The River Landscapes And Multicultural Awareness In Alice Munro's Short Stories

Alice Munro(1931-),known as “the contemporary Chekhov”,is the winner of the Nobel Prize for literature in 2013.In Munro's works,as a recurring image,the river is an essential means to develop the plot,form the background of the characters' activities and foil the environment and atmosphere of stories,possessing powerful symbolic and metaphorical functions.There are many descriptions about rivers in Munro's short stories Images,Baptizing as well as The Love of Good Woman,which are typical and representative and in line with the theme of each chapter;therefore,this thesis chooses the three short stories as research texts.Most of the previous studies on Munro focus on the literary connotation and narrative style of her works,but the landscapes especially the river landscapes are seldom analyzed.Based on the cultural geography of Mike Crang and relevant scholars,this thesis aims at analyzing river landscapes in Munro's short stories,finding that rivers in Munro's works are inclusive and in different shapes,which coincides with the widespread awareness of multi-culture in Canada.The definition of multi-culture is extended,which has breached the scope of the traditional ethnic recognition,involving various aspects and disciplines of the society,such as immigration,law,religion,gender,and ecology.Multi-culture generally refers tosocial phenomena and thoughts with connotations of pluralism,equality,inclusiveness and co-existence.Therefore,this thesis expounds the connotations of multicultural awareness from its three facets: the ecological balance awareness,the female equality awareness and the multi-moral cognition.This thesis consists of six chapters.Chapter one introduces the overseas and domestic research status about Munro's short stories and the theory of cultural geography.Chapter two analyzes the relationship between river landscapes and the ecological balance awareness in Images(1968): expressing the thoughts of equality and coexistence,harmony and inclusiveness between human and nature.Chapter three explores the relationship between river landscapes and the female equality awareness in Baptizing(1971): as a symbol of female,the river is the witness of the protagonist's growth and the catalyst for the formation of protagonist's sense of equality.Chapter four interprets the relationship between the river landscapes and the multi-moral cognition in The Love of Good Woman(1998): the river is not only the background of the story but also an important means to depict characters' psychology.Munro uses Jutland—a place name containing multiple cognitions,to illustrate that people's multi-ethical cognition is affected by the geography location.Chapter five integrates the relations between Meneseteung River and Munro,the background of Munro's multicultural awareness as well as the multicultural policy of Canada,so as to explore the cause of river writing of Munro.In the conclusion,this thesis points out that the inclusiveness of river also endows Canadians inclusiveness,and the implementation of the multiculturalism policy has provided the safeguard for Canadians' multicultural consciousness.Besides,the formation of multicultural consciousness promotes the development of the pluralistic society of Canada.