Unable to Find One's Self

A theme shown in "Luxurious Hearses" was the struggle to find and maintain an identity. Jubril is stuck between worlds in the sense of his religious and geo-social affiliations. He was baptized a Catholic and later became a Muslim. He has family in the north and south. His brother became a born-again Christian and was ostracized and killed by his community. This is not an easy way to grow up and leads to his confusion on the bus. Jubril sees himself as a Muslim from the north but acknowledges his dual-identity in Nigeria. It is unfair for the entire bus to murder him because of such an arbitrary label and the ridiculous paradigm of the country is exposed by his death.

The conflict between the way you see yourself and the way the world sees you is apparent in Jubril. He is scared more than anything and this fear is crippling in trying to find a safe label to travel with. There are too many physical traits that give away his Muslim identity (cut-off hand and accent) so he must exaggerate his Christian ones (his baptism and family). But the traits that are more obvious eventually give him away because the crowd is angry and don't believe his more abstract Christian aspects. Jubril is confused and afraid for most of the story and his confusion is understandable because he tries to leave a part of him behind and embrace a new part but then go back to the part he left behind. This identity crisis must've been unpleasant and disillusioning. The society in which he lived, however, found no sympathy.

Erik Erikson detailed the theory of identity development which can be found in this link:

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/identitycrisis.htm