Transgressions In Octavia Butler's Fledgling

Octavia Estelle Butler is the first well-acclaimed African-American female writer who focus on science fiction writing.She breaks down the traditional structures including the male/female binary and the white/black binary,attaching much importance to the living experiences of the marginalized black women.Featured by African protagonists and mixed communities,Butler taps upon far-reaching issues including race,sex,power and so on,exploring both the scars left by historical exploitation on the minorities and how the self-determination of one such deprived creature may bring about radical changes.Fledgling is a thought-provoking story which combine the Gothic element—vampire and science fiction together and studies on this novel are appearing in an endless stream,yet domestic research is still on the threshold.In this novel,Ina,the new vampire,who are reduced to a remote and isolated situation and human beings from different backgrounds live together harmoniously by crossing the old social customs and constrains.In order to cast off the miserable living situation,the oppressed minorities exert all their efforts to establish their identities and status within the society or the mainstream culture.As a sensitive and compassionate writer,Butler is able to use her writing as a vehicle to critique history and hierarchies with the lenses of feminism.Previous critics focus most on the particular form or the African-American theme,yet how do these two critical components combine together without feeling weird?This thesis positions Fledgling within the broader domain of speculative fictions,arguing that some transgressive phenomena and behaviors are of great significance in Butler's creating the alternative communities.In Fledgling,the most remarkable transgressive arrangements are respectively racial transgression and gender transgression.The unprecedented distortion and contortions the environment imposing on the black female protagonist of the novel enables her,without the restrictions of culture and convention,to examine the underlying causes for her tragedy and possible approaches for her future by integrating herself into the multiethnic and multispecies community fraught with hierarchical violence and inherent intolerance.It reveals part of the reality on the West Coast of America both inside and outside the story.Furthermore,Butler's incisive view on the true essence of interdependence and humanity revealed by the story is really what makes Fledgling popular in literature till present.This thesis,by drawing on the conception of transgression and applying the methods of close-reading and textual analysis to the study of transgressions in the book,aims to explain the reasons why both Ina and human beings engage in identity crisis in the marginalized Ina community and explore the underlying ideologies that enable Butler to create such a treacherous yet blessed community life.The thesis consists of five parts in all.The first part provides a brief introduction of Butler's life and her work Fledgling,introduces the critical studies related home and abroad,and puts forward the concept of transgression and the layout of the thesis.The second part centers on the racial transgression of Shori and the typical human symbionts,pointing out the contradictory between the species conventions and the character's identity crisis.Part three,from the perspective of feminism,explores the hidden values behind Shori's construction as an androgynous woman and the advantageous fruits of her outstanding behaviors.The fourth part,borrowing the definition of bildungsroman,comprehensively argues that it is the various abnormalities that Butler holds to when she depicts the living experiences within the vampire world to realize the arrangements of transgressions,searching for the essence of life and humanity,which also refers to the social values of the novel.The last section is conclusion,which points out that even though transgression beyond the boundaries can be a way of great help to cast off their marginalized living situations or status,the whole society still has a long way to go beyond all the stereotyped limitations.Moreover,Butler's speculations regarding future cultural and social transformations can be employed to subvert the racist and sexist ideologies of the present.