Content Outline - University of Phoenix



Week Five Content Outline

TOPIC and Objectives

ASIAN AMERICAN LITERATURE

• Describe the development of Asian American literature.

• Examine the historical, socio-political, and cultural context of contemporary Asian American literature.

• Identify representative Asian American authors and works.

• Analyze characteristic themes and literary techniques.

Content outline

1. DEVELOPMENT OF ASIAN AMERICAN LITERATURE

a. Asian American literature encompasses a diverse array of cultures from Chinese and Japanese to Indian, Korean and Filipino, and presents varying experiences.

b. Early evidence of Chinese American writing appears as poems written on the wall of Angel Island Immigration Station since 1910.

c. Since the 1920s, the works of Pulitzer Prize winning author Pearl S. Buck (1938), a White American who grew up in Asia, who gave insight into Asian life.

d. Memoirs were the favored genre among immigrants as early as 1931 and into the late 1950s.

e. Japanese internment camps produce censored English-language camp journals, literary magazines, newspapers, and letters.

f. Poetry and fiction by mostly Japanese and Chinese American writers become noticed in the 1950s.

g. The first Asian American anthologies appear in the early 1970s.

h. Critical acclaim sets in with Maxine Hong Kingston’s memoir Woman Warrior (1976) and Amy Tan’s novel The Joy Luck Club (1989).

i. The daughter of Indian parents, Jhumpa Lahiri won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for her collection of short stories, The Interpreter of Maladies.

2. Terminology and labels

a. The term “Asian American” is general and denotes people who trace their ancestry to various Asian countries, such as Japan, China, Korea, Vietnam, India, and the Philippines.

b. More specific ethnic reference is made by using terms such as Filipino American, Japanese American, Chinese American, etc.

c. The term Oriental, meaning Eastern, was intended as an equivalent to Occidental (Western) but its use has been discontinued.

3. Historical, socio-political, and cultural context of contemporary Asian American literature

a. Asian American Citizenship Act (1946) granted limited immigration and naturalization to Asian immigrants after decades of immigration restrictions

b. Immigration Act of 1965 significantly reduced previous immigration restrictions

c. Japanese Americans

1) 400,000 Japanese labor immigrants arrive as the first wave in the late 1800s

a) 200,000 to the U.S. mainland

b) 200,000 to Hawaii

2) Emigrants from Japan had aspired to comparatively high education and land ownership in United States.

3) Immigration Act of 1924 limited Japanese immigration

4) Attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941

5) Internment of Japanese American population to camps until the end of World War II

6) Four groups reflect staggered acculturation process

a) Issei – immigrants

b) Nisei – first-generation descendants

c) Sansei – third generation

d) Yonsei – fourth generation

7) Diverse religious affiliations: Buddhism, Shinto, Christianity

d. Chinese Americans

1) Mass emigration from China in 1848, approximately the time of the California Gold Rush

2) Wage laborers in mining and railroad construction

3) The Chinese Six Companies was formed in 1862 to provide organization, representation, and aid to Chinese in the United States, with headquarters in San Francisco.

4) Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 halted Chinese influx

5) Lack of female Chinese immigrants—sex ratio imbalance—isolated existing immigrants

6) World War II alliance lifted Chinese immigration restriction

7) Rise of communism in China in the early 1950s lead to a mass refugee movement to the United States

8) A majority of the Chinese American population currently lives in urban centers of San Francisco and New York.

9) Diverse religious affiliations: Confucianism, Taoism, Christianity

10) Traditional cultural values and social behavior

a) Allegiance to clan (kinship group claiming common ancestry)

b) Mediation and arbitration

c) Diligence and frugality

d) Learning and education – importance of scholar

e) Righteousness

f) Reciprocity

g) Respect of elderly and authority

e. Philippine Americans

1) Philippines annexed by United States in Spanish American War in 1898

2) Three primary immigration periods

a) Agricultural workers and subsidized students in the 1920s

b) Military support personnel during the 1940s and 1950s

c) Families following the Immigration Act in 1965

3) Filipino immigration centers are Hawaii and California.

4) Major religion among Philippine Americans is Christianity (Catholicism).

5) Traditional cultural values and social behavior

a) Respect for authority and elders

b) Loyalty and obligation to family

c) Social etiquette stresses polite, respectful, shy, quiet, nonassertive behavior

f. Indian Americans

1) Insignificant immigration numbers until the mid-1960s. Prior to the 1960s, Indian immigrants were considered unskilled laborers or agricultural workers.

2) Indian independence from Britain in 1947: India becomes largest democracy in the world—by population—in 1950.

3) The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 increases the previously restricted quota of 100 immigrants from India to 20,000 immigrants from each country. By 1975, the number of Indian immigrants had risen to over 175,000.

4) Contemporary Indian immigrants are considered highly qualified professionals.

5) The Association of Indians in America (AIA) formed in the mid-1970s.

6) Pride in Indian traditions abounds. The Indian American community in the United States sponsored statues of Gandhi in numerous U.S. cities.

7) Indian religions: Hinduism, Sikhism, and Islam

8) Traditional cultural values and social behavior

a) Duty-first value system

b) Duty without reward expectation

c) Nonviolence

d) Caste ideology

4. Representative Asian-American authors and works

a. Maxine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior (1976)

b. Cathy Song, Picture Bride (1983)

c. Amy Tan

1) The Joy Luck Club (1989)

2) The Bonesetter’s Daughter (2001)

3) The Kitchen God’s Wife (2006)

d. The Big Aiiieeeee! (anthology, 1991)

e. Bharati Mukherjee

1) Leave It to Me (1997)

2) The Tree Bride (2005)

f. Jhumpa Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies (1999)

g. Yin and Chris Soentpiet

1) Coolies (2000)

2) Brothers (2006)

5. Characteristic themes and literary techniques

a. Most common technique characteristic in Asian American writing is grafting.

1) Casual, sometimes reverent invocation of images, customs, or ideas

2) Clearly identifiable with a specific Asian culture but appear in a Western context; for example, jade, the Moon Festival, tofu, mah-jong, calligraphy, and Confucius.

b. Themes

1) Immigration experience

2) Acculturation issues – first and following generations

3) Sense of displacement

4) Coping with sinophobia (yellow peril)

5) Heritage and remembering the past

6) Transition of gender roles from traditional to contemporary

7) Re-use of mythic stories from respective traditions

8) Confucian philosophy

a) Honor

b) Family

c) Loyalty

d) Integrity

9) Family relations

10) Community responsibilities and hierarchical social roles

a) Obligations of kindness

b) Reciprocal generosity

c) Indirectness

d) Importance of appearances (keeping face)

e) Suppression of emotions

11) Education

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