My doctoral research focuses on the idea of the Modern Woman in China and Japan between the wars. I examine the ways in which this concept was created and projected by different women. I have taken a case study approach to this, looking at four women each in China and Japan, writers and artists whose work reflects different responses to the enormous social changes taking place, particularly with regard to the status of women.
Each of these women looked at how they could define modernity for a woman, and what I discuss is how they performed this role as well as depicting it in their work. This group includes Asian women and Western women resident in Asia. The women considered are Pearl Buck, Stella Benson, Sophia Chen Zen, Ding Ling, Carol Bache, Lilian May Miller, Miyamoto Yuriko, and Uno Chiyo.
The main themes throughout these women's works are cultural exchange, and the idea (continually contested) that modernity was a Western concept, and that modernisation was Westernisation. Through this, women who had lived in both East and West - and considered themselves to be cultural hybrids - found themselves in a position of negotiating two sets of values and debating their relative merits for women. Further, for Asian women who had lived or studied abroad, there was a sense of responsibility to prescribe to their fellow countrywomen the best path to take, based on their personal experiences.
My previous research − for my Masters thesis − explored ideas of racial liminality in Victorian culture through "going native" in Colonial societies. In contrast with the North American captivity narratives, in Australia and the Pacific the idea of going native involved those whites who chose to live in indigenous communities. These figures represented both a threat and a source of fascination in popular culture.
I am intrigued by ideas of cultural exchange and hybridity, and this is the primary theme in all my research. My new project looks at this idea in a city rather than in individuals. |