No Name Woman, By Maxine Hong Kingston

In “No Name Woman,” the theme of silence starts with the elementary words of the memoir stating you must not tell anyone. This statement is ironic because Kingston is in fact telling everyone, giving voice to Chinese customs and the lives that are foregone. As written in her memoir, she states, “You must not tell anyone,” my mother said, “what I am about to tell you. In China your father had a sister who killed herself. She jumped into the family well. We say that your father has all brothers because it is as if she had never been born.” (Deshazer 308). It is especially notable and ironic that the memoir begins with the phrase “You must not tell anyone.” Her effort in No Name Woman is to write about that which is never said; her unnamed dead aunt, and the outrageous behaviors in her mother’s Chinese village. Kingston was not necessarily silenced direct by a male figure; however, the words said by her mother “You must not tell anyone” is a representation of Kingston father’s authorization voice through her mother’s explanation. Kingston’s effort is also about discovering a voice, as both a Chinese-American

Being an author of several praised works, Maxine Hong Kingston has been deemed a noteworthy American writer since her first book debuted. Her unique style and interesting blend of myth and truth in memoir form garnered her international attention and won her several awards. Kingston’s works have put heavy emphasis on her family history and her experiences as a Chinese-American, so it is no surprise that she has been received well by many and misunderstood by others at the same time. A discussion on one of her most popular works, “No Name Woman”, and a look at the different ways Kingston’s works have been interpreted should reveal how literature can have different meanings depending on what one is looking for.

The Sun of the Revolution by Liang Heng, is intriguing and vivid, and gives us a complex and compelling perspective on Chines culture during a confusing time period. We get the opportunity to learn the story of a young man with a promising future, but an unpleasant childhood. Liang Heng was exposed to every aspect of the Cultural Revolution in China, and shares his experiences with us, since the book is written from Liang perspective, we do not have a biased opinion from an elite member in the Chinese society nor the poor we get an honest opinion from the People’s Republic of China. Liang only had the fortunate opportunity of expressing these events due his relationship with his wife, An American woman whom helps him write the book. When

In “No Name Woman”, Maxine Kingston’s ancestral line serves as a life lesson, whereas in “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens”, Alice Walker inherits culture and hope. Kingston recounts the first time hearing of her aunt “who killed herself” due to the fact that she was pregnant, and “could not have been pregnant… because her husband had been gone for years”; the mom adds a reminder: “Don’t humiliate us. You wouldn’t like to be forgotten as if you were never born”. Kingston’s aunt disrespected the honor of her family and her village by her lack of faith to her husband, and creating another person dependent on the village for food, which is always scarce. Her ancestry and aunt serve as a lesson to always respect family and their well being, or risk being forgotten

The author starts the book with the story of her aunt. This story was a well-kept family secret being that her aunt’s actions were of great disappointment to the family. The “no name woman” as the story names her, was forgotten by all her family because she had a child that was not from her husband. This story gives a clear

In the She’s The Man (2006), Viola Hastings (Amanda Bynes) cross dresses for the majority of the film, pretending to be her twin brother Sebastian. She does this in order to play for Illyria’s men’s soccer team as her school, Cornwall, cut the women’s soccer team and wouldn’t allow her to play for the men’s team. Her main motivation is to beat her former schools team and prove to them that even though she is a girl, she can play on the same field as the boys. While pretending to be Sebastian, Viola initially struggles to hide her femininity, such as when it is discovered that she has tampons in her bag. As the movie progresses her ability to hide this femininity and express masculinity becomes easier. Her cross dressing has an effect on everything and everyone around her and it pushes the line on the comfort people feel when stereotypical gender norms are challenged/ She becomes interested in her roommate, Duke (Channing Tatum) and throughout the movie the two become closer on an intimate level even though Viola is still masked as Sebastian. Duke is obviously uncomfortable with this as made evident by the end of the movie, when it is revealed that Viola was pretending to be Sebastian the entire time. His look of relief reinforces this idea of stereotypical, heterosexual gender roles, as now that Viola is revealed as a female, it is socially acceptable to be attracted to her. She’s The Man reinforces the stereotypical gender roles that society expects out of

She now knows that she has to carry the secret as her own giving her a reason to now live in silence. Kingston feels as if she is punishing herself because she feels as if her aunt is haunting her she states “My aunt haunts me--her ghost drawn to me because now, after fifty years of neglect, I alone devote pages of paper to her, though not origamied into houses and clothes. I do not think she always means me well.” (53) Here you see an example of women trying to find their voice in the Chinese society were men are the ones who make all the decisions. As you see in the beginning of the story it explains in detail how the men were married quiet rapidly to assure they came back home and send money. “No Name Women” also explains that once the aunt was married her parents gave her away, to her husband’s parents therefore, taking all her will power away. Kingston gave her aunt the benefit of the doubt by giving her a voice by believing that her aunt was not just a sexual person and that just possibly she had been in love. Kingston also explains how her aunt keep the child’s father name to herself while in labor and in death. The aunt could have put the man to shame but she did not giving her a self of empowerment demonstrating that she could give labor and die all on her own. Demonstrating that a man was not always

