초록 열기/닫기 버튼
The purpose of this article is to interpret different aspects and symptoms of trauma and its recovery process, as well as to investigate the influence of trauma recovery on the identity construction of Chinese American women as portrayed in The Joy Luck Club. In the novel, the protagonists, four pairs of mothers and daughters, undergo a series of extreme experiences, including war, death, separation, betrayal, and oppression, in China and America. Although these Chinese American women manifest some typical symptoms of trauma, such as hallucination, depression, and disconnection, they nevertheless achieve recovery from trauma through talk-story and reconciliation of the mother-daughter relationship, and accomplish their identity construction as Chinese American in the end. Amy Tan subverts language’s inability to articulate trauma by talk-story, revealing her optimistic stance towards trauma and its recovery in The Joy Luck Club. Amy Tan criticizes the unfair social norms and principles and expresses her hope for constructing a more fair and harmonious society.
