摘要
伍慧明是继汤亭亭、谭恩美之后备受关注的新生代美国华裔作家。1993年,她发表了处女作《骨》,这部作品得到了学术界以及广大读者的一致好评。同其它很多华裔小说或移民作品一样,它探究了少数族裔的文化身份问题。在《骨》中,伍慧明描述了处于东西方两种文化冲突中的第二代华裔美国女性所经历的身份危机以及寻求自我身份的不同经历,再现了中国城里的华裔美国人的生活。《骨》被认为是华裔美国文学中的杰出作品。
本文在总结和梳理现有对《骨》这部小说研究成果的基础上,综合运用霍米·巴巴后殖民理论中的翻译理论、流散理论和女性主义理论,分析第二代华裔美国女性在文化冲突中,通过文化翻译、自我流放以及消解性别的二元对立来完成其女性自我身份建构的不同模式。本论文首先,根据女性主义理论,分析了叛逆者安娜,以生命为代价抵抗父权制,诉求自身女性主体的历程;其次,运用离散理论探讨了移动者尼娜通过自我流放、穿梭于不同文化之间进而解构了宿主国文化和母国文化的二元对立,在霍米·巴巴的第三空间内建构了流动性的华裔美国人的身份。再次,通过运用霍米·巴巴文化翻译理论,研究了小说中的主人公莱拉在“第三空间”中对两种对立的文化进行了翻译、协商,由此,消解其面临的二元文化对立以及自我分裂,完成了其华裔美国女性主体性身份的构建。
本论文通过对小说中第二代华裔美国女性身份建构模式的分析,旨在揭示文化翻译、离散、以及消解性别二元对立对于少数族裔女性的文化身份及其主体性身份构建的有效性。论文论证了在文化、性别的二元对立中,华裔美国族裔女性从迷茫、自我分裂到最后在霍米巴巴的“第三空间”里通过文化翻译、消解性别的二元对立而建构华裔美国女性主体性自我身份的过程和不同模式。通过辩证分析证明伍慧明的《骨》为美国少数族裔女性提供了摆脱二元文化以及性别对立的束缚,在第三空间内确立女性自我主体性、实现文化身份的认同与建构的有效途径。
Fae Myenne Ng is one of the noted Chinese American novelists after Maxine Hong Kingston, Amy Tan, and others. Her debut novel, Bone came into publication in1993and it has received great attention in academic circles and high praise from readers. Like many other Chinese American fiction and immigrant works, Bone represents a vivid portrait of life in Chinatown, and the identity crisis caused by the cultural conflicts for the second-generation Chinese American daughters and their different ways of establishing women selfhood.
This thesis, based on the comprehensive researches on Bone, intends to apply Homi Bhabha's theory of cultural translation, diaspora, and feminist theory to analyze the three different models each daughter used to establish their female identity by means of culture translation, establishing fluid identity in diaspora, and the deconstruction of gender differences. Firstly, from the perspective of feminist theory, the thesis argues about Ona's resistance against the patriarchy with her death to obtain her woman subjectivity in Bone. Secondly, based on the postcolonial theory, it contends that constant migrations of Nina between different cultures destruct the binary opposites between the American culture and the Chinese culture, and thus enable Nina to confirm a Chinese American with a fluid identity in the "Third Space." Lastly, it applies Bhabha's post-colonial theory of culture translation to demonstrate that Leila, the protagonist in Bone, translates and negotiates between the conflicting cultures in the "Third Space"; thus, she deconstructs the binary opposites of the two cultures and the agony of self-split, and consequently constructs her Chinese American woman subjective identity in this negotiable and translational space.
By discussing the identity construction models of the second-generation Chinese American women, the thesis aims to explore the validity of the culture translation, constructing fluid identity in diapora, and the deconstruction of the gender binary opposites in establishing their women subjective selfhood for ethnic minority women. My thesis demonstrates the different routes of identity construction, and clarifies the process of establishing Chinese American women identity in the "Third Space." As is contended, my discussion on the identity construction models of Ng's Bone, in a tentative way, provides the ethnic minority women in America with an inspiration to dispel the binary opposites of the cultures and genders and consequently establish their women subjective identity in the "Third Space.'
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