Essentially, the process of translation is a complicated endeavor of decoding a message in one language in order to render its meaning to a target one. However, apart from the lexical peculiarities of the text’s journey, every single message bears a certain emotive meaning behind it, urging the respondent to react to the words in a certain way. When transferring these ideas from one language to another, people deliberately alter some parts of them to adapt to a new culture.
As a result, a part of the message’s uniqueness can be lost during the translation for the sake of feeling welcomed elsewhere. The same dilemma is ironically faced by immigrants who seek to find understanding and acceptance in the context of the foreign environment. Eventually, they tend to lose a part of their identity driven by the fear of unacceptance and marginalization. Some people make the conscious choice of localization, assimilating themselves to the extent where they are no longer perceived as a stranger to the community. Others, in their turn, opt for foreignization and draw a line between the person they are and the person they are expected to be. However, in most cases, in the pursuit of finding balance, immigrants find themselves lost somewhere in between, in the agony of creating a new version of their identity without losing the fundamental components of values, beliefs, and culture.
The family of Kimberly and her Ma is a prime example of the journey of self-discovery and disorientation in the new, frequently hostile environment. Ma and Kim, who move to the US from Hong Kong with the help of Aunt Paula, feel the obligation to repay their debt to Aunt Paula by working in the fabric factory. As a result, Ma embarks on a journey of hard work in order to allow her daughter to live through the ups and downs of the American dream.
At the very beginning, Kim realizes that no matter how hard she tries to fit in with her new circle, she will always be different from any of her newly acquired friends. Soon after moving, Ma warns her young and hopeful daughter:
Don’t get too close to the other children here. Ah-Kim, you must always remember this: If you play with them, learn to talk like them, study like them, act like them-what will make you different? Nothing. And in ten or twenty years, you’ll be doing precisely what the older girls are doing, working on the sewing machines in this factory until you’re worn, and when you’re too old for that, you’ll cut thread like Mrs. Wu. (Kwok 49-50)
Undeniably, Kim is smart enough to understand that the gap that exists between immigrant ethnic minorities and the rest of the country’s population cannot be bridged by language, wealth, or the ability to sing the national anthem by heart. However, at the same time, she remains a vulnerable and sensitive teenager who hopes to become a part of something bigger in her life. It is hard for an eleven-year-old innocent girl who enters an entirely different world to tolerate the thought of a never-ending circle where “they enter at this [factory] table as children, and they leave from it as grandmas” (Kwok 32). Clearly, Kim wants something different for herself. Kim believes she is smart enough to break the vicious circle of factory life for the sake of something beautiful and worthy, even if her dreams are as bold as getting into Yale.
While as a child going to a regular school, Kim does not feel the burden of “translating” herself according to the environment she finds herself in. The epitome of confusion hits when she manages to enter a private school and become one step closer to existing the “circle of factory life” (Kwok 32). Now, Kim feels like she cannot change enough to fit with her new classmates without changing too much for her community back home. A manifestation of this juxtaposition can be found in chapter seven, as it is the beginning of Kim’s private school journey. At school, Kim goes to the Milton Hall library to ask Mr. Jamali to change her work hours because she needs to find time to help her mother at the factory (Kwok 129). At the moment of this conversation, Kim feels very uncomfortable with not being like the rest of the others. She feels self-conscious about her inability to focus on her studies and school life like the rest of the kids. A few sentences later, the author relocates the reader to the factory and Kim’s feelings there. Kim thinks to herself:
But it made me realize that coming to the factory in my school clothes could cause trouble for me with the other factory kids or even with Aunt Paula, who clearly didn’t need to be reminded of my new private school. From now on, I would make sure I changed into my work clothes as soon as I arrived and never mention my new school. (Kwok 129-130)
Thus, while genuinely excited about the future ahead, Kim does not know how to show others in her community that her chance for a better future does not change the fact she is a girl from Hong Kong who tries her best to remain a decent member of her community and help her Ma. It is understandable that such a promising girl as Kim cannot simply embrace her immigrant fate without fighting back. In this situation, the image of Aunt Paula serves as a manifestation of the power of stereotype that lets down many immigrants who see themselves as outcasts without striving for a better shot at life. Kim, on the other hand, tries to be the advocate of change without neglecting the fact she will never be like the rest of her classmates and acquaintances. Indeed, she finds the courage to call the shots knowing perfectly well she is in the minority.
The toxic influence of Aunt Paula, along with the challenge of being accepted in the community, naturally makes Kim question why, of all people, she needs to constantly balance between the two versions of herself: the Kim that must be forever grateful to Aunt Paula and work hard for minimum wage, and the Kim who is head-over-hills in love and cherishes her dream of being successful. The turning point in this story is the news about Kim getting a full scholarship at Yale and Aunt Paula kicking the family out of the apartment. The reader finds out later in the epilogue that Kim becomes a surgeon yet postpones Yale for a year to have a child from Matt. However, despite the obstacles in the way, Kim eventually becomes the one to break the factory circle without losing the person she is. Hence, sometimes, losing some aspects along the way does not make the translation worse; it makes it unique instead.
Work Cited
Kwok, Jean. Girl in Translation. Penguin, 2010.