Negotiating Feminisms and Diaspora: Analyzing Gender Identity in the Works of Toni Morrison Beloved and Min Jin Lee Pachinko

Abstract

The study examines the theme of resistance and empowerment in Toni Morrison Beloved (1987) and Min Jin Lee Pachinko (2017) through the theatrical framework of radical postcolonial feminism and diaspora in their writings. In particular, the research paper explores how gender identity has been portrayed in cultural, racial, and historical structures in Beloved (1987) by Morrison and Pachinko (2017) by Lee. The research study explores and highlights the portrayal of the plight of women in their respective diasporic experiences the predicament of the African American women after the slavery and the Korean women in their displacement in Japan. The analysis focuses how the two authors demonstrate the strength and power of women despite the oppression of patriarchy and race through the lens of postcolonial and intersectional feminism. The finding reveals that both novels portray the value of motherhood and sacrifice; they further find the cultural and historical barriers that were so specific to women in various diasporic situations. In trying to draw parallels between these works, the study would highlight the necessity of a thorough study of gender and identity in reference to the interrelationship between the perspectives of race, class, and diaspora, in order to identify the feminine voice in world literature.

Keywords: Feminism, motherhood, cultural displacement, Diaspora, identity.