It is not uncommon for individuals to follow the crowd and do something just because it is popular, especially if it is a group of people who are close the individual. Often the ideals of the group do not align with the individual's principles but he or she is too timid to voice their unpopular opinion. This scenario is present during Kingston’s childhood. Kingston does not agree with her family’s treatment of her aunt, however, Kingston abides by her family’s rules of not speaking or acknowledging the aunt’s existence. In “No Name Woman” Kingston takes her readers through her own intellectual and emotional processing of her aunt’s story, which lends the story’s narrative/rhetorical strength.

Chapter one titled, “No Name Woman”, is an example of the narrator referring to her mother’s talk-stories and a prominent illustration of incorporating the past into the present. This talk- story is culturally based to express information about the past. In “No Name Women”, the narrator explains that her mother, Brave Orchid, would use the stories to give lessons on life that would stick with her children. She represents a bridge figure with one foot in the past, her Chinese culture that she relays on to the family and one foot in the present, her assimilation to American life. The bridge that Brave Orchid acts as brings together the two cultures and allows her to incorporate the family’s Chinese history into their present

She states, “When one of my parents or the emigrant villagers said, ‘feeding girls is feeding cowbirds’, I would thrash on the floor and scream so hard” (pg. 46). Therefore, Kingston fabricates her own versions of stories where she portrays herself as a warrior who is a hero rather than a useless individual. I believe Kingston tells stories to obliterate social perceptions of the woman in the traditional Chinese society. Based on Chinese traditions that Kingston cultured from her parents and the stories that her mother told, Kingston was under the perception that Chinese girls must only become a good wife and bare children. However, I believe Kingston refused the gender role defined by the traditional Chinese culture and used fictionalized stories to showcase that women are capable of doing masculine things and at the same time can be a great mother or a wife.

Kingston’s mother tells the story as a cautionary tale to her daughter, in the years Kingston begins to menstruate. Her mother warns her to be careful lest the same fate fall upon her. Kingston, looking back on the story later,

No Name Woman is a very controversial story written by the Chinese American author named Maxine Hong Kingston, in 1976. No Name Woman represents several aspects within the Chinese culture, Kingston struggling to find the right values between the Chinese and American culture. The story is told by the mother, and the daughter (narrator) is imagining and recreating the events into an exploratory story, Kingston trying to find out what part of her identity is Chinese Culture and what’s American culture. The story opens with a dramatic scene, a story within a story and throughout the story there are different views of thoughts on actions the aunt pursued with.

Written in 1983, Kincaid narrates the thoughts and moral beliefs of the time by her mother. In Girl, Kincaid uses repetition of the term “slut” to emphasize that her mother did not want her to develop a bad moral reputation (Kincaid 118-119). Later in the narration though are her mother’s thoughts on abortion, “this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it even becomes a child” (Kincaid 119). It shows that while the mother instructed her in moral principles, she also understood that things happen to a young woman. The practical nature of this instruction seems to indicate more modern thought while still living in a society of traditions. Another hint of the time period is the mention of divorce and how to live after it, “this is how you love a man…and if they don’t work out, don’t feel bad about giving up” (Kincaid 119). This could indicate that divorce is an accepted practice in the more modern society that Jamaica Kincaid wrote Girl in.

She considers that “some man had commanded her to lie with him and be his secret evil.” (Kingston 6). Kingston writes her initial version of the “No Name Woman,” who was raped, raided, and died an outcast, but Kingston determines that this telling does not fit her understanding of China. Therefore, Kingston entertains another hypothetical, that her aunt took a lover and saved him from shame by giving “silent birth” and not revealing the lover’s identity (Kingston 11). Here, Kingston critically examines the inherited talk-story of her mother to determine the meaning she should obtain from the death of her aunt. Her mother’s conclusion is that she must not become pregnant, but Kingston is uncertain about the simplicity of her mother’s story. In the “No Name Woman,” Kingston introduces the fictitious memoir structure that she utilizes through the variety of interpretations of her aunt’s story. Consistently through the memoir, Kingston writes contrasting accounts of the same stories and imagines the stories of others to further her themes about silence, authenticity, and identity formation.

No Name Woman begins with “You must not tell anyone,” a powerful statement leading into the story of an aunt the narrator’s family has erased the existence of. This short story provides the readers with a better understanding of traditional Chinese culture and the role of women in their society. Throughout the story, the narrator provides the reader with information about Chinese culture and the role women play in it. This first sentence reveals the secretive nature of Chinese society. The narrator’s mother starts and ends a short retelling of her aunt’s story with reminders to keep it a secret.