A Study On Family Ethical Relationships In Gish Jen’s Interracial Marriage Theme Of Her Fictions

As the most famous Chinese-American woman writer after Maxine Hong Kingston and Amy Tan, Gish Jen developed a style of her own in literary writing by "Golden Humour" and witty irony. She had become a prominent representative among Chinese-American women writers during1990s when Chinese-American literature began to thrive. Her deliberation on American minority and multi-culture made her not only a Chinese-American writer, but also a forthgoer of American multiculturalism and a promoter of harmonious relationships among different races.Gish Jen was born in a Chinese-American family, grew up in a Jewish community, and married an Irish American. It was her unique life experience that made her ponder over American minority and multi-culture. The description of interracial marriage was the best reflection of her meditation. In novels Mona in the Promised Land and The Love Wife, as well as novellas Who’s Irish? and House, House, Home, Gish Jen mirrored and deliberated on ethical relationships of different races and generations in interracial marriage family. The understanding of which was not only one of the main clues to realize her creative inspiration and creation purport, but also the key to comprehend her meditation about American minority and multi-culture as well as her advocation to multiculturalism and harmonious ethnic relationships.This thesis focuses on Gish Jen’s interracial marriage theme of her works and studies them from the viewpoint of family ethical relationships. It can be divided into three parts:introduction, text and conclusion.The introduction part outlines the present research situation of Gish Jen at home and abroad, pointing out that most researches focus on cultural identity, images of characteristics, mother-daughter relationships and other themes of her works, while research specializing in interracial marriage theme has not been found till now. Then, it clarifies the significance, methods and main contents of the research as well.The text includes three chapters. Chapter One explains that right role positioning of both sides is the precondition of successful interracial marriage by applying postcolonial literary theories. Meanwhile, it shows that the author pursues diversity, equality and autonomous choices of cultural value. Chapter Two analyses the conflicts between Chinese immigrant mothers and their American sons-in-law or daughters-in-law in interracial marriage families from the cross-cultural perspective of comparative literature and indicates the author’s strong appeal to common humanity which can transcend ethnicity and culture. Chapter Three discusses the problem about home education of half-breed as well as the great discrepancies between Chinese educational concepts and American ones using the knowledge of education history and sociology from the viewpoint of cultural studies, and manifests the author’s great expectation to half-breed children’s healthy development and harmonious ethnic relationships as well. The last two chapters are the key sections which containing the innovations of this dissertation.The conclusion points out Gish Jen’s creation characteristics comparing to other Chinese-American women writers, reviews the main contents and emphasizes the argument with a restatement of the thesis.