反东方主义面具后的东方主义

【作者】 于秀娟；

【导师】 王志耕；

【作者基本信息】 南开大学 ， 比较文学与世界文学， 2009， 博士

【摘要】 谭恩美是美国著名华裔女作家,她的作品数次登上畅销书排行榜,在美国已享有较高知名度。随着译介的深入,近年来越来越多的中国读者也对其日渐熟悉,但是因为其中作品中流露出的东方主义色彩,也使她招致了不少批评。本论文运用文本细读的方法,从叙事学的角度剖析谭恩美作品中的东方主义阅读感受的形成因素。全文共分六章:第一章是绪论部分,说明选题对象、选题目的、国内外文献概述,并概括介绍谭恩美的写作背景、主要作品。第二章分析谭恩美作品的结构模式。谭恩美作品结构上最大的特点是具有双叙述层,两个叙述者(往往是由母亲和女儿承担)各自对历史与现实生活进行描述。两个叙述层之间的转换自然绵密,把过去与现在穿插交织在一起。双叙述层结构表达了婚姻、种族、文化等多重主题,而作者对这些主题的笔墨分配不均衡,这是导致其作品呈现东方主义色彩的原因之一。双叙述层揭示了深层结构中三大矛盾系统:婚姻矛盾、种族矛盾、文化矛盾。作者重点铺排婚姻矛盾、文化矛盾,而略写种族矛盾的结构安排、笔墨分配彰显了作者的东方主义倾向。之所以避开种族矛盾等美国社会的痼疾,是基于其文化价值取向上的叙事策略,出生成长于美国的谭恩美把自己定位成“美国作家”,而不是“华裔作家”。因此,她不可能故意去抵触美国主流价值观,从而让自己的作品失去市场。第三章分析谭恩美作品的叙述者及叙述视角。谭恩美作品中的叙述者基本都是同故事叙述,她们的叙述职能、思想职能、交际职能,都是围绕婚姻、种族、文化的主题进行的。主观性很强的有选择的讲述,对中美两代人生活的评判,以及叙述者之间的交际障碍,使得华人形象、中国形象更多沾染了痛苦与冲突的意味。多重第一人称有限视角的使用,在其作品中起到了多方面的作用,其中造就的真实而神秘的自传效果,正印证了西方对中国的集体想象。但这种视角也为主人公的平等对话提供了可能,还引起了叙述距离、情感距离的变化,这些都冲淡了作品的东方主义色彩。第一人称的有限性使得作品内容不可避免地局限于主人公的所见所闻上,一定程度上影响了表达视野的开阔,为了解决这个问题,谭恩美常常悄悄地将视角越过第一人称的藩篱,延伸到全知视角的领地。第四章分析谭恩美作品中的叙事时间模式。时间是组成叙事文学不可或缺的一部分,叙事时间往往不遵循故事时间的制约,自由地伸展着肢体。谭恩美小说中的叙事时间也是如此,作者自如的控制着叙事的快慢时速,详细刻画母女冲突的场景,而压缩或省略母亲们初到美国的艰辛,彰显了时速背后的政治性。而在叙事频率上,不断重复的食物意象,食物与文化间的亲密接触,展示出“异国情调”,又进一步强化了作品的东方主义色彩。第五章分析谭恩美作品中的叙事空间模式。本章所分析的空间是指狭义的地理空间,分析谭恩美作品中的地理空间散发着的浓重的中国味道,中国空间的叙述成为了最直接展示异国情调的场所。本章重点分析了“富有而压抑的大宅门”、“一言难尽的桂林”、“缩微版的中国:唐人街”,作者用充满同情的眼光来看待中国,既描写了它的愚昧、贫穷、落后,也描写了它的引人入胜,但是却不会把它描绘成理想的、令人向往的异邦。谭恩美小说有一个大致相同的情节走势,即华人母亲们在中国历尽战争苦难、婚姻折磨,后来结识了美籍华裔青年,在他的帮助下终于逃离中国,来到美国。所以从大的空间趋势上看,作品就呈现出明显的由中国到美国的空间运动轨迹,而其中隐藏着的是从苦难走向幸福的情感历程。第六章《突破“主义”的樊篱》总结性的分析评价谭恩美的东方主义叙事模式。谭恩美的叙事模式形成的艺术效果是东方主义与反东方主义并存,表现了具有双重身份的作者的双重写作态度。一系列固有模式已经成为了谭恩美创作的瓶颈,要想有所突破,可以从美国犹太文学的崛起中获得启示。另外,中国读者与研究者也应该突破阅读视角,既看到谭恩美作品中的东方主义,也看到“西方主义”,比如她笔下变形了的基督教文化,继而超越主义,将其作为普通文本来审美,而不是民族寓言来审视。更多还原

