Taylor’s Search In Space For Woman Identity In The Bean Trees

Barbara Kingsolver(1955-)is one of the most famous female novelists in contemporary America,whose works feature a typical feminist style and show genuine concern over issues of gender,identity,and race in society.By dint of the Feminist Geography to the study of Kingsolver’s The Bean Trees,this thesis analyzes woman identity construction in isolated township space,public road space,and harmonious female space.This thesis sheds light on how Taylor constructs female space through traveling against the backdrop of disparate cultures,traditions,social mores,economic,and political systems.Ultimately,the way Taylor builds her unconventional maternal image embodies the freedom of choices in woman identity.This thesis is divided into three chapters.The first chapter analyzes the reasons for the runaway of the heroine Taylor.Iniquitous gender segregation in Pittman County,especially the family space that is dominated by patriarchal culture,reveals how man-centered discourse has influenced the spatial confinement to and dominance over women.Taylor,who hails from a non-traditional family,develops her independent personality with maternal care and father absence.To escape the suffocating reality in Pittman County,Taylor determines to have an auto-traveling westward by which she secures female space.Chapter Twocenters on Taylor’s subversion of the American west paradigm through transgression across gendered space.At the same time,Taylor’s fortuitous adoption of Turtle makes the car a mobile place for intimate mother-daughter relationship development,which challenges the traditional family model.Chapter Three elaborates upon Taylor’s feminine enlightenment and self-fulfillment in the female community.Hand in hand with women in the community,Taylor gets support materially and spiritually in making her braver as an adoptive mother and strives for custody of Turtle.In the meantime,Taylor selflessly escorts political refugees to safe lands.As it turns out,Taylor develops an independent female-oriented identity and finds her personal and social value in the role of a mother and the joy of helping others.This thesis ends in recapitulating that although space is the means for patriarchal culture to manipulate women,it provides them with a window of opportunity to transgress gendered space.It is the openness and mobility of road space that allow women to break through spatial segregation.Taylor’s westward journey not only justifies the necessity to transcend gendered space but also implies Kingsolver’s aspiration for social justice.