Research paper on identity crisis of Lydia

How parents excessive expectations lead to fatal incident happenings in their children's lives

1. Presenter: Palwasha Saeed

2. Introduction Analysed Text Everything I Never Told You (2014) A Chinese immigrated family making into American marathon, residing in small-town, Ohio. It revolves around the broken family values, societal verdicts of success, parental expectations, unhealthy competition among siblings and self-identity crisis Celeste Ng A Chinese- American author and novelist. Exploring rhythmic dilemmas between colour , race , creed , and identity confusion within a dissolved family dynamics. A social and literary activist, advocate of rights of Asian-American women.

3. Introduction Research Problem How does parental expectations lead to an identity crisis of Lydia Lee? Identity Crisis An identity crisis is a developmental event that involves a person questioning their sense of self or place in the wor ld. It was coined by Erik Homburger Erikson around in 1960s. A self-defining domain dealing with adolescent identity crisis and dysphoria .

4. Introduction Continued Theorist – Erik Homburger Erikson A German-American developmental psychologist and analyst. He is known for his psychological developmental theory of human beings. He coined the phrase “ Identity Crisis” His notable work includes; Childhood and Society (1950) Young Man Luther (1958) Gandhi’s Truth (1968)

5. Introduction Continued 8 stages of development for a successful identity Erikson maintained that personality develops in a predetermined order through eight stages of psychosocial development, from infancy to adulthood. For Erikson (1958, 1963), these crises are of a psychosocial nature because they involve psychological needs of the individual (i.e., psycho) conflicting with the needs of society (i.e., social).

6. Introduction Continued Research Objectives Investigating how the notion of continuous comparison, societal pressure and guilt of being a failure breaths life to a disaster; tending to break the family dynamics. Significance of the research Highlighting the vital role of personal evolution and how it is necessary in the long run of life for persistent and sustainable character. It has a personal implementation a depth to identity confusion that raises the alarming situation of negligence towards psychological well being. It fills the gap, the deficiency that is present in the works that has been done in the past, by probing into the life of Lydia– seeing it more than a tragedy. It trudges path to counter-question the challenges an immigrant teenage girl has to face –only to realize that she doesn’t belong.

7. Introduction Continued Delimitations Celeste Ng’s novel is used to analyse Lydia’s identity crisis, hopes, expectations, utopic standards and dysphoria while not dwelling into crippled manifesto of American Dream in the life of Lee’s family. Specifically, Erikson’s stance on drastic results caused by dysfunction of identity has been achieved by intrinsically negotiating Lydia’s behavioural psychology which has been a result of excessive expectations of her parents, comparison among siblings, dependence of teens and their need for external validation.

8. Introduction Continued

9. Research Methodology Research Method – Argumentative and Descriptive Content Analysis The descriptive illustration has been vastly used to demonstrate the nature of research in terms of literary approach for the opaque necessity of conversation or to create a dialogue. It is analysis about the development and misapprehension of the identity in the novel.

10. Data Analysis The adverse effects of over-dependency in order to mask up the reality of one's own insecure existence; for they have never been treated as if they were enough. This will help process character of Lydia, because experiencing deals with the psychological traumas and diasporic feelings of a person trapped in social enigma. All points of theory come under the heading of experience as this is what makes or break any human being. Ng talks about the uncertainty of life, Before that she hadn‘t realized importance and fragility of happiness, how little carelessness could knock it off the counter and shatter it‖ (Ng, 15). Lydia's identity confusion takes a toll on her ambivalent nature of self resignation and devastating rebellion act of proving herself only to fail everything entirely. "Lydia herself — the reluctant center of their university — every day, she held the world together. She absorbed her parents' dreams, quieting the reluctance that bubbled up within" (Ng, 2014). . As it can be seen in lyrics of a song named Marjorie about stamp line of unfulfilled dream, "All your closets of backlogged dreams and how you left them all to me" (Swift , 2021).

11. Conclusion The findings of this research paper give the explanation that the personality of Lydia has been torn through expectations . The multi-national background of the characters effected their decision making and choices that break and built them. Moreover, societal restrictions and personal assessment failures that never let them outgrow their past and regrets cunningly passed onto their children . As a result an entire lineage paid the price for what they could have been instead of what they ended up being. Excessive expectations and implementing parent's own broken dreams, "You never got what you wanted; you just learned to get by without it" (Ng, 120). " When a long, long time later, he stares down at the silent blue marble of the earth and thinks of his sister, as he will at every important moment of his life. He doesn't know this yet, but he senses it deep down in his core. So much will happen, he thinks, that I would want to tell you.“ (Ng, 2014)

12. THANK YOU!