Myth And Identity

Maxine Hong Kingston is the first Chinese American who secures an important place for Chinese American literature in American literary world. She is one of the most frequently taught contemporary American writers in the universities of the United States because her works are distinctive with her strategic use of Chinese traditional culture in English texts. Employing Chinese traditional myths, folklores and literary works in The Woman Warrior and China Men, Kingston transforms these Chinese sources into American forms. By creating her own "American myths", Kingston tries to search for her identity as a Chinese American.This thesis deals primarily with Kingston's The Woman Warrior and China Men. Using Jungian archetypal theory, it attempts to discuss Kingston's adaptation of Chinese traditional myths, folklores and literary works. In her reconstruction, recalling the first-generation Chinese Americans' experiences in both China and the United States, Kingston keeps on searching for her identity as a Chinese American woman.This thesis is divided into three chapters besides the introduction and the conclusion. The research objects are the three main archetypes - sex transformation, ghost and exile - in The Woman Warrior and China Men. By developing the three archetypes horizontally, it argues that the process of Kingston's reconstruction of these myths is the quest for the Chinese American identity.Introduction is about Kingston and her adaptation of Chinese traditional myths,...