UNRAVELING PRECARITY AND RECLAIMED IDENTITY THROUGH LANGUAGE IN GINA CHUNG’S WOMEN-CENTERED NARRATIVES
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.31851/2ekr3x16Keywords:
Precarity, Agency, Feminist Literary Criticism, Asian American Literature, LanguageAbstract
This study explores how precarity and reclaimed identity are constructed through language in three short stories “Green Frog,” “After Party,” and “Rabbit Heart” from Green Frog Stories by Gina Chung. Positioning women-centered narratives as a critical space for articulating female experience, the study adopts a female reader’s perspective to examine how Asian American women negotiate emotional, bodily, and domestic vulnerabilities within diasporic contexts. Grounded in Judith Butler’s concepts of precarity and agency and informed by feminist literary criticism and Asian American literary studies, the research employs qualitative textual analysis focusing on narrative voice, figurative language, and affective expression. The findings reveal that each story represents precarity through distinct yet interconnected linguistic strategies: emotional restraint and silence in “Green Frog,” gendered emotional labor in “After Party,” and embodied fear and desire in “Rabbit Heart.” Despite persistent vulnerability, the female protagonists demonstrate agency through reflective narration, subtle resistance, and moments of linguistic self-preservation that enable identity reclamation. Overall, the study argues that vulnerability is not portrayed as weakness but as a generative condition through which women articulate resilience and reconstruct identity through language.
References
Atmojo, E. R. D. (2020). Pengembangan kemampuan menulis cerita fiksi siswa sekolah dasar. Jurnal ADIDAS, 1(3), 88–182. https://doi.org/10.31004/abdidas.v1i3.39
Atterberry, A. L. (2022). Transnational migration, ethnic identity, and blurred boundaries: indian american youth redefine being a second-generation immigrant. Children and Youths’ Migration in a Global Landscape (Sociological Studies of Children and Youth, 29, 51–72. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1537-466120220000029004
Ayu, N., Suharno, & Chrysti Suryandari, K. (2023). Exploration: Creative thinking skills in writing essays media-based image series. International Journal of Elementary Education, 7(1), 1–7. https://doi.org/10.23887/ijee.v7i1.54095
Bennet, A., & Royle, N. (2023). An Introduction to Literature , Criticism and Theory (6th ed.). Routledge.
Buell, L. (2019). The future of environmental criticism: Environmental crisis and literary imagination. WIley.
Butler, J. (2022). Selection From Gender Trouble Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1st ed.). Routledge.
Chew, X. Y., & Asl, M. P. (2024). The poetics of identity making : precarity and agency in Tahmima Anam ’ s The Good Muslim. Journal for Cultural Research, 28(1), 86–101. https://doi.org/10.1080/14797585.2023.2291711
Chung, G. (2024). Green Frog. Vintage Books.
Fadilah, I. A., Jaya, A., & Uzer, Y. (2023). Visual Representation and Comprehension: the Exploration of Multimodal Text To Energize Reading of the Tenth Grade Students’ At State Vocational High School 5 of Palembang. Esteem Journal of English Education Study Programme, 6(1), 125–130. https://doi.org/10.31851/esteem.v6i1.10226
Ff, S. (2020). The Woman and Womanhood in Literature ( Introduction ). ANNALES, XXXVIII(2). https://doi.org/10.17951/ff.2020.38.2.9-13
Greene, G., & Kahn, C. (2020). Feminist scholarship and the social construction of woman. In Making a Difference (pp. 1–36). Routledge.
Herdayati, & Syahrial. (2019). Desain penelitian dan teknik pengumpulan data dalam penelitian. Journal Online International, 53(9), 1689–1699. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/syahrial-syahrial-2/publication/336304206_desain_penelitian_dan_teknik_pengumpulan_data_dalam_penelitian/links/5d9ac0ab92851c2f70f2184f/desain-penelitian-dan-teknik-pengumpulan-data-dalam-penelitian
Ilmonen, K. (2020). Feminist Storytelling and Narratives of Intersectionality. Signs: Journal OfWomen in Culture and Society, 45(2), 347–371.
Indah, S. (2024). Storytelling Method Using Hand Puppet Media: Cognitive Development Of Children Aged 4-6 Years. Journal of Education Technology and Inovation, 7(2), 32–42. https://doi.org/10.31537/jeti.v7i2.2080
Jaya, A., Hartono, R., Wahyuni, S., & Yulianto, H. J. (2025). Los efectos de la estrategia de aprendizaje basado en proyectos con actividad física en función del género sobre el rendimiento escolar y la confianza en sí mismos de los estudiantes. Retos: Nuevas Tendencias En Educación Física, Deporte y Recreación, 66, 349–360. https://doi.org/10.47197/retos.v66.110067
Kaforina, M., Mulyadi, M., & Jaya, A. (2023). The students’ personality based on their reading attitude. Esteem Journal of English Education Study Programme, 7(1), 12–23. https://doi.org/10.31851/esteem.v7i1.12654
Kroeber, K. (2018). Ecological literary criticism: Romantic imagining and the biology of mind. Columbia University Press.
Latha, R., Ananta, P., Uppal, G., Hymavathi, T., Sharma, R., & Kavithamizh, M. (2024). Voices Of Resistance : A Qualitative Analysis Of Marginalized Women In Feminist Literature. Educational Administration: Theory and Practice, 30(5), 1940–1945. https://doi.org/10.53555/kuey.v30i5.3202
Lee, C. (2010). Asian american literature and the resistances of theory. Modern Fiction Studies, 56(1), 19–39.
