Ambivalence & Ambiguity

The present dissertation is a thematic study of Chinese American literature, responding to the recent critical trends of denationalization. Contriving to induce the prefiguration of a different cultural regulating code that views ethnic works in a more universalized and comprehensive way, it points out that many Chinese American writers have achieved their literary success beyond the bounds of ethnic politics and ethnography. The dissertation starts from and centers on ambivalence and ambiguity, the two literary idiosyncracies from the perspective of both authors and readers, and attempts to point out that they are among the more intricate elements that enable the literary works to transcend their ethnic boundary.The study begins with an in-depth analysis of the ambivalence and ambiguity in domestic sphere in the first chapter. As a unique site to transform transnational object into national subject, family is an institution in which national and international interests intersect. Also, "home" stands for postmodern and diasporic communities as a nostalgic ideal, and serves as the primary and restricted domain for women's identity. In this chapter, mother and daughter's metaphorical relation in the Chinese American fictions is firstly explored. Since that relation involves cultural conflicts and images, marginal experience, Chinese culture in collective unconsciousness, and intuition in female discourse, the particular cultural context represented by these works could reveal the attitudes of alienation, reconciliation, rejection, etc. in literary creation. In Amy Tan's works, the mother and daughter motif gives readers a distinct perspective to explore the hidden and subtle information between cultures and artistic creation. Besides, Jade Snow Wong's and Gish Jen's ways of dealing with mother/daughter relation reveal an unending and ambivalent creative quest in literature. Though mother / daughter relation is a universalized subject in literary writing, the special attitude and cultural approach in these works engender special literary spell with its uniqueness. Then, literary ambivalence in interracial family found in Chinese American novels is analyzed. The ethnic elements and cultural contradictions revealed in the works bring forward the question of cultural assimilation and declining sense of ascription. Some works entangle the ambivalent view of cultural evaluation, life attitude, and also diasporic tradition, and they reveal the general concern of cultural orientation for every modern human too. Thus, by exploring the couples as an enduring paradigm ofhuman relationships, the study shows that the changes in ideology and views of life in society enrich the content of Chinese American literature.Chapter 2 investigates the ambivalence and ambiguity of quest within and beyond ethnic boundary. It begins with an analysis of the double and racial shadow hidden in many related works, trying to present the alter ego and ambivalence variously known in different terms in different literary creations as particular yet universal things in Chinese American literature. Confronting the ambivalent and ambiguous effect of the texts with the double and racial shadow, we need a mobilization of the knowledge of American realities on historical, racial, economic, and more other things, while prolonging the process of the distinctively aesthetic perception of life. The second part of the chapter mainly introduces and analyzes Gish Jen's novel Mona in the Promised Land (1996). Pondering on the author and the characters' cultural quests within and beyond the boundary of ethnicity, it discusses the features of diaporic literature, philosophical fusions of visions and self-certainty between cultures. Besides, the identity quest and the relation between homeland and hostland in the new perspective of diasporic criticism are re-considered, which offers an insight into the expectation of Chinese American literature's creation and criticism. In this chapter, the ambivalence and ambiguity in cultural and literary code-switch have brought attention to the implication for self-other and cross-cultural relations different from that of the past purity of European (or Western ) culture. Therefore, in literary creation and criticism of Chinese American literature, a complex "hermeneutics of difference" beyond traditional conceptions of identity and dialectics would be explored. From Jen's works, and also other Chinese American writers' creation, we probably would feel that we are in a dynamic process of dispersion and migration textually and metaphorically, which, to some extent, is the resources for polyphony in literature.Chapter 3 contextualizes the ambivalence and ambiguity in cultures in different borderlands such as those between post-Orientalism and commercialism, neo-primitivism and modernism, recollection and expectation, as well as cultures between homeland and hostland. Successful literary transplantation, especially for the prosperity of Chinese American literature within last fifty years, could by no means be achieved in the neglect of philosophical ideologies, particularly that of Orientalism. Also, the Chinese Americans' relation to the rest of the world that contains their native land and immigrated one appears intensively subtle. In order to construct their identity, their writings appear as unending efforts to wrest out of Orientalist grips an autonomous ethnic self, and to deconstruct what is falsely constructed as Chineseculture. Therefore, the "distribution," the "elaboration," and the "will" to power and to clear identity are shared by their minority subjects, while simultaneously changmg the Orientalist misrepresentation into self-representations. Furthermore, this success seems a little bit sarcastic today because many of these writers once or perhaps still in present days unconsciously collaborated with distortions of the East. Another ingenious way of integration applied by some Chinese American writers is their narrow focus on self-realization that belonging naturally to American individualism and American dream. In Chinese American literature's embrace with Orientalism and integration with the mainstream, it turns from its early task of revealing objectively a once stereotyped and prejudiced minority group to the freedom of expressing itself and emerging in American literature with its own distinctive voice.The second part of this chapter analyzes the tints of neo-primitivism and Amy Tan's works, with the purpose of revealing the relation between literary creation, especially that of ethnic female writings, and the mythically primitive elements, hi Amy Tan's works, the culturally ambivalent attitude emerges and the new American myths are reconstructed with the ambiguously aesthetic effects, while simultaneously, the works have to some extent brought forward some thought-provoking yet confused questions for modern readers. The third part deals with the dual sides of recollection and expectation, which explores the myth and specter in literary narratives, and the special narrative rhythm as the result of these elements. With the further analysis, we would know that some fantastic stories are made or chosen by the authors to form a unique type of speech, and many ethnic stories in recollection could take us far beyond the historical and cultural realm of the ethnic writings by giving us aesthetic bliss.Consequently, the immediate question follows is the cultural heritage standing at a nonplus, because of which the literary tensions within and beyond the works are extending the profundity of Chinese American literature. So the fourth part of this chapter would make a chronologically comparative analysis on Jade Snow Wong's works and those of Gish Jen's. Departing from the particularly intricate relation of cultures between homeland and hostland, the singular culture in borderland reflected in Chinese American writings offers a research potential with a special spectrum of diverse elements.The last chapter is on ambivalence and ambiguity as generalized yet particularized literary enigma and aesthetic charm. By revealing the shift of canonization strategies in literature and the latest trends of this intricate evaluation, the exploration would tien make an expectation on Chinese American literature's research and creation. During...