THESIS
2014
Abstract
As a writer who originated from Shanghai and lived in Sinophone communities such
as Hong Kong, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, the trajectory of Liu Yichang’s journey and his
works presents an interesting case to examine the influences of “place-specific experiences”
on the writings of Sinophone writers and the renegotiation of diasporic identities through
these works. This thesis evaluates the influences of Liu Yichang’s journey through Shanghai,
Malaya and Hong Kong on his fiction during the 1950s to 1960s – a period that witnessed
volatile social changes and shifts in the identities of Asian communities – and investigates
how these narratives provided an introspective way for Liu Yichang to examine the diasporic
condition for himself and his readership in Hong Kong and Malaya. Th...[
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As a writer who originated from Shanghai and lived in Sinophone communities such
as Hong Kong, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, the trajectory of Liu Yichang’s journey and his
works presents an interesting case to examine the influences of “place-specific experiences”
on the writings of Sinophone writers and the renegotiation of diasporic identities through
these works. This thesis evaluates the influences of Liu Yichang’s journey through Shanghai,
Malaya and Hong Kong on his fiction during the 1950s to 1960s – a period that witnessed
volatile social changes and shifts in the identities of Asian communities – and investigates
how these narratives provided an introspective way for Liu Yichang to examine the diasporic
condition for himself and his readership in Hong Kong and Malaya. The unique intersection
of Liu Yichang’s travelling route, his personal memories and the ways he handled nostalgia in
his fiction has resulted in his own distinctive Sinophone articulations; I argue that Liu
Yichang’s hybrid narrative styles reflect his negotiation of the multiple cultures in Shanghai,
Hong Kong and Malaya, and, more importantly, subvert the homogeneity of “Chinese
diaspora” as a category. Nonetheless, these works also demonstrate the consistent struggle
between identifying with one’s place of origin and the local host society.
Chapter One outlines the methodological significance of the Sinophone as a research
framework that resists the hegemonic notion of “Chinese diaspora”, as well as problematizes
the positioning of Liu Yichang as a “Hong Kong” or “China” writer. Chapter Two argues that
the inter-textual relationship between Shanghai’s neo-sensationist fiction and Liu Yichang’s
Malayan fiction subverts the reified Chinese identity through the construction of new
identities and narratives. Chapter Three clarifies that this subversion is not unproblematic;
through analysing the female representation strategies in his Malayan fiction, this chapter
argues that Liu Yichang’s attempts to address the newly emerging Malayan Sinophone
identity were, paradoxically, built on the Malayan Sinophone imagined community’s shared
diasporic and gendered past. Chapter Four analyzes the serialized fiction Chaos that was
based on Liu Yichang’s travels between the 1940s and 1950s; it elucidates how the
protagonist’s travels deconstructs the idea of a static homeland and illustrates the Sinophone’s
argument that “routes” can be applied as a concept of “roots” or “home”. Chapter Five
concludes that Liu Yichang’s aestheticizing of nostalgia and memories in his writings have the
potential to challenge static definitions of diasporic communities or physical homelands; this
renegotiation of diasporic identities exemplifies the translational nature of Sinophone
articulations.
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