【Abstract】 Amy Tan is a well-known Chinese-American woman writer, her works appear on several best-sellers lists, and have been enjoying a high reputation in the United States. With more translations in recent years, more and more Chinese readers have got familiar with Amy Tan and her works. But she has also been criticized for the Orientalism in her novels. Using the text narration method, the thesis analyses the forming factors of Orientalism in Amy Tan’s works.The thesis consists of six chapters:Chapter I is the preface, stating subject choice, purposes and the literature review at home and abroad as well as an overview of Amy Tan’s writing background and main works.Chapter II is the structural analysis of Amy Tan’s novels. The most prominent feature of the structure is the double-layer description: two narrators (often the mother and daughter) describe their past and present life. The two layers of description shift naturally and deliberately, combining the past and the present together. The double-layer structure reveals multi-subjects of marriage, race and culture. Yet, owning to the unbalanced emphasis on these subjects, her works show Orientalism. The double-layer reveals three contradictory systems in deep structure: contradiction of marriage, racial contradiction and cultural contradiction. The writer emphasizes the marriage and cultural contradictions, but neglects the racial one. Such kind of arrangement shows the Orientalism of the writer. The reason why Amy Tan avoids the ethnic conflicts in American society is based on her cultural values: she was born and brought up in America and considers herself as "American writer" rather than "ethnic writer." Therefore, she wouldn’t be inconsistent with the mainstream of American values which would make her works lose American market.Chapter III analyzes the narrative perspective and the narrator in Amy Tan’s works. The narrators in Amy Tan’s works are also the characters in the novels. The functions of their narration, thoughts and communication are focusing on the subject of marriage, race and culture. Highly subjective and selected narration, judgment of two generations of Chinese and American as well as communication barriers between the narrators make the image of the Chinese and China contaminated suffering and conflict elements. The use of multiple first-person limited perspective method in her work plays an important role in many aspects; of which, the creation of the true and mysterious autobiography effect is the evidence of the West collective imagination on China. However, such kind of perspective brings possibility for the equal dialogue between the hosts and causes changes of the narrative distance and emotional distance, which works to dilute Orientalism. Limited first-person perspective makes the work inevitably limited in observations on the main characters; and to some extent, affects the expression of the broad field of vision. In order to resolve this problem, Amy Tan usually extends the first person perspective to the omniscient perspective.Chapter IV analyzes the work of Amy Tan’s narrative time model. Time component is an integral part of narrative literary. Narrative time is often not in compliance with constraints of the story time. Amy Tan’s novels follow the same tendency. The writer controls the pace of the narrative speed freely: she writes detailed conflict scenes of the mother and daughter; she reduces, even omits, the hard time of those mothers when they first arrived at America. The time speed highlights political property. As to the narrative frequency, her repeated image of food, imitate contact of food and culture shows the "exotic" taste, but further strengthens the Orientalism as well.Chapter V analyzes narrative space model in Amy Tan’s works. Space analysis in this chapter only refers to the geographical space. The analysis of Amy Tan’s works is full of the Chinese taste, the narration of the Chinese spaces are the most direct display of exotic places. This chapter focuses on the analysis of the "pent-rich Planet" "untold Guilin" "microfilm version of the Chinese: Chinatown,". The writer is full of sympathy with the Chinese perspective, describing its ignorance, poverty and backwardness as well as attractions. However, she portrays it not an ideal and undesirable alien. Amy Tan’s novels have a common trend, that is, the Chinese mothers experiencing the suffering of war in China, tortured marriage, acquaintances with some Chinese-American youth and with whose assistance, came to the United States. Therefore, on the broad spatial tendency, the works shows an obvious geographical track from China to America. This coincides with the "Exodus" of the Bible.Chapter VI, "Break Barriers", sums up the analysis and evaluation of Amy Tan’s narrative model of Orientalism. The artistic effect of her narrative mode is the co-existence of Orientalism and Anti-Orientalism. The fixed model in series of her works has become the bottleneck. To make a breakthrough, she can gain inspiration from the American Jewish literature. In addition, Chinese readers and researchers should also read with a perspective breakthrough: not only see the Orientalism in works of Amy Tan, but also see the "Occidentalism ". For example, the deformation of the Christian culture, and then a transcendence that results in a general narrative, rather than a nation’s Fables.更多还原