Niclas Johansson, School of Education, Culture and Communication, Mälardalen University 

Cultural and Narrative Identity: Sami Said’s Väldigt sällan fin as Migration Literature 

Through a reading of Sami Said’s novel Väldigt sällan fin (Very rarely nice, 2012), this article explores how the concepts of narrative and cultural identity can be reconciled with each other in the context of migration literature which highlights transcultural processes of hybridity. The article begins with a theoretical discussion of the compatibility of theories of cultural and narrative identity which demonstrates how Bruner’s (1987) and Eakin’s (2008) accounts of narrative identity parallel Hall’s (1996) and Appiah’s (1994) accounts of cultural identity with respect to how they see personal narrative identity as grounded in a cultural narrative framework. Two theoretical dilemmas — regarding the primacy of subject or discourse and whether culture should be regarded as a subject position or a semiotic framework — are left pending, but it is suggested that a narrative hermeneutics in the Ricoeurian tradition allows for a practical resolution of these dilemmas. An interpretation of the novel along these lines is undertaken and demonstrates the complex interplay of personal and cultural identity in a many-faceted transcultural process. In conclusion, the article argues for the compatibility of narrative and cultural identity, that their intersection allows a more in-depth understanding of the personal experience of transcultural phenomena such as migration, suggests that key notions in transcultural and hybridity theory are sensibly adapted to a narrative-hermeneutic framework, and finally suggests a number of topics for future research.