Research On Phenomena Of Mimicry And Resistance In Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Harriet Beecher Stowe is one of the most famous writers of the abolitionist literature.She wrote more than thirty books during her life and was famous for Uncle Tom’s Cabin which was regarded as the highest achievement and the best masterpiece of American abolition of literature.Many scholars had done a lot of analyses of Harriet Beecher Stowe.Some had analyzed her writing background and intention,religious belief,life experience and ideology.These scholars praised Mrs.Stowe’s contribution to the abolitionist movement and also criticized her for the stereotypes of black slaves she created in the novel.The study of Uncle Tom’s Cabin had drawn a high degree of academic attention.Most of the scholars who studied this novel chose to study the influence of characteristics and religious belief on those black slaves’ fates,but very few scholars showed their interest in analyzing the phenomena of mimicry and resistance within the relationship between the colonizers and the colonized slaves with the theory of mimicry.Therefore,research on Uncle Tom’s Cabin with Homi Bhabha’s mimicry theory can not only expand the book’s research domain,but also can enrich Homi Bhabha’s literary criticism of mimicry theory.Mimicry is a colonial form of gaining power and carries out by the colonized people to gain recognition from the colonizers.Resistance is a by-product in the implement of mimicry.Bhabha points out that since the late 18th century,the colonized people have managed to build their cultural forms through a mixture of local culture and colonial culture.The strategy of resistance,the strategy of identity and the strategy of mimicry began to play their roles in the colonial process.The theory of post-colonialism is used to analyze colonial phenomena to contemplate the fate of the blacks and the weak culture of the blacks,and to explore the inevitable trend of cultural hybridity.In Uncle Tom’s Cabin,black slaves performed not only external mimicry and internal mimicry,but also passive resistance and active resistance to the colonizers under the dominant colonial discourse.Actually,mimicry produces "almost the same,but not quite"(Bhabha,1984:126)subjects which will gradually slip the stereotype of "the Other".This kind of subjects have three results:obey the colonizers,resist the colonizers and form a non-colonial relationship with the colonizers.The colonized slaves will disguise to cover their intension of resistance and will resist the colonizers unconsciously at first and then resist them actively.Although the theory of mimicry belongs to the post-colonial domain,it is a colonial phenomenon in the colonial era.In this novel,the colonized slaves’ mimicry and resistance to the colonizers exposed a complete colonial and anti-colonial process for the readers.Although the era of slavery has passed,the colonial relationship in the novel is still worth studying.As colonial culture can invade into any other culture in a variety of ways,mimicry can be viewed as an effective way of gaining power.Understanding and studying mimicry and resistance to the colonizers and the colonization can help today’s people to find their own identity and resist cultural invasion.