The Ghost As Ghost: Compulsory Rationalism and Asian American Literature, Post-1965

ABSTRACT Title of Document: THE GHOST AS GHOST: COMPULSORY RATIONALISM AND ASIAN AMERICAN LITERATURE, POST-1965 Lawrence-Minh Bùi Davis, Doctor of Philosophy, 2014 Directed By: Professor Sangeeta Ray, Department of English Since the early 1980s, scholarship across disciplines has employed the “ghostly” as critical lens for understanding the upheavals of modernity. The ghost stands metaphorically for the lasting trace of what has been erased, whether bodies or histories. The ghost always stands for something , rather than the ghost simply is —a conception in keeping with dominant Western rationalism. But such a reading practice threatens the very sort of violent erasure it means to redress, uncovering lost histories at the expense of non-Western and “minority” ways of knowing. What about the ghost as ghost? What about the array of non-rational knowledges out of which the ghostly frequently emerges? This project seeks to transform the application of the ghostly as scholarly lens, bringing to bear Foucault’s notion of “popular” knowledges and drawing from Asian American studies and critical mixed race studies frameworks. Its timeline begins with the 1965 Immigration Act and traces across the 1970s-1990s rise of multiculturalism and the 1980s-2000s rise of the Multiracial Movement. For field of analysis, the project turns to Asian American literature and its rich evocations of the ghostly and compulsory rationalism, in particular Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior and China Men , Amy Tan’s The Hundred Secret Senses , Nora Okja Keller’s Comfort Woman , Lan Cao’s Monkey Bridge , Heinz Insu Fenkl’s Memories of My Ghost Brother , Shawna Yang Ryan’s Water Ghosts , and Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being . It outlines a new reading strategy, a new means of conceiving of both Asian American literature and existing “spectral” scholarship as cultural productions. It also addresses a dimension of American history and lived reality that scholarship to date has not only ignored but actively suppressed. And insofar as the reach of “spectral” scholarship extends well beyond Asian American communities and Asian American studies—across an interdisciplinary net of subjects, a cross-cultural set of histories—this project is a necessary corrective with a wide scope of consequence for scholarly practice more generally. What it offers is an alternative approach, an alternative vision, reaching for a progressive politics of the ghostly. THE GHOST AS GHOST: COMPULSORY RATIONALISM AND ASIAN AMERICAN LITERATURE, POST-1965 By Lawrence-Minh Bùi Davis Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2014 Advisory Committee: Professor Sangeeta Ray, Chair Associate Professor Cathy J. Schlund-Vials Professor David Wyatt Assistant Professor Sharada Balachandran Orihuela Associate Professor Janelle Wong © Copyright by Lawrence-Minh Bùi Davis 2014 Acknowledgements This dissertation would not be possible without the support of a wonderful group of advisors, colleagues, friends, and family. My thanks to: • my committee members—chair Sangeeta Ray, second reader Cathy J. Schlund- Vials, third reader David Wyatt, fourth reader Sharada Balachandran Orihuela, and Dean’s Representative Janelle Wong. Sangeeta, whose kind words about an undergrad paper of mine all the way back in 1998 are responsible for much of my undue confidence in myself, and whose force- of-nature brilliance and irreverence have guided what I think a scholar should do and who I think a scholar should be. Cathy, the first—first!—to support two of my major scholarly-arts-pedagogical ventures, Mixed Race in a Box and a special issue commemorating the 10 th anniversary of Sept. 11, both of which importantly inform the dissertation and gave me untold irrational confidence in myself; Cathy also for her special brand of make- sailors-blush irreverence (apparently I really treasure irreverence!); and of course for her patient and careful feedback throughout the later stages of the dissertation process. Thanks too to my undergraduate advisor William Cohen, to my oral exam committee member Linda Kauffman, and to my former oral exam committee chair, dissertation chair, and long-time advisor, Kandice Chuh, who once asked me the important question, “Do you want to be thought of as an editor or a scholar?” (Well, both/neither of course…) ii • a long list of AAAS and CMRS colleagues—for their work, encouragement, and generosity of spirit. Special thanks to Karen Kuo and Zelideth Rivas for the 11 th hour pep talk. • my Asian American Studies Program