CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study Literature is simply another way we can
experience the world around us through
our imagination (Jones, 1968: 1). Literary work is an author's thinking.
The author writes the literary
works based on what he feels, sees, and experience in the real life. Literaturerepresents life.
And life is, in a large meaning, social reality,
even though the natural world and subjective world of the individual have also been the objects of the literary
'imitation' (Wellek and Waren. 1956: 94). In other word, we can say literature is one of
the subject which deals with internal and
external factors of human life which are described through author's imagination.
Because literature represents life which deals
with internal and external factors of
human life, it will be interestedto criticize it, because we will get much knowledge by this criticism. To criticize
literary works, we need some understandings
about literarycriticism. Peck and Coyle (1986:150) defined that "Literary criticism is the analysis,
interpretation and evaluation of literary works".
It does not mean that literary
criticism isto find the fault in literary works.
Analyzing literature means
analyzing human life as experiences, ideas, motivations, emotions or expectationswhich are
expressed in the words.
Literature also pays attention to
the society life reflected at that time. Therefore, if we read literature deeply we will not only be
entertained but also may be 1 influenced by author's idea about something
the author wants to say in his work, and
the idea will enlarge our point of view.
Talking about literary criticism,
we also remember the issue of gender discrimination.
We often find this issue in literary works because literature is a product of culture and becomes a media
oftransferring valuesto the society.
There are many kinds of topic
which can beanalyzed through the life of society.
One of them is feminism, or it is
well known as the movement to get equality between men and women.
Many feminists believe that patriarchy system
is the cause of inequality and unfair
treatment between men and women in the society as Mies (1987: 37) said that patriarchy means the rule of father
which includes the rule of husbands, of
bosses and the rule of every man in all of aspects such as politics and economics. It can be said that patriarchy is
the system where men dominated all of aspects
of life. So, there is an inequality and unfair treatment between men and women and men have more power to dominate
exploit, determine and control females.
It makes women oppressed in patriarchal society because these gender discriminations.
The concept of gender is the characteristic of
men and women that is formed by social
or cultural factors. So, there is an assumption about the role of women and men in our society. Women are
assumed as calm, beautiful, weak, motherhood
and emotional. Men are assumed as strong, rational, masculine and brave figure (Handayani and Sugiarti,2006: 5).
This condition builds an assumption that
men are more capable to bea leader in all aspects of life. Some literary works described those gender
discriminations. As K.M Newton (1988: 266)
said that much of our literature in fact depends upon a series of fixed images of women stereotypes. It is also supported by
the statement of Endraswara (2003: 143)
that literary work has been culture regime and has big interest to gender case.
In almost all of the literary
works, either written by men or women, the domination of men is stronger. The lack of
contribution of women happened because
of unequal opportunity. The assumption that women are irrational and emotional makes them impossible to be a leader
and place them in unimportant position.
In patriarchal society, there are almostalways
different treatments given to women that
cut them off from access to opportunities, facilities and resources.
Such discriminatory treatment may
be part of social custom. Therefore, men, either unconsciously or consciously, have
oppressed women, allowing them little or
no voice in the political, social or economic issues of their society
(Bressler: 1998: 160). In majority of
households, men are the central figures who financially support their family while women stay at home
and take care of their children.
Feminist criticism tries
todestroy this image. Initially feminist criticism reflected the political goals of feminism
inthat the authors and text are judged in accordance with how far they could be
reconciled with feminist ideology. These 'images of women' school of feminist critics
adopt this point of view and is particularly
concerned with how women's characters are represented in literature (Newton, 1988: 263).
Newton (1988: 267) also added
that feminist literary criticism becomes political when it asserts that literature,
academic curricula and the standards of critical
judgment should be changed, so that literature will no longer function as propaganda furthering sexist ideology. The
feminist critic recognizes that literature
is an important contributing element to moral atmosphere in which women are derogated.
Feminist literary criticism can
be divided into two distinct varieties. The first type in concerned with women as a reader
– with women as the consumer of male
produced literature, and with the way in which the hypothesis of a female reader changes our apprehension of a given
text, awakening us to the significant of
its sexual codes. And the second type of feminist criticism concerned with woman as a writer- with woman as the producer
of textual meaning, with the history,
themes, genres and structures of literature by women (Sholwater in Newton; 1988: 268).
Considering all the reasons above, the writer
would like to relate the topic to Pearl
S. Buck's novel, Pavilion of Women. There are some reasons why the writer chooses Pavilion of Womennovel as the
research object. The first reason is from
the novel itself. Pearl S. Buck's novel, Pavilion of Womentells the oppressions of women in traditional Chinese
society and it is influenced by patriarchal
family ideology. In the condition where the women are oppressed and most of women characters receive it as the
women nature, there are some female characters
that struggle for their rightand their freedom; for example Madame Wu, as the main female character inthis novel
gives big influences and contributions
to the other female characters to get the freedom from their problems and oppressions.
It is also supported by another
reason. Pavilion of Womenwas a fairly radical
approach to the subject of men and women in the decade of the 40s. It is because this novel tells about the struggle of
women who live in oppression because of
the patriarchal culture and this women oppression portrayed the condition of Chinese women at that time.
Women’s liberation was still catching its
breath before the next big battle; the sexual revolution was twenty years in
the future. Pavilion of Womenwas
published in 1946. Yet Buck tackles these issues head on through the story of Madame Wuwith a
frankness that was probably shocking at
that time (Sedges in http://www.bookreporter.com).
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