CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study Feminism is a term to mention women’s movement
to get equal right politically,
economically and socially with men. According to June Hannam in her book Feminism: A Short History of a Big Idea,
feminism history began in the end of th
century coincided with the raise of enlightenment era in Europe. It firstly appeared in 1785 which was pioneered by Lady
Mary Wortley and Marquis den Condorcet
who fight for women equality in having education like men. Generally feminist struggle divided into three parts,
the first wave of feminism lasted from th
century until pre-1960, the second wave begin after1960 and followed by the
third wave or post feminism (Hannam,
2007: 8). Every waveraised controversy in the era they were existed. In the feminism there are
many schools as followed: Liberal, radical,
Marxism, socialism, post modernism, and post colonialism feminist
In
1960, feminist literary criticism began to growin western, the development of feminist literary criticism followed by the
development of politic, economy, and social
condition at that time. According to Ratna (2004), feminist literary criticism can be described as a literary criticism that
emphasizes the critical concerns for the impact of gender and woman’s struggle, also
consists a diverse collection of social theories,
political movements, and moral philosophies, largely motivated by or xiv concerning
the experiences of women (Ratna, 2004, as cited in Amalia, 2007). While Culler (1983) mention it as “reading as a
woman”, according to Culler reading as a woman will be more democratic (Endraswara,
2003: 149). Moreover, Yoder states that
feminist literary criticism is not criticizingwomen, or critique about women,
and female author. It is simply defined
as sees literature with special awareness, awareness that there are gender injustice
which is related to our culture, literature and life. These genders differentiate between
author, reader, characterization and the extrinsic factor that influence the sense of
writing (Sugihastuti and Suharto, 2005: 5).
ourselves as a woman and analyze the
work through women’s view and paradigm. Basically, a feminist literary work must be portrayed men superiority toward women
existence. Why women become the victim
in the patriarchal system, and why women always be put as the second sex or inferior creature. The stereotypes above is
the focus of feminist literary criticism. In addition, Endraswara states that the literary
work which analyzed using feminism theory
emphasizes women position in the literary work and how the writer’s ideology as women or positions in which women
existence. Moreover, this literary criticism should be able to express the aspect of
women’s oppression and inferiority to men (2004: 147). In summary, Yoder assumes
feminist literary criticism as quilt, What
is quilt? A quilt combines in its make up the qualities of the “downhome”
American woman-practical, imaginative, nurturing, collaborative. It is an art of necessity; a quilt might be made on
the frontier in order to keep children
warm, out of whatever left over pieces of cloth existed (Endraswara, 2003: 149).
xv According
to Yoder’s statement above, feminism assumes as a quilt that build and formed from soft rags. It means that feminism
is a strong foundation for women to read,
write, and understanding a literary work as women just like quilt which become a foundation for many kind of rags. All in
all, feminist literary criticism can be defined
as the basic of reading as a woman, and analyzing literary work through women’s paradigm.
Literature is the mirror of real life. It is a
reflection of human’s life which described
what and how they were life and usually reflect the social condition when the work is made. Through literary work, human
can transcribe what is in his mind and
heart beautifully, artistically and imaginatively. In literary work, we can
find various kinds of problem taking
place in our daily life and the emotional sense on individual. There are many kinds of literary
work and one of it is novel. Novel is a long
prose narrative which present the world that created by the author. According
to Oxford English Dictionary, novel is
“a fictious prose narrative or tale of considerable length (now usually are long enough to fill
one or more volumes) in which characters and action representative or the real life of
past or present times are portrayed in a plot of more or less complexity”. In summary,
novelis the reflection of human’s life that
formed by the author into interesting story. The Awakeningis one of interesting
novels which is reflected the social
condition of the author, Kate Chopin. The Awakeningwas a controversy when it was
published in 1899; the novel is talking about
female character’s struggle to find place, love, and independence.
xvi The
Awakeningopens while Edna Pontellier and her family are vacationing on Grand Isle which is located in the Gulf of
Mexico. This is the place where Edna’s “awakening”
begins. In Grand Isle she learns to swim, rediscovers her passion for painting, and falls in love with a young,
single man, Robert Lebrun. While at Grand Isle, she is introduced to a dense network of
female community, which also contributes
to her awakening. She forges close bonds with two women, Madame (Adele) Ratignolle and Mademoiselle Reisz,
which continues after her return home.
