Critical Response: American Born Chinese (10 points--after this, responses will probably be 20 points)
Be sure to go to http://faculty.tamu-commerce.edu/slstewart/305CriticalResponses.htm so that you'll know what I'm asking for.
Prompt for Critical Response (look for your name and respond to that prompt)
Describe some of the transformations and explain the significance of those transformations associated with the transformer (the toy) metaphor Yang uses in American Born Chinese. (Be sure to discuss both images and words).
In a blog, Yang writes the following: "There is always the danger, of course, that by making a comic book about Cousin Chin-Kee I'm helping to perpetuate him, that readers - especially younger readers - will take his appearance in American Born Chinese at face value. I think it's a danger I can live with. In order for us to defeat our enemy, he must first be made visible" (http://www.firstsecondbooks.com/authors/geneYangBlogMain.html). Work from the assumption that racism is the enemy. How does he make "the enemy" visible, and thus fight that enemy in American Born Chinese? (Be sure to discuss both images and words)
Jin describes the transformer as "more than meets the eye." Explain the significance of that description in terms of race or racism. (Be sure to discuss both images and words)
Roberta Trites, quoting Robyn Wiegman, writes that race is "too often determined by an 'epistemology of the visual': we define race . . . in terms of physical appearance" (Trites, Disturbing the Universe 47). Considering that graphic novels rely on the visual, how does that play out in American Born Chinese? (Be sure to discuss both images and words)
Discuss how Yang both subverts and reinforces ideas regarding racial stereotypes in American Born Chinese. (Be sure to discuss both images and words)