A Model Of Initiation Story: Genre Analysis Of Brown Girl, Brownstones

American black female writer—Paule Marshall's first novel Brown Girl, Brownstones ispublished in 1959. At the time of its publication, it didn't gain enough attention. FewAmerican critics in 1950s paid attention to the initiation problem of marginal adolescents. "Itwas the decades of feminist that brought Paule Marshall to our attention." In 1981, theFeminist Press reprinted Brown Girl, Brownstones, and it attracted more attention than beforein the field of literary criticism. In the novel, Paule Marshall relates the story of a ten-year-oldBarbadian black girl, Selina Boyce, who is a descendent of African immigrants, on the basisof her own life experiences. The author tells the psychological pilgrimage of Selina fromchildhood to adulthood. Paule Marshall focuses on the conflicts between the White and theBlack and tells the growing story of Selina Boyce. The novel tries to shape a fully new andactive new black female image. We can not only see Selina's confusion, distress, dilemma andresentment but also see her expectation for the future life while reading the novel. The authormakes readers perceive hope and endeavor of the Black in their fighting against fate. BrownGirl, Brownstones widens the theme and horizon of the Black literature. It can be regarded asa novel describing female initiation. It adds voice of a weak minority to American literature.Moreover, it represents the subversion and rebellion of the marginal people towards Americanculture.This dissertation intends to explore how the novel manages to use the specific literarygenre, Initiation Story, to show the growing progress of the heroine, and to analyze BrownGirl, Brownstones according to the common characteristics of Initiation Story. Therefore wecan get the conclusion that the novel Brown Girl, Brownstones meets the requirements ofInitiation Story in its major characteristics and can be defined as a model of Initiation Story.Meanwhile, this paper will also briefly explore the peculiarity of the novel in genre.Thisdissertation will be divided into five sections:Introduction: This section gives a brief introduction of the author's family background,life career and the novel's main plot, genre, position and current research status.Chapter One: Initiation Story, a Specific Literary Genre. This chapter mainly traces backto the tradition of Initiation Story and analyzes the common characteristics of this specificliterary genre.Chapter Two: Brown Girl, Brownstones, a Typical Initiation Story. This chapter mainlyexplores how the author presents the difficult growing process of a black girl and defines theliterary genre of the novel Brown Girl, Brownstones by looking at the features of initiationstory in theme and in structure.Chapter Three: Growth of Marginal Character, Peculiarity of Brown Girl Brownstones.This chapter mainly explores the peculiarity of black female's initiation from the perspectiveof conflicts between two cultures. It also points out that the novel Brown Girl, Brownstones isnot only the succession of traditional Bildungsroman but also has its own peculiarity.Conclusion: This section summerizes this paper in terms of its successful manipulationof this specific literary genre—Initiation Story and its successful artistic representation of thepeculiarity of black female initiation and its significance in the field of literary criticism.