A Gynocritic Reading of Selected Filipino Women Writers’ Short Stories
Rizal Technological University
ABSTRACT
Philippine feminism began with the founding of Asociacion Feminista Filipina in 1905 and Asociacion Feminista Ilongga in 1906 to seek women’ s right to vote. Women’s literature began in 1859 when Leona Florentino, considered “the mother of women’s literature”, started writing poems and later exhibited her work in Madrid and Paris. In 1925, Paz Marquez Benitez wrote the first English modern short story, “Dead Stars”. Merging feminism and women’s literature, this qualitative study assessed the projection of women in selected short stories written by Filipino women writers in three feminism waves, namely, First Wave (1800-1928), Second Wave (1960-1980) and Third Wave (1990-present). It also threshed out similarities and differences in projection and proposed a new feminist model. Directed Content Analysis, one of Content Analysis’ approaches, was used to analyze these stories. American feminist Elaine Showalters’ Gynocriticism, a kind of feminist criticism, was employed as a framework. Results using its Biological Model showed that women’s bodies had different meanings, such as bodies for domination and reproduction. Employing its Linguistic Model, women were depicted to have reinforced and also opposed previous related studies regarding women’s language. Women were projected as ambitious, egoistic and erotic through its Psychoanalytical Model. Women portrayed positive and negative cultural values in its Cultural Model. A new feminist model who is socially aware was proposed based on the study findings.
KEYWORDS
Feminism, women’s literature, gynocriticism, feminist model