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Nicole Poppenhagen (Mainz): "'Transnational Haunting' –
Conceptualizing the Uncanny in the Works of the Chinese Diaspora"
Abstract
The literature of the Chinese Diaspora abounds with supernatural figures and mysterious objects. In Maxine Hong Kingston’s novels, the protagonists’ world is populated by ghosts and apparitions, and in Xiaolu Guo’s novel UFO in Her Eyes and her current movie of the same title, the life of Chinese villagers is profoundly changed by what appears to be an extraterrestrial intrusion of UFOs and aliens.
In her recent publication Diasporic Representations: Reading Chinese American Women’s Fiction, literary scholar Pin-chia Feng coins the term “transnational haunting” to describe this phenomenon prevalent in the work of Chinese American writer Amy Tan. In my paper, I will draw on psychoanalytical, transnational and postcolonial studies in order to further investigate and theorize this phenomenon.
Examining works by authors and artists such as Kingston, Tan, and Xiaolu Guo, I will suggest that cases of “transnational haunting” effectively question the cultural purity of communities if we understand these disturbing moments as examples of the “return of the repressed” in the narration of the nation. In his seminal essay “DissemiNation: Time Narrative, and the Margins of the Modern Nation,” Homi K. Bhabha argues that the narration of the nation relies on an “obligation to forget.” Accordingly, occurrences that are incompatible with the conception of the nation as homogeneous entity will be repressed but can resurface from the communal unconscious in the form of what Sigmund Freud terms “the Uncanny.”
The uncanny instances of “transnational haunting” do not only reveal the ambiguous origins at the heart of cultural and national formations in the Chinese American context but also speak of a reluctance to adopt a transnational perspective. Ultimately, the theoretical conceptualization of this phenomenon contributes to a better understanding of hybrid, transnational interferences and affinities as they occur in the literature of the Chinese Diaspora and in Chinese-American relations.
In her recent publication Diasporic Representations: Reading Chinese American Women’s Fiction, literary scholar Pin-chia Feng coins the term “transnational haunting” to describe this phenomenon prevalent in the work of Chinese American writer Amy Tan. In my paper, I will draw on psychoanalytical, transnational and postcolonial studies in order to further investigate and theorize this phenomenon.
Examining works by authors and artists such as Kingston, Tan, and Xiaolu Guo, I will suggest that cases of “transnational haunting” effectively question the cultural purity of communities if we understand these disturbing moments as examples of the “return of the repressed” in the narration of the nation. In his seminal essay “DissemiNation: Time Narrative, and the Margins of the Modern Nation,” Homi K. Bhabha argues that the narration of the nation relies on an “obligation to forget.” Accordingly, occurrences that are incompatible with the conception of the nation as homogeneous entity will be repressed but can resurface from the communal unconscious in the form of what Sigmund Freud terms “the Uncanny.”
The uncanny instances of “transnational haunting” do not only reveal the ambiguous origins at the heart of cultural and national formations in the Chinese American context but also speak of a reluctance to adopt a transnational perspective. Ultimately, the theoretical conceptualization of this phenomenon contributes to a better understanding of hybrid, transnational interferences and affinities as they occur in the literature of the Chinese Diaspora and in Chinese-American relations.
Bio
Current Research: Adopting a postcolonial and transnational perspective, my Ph.D. project focuses on Chinese-American relations in the works of women writers and artists of the Chinese Diaspora. My research is informed by the results of my State Exam thesis and suggests that, despite the commonly assumed dichotomy of Chinese and American civilization, Chinese and American cultural expressions and formations are not perceived as binary opposition but as potentially productive constellation by female members of the Chinese Diaspora.
Research Interests: Chinese American Literature and Culture, African American Fiction, Postcolonial and Transnational Studies, Gender Studies, Theater and Performance.
Nicole Poppenhagen was lecturer at the JGU Mainz, teaching assistant in Belgium, and teaching fellow at Bowdoin College, Maine, USA, and receives a scholarship from COMENUS.
Research Interests: Chinese American Literature and Culture, African American Fiction, Postcolonial and Transnational Studies, Gender Studies, Theater and Performance.
Nicole Poppenhagen was lecturer at the JGU Mainz, teaching assistant in Belgium, and teaching fellow at Bowdoin College, Maine, USA, and receives a scholarship from COMENUS.