This paper addresses the move away from sociological and cultural interpretations of texts at a time when the commodification of ethnicity is a dominant characteristic of late capitalism. I am interested in the way some scholars of Asian American literature are calling for a turn away from cultural approaches towards the aesthetics of the text. I would like to question the definition and role of the “aesthetic” in this critical move, a development that appears to be in contradiction with transnational constructions of American identity and the contemporary globalization of cultures, especially the global market in ethnic artistic and cultural commodities. Focussing upon the work of Gish Jen, I want to question this idea of the “aesthetic” and the ways in which art is constructed and consumed in the Chinese American literary context.