Feminist Literary Theory

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Feminist Literary Theory

• Ms. A. Stephens
• Benjamin E. Mays High School

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Quotes for comments

• What enrages me is the way women are used as
  extensions of men, mirrors of men, devices for
  showing men off, devices for helping men get what
  they want. They are never there in their own
  right, or rarely. The world of the Western
  contains no women.
• Sometimes I think the world contains no women.
• -JANE TOMPKINS, Me and My Shadow

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Student Quote

• I have a male mind with male experiences.
  Therefore, I see things through the perception of
  a man. I couldnt relate to some of Virginia
  Woolfs view and I despised the way she pushed
  her view on the reader. This was brought on by
  my masculinity, I feel.
• -Bill, Grade 12, after reading A Room of Ones Own

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Student Quote

• Being a feminist is not a gender-specific role.
• -Erin, Grade 11

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Feminisms Goal

• Change the degrading view of women
• Help make all women realize that they are
  significant
• Make all women see that each woman is a valuable
  person possessing the same privileges and rights
  as every man
• Women must define their voices

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Feminisms Goal

• Hope to create a society in which the female
  voice is valued equally with the male

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What Students Can See With Feminist Theory

1. How students view female characters and deal with
   the authors treatment of those characters
2. How students evaluate the significance of the
   female in terms of her influence on the literary
   work
3. How students decipher and manipulate patterns in
   text, especially with the treatment of women

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Whats Wrong With This Picture

• Feminist critics wish to show society the errors
  of ways of thinking concerning women
• Literature and society have frequently
  stereotyped women as angels, barmaids, bitches,
  whores, brainless housewives, or old maids
• Women must break free from such oppression and
  define themselves

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How To Apply

• Images of the female body as presented in a text.
  This would highlight how various parts of the
  body are significant. (uterus and breasts)
• Female language. Look at differences between male
  and female language. Do women speak or write
  differently from men?

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How To Apply

• The female psyche and its relationship to
  writing. Freud and Lacan are decent
  references.(hint, hint)
• Culture. Analyzing cultural forces (such as
  importance and value of womens roles in a given
  society), critics investigate how society shapes
  a womans understanding of herself, her society,
  and her world.

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Traditional vs.. Feminist

• She was a bad girl, a tease, and a flirt.
• She was a beautiful little fool who depended on
  her husband to take care of her.

• Shes just been treated poorly by her horrible,
  selfish, chauvinistic husband. She is not bad.
• Her husband took control of her and wouldnt let
  her think for herself. She was doing her best
  within the limits of womens role in society.

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Traditional vs. Feminist

• She is the queen, she has some power.
• Gertrude is simply the mother of Hamlet and the
  queen of the country.

• She is more of a plot device than of thematic
  importance herself.
• Shes defined by her husbands and her son.

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Works Cited

• Appleman, Deborah. Critical Encounters In High
  School English Teaching Literary Theory to
  Adolescents. Urbana NCTE, 2000.
• Bressler, Charles E. Literary Criticism An
  Introduction to Theory and Practice. Englewood
  Cliffs Prentice Hall, 1994.