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The founding ideal of the American society is structured upon the fact that the distinctiveness of the American nation stems from the mixing of different races into a nation called Americans. The discussion of contemporary Chinese-American novels suggest that mixed-race relationships in American society are based on descent rather than the consent of individuals. Therefore, this work aims to examine contemporary novels written by Chinese American authors with the guidance of a theoretical background from Werner Sollors´s definitions of consent and descent, together with the idea of racial formation presented by Mchael Omi and Howard Winant. Lastly, we hope this piece of work contributes and helps future academic work on mixed-race studies.

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Karagöz Gümüs‡ubuk, Özlem
Özlem Karagöz Gümüs‡ubuk graduated from Ege University, Department of American Culture and Literature in 2001. She completed her M.A. thesis titled, "Defining the Beats: Jack Kerouac´s On the Road". In 2008, she received her PhD at Dokuz Eylül University. She is currently working as an Assistant Professor at Ege University.

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