Changez tells more about his job at the prestigious “Underwood Samson” underlying the unpleasant sensation he felt as a Pakistani among the Americans. Changez enlightens such unpleasant feeling in chapter 4 where he deals with the resentment Erica's father felt for Pakistani and Middle East's people in general. During the exchanging dialogue between Changez and Erica’s father comes forth the patronizing attitude of Americans, since Erica’s father doesn’t let the protagonist any space to answer back to his attack, silenced him. The chapter allows the reader to understand the relationship between Changez and the American culture.

The protagonist doesn’t deal with blackouts problems – an important problem since in Pakistan there’s a lack of energy – at first but he starts talking about the scar on his forearm. This use of language makes the reader understand that Changez doesn’t perceive the problem as such but as normal event inasmuch as he is used to it since he was young. And to reinforce this perception he adds that “We have in this country a phenomenon with which you will doubtless be unfamiliar”.

In this chapter Changez goes to meet Erica’s family, and her father says something that annoys Changez (“Erica’s father had asked me how things were back home, and I had replied that they were quite good”). He is he irritated because he is a representative of the eastern culture.

In front of Changez’s polite answer, Erica’s father sets out a list of negative elements about Pakistan saying “Economy’s falling apart though, no? corruption, dictatorship, the rich living like prices while everyone else suffers. Solid people, don’t get me wrong. I like Pakistanis. But the elite has raped that place well and good, right?” and fomenting thus the protagonist’s anger who has to accept those – unfortunately – actual comments.

The interesting aspect of their exchange of dialogue though is that Erica’s father poses some question but answers them himself, not allowing the protagonist any chance to answer back to his attack. And so the dialogue between the two men becomes a monologue. In this way Erica’s father’s behavior become patronizing and on the contrary the protagonist is silenced.

Erica’s father supposes also that Changez is a fundamentalist (“You guys have got some serious problems with fundamentalism.”)

It follows that Changez feels annoyed because he understands that Erica’s father thinks according to American stereotypes of fundamentalism.

But what really bothers him is that he perfectly understands he’s being judged like a fundamentalist stereotype without – in his opinion – Erica’s father really troubles about him.

Indeed the previous quotations emphasize the stereotypes trough which Americans see/judge Pakistanis.

“I limited my response to, “Yes, there are challenges, sir, but my family is there, and I can assure you it is not as bad as that.””

Here Changez’s cleverness and wit are put in evidence. Even if he is annoyed by Erica’s father, he limited his answer not showing his irritation.

And the sentence also underlines that the perception of Pakistan of Erica’s father does not totally correspond to Pakistan reality and as Changez sees it.

The short exchange of dialogue between Changez and Erica’s father makes one understand that every human being – even the characters in the novel – bears some ideas – usually based not on cognizance but on an incomplete knowledge – about other cultures and counties and people.

Once more the narrator refers to stereotypes that garble people’s vision of reality. Everybody – both Americans and Pakistanis – talk about other countries without knowing exactly their problems. He wants to make the readers sound out the easiness human being judges other cultures without knowing them but only resorting to stereotypes built up by social media, that instead very often darken real problems troubling a country.

People are led to judge ‘the other from them’.

This attitude that first of all is expressed through Erica’s father’s point of view – which in terms of macro language is Americans’ point of view – is found even in the 7^th chapter whereas Changez realizes that Americans’ offensive behavior toward Muslims is perpetrate with no distinction from one person to another.

To sum up the choice of language has the function of focusing how slightly cultures knows each others and so the difficulties of having an quite impartial perception about civilization.

It is difficult for 2 countries do not judge each other on prejudices and stereotypes. Adjustment process to another culture is made possible only through common elements one finds in both of them. Indeed in the previous chapter the protagonist felt at home by experience pertaining to the sense.

In conclusion there are 2 main reasons/functions that made chapter 4 what it is and they are: the difference between American and Pakistan economies, and the difference between American and Pakistani cultures. In the first part of the chapter 4 Changez describes the economical problems of Pakistan: in winter there are often blackouts in some cities. And after that he describes the beauty of New York. So he focuses on the disparity between the 2 countries. In the second part of the chapter Changez underlines the cosmopolitism concept in New York (the fundamental of Underwood Samson is meritocracy).