The Rise And Fall Of Female Subject Consciousness

For women the enlightenment means coming out from the patriarchal limits and traditional male-centered roles and becoming a person with economic independence,freedom of thought and perfect personality.Louisa May Alcott's masterpiece Little Women sparks reflections on female subject consciousness through portraying March sisters as new women.From the perspective of dialectics of enlightenment this paper adopts the method of theoretical analysis and text reading to affirm and question women 's subject consciousness reflected in the novel,and analyze the differences,contradictions,oppositions and regressions in the process of establishing subject consciousness.By analyzing the resistance of the young women to the tradit ional society and their inherent compromise the author tries to study the imperfection of Alcott in the pursuit of female subject consciousness.On the one hand,it is undeniable that the author and the little women in the novels have the female subject co nsciousness daring to break through tradition and being independence and freedom;on the other hand,the female subject consciousness is ups and downs.They work for the effort but ultimately give up and return to the original state for family.This paper is divided into six parts: through the introduction part expounds the background,the present situation both at home and abroad,the research purpose and significance of the thesis,the research content and the research innovative point and the method;Chapter two summarizes the dialectic of enlightenment and female consciousness which provides the theoretical foundation for the following discussion and paves the way for explaining the practical significance of the dialectic of enlightenment.Chapter three affirms the feminine consciousness enlightenment.It uses the Marxism and feminist theory to criticize patriarchy in Little Women.It eulogizes the new women's excellent quality such as independence,the pursuit of gender equality and the courage to bear the responsibility.Chapter four analyses the ups and downs of female subject consciousness in Little Women and the reasons in the perspective of dialectic of enlightenment.In Little Women the image of father is missing but the patriarchal oppression still exists.The female subject consciousness is down and towards to enlightenment self-destruction.Chapter five is from the ups and downs of female subject consciousness in Little Women and receives the reflections on enlightenment and female's better development.The last part concludes the whole paper.It emphasizes Luisa's expectation of women in Little Women and choice to meet the patriarchy and contradictory in case of the attack from its authority as implicitly to express her ideas.