ABSTRACT
Dalam tugas akhir ini, saya akan menganalisis sebuah drama berjudul M. Butterfly karya David Henry Hwang. Drama ini menggambarkan sejumlah stereotipe negatif orang Asia yang diciptakan oleh orang Barat yang telah mengakar dan tertanam dari masa-masa penjajahan. Stereotipe ini telah mengkontaminasi pikiran dan menghakimi karakteristik seseorang hanya karena berdasarkan ras orang tersebut.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE……….…………i
ABSTRACT……….……….………...ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS……..……….…………..…..…………iv
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION Background of the Study………1
Statement of the Problem ………...4
Purpose of the Study………...5
Methods of the Research……….5
The Organization of the Thesis………...5
CHAPTER TWO: DISCUSSION ON NON-STEREOTYPICAL IN M. BUTTERFLY………6
CHAPTER THREE: CONCLUSION………..………...24
BIBLIOGRAPHY………..………..………..27
APPENDICES Synopsis of M. Butterfly………..………29
APPENDICES
SYNOPSIS OF M. BUTTERFLY
Rene Gallimard, a French diplomat, who is sent to Beijing during the Vietnam War, is being spied by Song who works for Chinese government. Song disguises as a woman who has the same characteristics with Butterfly’s characters in Madame Butterfly. In Beijing, Gallimard meets Song. He becomes an opera singer of Madame Butterfly which is Gallimard’s favorite opera and it is also liked throughout the Western world. The opera tells about a submissive beautiful Japanese woman who waits for her Western lover for three years. She is known as Butterfly. Moreover, the end of story she commits suicide.
Song is actually a smart man. Song succeeds to make Rene believe that Song is a woman for about twenty years and has characteristics as Butterfly. In the end of the story, Song appears as a man in French court to testify against Gallimard. The result is Gallimard is sent to jail because his guilty of treason. He is accused to pass political information which he gets from the diplomat. In this court Gallimard for the first time knows that Song is a man. In the end of the story Gallimard decides to commit suicide whereas Song succeeds to survive.
BIOGRAPHY OF DAVID HENRY HWANG
David Henry Hwang is a son from parents who are immigrant. His father worked as a banker and his mother was a professor of piano. He was born in Los Angeles in 1957.
Before graduating from Stanford University and earning his B.A in 1979, he had already written his first play, FOB (Fresh Off The Boat) in 1978, which won the 1981 Obie Award as the best new play of the season when Joseph Papp brought it to off-Broadway in New York. After finishing his study, he attended the famous Yale School of Drama from 1980 to 1981.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
People’s judgment of another group of people is sometimes unfair. Their judgment is often based only on physical traits, such as age, sex, race, and nationality. This kind of judgment is known as stereotype. ‘Stereotype is an oversimplified and usually value laden view of the attitudes, behavior and expectations of a group or individual’ (Edgar and Sedgwick, ed: 1994, 380). For example, in Popular Culture:
An Introductory Text by Nachbar and Lause(http://www.serve.com/shea/stereodf.htm), it says that ‘…we often find people
stereotyped around characteristics of age (“all teenagers love rock and roll and have no respect for their elders.”), sex (“men want just one thing from a woman.”), race (“all Japanese look and think alike”)…and nationality (“all Germans are Nazi warmongers”)’.
(http://www.serve.com/shea/stereodf.htm). People accept the stereotypes which are believed as a fix image from the society while stereotypes are actually untrue images
as further suggested by Nachbar and Lause (http://www.serve.com/shea/stereodf.htm), ‘the characteristic of stereotype is erroneous: all stereotypes are false.’ So this false image is created by others.
One of the forms of superiority and Western power are shown from canonical literary works. ‘canonical works do represent the ideals of Western civilization’. (Guillory: 1993, 21). Canonical literary works represent dominant social group as Western country and one work will become canonical work if they are seen to support dominant country. ‘…works cannot become canonical unless they are seen to endorse the hegemonic or ideological values of dominant social groups’. (Guillory: 1993, 19).
This case shows there is an unfair portrayal of the other groups outside the Westerners because they are seen from Western’s perspective. So in 1970s, the post-colonialism begins to bring post-colonial writers expressed their voice. ‘Post-colonialism deals with many issues for societies that undergone ‘Post-colonialism…attempt to articulate and even celebrate their cultural identities and reclaim them from the colonizers’. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-colonialism).
I find that David Henry Hwang as an American playwright of Asian descendant is one of the post-colonial writers who has a big awareness about Asian life which is connected with Western and Asian values. It is seen from his works as FOB in 1978 which focuses on a Chinese immigrant lives in Los Angeles. The life of Chinese American is also shown in his two works in 1981 The Dance and The Railroad and Family Devotion. (Meyer, 2001: 1295). From his work I find that he usually expresses the cultural identity of Asian.
stereotypes through the portrayal of the major characters. The characters are portrayed differently with the stereotypes and is reversed the old the stereotypes of the Asian and Westerner.
