Violence, Language, and Embodiment: Reimagining Identity through Writing in Twenty-First Century Asian American Poetry
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Date
2024
Authors
Lane, Eric
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Oregon
Abstract
This project analyzes the poetry of Mai Der Vang, Ocean Vuong, Franny Choi and Victoria Chang within the larger context of Asian American literature. My research question is, “How do representations of language, violence and embodiment in twenty-first century Asian American poetry influence the formation of identity?” In order to answer this question, I utilize close-reading of primary texts, social and historical context, literary criticism, and cultural studies to understand how these poets respond and contribute to a tradition of Asian American poetry. Through a close reading of Vuong’s “Notebook Fragments” and “The Gift” from his collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds as well as Vang’s “Mother of People without Script” and “Your Mountain Lies Down with You” from her collection Afterland, I argue that their poetry is deeply concerned not only with what is destroyed in war and displacement, but also what is created. Then, in analyzing Choi’s “Chatroulette” from her collection Soft Science and Chang’s “Home” from her collection Obit, among other poems from these collections, I argue that these poets use the dissolution of binary opposites (e.g. “Eastern” v. “Western) in order to construct a “home” within language. I identify three crucial aspects of Asian American identity—language, violence, and embodiment—that are ambiguated but also are reborn and reimagined in these poems. As such, these poems assert the importance of Asian American identity as a new creation of the self, despite the histories of violence that, in many ways, necessitated its creation. Thus, these 21st century works suggest a development within the Asian American literary tradition towards a representation of the Asian American diaspora as a creation of a new culture, rather than a loss of a traditional culture.
Description
76 pages
Keywords
Asian American, Poetry, Identity, American Literature, Twenty-first century