Exploration Of The African American's Identity In Toni Morrison's Jazz

As a prolific African American female writer, Toni Morrison won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993. In her writing career, Morrison attaches importance to the life of marginalized black people in American society. Among all her novels, Jazz is her sixth one and the second of her trilogy. The story takes place during the Harlem Renaissance, and vividly reflects the historical events of that period. In this novel, Morrison depicts a love triangle relationship between the protagonists Joe, Violet and Dorcas, and reveals the damaging impact of internalized racism on the construction of African American identity. By recalling the past memory, Morrison describes the hardship that black people have suffered during the process of immigration from rural south to urban north.Despite its complex and even confusing connotations which result from a discursive explosion around the concept, one thing at least is clear—identity only becomes an issue when it is in crisis. Accordingly, the issue of identity has become one of the recurring motifs in contemporary literature, especially in minority and diaspora writings, it is also a permanent concern of Toni Morrison. Therefore, the topic of identity and identity reconstruction become the writing purpose of this thesis. From the perspective of identity theory, the author of this thesis not only analyzes the protagonist's identity crisis caused by trauma and conflict, but also probes into the text to find the healing method to reconstruct self-identity. This thesis is divided into five parts, including Introduction, three main chapters and Conclusion.The Introduction gives a brief account of the author Toni Morrison and her works, a summary of the main plot about Jazz and literature review are also given in this part. This part also makes an overview of the concept of “identity” and introduces the notion of “identity-reconstruction” adopted in this study. Chapter One focuses on the fact of the characters' identity crisis such as loss of self, the struggle between black culture and white culture. It is the blacks' double consciousness that leads to their cultural identity crisis in which they lose themselves in bicultural conflicts. Chapter Two is devoted to the characters' quest for their self-identity and the efforts they have made to search for their maternal love. To search for the mother is symbolized as finding their ancestor and root. Chapter Three focuses on the reconstruction of African American's self-identity and also stresses the significance of love and community to black people.For African Americans who are the marginalized group in the mainstream society, it is mutual understanding and tolerance that can dissolve the conflicts inside the black community; it is love and communication that can build up the harmonious relationship between black and white, men and women. The best way to reconstruct the blacks' identity is to stick to the traditional culture and be united as a community to overcome various obstacles.