On The Concept Of The Identity Of The Chinese American Writer Gish Jen

The thesis is a study of Gish Jen's novels, Typical America (1991),Mona in the Promised Land (1996),the Love Wife (2004)and a short novel Who's Irish? (1996). Gish Jen is one of the most prominent contemporary Chinese American novelists. This study tries to examine and explore her novels from a cultural perspective, elaborates on fluid identity and her claim of anti-essentialism, and investigates her writings'impact on the whole development of Chinese American Literature.In the Introduction, the key terms and the basic referential frame for the research are explicated, and a literary review is presented of Gish Jen's novels.The first chapter gives a brief review on development of Chinese American Literature and traces different Chinese American writers'thoughts on identity.The second chapter gives a prior analysis on how protagonists in Gish Jen's novels constructing identity and then dwells on analyzing her attitude of anti-essentialism based on above discussion.The third chapter analyzes fluid identity in Gish Jen's novels with the concept performing identity. Besides, the view of youth subculture is also applied to the discussion.The forth chapter analyzes ways of characters in her novels seeking their balanced point of cultural identity, and explores Gish Jen's main contributions to the whole development of Chinese American Literature as well as her enlightenment on its following development.