Shortly after she returns to her New Orleans
home, she stops observing social conventions
such as calling on other women of her class and accepting callers. She continues her painting, which makes her
independence financially. Edna also begins to participate in gambling at the race track
which,in turn, affords her more control over
decisions about money. This newfound financialindependence allows her to purchase a house of her own, and allows her to
leave her husband. Edna’s desire for further
freedom leads her to send her children to her mother-in-law’s house, pursue an affair with another man, and reunite with
Lebrun(who ultimately leaves her). In the
end, she realizes that despite the female community in which she participates,
she is denied the agency she desires. As
a result, she returns to Grand Isle and swims to her death. In summary, The Awakening indicts
the phallocentric domination requiring women
to submit to, financially depend upon, and loyal to their husbands. The marriage institution also requires women to
place their children above themselves and xvii maintain
social appearances. This novel takes setting on the Victorian age which is women or wife treated as the property, and
they didn’t have any chances like man.
Victorian age is a term to mention an era in
which Queen Victoria of United Kingdom
took a rule from June 1837 until her death on the nd of January 1901.
This era is believed as the most successfull
era inthe British history, there are many progress in every aspects. In the contrary the
development in this era did not follow by
the development on the way they think. Poverty, child labor and prostitution is
some problems that faced by the
Victorian people atthat time. The social classes also existed at that time, in every side of the
town there are many slum areas that inhabitant
by the working class, in the other side people from upper and middle class live in wealthy and did not care each other
(http://www.fashionera.com/victorian_era). The status of women in the Victorian
era is often seen as an illustration of
the striking discrepancy between England's national power and wealth and what many, then and now, consider its
appallingsocial conditions. Women were seen
as pure and clean. Because of this view, theirbodies were seen as temples which
should not be adorned with jewelry nor
used for physical exertion or pleasurable sex.
The role of women was to have children and
tend to the house, in contrast to men, according
to the concept of Victorian masculinity
(http://www.fashionera.com/a_womans_place).Women in Victorian were placed as
the second sex; they did not have any
chances like men. Although the government is a woman, but ordinary women still oppressed by men, women
also did not have right to vote.
xviii Women
were put as the second class in the society under the men. They believed women would be better occupied concentrating
on improving the lives of other women
and children than working to improve healthcare, education and social service. That is why in the end of this era
feminism movement aroused to fight for the equality of women right to men.
The history of women’s rebellion begins in
1790 when a philosopher and matematician,
Marquis den Condorcet wrote an essay under the title “Essay on the Admission of Women to Citizens' Rights”in
which he theorized that there was no justification
to keep women from voting (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/rschwart/hist255/at/rebellion),
his essay inspire Olympe de Gourges to
write an essay by the title "Declaration of the Rights of Women and Female Citizens."She wrote that
if women could go to the guillotine for breaking
laws then logically they should have citizen rights to begin with. Later this movement is followed by other movement and
rebellion to show women’s existence as a
human being. Basically women’s rebellion is caused by the condition of the society itself; at the time when feminism
begins the society condition is constructed by the patriarchal system, women were put as
the second class of society after men, they
were treated as an inferior creature. In The Awakening, Edna Pontellier is portrayed as a woman who is oppressed by the
patriarchal system. The Awakeningis a
mirror image to feminism it is about Edna’s rebellion against and emancipation from the patriarchal system. According to
Saphiro in her book, Women in American xix
Society(1994), there are some
discrimination which have to be faced by American women in the past; one of them is related to
genderdivision labor. Women do not have
some occasion and wide access as men, because women have to work some jobs which have been constructed by the society,
they are cleaning, washing, cooking, decorating
the house and other jobs related to private sphere (Saphiro, 1994, as cited in Kurniawati, 2007). As commonly Victorian
women in the United States, Edna Pontellier
is expected to be a good “mother-women” (house wife) for her husband, she always wished to stay at home, be a good
host and taking care of her children.
That is why the vacation with her family to
Grand Isle becomes the beginning of her “awakening”.
After she goes home to New Orleans, she changes to be someone that totally different. She starts to paint and
become financially independence. This condition
makes her brave to leave her home and buyher new own house, she leaves her husband and let her mother in law taking
care of her children. Those all things are Edna’s rebellion to get her right as a freedom
creature not as an inferior creature.
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