The (De)Formation of African American Subjectivity in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye

• Main Authors: Kai-chung Cheng, 鄭凱中
• Other Authors: Chang Shu-li
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2004
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/42969606323079131209

碩士 === 國立中山大學 === 外國語文學系研究所 === 92 === Title: The (De)Formation of African American Subjectivity in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye Institute of Foreign Languages and Literature, National Sun Yat-sen University Date: June 17, 2004 By: Kai-chung Cheng Advisor: Professor Shu-li Chang Abstract: This thesis aims to examine Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye with Michel Foucault’s concept of discipline, the notion of ownership, and the impotence of manhood to explore how Morrison textualizes the (de)formation of African American subjectivity. To begin with, I will justify the feasibility of setting up such a dialogue between Toni Morrison and Michel Foucault. Both the racial oppression Morrison textualizes and the disciplinary process Foucault contextualizes operate in such a subtle way that the subject is not aware of it and thus does not fight back. Therefore, Morrison and Foucault draw attention to how people are implicitly oppressed and disciplined in the construction of their docile subjectivity. In addition, Morrison emphasizes how she worries about the effect of ownership on the construction of African American subjectivity by pervading The Bluest Eye with African Americans’ desire to own properties. Their craze to own properties indicates their desire to acquire something that they believe can be found in ownership. Morrison points out implicitly that what African Americans truly desire in their desperate pursuit of ownership is their own self. However, in Morrison’s textualization, such a strategy employed by African Americans to own their self almost always ends up in failure. Based on such a failure, Morrison posits the success of owning a self, specifically an African American female self, requires one to continue in the struggles to achieve one’s self identity and to build up a healthy and intimate relationship with one’s community. Moreover, Morrison’s portrayal of the dehumanization of African American men aims not to place blame on how brutal they are, but to arouse attention as well as pity to their suffering. It is impossible to construct a wholesome African American subjectivity without paying attention to the frustration African American males confront, for, feeling impotent in achieving their manhood, they turn to the oppression of African American females. Though Morrison projects African American females and males in different ways, she devotes her writing to both of them. To sum up the structure of my thesis: In Introduction, I will justify the feasibility of examining Morrison’s The Bluest Eye with Foucault’s discipline; in Chapter One, I will present how Foucault’s concepts of gaze, norm, and Panopticism explain the reason why African Americans do not fight against the white value that oppresses them but adopt and practice it in their daily lives; in Chapter Two, I will focus on how the notion of ownership impinges upon their subjectivity and what Morrison puts forth to about how African Americans may begin to own their self; in Chapter Three, I will elaborate the significance of the process in which African American males are made impotent and dehumanized; in Conclusion, I will summarize the main arguments in previous chapters to conclude this thesis.