An Analysis Of The Urban Landscapes As Cultural Symbols In Zadie Smith's NW

Zadie Smith(1975-)occupies a very significant position in the current British literary world.She has gained widespread attention in the British literature for her reflections and insights on issues in a series of literary works such as White Teeth.NW is Smith's fourth literary work,which not only continues her existing style,but also displays new features,and is also a focus of contemporary literary arena.Landscapes can be considered as interpretable texts which have symbolic and cultural meanings.Based on Don Mitchel and Mike Crang's cultural geography,this thesis studies different landscapes in NW and finds the xenophobia,openness and interaction between the whites and the colored immigrants.This thesis is made up of five chapters.The first chapter is an introduction,which provides some information concerning Zadie Smith and her novel NW as well as the literature review,theoretical framework,and thesis statement.The second chapter focuses on the districts with comparative closure and the xenophobic attitude reflected by the districts.From the examples of landscapes of enclosed home and office,it can be seen that the limited and enclosed districts confine the Londoners and the attitude of xenophobia is reflected in metropolis.Chapter three discusses paths with more multicultural possibilities as represented by the streets as well as transport.Leah and Felix represents the possibilities of an open nation,in which individuals are no longer afraid of being open to others,and even exhibits great enthusiasm and amity to immigrants in metropolis.Chapter four analyzes active interaction in the pubs and the church,which implicates the convivial culture.Convivial culture signifies the encounters and interactions with others in spite of cultural discrepancies.The last part of the thesis comes to a conclusion that promoting the extensiveness and interaction of social exchanges and respecting racial differences are important ways to improve the living conditions of minorities and resolve social conflicts.