On The Spatial Construction And Cultural Identity Of "Muyu Ge"

Ruthanne Lum McCunn is an emergent Chinese-American writer in the1980s in America, whose works are devoted herself to writing Chinese immigrants’legendary experience, and commemorating their ordinary but the great life. As a Chinese-American writer with the dual cultural identity, not only did she find a proper position for the Chinese story disappeared in the official history of the United States, but also won the voice of justice for the silent, marginalized Chinese in the mainstream American society through her writing of crossing national boundaries, races, and cultures.Based on a Chinese pioneer, Lue Gim Gong’s true story, her novel Wooden Fish Songs vividly reproduced the geographical migration of Lue Gim Gong from China to the United States, which portrayed the immortal Chinese footprint. The novel is told by three women having different cultural backgrounds and coming from different geographical spaces, which established three spatial relationships and mixed three different cultures with different races. In the course of constructing the three spaces, Ruthanne Lum McCunn implied a flowing clue on purpose:Lue Gim Gong’s migration of "China to America" and "Massachusetts to Florida" explains the identity dilemma of Chinese-American Diaspora in conflict of different spatial and cultural experience, containing Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s good wish for racial integration and multicultural identity. This paper will mainly focus on the study of Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s Wooden Fish Songs under the horizon of the "cultural geography" by means of analyzing "spatial structure" concretely presented in the text so as to explore the meaning of "spatial writing " in Wooden Fish Songs.There are three parts in this paper. In the introduction of this thesis, it introduces the author Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s lifetime and her creations. And also in this part, it describes its researching situation on Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s fiction at home and abroad and researching methods that combined "cultural geography" with "literary studies" will be summarized in this part. With the historical background, the second part mainly analyzes three spaces in the empire discourse constructed by Ruthanne Lum McCunn, and fully reveals the social, political, historical, and cultural properties behind the space. The third part focuses on Lue Gim Gong’s migration from different spaces, which interprets the problem of cultural identity in the conflicts and integration of multi-ethnic American society. In the conclusion part, it reveals the significance of "space construction and cultural identity" interpreted by "cultural geography" in the Wooden Fish Songs based on the whole text.