Mothered/Othered Daughters: Mother Abjection and Diasporic Identity in Ethnic American Short Fiction

Mother-daughter relationships are usually fraught with tension, which is intensified by the cultural and social conditions under mother daughter live in culturally diverse societies. Immigrant mothers affect their daughters’ identity formation as they simultaneously nourish hinder initiation into societies reside in. Through adopting Julia Kristeva’s theory of abject a psychoanalytic critical framework, study examines extent to ambivalent feelings shows towards her embodied conflicting she experiences two cultures forming second generation immigrant. This done analysing connection between mother-daughter relationship, diasporic daughter’s cross-cultural relations forms setting manifested four short stories written ethnic-American writers: “Everyday Use” African American Alice Walker, “Two Kinds” Chinese Amy Tan, “Aunt Moon’s Young Man” Native Linda Hogan “How I Became My Mother’s Daughter” Arab Laila Lalami.