| In her initial attempt at creative writing, Toni Morrison, the most eminent third generation Afro-American writer, delivered The Bluest Eye in 1970. It is one of her most powerful and unforgettable novels "with its vivid evocation of the fear and loneliness at the heart of a child's yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment"(1).The Bluest Eye is the first black novel representing the psychic presence of the blacks, and a myriad of valuable essays have been accomplished revolving around the discussion of their distorted soul. Nevertheless, it is the aim of this thesis to explore one form of cultural hegemony - institutional hegemony by applying cultural and postcolonial theories. Along with the analysis of various cultural institutions is the unveiling of the complicit connection between authority and cultural networks, and the engendered black inability. These cultural institutions produce and disseminate a large amount of white notions, and construct a white myth in the whole civil society to which the blacks estranged from their indigenous culture are unconsciously or consciously aspire, thus leading to their fracture and distortion. Apart from that, Toni Morrison's different writing techniques are also analyzed to show her intention of subverting the white cultural myth. Furthermore, the black culture and its values are explored, which indicates that the retaining of black culture may act like a kind of potential resistance to the cultural hegemony and a therapy to black's physical and psychological disability. In doing so, the thesis echoes what Gramsci has said that the practice of "cultural hegemony" is a dynamic process of action and counteraction.Therefore, a thorough study of cultural hegemony can, on the one hand, arises the blacks' consciousness to themselves and their vigilance to the authority and the complicit institutions, and on the other hand, guides the blacks from the "hopeless reality"(2) criticized by the Frankfult School.
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