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The Critique of Fundamentalist Discourses in Zadie Smith's White 國立成功大學 外國語文學系研究所 碩士論文 A Thesis for the Master of Arts Department of Foreign Languages and Literature National Cheng Kung University 查蒂•史密斯《白牙》中基本教義論述的批判 The Critique of Fundamentalist Discourses in Zadie Smith’s White Teeth 研究生：孫玉玲 Advisee: Yu-Lin Sun 指導教授：張淑麗 教授 Advisor: Prof. Shuli Chang 中華民國一百零二年六月 June 2013 Abstract Zadie Smith’s debut novel, White Teeth, is known as celebration of multiculturalism which also presents fundamentalist discourses and a problematic and ambivalent view of cosmopolitan London. This thesis thus argues that Smith examines and criticizes two different fundamentalist discourses in her novel—religious fundamentalism and rational/scientific fundamentalism—by situating them against the backdrop of multicultural London to render precarious their claims to redemption, be it redemption by a divine act of grace or by the genetic improvement of mankind. Given that the novel exposes the multiplicities of these two fundamentalist discourses, the first chapter thus examines two rather different expressions of religious fundamentalism, those of Samad and Millat. It points out the deployment of such discourses by ethnic minorities is one way to resist racial discrimination. The second chapter focuses on the Chalfenist fundamentalism, which insists on the omnipotence of modern science and human intelligence. It articulates how this approach comes into conflict with religious fundamentalism and conservative groups. On the one hand, these fundamentalist discourses represent Smith’s awareness of the emergence of counter movements to resist the hegemony of multiculturalism and globalization. The failures of these fundamentalist discourses, on the other hand, point out the impractical fantasy of religions insistence on racial and ethnic purity, and also the blindness of scientific fundamentalists’ obsession with progress, development and human intelligence. Accordingly, White Teeth uncovers a very simple fact that humans can never reach the ultimate and eternal truth, because of the inherent finitude of the human condition and the innate flaws of humanity. Key words: Zadie Smith, White Teeth, fundamentalist discourses, globalization, multiculturalism, transgenic experiment 中文摘要 查蒂•史密斯壯麗的小說初航——《白牙》，被譽為是一部多元文化主義的慶典。 而作者史密斯在小說中，對於多元文化與基本教義論述的混合辨證，凸顯了英國倫敦這 一世界大都會所存在的人文問題和認同矛盾。小說呈現兩種極端的基本教義派之意識形 態：狂熱的宗教者企圖從神聖律法中尋找人類的救贖的解方；以及激進的科學家企圖以 科技改造人類的先天缺陷。因而，本研究認為史密斯透過小說《白牙》呈現了「宗教式 基本教義」和「理性／科學基本教義」這二類極端論述。從小說人物的處境和倫敦多元 的文化背景，以角色人物追求救贖的過程，隱喻了宗教性的恩典或科學性的遺傳改良這 兩種極端論述的失敗結果，藉此檢視和批判這兩類基本教義論述。有鑒於作者對此二類 基本教義開展了創新的多重性辯證，因此本論文第一章探討小說人物——山曼德和米列 特二人，以呈現兩種對宗教式基本教義截然不同的立場表述，表達少數族群以宗教式基 本教義論述作為一種反抗種族歧視的部署。第二章著重於喬分式基本教義論述，描述其 堅信現代科學和人類智慧的無所不能；探討喬分主義如何面臨保守團體和宗教式基本教 義論述的挑戰。小說中對兩類基本教義論述的陳述與隱喻，代表著作者史密斯對基本教 義的霸權論述作出反抗與針砭，並展現其多元文化觀點和全球化意識。小說中描述基本 教義論述之失敗，諭示了宗教式基本教義堅持純粹種族根源的不切實際與空幻，以及批 判理性／科學基本教義論述對於現代科技和人類智慧的癡迷與盲從。於是，《白牙》這 一部小說最終揭示了一個非常簡單的事實——由於人類生存條件下的有限性和先天的 缺憾，使得人類永遠不能達到那個最終且永恆的真理。 關鍵字：查蒂•史密斯、《白牙》、基本教義論述、全球化、多元文化主義、基因改造實 驗 Table of Contents Introduction......................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter One: ..................................................................................................................... 21 The Religious Fundamental Discourses of Samad and Millat Iqbal Chapter Two: ..................................................................................................................... 48 The Rational/scientific Fundamentalist Discourses of Marcus, Magid and Joyce Chalfen Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 74 Works Cited....................................................................................................................... 78 Sun 1 Introduction Written in 2000, Zadie Smith’s debut novel White Teeth gains enthusiastic responses from readers across the world. Painting a lively portrait of the multicultural, immigrant society of London city in the late twentieth century, Zadie Smith ushers post-colonial and diaspora writing into a new era. White Teeth presents the complexity of a hybridized metropolitan city by featuring characters from diverse races, ethnicities, social status, and cultural and economic background. Smith examines the hybridization of identity in the postcolonial context when western and eastern nations, or former colonizing and colonized cultures, came into active contacts. The novel focuses on the interactions between three main London families from different races and cultural backgrounds, the Jones, the Iqbals and the Chalfens. Archibald Jones (Archie Jones), the father of the Jones, is a white British middle-age man married with a Caribbean woman, Clara, the mother of his daughter, Irie Jones. Samad Miah Iqbal (Samad Iqbal), a former