The Identity Quest Of A Culture Interloper

The novel Fifth Chinese Daughter by Jade Snow Wong is regarded as a must for all readers who are interested in the life of Chinese Americans. It has won great favor from American society since its publication. This thesis adopts the postcolonial criticism approach to probe into the identification of the protagonist Jade Snow in Fifth Chinese Daughter, laying stress on her process of identity seeking and discussing her integrated state of Chinese and Western culture in order to dig out the primary reason of the protagonist's success and seek certain significant inspiration for the location of Chinese Americans' or even other American minorities' identification.This thesis consists of six parts, with four chapters set between the introduction and the conclusion. These four chapters go respectively to literature review and relevant theory, the rupture of Snow's identity, the rewriting of her identity and the location of her identity. The introduction includes the background and significance of the study as well as a brief overview on the author Jade Snow Wong and her Fifth Chinese Daughter.Chapter One presents a literary review of the novel which includes the studies of Fifth Chinese Daughter at home and abroad and the relevant theory which introduces some postcolonial concepts and viewpoints. Though Fifth Chinese Daughter has been widely praised, it has been severely criticized by some Asian American writers and ethnic critics since 1970s and we can scarcely see the interpretation of Fifth Chinese Daughter from a postcolonial perspective. Therefore, this thesis attempts to give the novel an interpretation through a postcolonial approach which turns out to be a perfect conjunction with Jade Snow's identification strategy.Chapter Two discusses the rupture of Jade Snow's identity. Living in Chinatown, Jade Snow is brought up as a traditional Chinese woman. While she goes to American public schools and works in American families, Jade Snow bears the impact of American culture that is different from or even contrary to Chinese culture, raising doubts about her parents' indoctrination. So Jade Snow often meets the conflicts between two cultures, forcing her to face the dilemma. At the same time, she gradually recognizes the racial discrimination from the white society which makes her hardly find her position in the larger society. Consequently, Jade Snow's identity is ruptured by her Chinese family and American mainstream, losing her sense of belonging.Chapter Three addresses how Jade Snow rewrites her identity as a subaltern and makes her own voice heard both by her Chinese family and the larger society. Firstly, Jade Snow resists the male superiority of her Chinese family and strives for the freedom to seek the new life pattern conforming to the larger society through her continuous efforts. Then she seizes the power of discourse which the subaltern desire for in white society and subverts the racial stereotypes of Chinese by right of her outstanding performance in school work and career.Chapter Four concentrates on Snow's location of identity. As a Chinese American, Jade Snow identifies with neither the Chinese culture nor the American Caucasian culture but the distinct Chinese American culture which is located in the Third Space. Her identity is hybrid and dynamic, which is reflected by her complicated images in Chinese family and mainstream society, her hybrid life style and thoughts. And the great success brought by her hybrid identity in her liminal position proves that the location of her identity is proper.Then the last part draws the conclusion of this study:when it is viewed from the whole process of Jade Snow's identity seeking including the rupture, the rewriting and the location of identity, her cultural identification approach which is an outstanding pattern of stepping from binary cultural opposition to the multicultural state conforms to the contemporary or even present trend. And the process of identity seeking also manifests that the Chinese American identity should be hybrid and dynamic, which can be constructed and obtained by hard personal quest.