| Amy Tan, one of the most famous Chinese American writers, made a successful debut in the American literary circle with her novel The Joy Luck Club which made The New York Times best-seller list at once, staying on the list for nine months and won many important awards. Later, her subsequent novels, The Kitchen God's Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses and The Bonesetter 's Daughter, go on being universally acclaimed by readers and critics alike. Hence, Amy Tan is regarded as a representative for the Asian Americans.Amy Tan is notable for her delineation of the complicated relationships between Chinese immigrant mothers and their American-born daughters. Also, she is skillful at depicting the harrowing past and the present puzzle of those Chinese American women, and the pressure they receive from the tradition and reality. In her novel, women become protagonists in place of men. In The Bonesetter's Daughter, she followed her constant style, bringing out the identity dilemma of those women who live between two worlds by the narration of mothers and daughters.Chinese American women, are marginalized both by the patriarchal Chinese community and the mainstream society. Further, they are lost between the two different cultures. On the one hand, they want to identify themselves with the mainstream society, but they unconsciously remain culturally alien; on the other hand, though they want to separate herself from the Chinese tradition, they find that they are bound to her all the same. They don't know where to locate themselves and they have no self to locate. They are obsessed with "who I am?" Consequently, to define them by themselves becomes urgent for the Chinese American women.An analysis from the perspective of postcolonial feminism can display the status of Chinese American women in the white and males dominated societydistinctly because postcolonial feminism has stressed that women are not defined solely by the fact that they are females and other attributes such as class, race and so on, come together in influencing the lives of women. At the same time, it points out that the middle class white women are the accomplices of the white and males in oppressing the doubly marginalized women.The author of this dissertation endeavors to analyze the female figures in The Bonesetter's Daughter from the perspective of postcolonial feminism exposing their doubly marginalized positions and their struggle, and highlighting the way in which they define themselves thus finding the location in the white and males dominated society and throwing off the identity dilemma.The dissertation is mainly divided into two parts. The first chapter elaborates the grounds for defining Chinese American women. That is, they have no place in the white male dominated society and they don't know where they belong to with their bicultural status. The second chapter centers on exploring the means of defining Chinese American women, such as subverting the stereotypes, voicing the needs and desires, and finding out the family history.The conclusion is that the prominent female figures in The Bonesetter's Daughter define themselves eventually after their stereotypes are subverted, their needs and desires are voiced and their family history is found out. They know where their roots are and where they can locate; they can confront themselves with confidence and be in harmony with the white and males. Probably, the dream is hard to realize in reality, but both Amy Tan and we, readers, are convinced that where there is a dream, there will be a hope. |
