Queering hegemonies of gender and cultural identity through a critical adaptation of Maxine Hong Kingston's novel 'The Woman Warrior'.

摘要

This thesis explores hegemonic discourses associated with the constructs of gender, culture, and transglobal migration from China to the United States and how these discourses might be made visible, resisted, internalized, reappropriated, and queered through live performance. This thesis used the methodology of critical adaptation and adapted Maxine Hong Kingston's novel The Woman Warrior (1976) into a one-woman performance that explored hegemonic social structures of gender, culture, and transglobal migration and the ways in which identity is constructed and performed. Through a critical adaptation and performance of literature, this thesis reflects, expands, and raises some of the nuanced issues of transglobal identity that move between structures of marginality and empowerment. The timeline of this thesis project expanded over the course of a year and a half. The spring semester in 2009 was dedicated to adapting Maxine Hong Kingston's novel The Woman Warrior. In the beginning months of the fall of 2009, the prospectus was written and the performance was rehearsed. In the month of October, the prospectus defense was held and of the performance was premiered on the evenings of November 5th, 6th, and 7 th in Hugh Gillis Hall room 231 at San Jose State University. And lastly, in the spring semester of 2010, the analytical portion was completed.