“Want to be a superior man?”: The Production Chinese Canadian Masculinities in Paul Yee’s Writing

Keywords:

Inter-racialized relations, Chinese Canadian Literature, Canadian Literature, Canadian Cultural Studies

Abstract

This paper examines the re-imagining of Chinese Canadian masculinity in Paul Yee’s novel, A Superior Man (2015). Unlike Yee’s previous writing, this novel does not describe Chinese Canadian men as Western Frontier heroes. Rather, it illustrates how Chinese immigration intersects with the oppression of Indigenous peoples, and how notions of masculinity are produced within settler colonialism. The novel thus provides an important entry point into discussions about how to make Indigenous presence and colonization foundational to anti-racist efforts. Yet, since it represents Indigenous peoples as largely peripheral, the novel also points to how much anti-colonial work remains to be done.

Author Biography

Lindsay Diehl, University of British Columbia, Okanagan Campus
Lindsay Diehl recently received her PhD in Critical Studies from the University of British Columbia, Okanagan campus, where she currently teaches. Her research focuses on racialized subjectivity within the fields of cultural studies, postcolonial theory, and Asian Canadian literature. Her work has appeared in Rupkatha, Postcolonial Text, and English Studies in Canada.

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Published
2019-12-20