| The purpose of this study was to investigate the ways in which young women read stereotypical female characters in traditional American literature written by male authors. The study focused on responses to reading that reflected individual, societal, and cultural changes in young women's attitudes toward their own gender. The researcher examined the literary responses of ten young women in an 11th grade Advanced Placement Language and Composition class. Three novels were read and discussed during the year-long project: The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne; The Portrait of a Lady, by Henry James, and The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. After the reading, discussion, and journal work was completed on each novel, a focus group discussion was conducted and videotaped for later transcription and analysis. The data from the focus group discussions, together with the young women's journal responses formed the basis of this study.;A method of layered reading, adapted from Brown and Gilligan (1991), was used for analyzing the data. In this method, the videotape transcriptions were read four times for different purposes: Understanding the Dialogues, Listening for a Sense of Self, Listening for the Voice of Resistance, and Listening for the Autonomous Voice. Results of the study indicated that the young women strongly resisted stereotypical female roles in the literature that did not reflect equitable positions for women in society. The participants exhibited a high level of resistance to women in abusive relationships, women with morally corrupt characters, and women as objects of public ridicule. The analysis of data indicated that several of the young women imagined female characters that possessed qualities, which defined them as autonomous women. The study suggested that the young women held positive attitudes about the role of women in modern society and were unlimited by stereotypical models in literature. |
