| Nelle Harper Lee is an American author known for her1960Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, which deals with the issues ofracism and feminism that were observed by the author as a child in her hometown ofMonroeville, Alabama. As Lee’s only published book, it led to the Presidential Medalof Freedom of the United States for her contribution to literature in2007. Concernedwith some social issues, the book was banned and lifted for several times, and finallyfound its unique position in American literarure.Some critics have analyzed the novel from the narrator’s father, an integritylawyer defending for a wrongly accused black man to demonstrate some social issues,such as unfairness and racial discrimination. This thesis tries to analyze the freedomof choice of some female characters in men-dominated society fromExistentialist-Feminist aspect.Based on Simone de Beauvoir’s Existentialist-Feminist in The Second Sex, thethesis uncovers the social bondage to women in the patriarchal America and revealsthe dilemma of women in men-dominated society by analyzing some femalecharacters. Besides Introduction and Conclusion, the thesis consists three chapters.Chapter One explores the oppression and bondage of women from patriarchal society.Chapter Two probes into the self-consciousness of female and their resistance tomales. Chapter Three analyzes their life after the resistance. The free choice of femalein the men-dominated society is doomed to failure.The thesis aims to reveal that women, in men-dominated society, are in thesecond place and would be the second sex forever. They could not acquire theauthentic freedom in patriarchal society. |
PDF Full Text Request