Daniel B. Stuart

Final Exam Essay #1

The Multi-Faceted Nature of Multicultural Literature: Issues Beyond the Narrative

Multicultural Literature, especially as it applies to the “American experience,” embodies the human condition as well as anything. No encounter with the world around us is so predisposed to unlocking the roots of family, culture, society and individuality as the immigrant narrative. Perhaps that’s why the authors our course text decided to title their work Imagining America. For it is that America, the land of dreams, of promise and hope which characterizes not only the American experience, but the human experience. From stories of transcontinental migration and pioneering odysseys to tales of short trips across a border and brief jaunts by sea to the north, the world of the American immigrant exposes us to the ethos of what it is to be alive and how multi-faceted the ties of origin, existence and culture really are.

    It is a relatively novel concept, this “multicultural literature.” The terminology implies a variety of ideas acquainted to the reader, though not necessarily contained within a prescribed genre. It is more than just a travel story. Not merely is the independent account of a single sojourner undertaken to express the trials and consequences of an instance or encounter. Nor is there the clearly stated linear pattern of a traditional story arch. The immigrant narrative is always an amalgamation of running themes and nuances, many of them afforded to the reader for the first time as an introduction into new areas of intellectual pursuit. Characters like Sui Sin Far’s Lae Choo account for the foreign perspective of a newly arrived immigrant, still straddling the border between two countries, and indeed two cultures, as the story opens. The traversing across geographical boundaries subtly introduces the reader to the departure of an old world and culture, of a known lifestyle and pattern, into a (predominantly) new and “unknown” place and system of living. This dynamic presents not two but three distinctly defined places, the old, the in-between and the new. As the story progresses, these three places imbue themselves as the three stages of existence: past, present and future. As with all lives, and more precisely delineated with immigrants, there is the certain past, the acting present and the unknown future. Even more candidly is the interpersonal and intrapersonal microcosm. Lae Choo’s inward convictions and love for her newborn son are among the most strongly resonated emotions in the story, far outweighing the capitulating maneuvers of her husband and the precursory procedures of the bureaucratic system (Brown, 3-11). As all people experience, the world of our own thoughts and how it relates to our own existence feature as some of our most prominent symptoms. The “outward” world of external stimulus, the contributing factors of foreign phenomenon, can be the most problematic and disheartening facets of life. The dichotomy rages all the more fierce when moving from one place to another.

There are as many offsetting and disconcerting issues within multicultural literature as there are “model” narratives. Much like Yekl, the personal implications of relocation and assimilation can quickly become barriers, barriers which disrupt the model of the nuclear families and further distort the ideal of the American Dream. Yekl doesn’t come from much and doesn’t have much. Even what he does have, his wife, child and home are impermanent fixtures within his own personal immigrant narrative. Yekl’s story is among the more disappointing immigrant narratives, describing a rather modernist take on life and reflecting on the pitfalls of the immigrant’s immobility and constraints (Cahan). The loss of his wife and child, the breakup of his family and further resettlement all contribute to a less than ideal immigrant pattern. Even propped up by the “National Migration” of his Jewish brethren, their shared heritage and language enabling a mutual support system, Yekl is unable to forward his status and remains mired in codependence and transience. Taken another way, the story is among the most pragmatic accounts of American immigration, reminding readers that the American Dream comes at a price. And it’s not just the personal sacrifice of individuals for their loved ones and future generations, but the displacement and dismemberment of entire cultures.

          Perhaps given the volatile state of the immigrant narrative, the polarity of success and failure and all of the ambiguity in between, there should be a reconsideration of just what immigration really is—the end result of emigration and the natural result of human “migration,” of a permanent resettlement among human kind and its stipulations across cultures. Even differentiating between the old and new immigrant models, the significance of constant migration across geographical borders and, by proxy, unilaterally across generations, cannot be overemphasized: human kind is constantly “immigrating.” It is a permanent process, a model even, of ever integrating people and places. In “How To Date a Brown Girl . . .,” Junot Diaz very practically gives a panorama of intersecting cultures in the form of a young teenage Dominican boy working the dating game in “New World” American society of varying races and cultures, all of which, it must be said, have assimilated into the melting pot in their own way. “If she’s from around the way,” our narrator details, in understated nonchalance, “Wendy’s will do” (Brown, 258). The message is clear, but circumspect: every immigrant “assimilates,” but in what ways and to what standard, the model fluctuates. Adaptation and continuing “migration” are always inherent within the process.

          One thing heretofore not considered within this course, and to which some input here will be given is the alter ego of the American Dream, the achievement of success by assimilating within an entirely different depth, an entirely new mode: that of the criminal element. Both in popular culture and documented history, immigrant narratives are full of American “dreams” achieved by not playing according to the rules. Vito Corleone, Bugsy Siegel, Tony Montana, Al Capone all come to mind, but multiple other characters, real and otherwise composited from actual cases, contradict the “model” immigrant experience and indeed offer a new take on the immigrant narrative. Perhaps such a story, patterned certainly after the figures like the ones listed above, has a place within the “American experience.” Perhaps such figures arise as a result of the “dominant culture,” in response to exploitation at the hands of those who would capitalize off the immigrant’s plight. The poor immigrant, discouraged from his or her attempts (often genuine) at assimilation, turn to the alternate lifestyle as both a means of “de-assimilation” and necessity of living conditions. Is such an experience within literature to be discounted as an “immigrant narrative”? By all means, no it shouldn’t.

          Maybe the most appropriate way to describe the essence of multicultural literature as it relates to immigrants is to outline what it is not. The immigrant narrative is not folklore, it is not fantasy or science fiction. It is certainly not mystery or adventure. It entails aspects of biography, but the chronology of an individual life doesn’t accurately characterize the depth and range of the material. Multicultural literature is neither social commentary nor literary fiction. And though it can be tragedy or comedy, even farce, it is, as a genre, the very subjectively attenuated outline of individual experience. It details immigrants (former and latter), of their hopes and dreams, their ambitions and choices, the new lifestyles they choose and the customs they cling to. This genre describes not a definitive category or even a literary style, but an ever-evolving and steadfastly progressing movement within literature. It is among the most dynamic and poignant characterizations of life lived, not merely in a passive contentment, but experienced as a driving force, a coercion born of soul, spirit and character.

Works Cited

Brown, Wesley and Amy Ling, eds. Imagining America: Stories From The Promised Land. Rev. Ed. New York: Persea, 2002.

Cahan, Abraham. “Yekl: A Tale of the New York Ghetto.” LITR 5731. Web. 2012.

Diaz, Junot. “How To Date a Brown Girl, Black Girl, White Girl and Halfie.” Imagining America: Stories From The Promised Land. New York: Persea, 2002. pp. 257-261.

Far, Sui Sin. “In the Land of the Free.” Imagining America: Stories From The Promised Land. New York: Persea, 2002. pp. 3-11.

O’Neill, Eugene. Long Day’s Journey Into Night. New Haven: Yale, 2002.

White, Craig. LITR 5731 Multicultural Literature: American Immigrant Literature. English Dept. UHCL. Web. 2012.