Displacement, Migration, and Cultural Hybridity in Amitav Ghosh's Novels

Amitav Ghosh occupies a central position in contemporary Indian English literature for his sustained engagement withhistories of displacement, migration, and cultural hybridity shaped by colonialism, globalization, and transnational movements. Hisnovels consistently foreground mobile subjects—migrants, refugees, traders, sailors, indentured laborers, and exiles—whose livesunfold across borders of nation, language, and culture. This paper examines how displacement and migration function not merely asthematic concerns but as structuring principles in Ghosh’s fictional universe, giving rise to complex forms of cultural hybridity.Focusing on major novels such as The Shadow Lines, The Glass Palace, The Hungry Tide, Sea of Poppies, River of Smoke, and Floodof Fire, the study explores how Ghosh reimagines history from the margins, challenges nationalist narratives, and articulates hybrididentities shaped by cross-cultural encounters. Drawing on postcolonial theory, diaspora studies, and cultural criticism, the paperargues that Ghosh presents hybridity not as cultural dilution but as a dynamic process of negotiation, survival, and creativity. Hisfiction reveals displacement as a shared condition of the modern world and migration as a force that reshapes memory, identity, andbelonging beyond fixed territorial boundaries.