CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
This chapter is presenting about background of
the study, statement of the problems,
objectives of the study, scope and limitation, significance of the study, and research methodology.
1.1 Background of the study Literature is interesting thing to be
discussed, since its existence could enrich
the variety cultures of a nation. Frequently, a literary work depicts the condition of certain society in a certain
time. But, before conducting the study of literature, definitely we should know first
what ismeant by literature.
Literature is a creative
activity, the work of art (Wellek and Warren, 1993: 3). Reconsidering the statement above, of
course westill wonder if the literature as
simple as the statement. If the literature is simply a creative activity, the
work of art, then it could be painting,
carving, etc. However, the definition of literature depends on the particular kind of literary
theory or school of criticism that the reader
or critic espouses (Bressler, 1999: 12). Forscientist, for example, the text may contain certain qualities that make a
particular piece of writing literature (writing
reference). But for reader-response critics, the interaction and psychological relationship between the text
and thereader help determine if a document
should be considered as literature.
To sum up the explanation above,
we admit that literature has some definitions
based on what it relates to. Thus, we should specify its definition into the narrower one. Here, the writer defines
that literature is the form of art that made
of words or text which expresses the beauty.
Literature has several genres;
some of them are poetry, drama, and novel which included in prose. As like another field
of study, literature also has its main function.
Through the literary work, the author canshow or deliver their ideas toward the readers. Furthermore, literature
also can be an entertainer for the readers
towards its art values. Nevertheless, the writer will not discuss all about those literary genres. In this study, the
writer isgoing to discuss about the novel as one of literary works will be analyzed.
Novel is one of literary works that presents
characters’ complicated problems of life
in detail. As Peck and Coyle (1984:103) stated that novels are long works with a great amount detail on every
page. Its detail will give the effect to
the readers. They will come to recognize the complex reality of a certain character or event in the story. It can also
contribute to a deeper understanding of the
central themes, complicated characters, and ourview towards this world and its complicated things.
Because the novel presents
characters’ complicatedproblems of life in detail, so the existence of the characters is
very important to build story’s unity.
Characters are the members of a
society. Thus, in anovel the author created a certain character trait and personality as a
part of human psychology through the character
itself. It aims to reveal a certain imagethat will be related to the whole story of the novel. The highlight of the
charactersin a novel is really important in order to get the perfect understanding about
the story.
Chinese American literatures are
flourishing nowadays. Many Chinese authors
who immigrated to America write their literary works in English then translated it into Chinese (Mowry). Beside its
own literature, America has many different
kinds of literature that written by the immigrants, some of them are Indian American literature, Japanese American
literature and Chinese American literature.
Thus, those immigrants’ literary works could enrich and included as the American literature.
One of Chinese American literary
works is Fan Wu’s novel, February Flowers(2006).
The novel which takes a set in China in 1991 has unique main characters. In addition, Wu's debut novel
captures the gap between both the old and
the modern of her motherland, constructed in a unique and attractive story.
The novel talks about a
complicated close relationship of two girls. Miao Yan (24 years old) and Chen Ming (17 years
old), the students of Guangzhou University,
had a very close relationship in a relatively short time for about eleven months. Yan and Ming were very different in
almost aspects of life; such as ideology
and personality, by whom Ming is more introvert, bookish and stays comfort with her imagination world. By
contrast, Yan is extrovert, wild, beautiful and free. However, they amaze each other and
their togetherness stay alive in Ming’s
memory. But their differences of their childhood and ideologies eventually drive them apart, leaving each to face their
own dark secret alone.
After reading the novel, it seems
to the researcherthat characters’ childhood
and society significantly influence the development of their self concept in growing up. It has a great deal in
theirlife, albeit at a glance it looks as a simple thing. Thus the researcher is going
to analyze the main characters’ self concept
through social psychology perspectives.
Social psychology is a part of
psychological literary criticism. Beside the social psychology, psychology also has
psychoanalysis as another part of field study.
Hence, psychology has a great contribution to literary critique. In applying psychological literary criticism, frequently,
a researcher analyzes character’s personality
and/or author’s mental process in writing his/her literary work.
The use of literary texts as a
source of data to test ideas and theories in social psychology and related discipline may
be notwidespread. However, Contarello
(2002) said that it has proved to be suitable, in particular, for
crosscultural, historically oriented research on social psychology and
personality issues in order to enrich
and extend our knowledge.
Contarello (2002) may be inspired
by previous researcher of such studies aimed
at illustrating social psychology theories. An author who developed this line is Seymour Rosenberg, who analyzed
Dreiser’s collection of short stories A Gallery
of Womenapplying multidimensional scaling in order to detect the writer’s implicit theory of personality. He
also compared the use of personality and
emotional terms in some U.S. and Hungarian Novels to investigate possible personality and emotional differences linked
to cultural variables.
Since it is a literary research,
the use of social psychology ideas and theories
is just as a tool to analyze the novel; toinvestigate the main characters’ self concept development. By using the social
psychology theories we get the new insight
and the new way in understanding a literarywork.
Every author, exactly, has his/her
own ideas or messages that they want to deliver
and share with the readers. Fan Wu, the author of February Flowers, also has her own concept. As stated in one of her
interviews with Stephanie Yap, she said
“I want to show that we are individuals, not products of government. So I wrote this book for my self and my friends,
about the frustration of growing up. In China,
we had little understanding of who we were, and never got a chance to understand sexuality.”
(www.chinahistoryforum.com). Wu’s statement gives a very clear depiction about Chinese women’s
past. They did not recognize much about
their self which caused their confusion and frustration in facing their future and the culture changing of their motherland.
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar