The Rails Are Roaring:The Reshaping Of Chinese Masculinity In China Men

Since the end of the 19th century,mainstream American society began to have a stereotype of Chinese immigrants in the United States.Since then,in the works of white American writers,the Chinese have mainly appeared in two image systems-the"Yellow Peril" represented by Ah Sin and General Yen,venting the racist hatred of white Americans.The "American good people" represented by Gunga Din and Charlie Chan,expressing the racist preferences of white Americans.However,no matter what kind of image system they belong to,the common point of these Chinese images is that although they are men,they are portrayed as feminine images by white writers,lacking masculinity.Some Chinese-American writers have noticed this problem and tried to correct it in their works,in order to reshape the masculine image of Chinese-Americans.This article focuses on Chinese American novels in the 20th century,taking Chinese American author Maxine Hong Kingston’s China Men as an example,using comparative literary imageology,R.W.Connell’s masculinity theory and other research methods,analyzing how the work reshapes the masculinity of Chinese people.In contrast to the image that white American writers have long portrayed Chinese men as feminine,Kingston takes a male narrative perspective.Through the tracing of the hard journey of her grandparents in the United States,as well as the processing and creation of family anecdotes,legends,unofficial histories and literary classics,she reshapes the tenacious,intelligent,brave and powerful masculinities of the four generations of men in her China Men,in order to correct the American mainstream narrative of "castrating" Chinese masculinity.The American Pacific Railway built in the 1860s traverses the east and west of the United States.Chinese workers played an important role in its construction,and many people were even buried here.The grandfather in China Men is a member of the Chinese workers who participated in the construction of the Pacific Railway.However,when the railway was completed,there were no Chinese workers in the celebration photos or in the history textbooks.Instead,the US government began to expel Chinese workers by force.What happened to the grandfather is typical and universal among American Chinese workers in the same period.Discrimination and unfair treatment suffered by other parents in similar families in the United States are everywhere in the book,and the commonness reflects the differences of various times.China Men positively describes the great efforts and outstanding contributions of Chinese ancestors in cultivating plantations,building railways and building the United States,shaping their heroic images of tenacity,wisdom,diligence and courage,supplementing the missing history,making the Chinese who have been silent for a hundred years sound like the roar of railway tracks,and positively highlighting the masculinity of Chinese who have been "castrated" for a long time.After the publication of China Men,it has set off a wave of waves in Chinese and American literary circles and critics.Its efforts to reshape Chinese masculinity have been responded by American literary and cultural circles.Since then,the Chinese male image in American literature is no longer only Ah Sin and Charlie Chan’s distorted feminine single face,and the Chinese male image is developing in a positive and diversified direction.This paper has five parts.The introduction includes the research topic of the thesis and its academic significance,the landscape of research in China and overseas,research methods and the structure of the thesis.The first chapter discusses what is masculinity,defines the concept of "masculinity" by analyzing and summarizing Connell’s masculinity theory,and then summarizes how Chinese masculinity is castrated in the works of white American writers.The second chapter enters the research focus of this paper.From the aspects of exposing the reality of being"castrated",body,speech,tools,family,wilderness and story,combining with Connell’s masculinity theory and iconology theory,this paper analyzes how China Men reshapes Chinese masculinity,and carefully analyzes the relationship between the sub text contained in the book and reshaping Chinese masculinity.The third chapter discusses the effect of China Men on the reconstruction of Chinese masculinity,mainly from two aspects:firstly,the influence and acceptance effect of Kingston’s efforts to reshape Chinese masculinity in China Men in American literature and culture;secondly,by presenting the shaping of masculinity in the novels of Chinese American writers in different times,such as Sui Sin Far,Pardee Lowe,Shawn Wong and Frank Chin,it is found that the masculinity of Chinese presents the evolution track of three stages in these writers’ novels,and takes this as a reference to illustrate the unique position of China Men in them.The conclusion summarizes the research findings and limitations.