I have decided to analyze the portrayal of the major characters in M. Butterfly because through the character, the reader can understand the author’s purposes. Furthermore, the readers can understand the characters from the author’s description. According to Roberts, ‘Character is a verbal representation of a human being as presented to us by authors through the depiction of actions, conversations, descriptions, reactions...’ (Roberts, 2003: 32). Through character, the readers can see the representation of human being daily life.
M. Butterfly conveys the issues of racial and cultural prejudice which make many critics regard Hwang as the most talented young playwright in The United States. ‘when M. Butterfly was produced on Broadway, that he achieved astonishing commercial success as well as widespread acclaim. His awards for this play include the Outer Critic’s Circle Award for the best Broadway play.’(Meyer, 2001: 1295). Since the end of 1988, M. Butterfly has been shown in theaters around the world.
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
1. How does the author remind the readers of the Westerner’s stereotypes toward Asian in M. Butterfly?
2. How does the author portray the major Asian and Western characters in the play?
PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
1. To analyze how the author reminds the readers of the Westerner’s stereotypes toward Asian in M. Butterfly
2. To analyze the portrayal of the major Asian and Western characters in the play.
3. To show the way of how the author reverses the Western’s binary opposition through the portrayal of the two major characters
METHODS OF RESEARCH
I use library research as the method of research. First, I read the primary text, M. Butterfly, written by David Henry Hwang; afterwards, I read several references from the Internet that are relevant to the topic of the research. I also read the biography of the playwright. Finally, I analyze the primary text itself and draw some conclusions.
THE ORGANIZATION OF THE THESIS
CHAPTER THREE
CONCLUSION
The portrayal of the major characters in David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly is used as an attempt to erode the stereotypes which have the negative images for a long time. He conveys these purposes in three steps. First, he introduces the stereotypes in Madame Butterfly which is created by Westerner. Second, Hwang creates the major characters which are portrayed differently from the old stereotypes. Third, Hwang reverses the position that Westerners are superior to Asians.
same as the stereotypes in Madame Butterfly, later in the play he will reconstruct the idea of the story and reverse the stereotypes.
M. Butterfly is about a French diplomat, Rene Gallimard, who is sent to Beijing during Vietnam War, is being spied by Song who works for Chinese Government. Gallimard meets Song and he falls in love with Song who has the same characteristic with Butterfly in Madame Butterfly who is helpless and submissive to Western character. Song is actually a man who disguises as an Asian woman to gain political information.
The second step of eroding the stereotypes, Hwang creates the character of the Asian and Westerner that are different with the stereotypes. This portrayal reverses the old stereotypes. Song, the Asian character, is portrayed as smart, educated and outspoken person. Song is a spy who disguises as an Asian woman and benefits these stereotypes above to cheat Gallimard. Song deceives Gallimard and makes him believe that Song is a typical Asian woman who is submissive and helpless. It makes Song succeed to gain the political information
Song as he falls in love with her. He has believed for twenty years that Song is a woman.
When Gallimard is helpless and surrenders to Song, the position of Westerner as superior people is reversed. This is also the third step of Hwang to erode the stereotypes that Asians are helpless and pathetic while the Westerners are powerful and superior to Asians. He reverses the Western and Asian position. Through the Asia character, Song’s position as Asian woman and man raises. Song as a woman can control Gallimard’s mind. Song makes Gallimard fall in love and surrender to Song. Moreover, Song’s position as a man is also superior to Gallimard. Song as a spy is freed and he survives until the end of the story while Gallimard is still imprisoned as he is accused of passing political information; furthermore, he decides to commit suicide because he cannot bear his shame.
By eroding and reversing these stereotypes, I see that in M. Butterfly, Hwang succeeds to raise the Asian position and erode the negative stereotype. In this play Asian can show their true image and their strength.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
REFERENCES:
Edgar, Andrew, and Peter Sedwick, ed. Key Concepts in Cultural Theory. London and New York: Routledge, 1999.
Guillory, John. Cultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon Formation. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1993.
Kim, Elaine. H. Asian American Literature: An Introduction to The Writings & Their Social Context. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1982.
Roberts, Edgar V. Writing About Literature. New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc, 2003.
Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York: Vintase Books, 1994
Webster, Roger. Studying Literary Theory. London: Hodder Headline Group, 1996.
INTERNET WEB SITE:
Drama: David Henry Hwang. 10 Sept. 2005
<http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/litlinks/drama/hwang.htm>.
Post-colonialism - Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 2 March 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-colonialism>.
PRIMARY TEXT: