本研究旨在将叙事学引入自传，尤其是美国经典自传这一领域，将结构形式研究与种族和性别等意识形态问题研究相结合，建构一种适用于自传的社会历史语境化叙事诗学。20世纪70年代以来，美国经典自传的研究可谓方兴未艾，其总体批评趋势也逐步从之前的“生活”转向 “自我”，并开始重视对所谓的边缘化民族（少数族裔）和性别（女性）对自传叙事影响的研究。尽管如此，美国经典自传的批评作为一个整体并没有对“写作”或曰“形式”本身给予足够的重视。为弥补这一不足，本文以叙事技巧与意识形态的有机关联为切入点，采用对比研究的方法，从不同的叙事语法、结构和手段，对《富兰克林自传》、道格拉斯《1845年自传》及《1855年自传》、以及汤亭亭的《女勇士》等四部自传进行了深入研究。通过对叙事学现有理论模式的修正，本研究对上述美国经典自传的叙事技巧和策略进行了探讨，既展示了叙事学理论对自传文学研究强大的阐释作用，也从一个新的侧面丰富了美国经典自传的研究成果，既达到了促进叙事研究的语境化和传统意识形态或政治批评的形式化进程，也有助于克服文学批评中的单纯形式研究或单纯政治文化批评的片面性。

This study aims to study classical American autobiographies with a narratological-ideological approach that combines the formal studies with the issues of race and gender. On the one hand it forms an attempt to extend narratological studies into the long neglected field of autobiography; on the other hand, it can also contribute some original findings to the reading of classical American autobiographies. Historically speaking, the studies of classical American autobiographies has thrived since the 1970s with its focus shifting from the traditional “bios” to “auto” along with the ever increasing tendency of centralizing the marginalized and the gender –biased. However, the studies of American autobiography in general have not given the “writing” its due.To redress the balance, this reseach probes into four classical American autobiographies, namely, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Douglass’s Narrative of 1845 and My Bondage and My Freedom of 1855 in terms of narrative grammar, structure and strategies with a methodology of comparison and contrast throughout. Based on a new narratological framework of autobiography, this study hopes to shed some new light not only on the classical American autobiographies in question but on American autobiography as a whole.