Lewis, M. S. (2019). Read more— Read Better? A Meta- Analysis of the Literature on the Relationship between Exposure to Read-ing and Reading Achievement [University of Minnesota]. https://www.proquest.com/openview/8fd23587dc117100d8887d94ef20e2b9/1?cbl=18750&diss=y&pq-origsite=gscholar
Li, Z., Vengadasamy, R., & Pillai, S. (2025). The construction of archetypal hero identity in selected asian american literary works. Theory & Practice in Language Studies (TPLS), 15(6).
Listyani. (2019). The use of a visual image to promote narrative writing ability and creativity. Eurasian Journal of Educational Research, 2019(80), 193–224. https://doi.org/10.14689/ejer.2019.80.10
Mauliddiyah, N. L. (2021). Metode Pengumpulan Data dan Instrumen Penelitian [UIN Alauddin Makassar]. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/svu73
Monshcheuer, O. (2023). National identity and the integration of second-generation immigrants. Labour Economics, 82, 102327. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.labeco.2023.102327
Neuman, W. L. (2019). Social research methods: Qualitative and Quantitative approaches. In Pearson (Seventh Ed). Pearson New International Edition. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Social-Research-Methods-Quantitative/dp/0205786839/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1461496914&sr=1-5&keywords=social+research+methods+qualitative+and+quantitative+approaches
Nurgiyantoro, B. (2019). Teori Pengkajian Fiksi. Gadjah Mada University Press.
Pareek, R., & Choudhary, S. (2024). Emotional realism and female agency : a study of women ’ s voices in shashi deshpande’s novels. International Journal of Linguistics Applied Psychology and Technology, 01(06), 18–27.
Roberts, H. G. A., Barciela, R., Flint, S., Fussell, I., Maestri, E., Mañosa Nyblon, C., Marple, A., Sabet, F., & Stott, P. (2023). New narratives for a healthy planet: creative writing and art projects reveal We Still Have a Chance. The Lancet Planetary Health, 7(8), e646–e647. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(23)00144-4
Rys, M., & Philipsen, B. (2021). Introduction: Poetics and Precarity—Literary Representations of Precarious Work, Past and Present BT - Literary Representations of Precarious Work, 1840 to the Present. 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-88174-0_1
Soe, M. T. (2024). Textbook Evaluation Studies in ELT: A Systematic Literature Review. Asian EFL Journal, 26(2), 75–98.
Susanto, D., Risnita, & Jailani, M. S. (2023). Teknik Pemeriksaan Keabsahan Data Dalam Penelitian Ilmiah. Jurnal QOSIM Jurnal Pendidikan Sosial & Humaniora, 1(1), 53–61. https://doi.org/10.61104/jq.v1i1.60
Tisdell, E. J., Merriam, S. B., & Struckey-Peyrot, H. L. (2025). Qualitative research: A guide to design and implementation. John Wiley & Sons.
Tripathi, L., Pradesh, M., Nanda, V., & Pradesh, M. (2024). “ Who Needs a Hero ? Redefining Female Agency in Jane Austen ’ s Novels ”. Creative Saplings, 03(06), 43–63.
Veto Mortini, A., Jaya, A., & Akbar Zam, M. A. (2023). the Effect of Map Libs Technique on Students’ English Learning Achievement in Learning Personal Pronoun. Esteem Journal of English Education Study Programme, 6(2), 216–225. https://doi.org/10.31851/esteem.v6i2.12316
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Dewi Suryanti, Ayu Triria Puspita Devi
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Copyright Notice
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
In order to assure the highest standards for published articles, a peer review policy is applied. In pursue of the compliance with academic standards, all parties involved in the publishing process (the authors, the editors and the editorial board and the reviewers) agree to meet the responsibilities stated below in accordance to the Journal publication ethics and malpractice statement.
Duties of Authors:
- The author(s) warrant that the submitted article is an original work, which has not been previously published, and that they have obtained an agreement from any co-author(s) prior to the manuscript’s submission;
- The author(s) should not submit articles describing essentially the same research to more than one journal;
- The authors(s) make certain that the manuscript meets the terms of the Manuscript Submission Guideline regarding appropriate academic citation and that no copyright infringement occurs;
- The authors(s) should inform the editors about any conflict of interests and report any errors they subsequently, discover in their manuscript.
Duties of Editors and the Editorial Board:
- The editors, together with the editorial board, are responsible for deciding upon the publication or rejection of the submitted manuscripts based only on their originality, significance, and relevance to the domains of the journal;
- The editors evaluate the manuscripts compliance with academic criteria, the domains of the journal and the guidelines;
- The editors must at all times respect the confidentiality of any information pertaining to the submitted manuscripts;
- The editors assign the review of each manuscript to two reviewers chosen according to their domains of expertise. The editors must take into account any conflict of interest reported by the authors and the reviewers.
- The editors must ensure that the comments and recommendations of the reviewers are sent to the author(s) in due time and that the manuscripts are returned to the editors, who take the final decision to publish them or not.
Authors are permitted and encouraged to post online a pre-publication manuscript (but not the Publisher final formatted PDF version of the Work) in institutional repositories or on their Websites prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (see The Effect of Open Access). Any such posting made before acceptance and publication of the Work shall be updated upon publication to include a reference to the Publisher-assigned DOI (Digital Object Identifier) and a link to the online abstract for the final published Work in the Journal.
