An Analysis of Female Characters in The Woman Warrior from the Perspective of Social Exclusion_英语论文

摘要

华裔女作家汤亭亭的代表作《女勇士》被誉为华裔美国文学史上的一座里程碑。《女勇士》以中国为写作背景，通过富有想像力的虚构情节与简洁的描写，向读者展示了生活在多元文化背景下的小女孩的童年生活以及她周围女性的现实生活。这本小说一经出版就轰动美国文坛，引起了学术界的广泛关注和积极讨论。国内外有许多学者从不同的角度研究这部小说，他们大多集中在以下研究领域：身份问题、女权主义、文化冲突等。但是很少有论文从社会排斥的角度来分析这部小说。因此，本文旨在从社会排斥的两个角度——个体排斥和群体排斥角度，分析《女勇士》中女性人物的形象，探究多元文化背景下华裔女性在追求主体地位中遭受性别和种族歧视的原因。最后通过分析和总结文本，提出华裔女性如何在社会排斥中实现文化独立和自由的建议。

关键词：《女勇士》  社会排斥  性别歧视  种族歧视

Abstract

The Woman Warrior is one of the most famous works of Maxine Hong Kingston. The novel is regarded as a milestone in the history of Chinese American literature. The Woman Warrior sets China as the background of the story. Through imaginative fiction and concise sketches, the work shows the childhood life of a little girl living in a difficult and entrepreneurial Chinese community and the real life of the women around her. As soon as it was published, it stirred up the American literary world and aroused wide attention and active discussion in the academic field. Many scholars study this novel from different perspectives at home and abroad. Most of them concentrate on the following research fields: the issue of identity, feminism, cultural conflicts etc. But there are few papers analyzing the novel from the perspective of Social Exclusion. Thus, this paper is aimed to analyze the images of female characters in The Woman Warrior from two perspectives of Social Exclusion: Individual Exclusion and Community Exclusion, and to explore the reasons why Chinese women suffer from gender and racial discrimination when they pursue subjectivity under the multicultural background. Finally, by analyzing and summarizing the text, this thesis puts forward some suggestions on how Chinese women realize their cultural independence and freedom in Social Exclusion.

Key words: The Woman Warrior  Social Exclusion  Gender Discrimination   Racial Discrimination  

Contents

Chapter One  Introduction 1

1.1  A Brief Introduction to Maxine Hong Kingston 1

1.2  A Brief Introduction to The Woman Warrior 2

1.3  Structure of this Thesis 3

Chapter Two  Literature Review 4

2.1  Domestic Research 4

2.2  Overseas Research 5

Chapter Three  Theoretical Framework 7

3.1  A Brief Introduction of Social Exclusion 7

3.1.1  Individual Exclusion 7

3.1.2  Community Exclusion 8

3.2  Social Exclusion and Women 8

3.2.1  Social Exclusion in Employment 8

3.2.2  Social Exclusion in Education 9

3.2.3  Social Exclusion in Marriage 10

Chapter Four  Analysis of Female Characters in The Woman Warrior from the Perspective of Social Exclusion 11

4.1  Individual Exclusion in The Woman Warrior 11

4.1.1  Individual Exclusion in The No Name Woman 11

4.1.2  Individual Exclusion in Moon Orchid 13

4.1.3  Individual Exclusion in Brave Orchid 14

4.1.4  Individual Exclusion in “I” 14

4.2  Community Exclusion in The Woman Warrior 16

Chapter Five  Conclusion 19

Bibliography

Acknowledgements