soldier in the War from Bangladesh and a waiter in an Indian restaurant with a crippled right hand. Samad and Archie become best friends during the War. After settling down in London, Samad met his wife, Alsana, a Bangladesh woman, and bears two children, Magid and Millat, the twin brothers. The Chalffen family is a typical middle-class British family and also the third generation of Jews. The father, Marcus Chalfen, is a scientist and the leader of a controversial transgenic program, the FutureMouse. Joyce Chalfen, wife of Marcus and the mother of four children, is a horticulturalist and a book writer. Her admiration of her husband and her needs for maternal pride make her a persuasive mother figure who forces the others to satisfy her expectation of perfectionism. The first half of the novel focuses on the first generation, the parents and their struggle against anxiety and frustration in multicultural London. Samad suffers from anxious fears of cultural assimilation and identity crises, ending with the miserable separation of the twins. Marcus, instead of being a Sun 2 victimized Jew, chooses to be a rationalist who believes in the intellectual power of humans, while searching for ways to transcend human’s limitation. Unfortunately, at the end of the novel, with a sudden twist of the plot, the mouse he uses in his experiment, the FutureMouse, escapes from the press conference, and its escape symbolizes Marcus’ downfall and the breakdown of the fantasy of the unlimited power of modern science to change the world. The other half of the novel illustrates the difficulties that the second generations confront. As London inhabitants since their birth, the immigrant children, Irie, Magid and Millat, still experience certain degree of racial discrimination and struggle with identity problems every day. The different ways for these kids to choose to deal with their identical crises represent the conflictual interactions of multiple discourses and the various possibilities available in cosmopolitan London. The story ends with the untold story of the escaped FutureMouse, Irie’s unborn child, whose father is unrecognizable due to the limits of science and also the unsolved conflicts between the twins, Magid, a modernist and Millat, a radical fundamentalist. With the delicate and complicated plot, White Teeth has won various book prizes since it was published, which includes Ethnic and Multicultural Media Award for Best Book in 2000, Authors' Club First Novel Award in 2001, TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005 and many others. As a young British female writer, Zadie Smith is honored as one of the best diaspora writer in Britian and also on Granta's list of the 20 best young authors in 2003 and 2013 after publishing her successful debut novel. White Teeth is a novel which seems to celebrate multiculturalism and promise a bright future to the upcoming generations of immigrants. Smith, as many critics believe, narrates a “sunny” London, where white and non-white citizens seem to get along with each other well. The novel’s conclusion depicting Irie’s unborn child and the escaped FutureMouse again implies that the younger generations have chances to build a brighter and happier future than what their parents have promised them. For Smith, the feeling felt by the young about not being needed does not necessarily trap them to a dull and miserable life; nevertheless, Sun 3 “belonging ‘nowhere’ is neither comic nor wistful, but means instead that they can create their own ‘elsewhere’,” notes Phyllis Lassner (197). “[T]he children knew the city,” and they situate themselves well in the city, where they create and form their own identify (WT 145). Yet, this does not mean that they are anxiety free. Instead, they do experience an acute identical crisis as they are caught in the web of multiculturalism, desperately desiring to find an anchor to root their fluid and hybridized identity. Focusing on the identical crisis of the younger generation, Smith writes White Teeth to ask crucial questions about the tension of roots and routes, multiculturalism and cosmopolitanism. Many critics may feel pleased with this fact for many of them repeatedly emphasize the importance of routes and the positive side of fluid identities and downplay the significance of history and roots. Jonathan P. A. Sell, for instance, argues that identities “metamorphose by chance” (33). That is, anything is possible. The shocking reappearance of Dr. Sick, who was supposed to be dead during the War, proves the unreliability of history as well as the fickleness of truth. Irie’s child, whose very “biological determination is merged with indeterminacy” (Lassner 195) offers further evidence of the mutability of nature.
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