The Writings of Bamboo Hirst: Italy, China and the Performance of Cultural Identity
Author: Lee, Joanne
Source: Italian Studies, Volume 63, Number 1, Spring 2008 , pp. 105-118(14)
Publisher: Maney Publishing
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Abstract:
The writings of Bamboo Hirst weave a public history of Italy's wartime relationship with China into a personal history of travel and migration. They are centrally concerned with the developing identity of their authorial protagonist, revealing the impact of displacement on subjectivity. Blu Cina represents a journey into self-consciousness in which the protagonist comes to an awareness of the ways and processes by which identities are formed and the limitations of constructed categories of identity. It shows how initially her biracial and migrant status is internalised as a rupture between two contradictory selves. This article examines how this sense of division is partially resolved through a performative construction of cultural identity. It documents the protagonist's attempt to transcend categories of identity imposed on her as she moves between cultures, which leads to a statement of the validity of hybridity that can be likened to the mestiza consciousness advocated by Gloria Anzaldúa.Document Type: Research article
DOI: 10.1179/007516308X270191
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