Argumentative Essay: The Reluctant Fundamentalist

The Reluctant Fundamentalist Argumentative Paper The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a novel that looks into the life of Changez, a young Pakistani man, that came to the United States to receive a college education from Princeton University. Changez later lives in New York City and has a very well paid job at a business evaluation firm. With the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Changez goes through many physical and emotional hardships before eventually returning to his home country. Throughout this novel, there was really one argument that continued to catch my attention: can you be two people at one time? During the novel, Changez argues his Pakistani side with his American side. He struggles to find his identity; therefore, bringing up the discussion

At the beginning of the novel, Changez shows a modest amount of love for his new home in New York. “I was, in four and a half years, never an American; I was immediately a New Yorker” (Hamid 33.) As the main character progresses, he starts to see the concealed, unsatisfactory point of view of American society. Consequently, his dislike evolves through many events, which ultimately leads him to smile after seeing the twin towers implode from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. “I stared as one-and then the other-of the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center collapsed. And then I smiled” (Hamid 72). Therefore, these events show how Changez wrestles with his identity in America. He begins with a love for his new life, which presses his Pakistani identity on the back burner. Changez is engrossed by the finer commodities that America has to offer, such as his education at the pretentious Princeton University. Eventually, the event of 9/11 arises and Changez experiences that he is still Pakistani at his core. Changez grows out his beard in an unconscious way to show pride of Pakistan, and he shows aggression towards the people who confront him with rude comments on the street. Towards the conclusion of the novel, Changez returns to Pakistan and teaches in an Anti-American way, which ends his internal struggle that was presented since he arrived in the United