Gender Geography: Space,Place And Gender In Literature

With the development of literary spatial studies,space theories and geographical theories are more and more used in literary studies,so as to provide new perspectives,approaches,methods and findings for literary research.Gender geography is the combination of gender and geographical studies to explore the relationship of space with gender relations,gender differences,and power relations between genders.The space is composed of binary opposites,that is,the male is in the center of the space,with the control over the space,while women,on the contrary,are on the edge of the space and are restricted by men in the use of space.Men construct spatial representations of sexual oppression by gazing at the female body.The female body is regarded as the consumed landscape,and in the male visual space,they exist in the form of “object,” without little chance to have their voice heard.At the same time,women are the subjects of male surveillance.By looking at the female body,men achieve the purpose of disciplining female bodies and forcing sexual violence on them.Besides revealing this unbalanced spatial distribution pattern of the sexes,gender geography,more importantly,points out that the spatial distribution of these two-element opposites is not fixed.Women can move their bodies across spatial boundaries by walking and by means of transportation.At the same time,through the replacement of gender space and the construction of "feminist society",they can deconstruct the discourse which is set by patriarchal society.This thesis is composed of five chapters.The first chapter is the introduction part,mainly introducing the research background,combing the domestic and foreign research results and pointing out the research significance of this thesis.The second chapter focuses on the viewpoint that space is a “binary opposition”: It mainly examines the masculine workspace,consumption space,adventure space and knowledge space as well as the feminine repression space,escaping space,conquered space and caring space.The third chapter analyzes the spatial representation of sexual oppression under male gaze,which mainly includes the consumed landscape represented by salesgirls / waitresses,prostitutes,window-dressing / billboards,and the surveillance and regulation of women through panoramic viewing and peeping by the male.Chapter four discusses the geography of women’s resistance,that is,women can use boundaries,space practices such as body movement,and space displacement to resist the spatial representation of binary opposition.The fifth chapter summarizes the whole thesis.