first-generation citizen. This paper seeks to examine critically how Jacob’s works capture the core essence of the immigrant experience from the point of view of a Malayali who was born and brought up in the United States. Keywords: Migration, Kerala, Malayali identity, Identity Crisis, Women diaspora.