비엣 탄 응웬의 『동조자』: 베트남 전쟁과 베트남계 남성 주체의 남성성 문제

Abstract

Viet Thanh Nguyen’s The Sympathizer is often discussed with the hybridized subject represented in/within the American society. However, this paper aims to explore the narrator’s masculinity confined by his general’s overwhelming orders as soldier in America and his ruined nation, Vietnam where he can never recover his masculine power, and the white male-centered American society. However, his masculinity seems to be relocated in a different way in Vietnam among the relationship with a few women. He even dreams of subverting the class stratification between him and the general by dating and ultimately controlling over the general’s daughter, under his masculine power. He, however, proves himself that America does not allow him to fully recover his masculinity, and decides to revolutionize Vietnam because like the general, he believes that the revolution is a possible way to recover his masculinity. Failing to do revolution, the narrator realizes that surviving in American society is much more urgent than establishing masculinity as racial/ethnic other after a long torturing at a military prison.