Analysis On Cultural Identity Of Characters In Steer Toward Rock

With the rapid process of globalization. cross-regional and cross-national communication becomes more and more convenient and frequent. Chinese American Literature has drawn attention from a great number of scholars. Since the boundaries between different countries and different languages are increasingly becoming blurred, most of the characters in Chinese American literature present hybrid cultural identities. In Steer Toward Rock, Chinese American writer, Fae Myenne Ng, explored how the Chinese Exclusion Act in the 1950s influenced the Chinese Americans’ cultural identity. The Chinese Americans she described neither got rid of the impact of their mother culture, nor fully integrated into American society to realize their ’American Dream". After the sufferings of a series of collisions and conflicts, Chinese Americans gradually found their own lives. They were not completely addicted to the sorrow experience in America: they did not entirely return to the Chinese way of life. Finally, they found their own spiritual homeland in a foreign country and established their harmonious and coexistent ’third culture’ space.This thesis mainly analyzes Steer Toward Rock (2008) by using Homi Bhabha’s hybridity theory and Stuart Hall’s cultural identity theory. Research method includes internal study and external study. It firstly discusses the characters’hybrid cultural identity, and their cultural conflicts with both cultures, and then deeply explores the reasons and strategies to cope with these conflicts.This thesis is primarily around the ’problem’. At first,’raised questions’:what is the representation of cultural identity of characters in the novel:it analyzed Jack’s state of in-betweenness, Joice’s ambivalent attitude towards Chinese culture, Veda’s root-seeking tour and conflicts and negotiations between two kinds of relationships in an attempt to explain the hybrid cultural identity of characters in the novel. Then, ’analyzed problems’:mainly discussing personal, family and social reasons to explain the causes of hybrid cultural identity. And then,’solved problems’:proposing strategies about how to reconstruct cultural identity in the’third culture’ space on self-cognitive, emotional and behavioral levels. At last, the Conclusion part points out that through their own efforts and with the help of their relatives and friends, the characters in Steer Toward Rock reconstructed their cultural identities in a mutually beneficial, harmonious and coexistent’third culture’ space. In this space, people admit the conflicts between Chinese and Western cultures, deal with them rationally, and respect the differences between two cultures. The ’third culture’ space is an ideal of cultural exchange.