On The Identity Consciousness And Cultural Identity In Ang Lee’s Works

Cultural conflict inevitably draws more and more attention with increasing cross-cultural exchange under globalization context. As an artistic language, screenplay plays a critical role in letting people know this conflict. This thesis aims at analyzing Ang Lee’s effort in exploring the recognition and the reconstruction of cultural identity for contemporary Chinese Americans who were considered as marginal men in mainstream America. As a director with worldwide reputation, Ang Lee interprets this phenomenon through shaping various different characters in his screenplays from different point of views to represent his own confusion and dilemma.Ang Lee was born in Taiwan, educated in America, thus was influenced by multiple cultures. But in reality, he was considered as an outsider by mainstream Americans, Taiwanese and mainland Chinese. This identity of multiple outsiders makes his path of seeking cultural identity more difficult. Characters in his works are interwoven and foiled for each other; their struggles for cultural identity can arouse deep reflection.This thesis consists of three parts. The introduction part gives a brief review of Ang Lee as well as his achievements, his cultural identity background and current researches about him.Chapter one gives a brief introduction to Stuart Hall’s conception of fluid cultural identity and the formation of identity crisis under globalization. By analyzing the cultural consciousness, ethnic culture exploration and identity reconstruction in Ang lee’s works, this thesis tries to reveal Chinese-American’s attachment to their mother culture.Chapter two was completed based on Edward hall’s high-context culture and low-context culture. By discussing the awakening of identity consciousness in Ang Lee’s works, the cultural conflicts under identity consciousness and the exploration of cultural identity to analysis Ang Lee’s unconsciously demonstration of this mother culture and his identification to Chinese tradition culture.Chapter three introduces the image of Chinese-American as a marginal group in mainstream America. It further discusses how they went through the deconstruction of “family” and the process of how they finally broke emotional obstacles to seek for self-recognition and cultural identity reconstruction.