Choice
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.

The need for reading "beyond the hyphen" in contemporary literature informs Ty's study of Asian American narratives within transnational and diasporic cultures. In this examination of the "1.5 generation," Ty (English and film studies, Wilfrid Laurier Univ.) looks at novels by Filipino authors Brian Roley and Han Ong, Asian sex workers in novels by Lydia Kwa and Nora Okja Keller; disability in Asian Canadian plays by Betty Quan and Suril Kuruvilla, and techniques of feminist subversion in work by Nina Aquino, Nadine Villasin, and Deepa Mehta. She argues that identity has become "unfastened" from claims of racial status or national origin and must be negotiated as a performance within global culture. While remaining mindful of the "inequitable circumstances brought about by globalization," the author demonstrates how Asian American characters employ a "critical globality" by resisting and challenging their circumstances through sometimes playful, sometimes transgressive "tactics" of "using and reinscribing available meaning." Though Ty neglects to mention precursors within Asian American literature--the work of Diana Chang, Sui Sin Far, and Onoto Watanna--a reading of 21st-century narratives within a global/diasporic framework is much needed, and this book makes an important start. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. C. Roh-Spaulding Drake University