Asian Australian Poetry
Thesis - People can experience a sense of disconnection from their culture when they struggle to understand who they are in modern, multicultural Australia. Through Asian Australians’ poetry, we see their struggles with identity and their questioning of where they belong, which the poets express through their stories. “New accents “ Ouang Yu has shown a personal experience, expressing the multicultural differences and stereotypes with new accents in Australia. “Home” by Mirum Wei Wei Lo, explores the understanding of where she belongs and whether she is truly home in Australia. Furthermore, both poets explore cultural isolation in our contemporary society.
Poem 1 The poem New Accents challenges the Australian identity showing the multicultural differences in
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It helps the audience empathise with how minor mistake they need to make to be ridiculed and alienated this poem effectively demonstrates the different experiences of disconnection that multicultural Australians can feel.
Poem 2
The poem “Home” by Wei Wei Lo emphasises her belief that "home" is an abstract concept that can represent different things to different individuals rather than merely a physical location. “The dark bitter words of my heart” The metaphor suggests that the pain is deeply rooted and the anger comes from her heart. This deep-rooted pain shows the audience that she is struggling with her sense of disconnection due to her lack of understanding of where she belongs. Though a person that struggles to understand themselves can often feel disconnected from their culture, if they find themselves, they can often reconnect to their identity and culture.
The poet describes her journey of reestablishing her linguistic connections to her ancestors and cultural history as a transcendental, spiritual experience that takes place outside of the material