Some Key Questions for Feminist Theory
A small group presented Feminist literary theory to our class on October 4. Here are some of the key questions they presented:
- How does the fictional portrayal of female characters reflect the reality of women’s lives?
- How does the creation of female characters reinforce or resist certain social attitudes toward women?
What are some more key questions that Feminist Theory asks of texts?
on October 24th, 2006 at 8:08 pm
Jim-
I think that the manner woman are presented in “great literature” of the past matters little, but I believe that the way they are presented in contemporary literature, film, and mass media is tremendously important. In brief, this is because our horizons of possibility are derived from the narratives we encounter. We like to think that our imaginations are boundless, but in truth we have to be shown that something is possible before we can conceive it as a possibility. If women are only portrayed in very narrowly defined roles, they are likely to overlook real possibilities. Unfortunately, while many persons understand this, the commercial media, driven by the “almighty dollar,” continues to feed us mostly stereotyped images of women. Unless an attempt is made to curb this “freedom of expression,” I think the situation will only worsen.