The Woman Warrior Literary Analysis

``The woman warrior`` written by Maxine Hong Kingston is a collection of memoirs. It has a hybrid form: it is a myth, fiction, as well as autobiography. ``The woman warrior`` is a book about finding and discovering yourself in the circumstances of a Chinese family and an American upbringing, always fluctuating between the two worlds, wondering about your true self. In ``A Song for a Barbarian Reed Pipe`` a very important theme is the Identity Plot.

Women are viewed as fragile and delicate, but strong enough to keep a house clean, kids in line and a happy husband. Women are expected to be stay at home moms and depend on their husbands for everything while having no opinions of their own. However, there are women who have overlooked those expectations and proved that women are capable of doing anything. Deborah Sampson and Elizabeth Van Lew are just two women who have helped break the norms of women’s roles in society. Sampson’s impressive braveness and loyalty to fight for her country against all odds have proved that women are capable to endure harsh horrors.

Maxine Hong Kingston's use of talk stories in The Woman Warrior emphasizes that individuals will find a more fulfilling life if they defy the traditional gender norms place on them by society. While contemplating beauty standards in Chinese society in “No Name Woman” Maxine Kingston thinks, “Sister used to sit on their beds and cry together… as their mothers or their slaves removed the bandages for a few minutes each night and let the blood gush back into their veins” (9). From a young age girls are expected to be binding their feet and are told that it is to look beautiful, but in reality that is not why. When a womans feet are bound they are restrained and silenced. These girls could be free and happy but they are restrained by men through this binding.

A defiant one—a warrior, in every sense of the word! Kingston wants her journey, being raised traditionally a “slave” by her parents, she wants to become a warrior. In the beginning of the chapter she describes how a woman could become a warrior and fight for their family, but then I feel as if she stops and looks at her surroundings and asks, “Where are these warriors?” and “why didn’t my aunt fight back?”. The author explains that maybe women were so dangerous that they must have been “bound,” or enslaved to the duties for their husbands.

Critical use of Chinese myths in the Woman Warrior shows a sharp contrast with her real life in America and accentuates the equality between women and men.

In The Woman Warrior, it states that “Women in the old China did not choose. Some man had commanded her to lie with him and be his secret evil” (6). This quote shows the interpersonal relationships that enforce the ideology of women being inferior to men. Women in China didn’t get to choose their paths. They were forced into adultery if a man wanted them, which could even be along the lines of rape.

In nearly all historical societies, sexism was prevalent. Power struggles between genders mostly ended in men being the dominant force in society, leaving women on a lower rung of the social ladder. However, this does not always mean that women have a harder existence in society. Scott Russell Sanders faces a moral dilemma in “The Men We Carry in Our Minds.” In the beginning, Sanders feels that women have a harder time in society today than men do.

In the end her push for equality’s of gender, causes her to be sent to death by the male figure she

Canada Cunningham Manfredo Grellert March 24, 2023 Literature The Identification Figurative language from immigrant parents can develop feelings of inferiority, inadequacy, and worthlessness for a first-generation American, raising concerns about fractured self identity in expectations of being the idealized child of immigrant parents. The Woman Warrior, by first-generation Chinese-American Maxine Hong Kingston, is a book that blends autobiographies with old Chinese folk tales. Brave Orchid, Maxines overbearing mother, used words in a way that deviated from traditional meanings to convey a complicated meaning. The use of this language was Orchids way to refer to a particular concept without actually saying

These “assigned roles” and expectations have robbed women of the right to have a personal identity. Women have long been bound in the shackles of stereotypes strong enough to stunt their mental and emotional growth and to limit their abilities to reach their full potential.

The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston heavily deals with women and their experiences/roles in society. In each of the five sections, a woman is the central character with little to no male presence, and the novel explored both the humiliation and empowerment of being a woman. Specifically, No Name Woman and White Tigers show two different experiences of being a woman in society by portraying the central character as either more feminine or masculine in terms of character traits. These differences are shown in the choice of language and presence of pregnancy.

During this week, we have covered numerous topics, none more prominent than the oppression of women. Everyone had different opinions, allowing me to take into account different views on the issue. In one of the texts we examined, “Oppression”, Marilyn Frye, a philosopher, debates the subjugation of women. She states the cultural customs that causes oppression of women. I do agree with her view that women are oppressed, but I do not agree that it is just women.

Even during major events and wars, they were expected to assume roles that were merely supportive of men. However, despite all the boundaries that society set for them, women did not stand, watching the ongoing cycle of life from their windows; they fought and worked hard to achieve a reassessment of the traditional

Life as a Chinese American woman during World War II was very difficult and challenging. In the article “Chinese American Women Defense Workers in World War II” by Xiaojian Zhao, the article talks about the lives of Chinese American women who worked as defense workers. It also talks about their journey to becoming a defense worker and all the challenges that the women had to face. The author wrote this article to inform the audience the lives of Chinese American women, while their men were off serving the country the women helped the war efforts by working as defense worker. Most of the time Chinese Americans are overlooked in their war effort it was mostly the whites males and females who gained the most attention for serving their country

In the essay “The No Name Woman” by Maxine Hong Kingston, the story of living in a traditionally male-dominated Chinese society with a very dysfunctional family structure is told. The villages would look upon the men as useful, and women as useless to their society. Kingston, the main character, learns this first hand from how her aunt was treated. Kingston’s aunt, The No Name Woman, is victimized by a male-dominated society by being shunned for an illegitimate child. As a woman, the odds were automatically against you in their society.