family over the years—Tracy Chung (who first introduced me to the Program), Chang-Won Lee, Julie (Yujie) Chen, Ying Wang, Willis Phan, Steve Lim, Gerald Maa, Doug Ishii, Betsy Yuen, Mimi Khúc, Phil Nash, Lisa Mar, Jude Paul Dizon, Jessica Kim, Grace Lee, and Janelle Wong. Thanks to all for the community and camaraderie, and to Jessica and Grace for making the office such a welcoming, nurturing space. Thanks to my many students over the years for continually reaffirming my belief in the importance of Asian American studies and the humanities. Thanks to Janelle for vision and leadership, for integrity and community-building, for pushing, for friendship, for laughter. • my Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center family—Terry Hong, Konrad Ng, Amy Hever, Gina Inocencio, Adriel Luis, Sameen Piracha, Krista Aniel, Masum Momaya, and Sandra Vuong—for all of the patient support throughout the dissertation process, for helping me think about Asian American cultural production in terms of responsibility, in terms of commitment to communities, carving out representational space on an international stage. Thank you in particular to Konrad for always believing in my abilities. • my AALR family—Gerald Maa, Terry Hong, Parag Khandhar, Reme Grefalda, Betsy Yuen, Doug Ishii, Alicia Upano, and Tarfia Faizullah. Thank you for dreaming this dream of creative community together, for working to host the kind of critical conversations not happening elsewhere; for working to push writers and develop new iii audiences and new conduits between readerships; for working to create new creative, political, and intellectual spaces. Gerald for comradeship, for vision, for the keenest taste, for pause and deliberation, for faith. Parag for passion and attention to detail, for investment in community, for keeping the stakes always front and center. Terry for teaching me to believe in myself. For hours of bonding over kids and allergies. For always vouching for me. For endless kindnesses and bottomless irreverence. For always being herself and teaching me to be comfortable in my own skin. • my partner, Mimi Khúc, who held my hand for the last, and weightiest, stretch of dissertating. Whose care and feedback are written across the project. Thank you for pushing, for listening, for advising, for strength, for patience and impatience, laughter and relief, belief and vulnerability and, most of all, love. • my two boys, my two beautiful boys, my angels, to whom I devote all of my work, all of my life. Thanks too to my ex-wife, a wonderful mother to my boys, whose time and patience gave me the space to think and write. • my family, my uncles and aunts, for whom ghosts are part of life, my first and last community of ghostly knowers. • my parents, who have only ever asked one thing of me: be a good human being. This is me trying, for you. iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... ii Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... v List of Figures .............................................................................................................. vi Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Schoolyard Exorcisms: Rationalist Interpellation and the Multicultural Academy ..................................................................................................................... 28 Chapter 2: Women’s Stories: The Gendered Supernatural ....................................... 85 Chapter 3: Beyond Possessive Individualism: Mixed Race and a Progressive Politics of the Ghostly ............................................................................................................ 123 Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 201 Bibliography ............................................................................................................. 212 v List of Figures Fig. 1, from Kip Fulbeck’s Part Asian, 100% Hapa , 2006...………………………171 Fig. 2, “Issei,” by Laura Kina. 30 x 45, canvas, 2011……………………………..190 Fig. 3, “Nisei,” by Laura Kina. 30 x 45, canvas, 2012…………………………….190 Fig. 4, “Sansei,” by Laura Kina. 30 x 45, canvas, 2012…………………………...191 Fig. 5, “Yonsei,” by Laura Kina. 30 x 45, canvas, 2012…………………………..191 Fig. 6, “Gonsei,” by Laura Kina. 30 x 45, canvas, 2012…………………………..192 vi Introduction In 1949 a young girl in rural Tay-Ninh, Vietnam, watched a severed leg walk. It was daytime and she was at home, perched on a bed in the master bedroom, rubbing her mother’s back. The leg was just a lower leg, ending at the knee, but without any blood at the point of division. As if still attached

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