The Awakening of Female Consciousness in Little Women文献综述

 2022-09-08 12:04:20


The Awakening of Liberal Feminism

—An Analysis on Louisa May Alcottrsquo;s Masterpiece Little Women

Little Women is a novel published in 1868 and is loosely based on Louisa May Alcottrsquo;s own experiences during her childhood. From the book, I know that the four sisters do not rigidly adhere to society but strive for freedom and their dreams. Therefore I think that the liberal feminism was awakening and that society would not simply be a patriarchal society.

As a classic work in female literature, Little Women has been researched for many years, especially in the last decade in China. Specifically, as early as 1868, when Louisa May Alcott first publicly published her work, studied concerning her work rose. From a research perspective, scholars had a variety of opinions. Those who took on a culture perspective analyzed American traditional culture that influenced the story; those who took on the perspective of feminism discussed liberal feminism that was shown by the four sisters in the novel; those who held their perspective in education were concerned that the four lsquo;little womenrsquo; were greatly influenced by Ms. Marchrsquo;s education style and her own behavior; those who took on the character perspective analyzed the experiences and qualities of the women characters. My thesis is mainly concentrated on lsquo;the awakening of liberal feminismrsquo;.

In the past ten years, Chinese scholars have performed a lot of research on women characters and feminism. In the essay Focusing on Women Growth, Huang Ran saw women bravely fight for freedom in a cruel reality in Little Women in 2008. The four sisters in this book each has different personal qualities, habits, dreams, ideologies, and values. They also have their own thought patterns, which allows them to not be the subordinates of men, but independent individuals. Additionally, in 2008, Wen Zhaolian put forward that female consciousness is the key to unscrambling female literary works in The Interpretation of Female Consciousness in Little Women. In her opinion, Louisa May Alcott not only characterized new women images that pursued marriage based on love and equal status with men in families, but also put them into traditional women images that conformed to certain social requirements. Nowadays, the matters that Alcott advocated are still meaningful. There are many people that have tried to unscramble feminism from another perspective, such as Chen Youfang and Chen Jing. In their essay American womenrsquo;s growth under patriarchy in the 19th century, they unscrambled Little Women by mainly talking about Jorsquo;s growth in the patriarchy. They thought that the author expressed her strong desire to overthrow the patriarchal culture by means of Jo. As an ideal incarnation of Alcott, Jorsquo;s unique personality challenged the role of traditional women defined by patriarchal culture. In the description, with an independent will and strong character, Jo abandons her passive position in society, and shows that the author may deny the gender conception at that time and emphasize the independent personalities and intrinsic values of women. Some researchers were seriously concerned about the education in Marchrsquo;s family. They concluded that although most women were restricted by families, the four sisters in Marchrsquo;s family did not stop chasing their dreams. At the same time, their respect ideals in liberal feminism were awakened via family and family education.

Fortunately, I found some researchesrsquo; themes that are similar to that of my research. These studies mostly discussed the awakening of feminism from several aspects, such as attitudes toward love and marriage, female self-strengthening and family values so that one may have a deeper understanding of the development of the American female consciousness. Nevertheless, most of these studies only focused on the four sisters and their efforts in chasing their dreams and freedoms, but a few of them concentrated on the society. There is not enough contrast with the society or tradition, so I believe it is not sufficient to prove the awakening of liberal feminism.

Previous studies and comments on Little Women have attained various achievements, providing valuable information for future research. Particularly, studies on many aspects, such as the characteristics of the four sisters, female consciousness showed by the work, and feminism offer me a solid foundation for further research and analysis. But only a few of them deeply researched the awakening of liberal feminism, and most of them just analyze women characters and their personalities or how female consciousness is embodied in the novel. When we talk about lsquo;awakeningrsquo;, we should not only discuss liberal feminism, but also pay attention to the society where it originally has almost little awakening in order to compare the proof that the four sisters, especially Jo, in this novel contribute to the change of womenrsquo;s status. I would like to concentrate and do more research on both concepts of lsquo;feminismrsquo; and lsquo;awakeningrsquo;.

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