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Chapter TwoServing Alcohol and Exploitation

A.Alcohol Drinking between Vietnamese and Americans

While the General and the commandant make up the plotline that highlights thesubjectivity of Vietnamese,regardless of their political orientations,in the war thatcarries on after the end of the official one,the narrator’s constant interaction withAmerican elites when being a refugee in the US is an obvious implication of anotherpower structure that secretly supports the undestroyed violence machine.TheAmericans who appear as main characters in the novel are majorly white men,all ofwho are shown to be authorities working either for the US government or as influentialscholars or movie producers.They include a CIA officer named as Claude,a congressmember referred to as the Congressman,a literature professor called Hammer,a headscholar majoring in Oriental Studies mentioned as the Department Chair,an Englishscholar of Asian Studies called Richard Hedd,and lastly a well-recognized Hollywoodmovie director named as the Auteur.Like the General and the commandant,all of themexcluding the Chair are explicitly mentioned in the novel as alcohol drinkers,despite ofthe fact that there are more types of alcohol varying from whiskey,wine to cocktail etc.and they are shown to drink at feast in which the narrator participates as a guest.

Claude is the first American revealed to frequently drink alcohol with the narratorand the General.As mentioned in the last chapter,the novel begins as the General andthe narrator drink Jack Daniel’s while they are planning to retreat from Saigon.Thewhiskey is brought by Claude,who is asked for help in the situation,to the General as agift.Similar scenes also take place when Claude is invited by the General to the grandopening of his liquor store where they discuss the plan of killing the crapulent majorwhile drinking scotch together.Besides,Claude is also indicated to constantly drinkalcohol with the narrator at bars run by Americans back in Vietnam,as well as inThailand during the first couple of days after the narrator arrives in the country as amember of the vanguard team.

B.Discourse Manipulation through Alcohol

In order to recover from the power crisis resulted from failure in Vietnam War,theUS has turned its emphasis from direct military intervention to a more implicit way ofpracticing imperialism politics and retaining its global hegemonical power.In the novel,alcohol drinking of American elites particularly with their Vietnamese collaboratorsexemplifies the continuity of American imperialism discourse that drives its global andtransnational war machine,political manipulation that fuels violence while covering upthe fact of injustice,and economic exploitation which helps expanding its capital andwealth while undermining the body of undeveloped nations.

Alcohol can help people temporarily get rid of differences in identity and status,and communicate based on the essential identity as humans and equal members of the society.Plato thinks wine gives people rationality and reason(Belfiore,1986).It haseducational function and helps build good interpersonal relationship and creativityduring conversations.However,alcohol drinks in relations of sociality can be part of本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。