A Study On Trauma Narrative In Dreaming In Cuban

This thesis attempts to explore the trauma narrative represented in Cristina Garcia’s Dreaming in Cuban. As one of the classic works of Cuba-American ethnic minority novels, Dreaming in Cuban has received much more popularity among readers and scholars in the western world. Meanwhile, a few theses about this book can be found in China. Overall, most of the studies belong to the field of cultural studies, among which trauma has become frequent study object of many scholars. However, less attention has been paid to trauma narrative.For the purpose of the study, trauma narrative can be explained from two aspects:in one sense, it is a kind of narrative style, in which trauma functions as the means of narrative; in the other sense, it is also a kind of writing, in which trauma contributes to the stories and themes of the novel. In this project, the study of trauma narrative will focus on two questions:as a kind of narrative, how trauma narrative enriches the artistic values of Dreaming in Cuban by different kinds of narrative techniques; how the author uses traumas and traumatic symptoms, as the constructive elements of the story, to construct the narrative and achieve her aesthetic goal. Three main narrative elements will be analyzed accordingly:narrative motifs, narrative structure (in time and space), and narrative voice.Chapter one focuses on the smallest narrative unit—motif. By exploring the two types of traumas, including familial trauma (traumatic relationships between characters) and female traumatic motifs, the contemporary miserable life of the common Cuban family will be revealed, especially the causes, symptoms and presentations of trauma among females. In order to arrange the motifs vividly, the writer deliberately creates a fragmented flow about the whole story as well as any single story of each character, which will be the focus of the second chapter. In terms of time, a fragmented structure is created, which shifts between the past and the present, with memories and flashbacks interspersing all the narrative. In terms of space, a distinct dichotomy of Cuba-America is employed, which deepens the distance between the families and indicates the divergence between the two camps of Cold War. Therefore, a three-dimensional shifting structure will be constructed under such arrangement, coinciding with the forming process and the representations of the trauma motifs. In the third chapter, the voices dyed with traumatic colors will be discussed, including the missing voices from the second generation and the female voice in the form of epistolary. By using those voices, the author connect the motifs and structure together, helping women to try to enunciate against the male-dominated society and constructing a vivid and delicate three-dimensional picture about the traumatized female characters.Based on the discussion in these chapters, this paper concludes that Dreaming in Cuban, as a product, as well as a representation, of the traumatic contemporary world, has demonstrated a perfect combination of great practical significance and high aesthetic values by using trauma narrative as its major writing technique.