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The Womb and Cyborg Poetics in Asian Canadian Literature

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The Womb and Cyborg Poetics in Asian Canadian Literature PROMISING TRANSNATIONAL BIRTHS: THE WOMB AND CYBORG POETICS IN ASIAN CANADIAN LITERATURE Tara Lee B.Comm., University of British Columbia, 1999 M.A., University of British Columbia, 2002 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in the Department of English O Tara Lee 2006 SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY Summer 2006 All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without the permission of the author. APPROVAL Name: Tara Lee Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Title of Thesis: Promising Transnational Births: The Womb and Cyborg Poetics in Asian Canadian Literature Examining Committee: Chair: Dr. Margaret Linley, Assistant Professor Dr. Roy Miki, Senior Supervisor Department of English, Simon Fraser University ~rlDavid Chariandy, Assistant professor Department of English, Simon Fraser University Dr. Helen Hok-Sze Leung, Assistant Professor Department of Women's Studies, Simon Fraser University Dr. Kirsten McAllister, Assistant Professor School of Communication, Simon Fraser University Internal-External Examiner Dr. Smaro Kamboureli, Professor Canadian Research Chair in Critical Studies in Canadian Literature, University of Guelph External Examiner Date Approved: HUy 20/& SIMON FRASER ' UNlVERSlTYl Ibra ry DECLARATION OF PARTIAL COPYRIGHT LICENCE The author, whose copyright is declared on the title page of this work, has granted to Simon Fraser University the right to lend this thesis, project or extended essay to users of the Simon Fraser University Library, and to make partial or single copies only for such users or in response to a request from the library of any other university, or other educational institution, on its own behalf or for one of its users. The author has further granted permission to Simon Fraser University to keep or make a digital copy for use in its circulating collection, and, without changing the content, to translate the thesislproject or extended essays, if technically possible, to any medium or format for the purpose of preservation of the digital work. The author has further agreed that permission for multiple copying of this work for scholarly purposes may be granted by either the author or the Dean of Graduate Studies. It is understood that copying or publication of this work for financial gain shall not be allowed without the author's written permission. Permission for public performance, or limited permission for private scholarly use, of any multimedia materials forming part of this work, may have been granted by the author. This information may be found on the separately catalogued multimedia material and in the signed Partial Copyright Licence. The original Partial Copyright Licence attesting to these terms, and signed by this author, may be found in the original bound copy of this work, retained in the Simon Fraser University Archive. Simon Fraser University Library Burnaby, BC, Canada ABSTRACT Up until this point, 2006, Asian Canadian criticism has sought legitimacy within a national framework in its efforts to carve out a distinctive Asian Canadian identity space. However, Canada is now explicitly "transnational"; it has been and continues to be a site of interconnected local and global movements that come together to produce particular spatial, political, and cultural configurations. Asian Canadian criticism has the potential to leverage itself as a critical medium for disturbing and deterritorializing constructed borders. The permeable critical lens of the present rereads the nation as a womb-space whose naturalized borders have allowed the nation-state to obscure its heterogeneity with the myth of stable identity reproduction. Literary texts like SKY Lee's Disappearing Moon Cafe, Denise Chong7s The Concubine's Children, Joy Kogawa7s Obasan, and Kerri Sakamoto's The ElectricalFiedhave a tendency to write according to national confines because they have yet to break out of naturalized domestic borders. Other texts like Anita Rau Badami7s Tamarind Mem and Wayson Choy7s TheJade Peony claim belonging within the nation by reproducing dominant paradigms that reify constructed borders. However, recent works like Hiromi Goto7s The Kappa Child, Ashok Mathur's 7%e Shorf, Happy Life of HanyKumar, and Kerri Sakamoto's One HundredMillion Hearfs have moved beyond claiming the nation to using present transnational contexts to rethink supposedly fixed identity spaces. Hiromi Goto7sHopeful Monsters and Larissa Lai's Salt fish Girlare examples of texts that further denaturalize the borders of the nation by claiming materiality and productivity within ambivalent subject positions. Donna Haraway7s"cyborg" is a crucial term for thinking about these recent Asian Canadian texts that negotiate the multiple material and discursive forces that shape their subjectivity. The cyborg exposes Asian Canadian as a fundamentally mixed and intersectional subject position. Asian Canadian criticism moves beyond a national framework through this critical performance that mobilizes the category as a productive rereading medium. Works like Laiwan7s"notes towards a body," "notes towards a body II," and Remotely in Touch presage a future for Asian Canadian literature in which it can leverage its own cyborg power for performing and producing change. Keywords: Asian Canadian literature; transnational; womb; cyborgs DEDICATION I dedicate this work to my family for all the love and support that they have given me over the years. Above all, I wish to thank my Porpor for serving as a role model for the kind of person I can only hope to be someday. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to give thanks to my committee members for all their support and encouragement as I worked to complete this dissertation. In particular, I would like to express my deep respect and appreciation for my supervisor, Roy Miki, who has worked so tirelessly in helping to "birth" this critical project. Lastly, my acknowledgements would be incomplete without a note of thanks to the literary works themselves for serving as such a continual source of inspiration, provocative thought, and possibility. TABLE OF CONTENTS . Approval ............................................................................................................................. 11 Dedication ............................................................................................................................ .v Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... vi . Table of Contents .............................................................................................................. vii Chapter One ......................................................................................................................... 1 Introduction: From the National to the Cyborgian: The Future Present of Asian Canadian Literature Chapter Two ...................................................................................................................... .45 The Search for Original Bones: Chinese Canadian History and Nation-Building in SKY Lee's Disappearing Moon Cafe and Denise Chong7si3e Concubine's Children Chapter Three ................................................................................................................... 7 7 The Absent Mother: Resuturing the Nation in Joy Kogawa7s Obasan and Kerri Sakamoto7si3e Electrical Field Chapter Four .................................................................................................................... 1 1 3 Transnational Nostalgia: Reproducing Dominant National Paradigms in Wayson Choy's TheJade Peonyand Anita Rau Badami's TamarindMem Chapter Five ..................................................................................................................... 1 4 5 Rereading Terra Nullius: Transnational Voyages in Hiromi Goto's The Kappa Child, Kerri Sakamoto's One Hundred Million Hearts' and Ashok Mathur7s The Short, Happy Life of Harqv Kumar Chapter Six ..................................................................................................................... 1 79 Mutant Bodies: Immaculate Conception and Cyborgs in Hiromi Goto7sHopefid Monsters and Larissa Lai7sSalt Fish Girl Chapter Seven .................................................................................................................-2 1 6 A Voice from the Womb: Laiwan's Cyborg Poetics Chapter E@t ................................................................................................................... 2 50 Conclusion: Cyborg Textuality: Asian Canadian and the Nation Notes ................................................................................................................................. -26 2 Bibliography ....................................................................................................................-2 6 7 Vll CHAPI'ER ONE Introduction From the National to the Cyborgian: The F'uture Present of Asian Canadian Literature Where is here now for Asian Canadian criticism? In 2006, Asian Canadian criticism stands at a moment of praxis as one of multiple Asian Canadian bodies that have worked within the previously naturalized borders of the nation. With the spread of globalization and its destabilizing effects, new spaces for rereading the borders of the nation have opened up. As Diana Brydon writes, "it's time for a new set of questions" (14), arguing that twenty-first century Canadians must move beyond seeing the nation as a static,
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