Family Value Transformation In Chinese American Families

From the publication of the first representative work of overseas Chinese literature named When I Was a Boy in China was in 1887,until now,the history of overseas Chinese literature is over more than one hundred years.Overseas Chinese literature is not only a highlight of literature but also a miniature portrayal of Chinese immigrants.In overseas Chinese literature,Chinese-American literature has become a hot topic.Gish Jen is one of the famous Chinese-American literature authors who have a distinctive writing style.She was born in 1955.In 1991,her first full-length novel named Typical American was published.It was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award and won the Best American Short Stories of 1988.Five years later,she published a sequel named Mona in the Promised Land in 1996.It was named one of the ten best books of the year by the Los Angeles Times.Until now,these two novels are still her the most influential works.These two novels are both about the story of the Chang family,an ethnic Chinese family.However,family value is reflected differently in these two novels.This thesis will take two representative novels of Gish Jen as research text which are Typical American and Mona in the Promised Land to analyze the family values from three perspectives including kinship values,marriage values,and education values.By comparing the conceptual changes of the two novels,can be found the differences between the first generation and the second generation.From kinship values,the transformation can be briefly summarized as sinicization to Americanization.In Typical American,Ralph's mind is influenced by patriarchal ideology and the democratic ideology towards to his sister Teresa.He is ambivalent.Teresa always sacrifices herself to help her brother.The kinship between siblings shows the sinicized kinship values.In Mona in the Promised Land,no matter the parent-child relationship,or the brother-sister relationship,all embody individualism and liberalism.These relationships reflect the Americanized kinship values.From love and marriage values,the transformation can be briefly summarized as altruism to individualism.In Typical American,Helen's marriage and Teresa's love both involve affairs.In the end,they sacrifice themselves for marriage and chose to benefit others.Altruistic views on love and marriage can be found in this novel.In Mona in the Promised Land,Mona always takes self-feelings as the most important consideration no matter in the relationship with her first love or her husband.She takes herself as the center,which shows an individualistic view of love and marriage.From education values,the transformation can be briefly summarized as essentialism to conservatism.In Typical American,Ralph believes education method depends on social atmosphere and culture background.When he accepts Chinese culture,they will teach children to worship fame.Then,he accepts American culture,and teaches children to worship money.Both the cognition of society and the cognition ofeducation are essential.In Mona in the Promised Land,parents are conservative about children's education.They want their children to enter the mainstream American society.At the same time,they want children to keep Chinese identity and accept Chinese culture.However,the children's rebellion proves their parents too conservative to educate them.Typical American is a realistic portrayal of the first generation of Chinese Americans.Through unremitting efforts,Chang's family becomes the middle class in America.Mona in the Promised Land is a typical representative of the second generation of Chinese Americans.An American native Mona has different ideas from her parents.The collision of two different values has produced different characters based on the multicultural background.In these two novels,the transformation of the family value of two different of generations Chinese Americans reveals the identity confusion of all immigrants.