Markierung literarischen Weißseins: Post-kritische Weißseinsdiskurse im zeitgenössischen amerikanischen Roman

Abstract

This dissertation is a contribution to critical whiteness studies, an academic field that has complemented minority studies of racialization. It critically examines the literary representation of whiteness in eight American novels, including John Steinbeck's "East of Eden", Mary McCarthy's "The Group", Dorothy Allison's "Cavedweller", Brock Clarke's "The Ordinary White Boy", Anthony Giardina's "White Guys",Jeffrey Lent's "In the Fall", Kate Manning's "Whitegirl", and Danzy Senna's "Caucasia". By analyzing the main characters in these novels, this study focuses on the discursive process of developing a white racial identity. In addition, it unveils the manner in which whiteness and white identity have been shaped through a range of intersectional aspects (gender, class, sexual orientation). Furthermore, this study inquires how the novels contribute to a self-conscious social and cultural discourse on whiteness by way of literary representation. Those literary critics who focus on whiteness in their studies primarily analyze works of white American authors prior to the development of critical whiteness studies. In these earlier publications, whiteness is usually perceived as a racially neutral category and is never explicitly stated unlike the race of black characters. This is also illustrated in the analysis of Steinbeck's "East of Eden" and McCarthy's "The Group". The contemporary novels of Senna, Clarke, Giardina, Manning, Allison, and Lent, however, disrupt the notion of whiteness as invisible and clearly mark whiteness and white identities. Each of these contemporary novels stresses specific elements of whiteness/race such as racial passing, white trash or white masculinity. The writers deal with whiteness in a new and direct way, which challenges (white) readers and literary critics alike.