Female And National Identities

The dissertation focuses on a group of novels written by American female writers from the 1830s to the 1860s.It mainly studies the masterpieces of the four representative authors,namely The Hidden Hand and Capitola’s Peril:A Sequel to The Hidden Hand written by E.D.E.N.Southworth,The Wide Wide World by Susan Warner,The Lamplighter by Maria Cummins,and St.Elmo by Augusta Jane Evans.Women’s fiction in the period,usually defined as "domestic fiction" and "sentimental fiction",embodies the objective life experiences and the subjective emotional world of the white middle-class women in the United States from the perspective of women.Having almost monopolized the literary market in the United States around the mid-19th century,women’s fiction was the most popular literary works in that period.David S.Reynolds,an American literary historian,named this period "American female Renaissance".However,these women’s novels were devaluated and neglected by the traditional literary criticism till about the middle of the 20th century.Such critics as Herbert Ross Brown and Francis Otto Matthiessen believed that women’s fiction taking a family as the setting attached much importance to the inner feelings of women,but little to the society and history.On the one hand,the fiction with the limited literary quality just catered to the vulgar literary taste of the general public;on the other hand,it failed to reveal American spirits and political culture.From the end of the 1970s,with the development of feminism and the emergence of neo-historicism,those women’s novels returned to the focus of the criticism,and the traditional comments were challenged.Although these studies involved the influence of women’s fiction from the 1830s to the 1860s on American culture and morals,the participation in the construction of the social order,and the characteristics of female writing,they just conducted some of the detailed textual analysis,and explored a little about the way how the female works took part in the contribution of American culture,let alone the relation between women’s fiction and the national consciousness.The dissertation mainly adopts the method of textual analysis,identity studies in psychoanalysis,and the concept of community.The study traces the chronological line of the growth of female consciousness,and connects the concerned literary studies with the historical context,public values,women’s inner emotions and the social acceptance of their works.On the one hand,the paper tries to dispute the devaluation and contradict the lack of literariness towards the female fiction so far;on the other hand,it explores the correlation of women’s fiction and American social ideology in that period.Then,it proves that the ideas and values presented in those women’s novels at that time catered to the public desire for independence,freedom and equality,and complied with the general needs to make the nation stable and develop.The thoughts conveyed by those female authors constituted the American mainstream values to be independent,democratic and republican in the mid-nineteenth century.Women’s fiction with the gendered theme,language,and wide social acceptance formed a virtual literary community.Meanwhile,the community,with the great publication and distribution of women’s fiction,became the carrier and agent of the female thoughts and qualities including independence,fortitude,and cooperation so as to promote the establishment of national consciousness and mainstream values and accordingly strengthen the national identity.The relationship between the female identity illustrated in the fiction and the national identity achieved by the public is elucidated and dialectical.The unique artistic features and the irreplaceable social values of women’s fiction from the 1830s to the 1860s are illustrated.The dissertation analyzes the artistic features of the female novels in that period and manifests the unique writing techniques of the female writers.Those women’s novels represent the historical progress of American society.With the description of American social and cultural changes,and the development of the awakening female consciousness and identity,women’s fiction illustrates the female efforts to break through the survival dilemma,to fulfill the domestic obligation,and to take on the social responsibilities.And those novels witness the social senses and participation of American female authors at that time.Although women’s fiction takes the female perceptual cognition as the starting point and a family as the setting,its awareness is public and social.That is confirmed and represented though the delicate description of the female emotion and behaviors.In women’s fiction,the survival predicament alludes to the difficulties of American development;women are applied to indicate the American people;and the family refers to American society.The growth of women forecasts the development of the United States.Such female qualities as independence,persistence and morality constitute American national ideology and core values.Thus,women’ s fiction promotes the process of American national identity.The dissertation deals with each stage chronologically from the 1830s to the 1860s.It focuses on the representative novels in each stage to demonstrate the reflection and promotion of female novels to American social culture,and to illustrate the influence of the female consciousness on the national ideology.With the continuous development and unity of American culture and society,the female consciousness embodied in the female novels also experienced a process from awakening to maturity.To be specific,the rapid rise of American capitalism made the social conflicts increasingly obvious in the 1830s and the 1840s.And the social status of women was relatively low.Correspondingly,The Hidden Hand and Capitola’s Peril:A Sequel to The Hidden Hand written by E.D.E.N.Southworth,as the representative works in the period,expressed the female consciousness awakened in the survival predicament and the preliminary efforts to deal with the identity problem.The immaturity of female consciousness at that moment was also reflected in the literary techniques.The 1850s coincided with the formation of American culture and values.In the historical background of the unbalanced economy and acute social conflicts,the demand for the ideological and moral construction was particularly urgent.The literary works,represented by Susan Warner’s The Wide Wide World and Maria Cummins’s The Lamplighter,explored the process of female identity and proved the female worth through self-analysis and selfculture so as to achieve self-actualization.In the late 1860s when the Civil War and the unity of North and South ended,the feminist movement entered into the historical stage.In Augusta Jane Evans’s St.Elmo on behalf of the literary works of the decade,the female consciousness tended to be mature,and the female identity was to be achieved.That was mainly illustrated by the increasing independence and firm personal behaviors and moral choices.As regards the significance and value of the dissertation,there are five points.Firstly,women’s fiction collectively appeared and rapidly developed from the 1830s to the 1860s.The period is an indispensable part in the history of American literature,as well as an essential content for remolding or rethinking American literature.Secondly,women’s fiction was underrated and neglected for a long time,but its unique literary value and inheritance significance should be practically recognized,especially its relation with the traditional writings before the 1830s and those after the 1860s.In the transitional period from the non-classical to the classic,a group of influential female authors emerged,especially represented by Susan Warner.Thirdly,those female novels vividly presenting American ordinary life at that time provide readers with an access to such aspects as nation,society,politics,economy,war,and history,and show a tendency of women’s participation in social business and politics as well.Fourth,the fiction deals with a series of major issues from the early period of the United States to the civil war,such as the society,the unbalanced economy,the increasingly obvious social contradictions and the weak national consciousness.women’s fiction reflects the ways to carry out the family reform,to conduct the social administration,and to reshape the American tradition.Women’s fiction from the 1830s to the 1860s remolded the female images and made women become the target in the literary horizon.The change lays a solid ideological foundation for the development of feminism.The Fifth is the allusion of the female identity to the national identity.The female growth is portrayed to indicate the formation of national will,the stability of American society,the development of the country.An individual is referred to the general public,and a family is compared to the nation.Women’s fiction plays a positive role in the formation of American ideology and constitutes a necessary component of American national identity.