-
滨江学院
本科生毕业论文（设计）
The Study of Jo
in
Little Women
from the
Prospective of
Feminism
姓
名：
庄芳琳
何佳萍
吴雪诚
吴怡斐
郑潇洒
何斯钦
指导老师：
吴素芳
专
业：
英
语
提交日期：
2
013
年
5
月
30
日
1
Contents
1.
Introduction……
………………………………………………
.
……………………<
/p>
5
2.
Literature
Review………………
.
………………………………………………
.
…
..5
2.1 Definition
and Features of
F
eminism……………………………………………
.6
2.2Relevant Studies
of Jo’s
Feminism in
Little Women
…………………………
.
…
.6
3. A comprehensive
analysis of feminism on Jo in
Little Wo
men
………………
...
……
8
3.1 Pursuit of
F
reedom ……………………………………………
.
…………………
8
3.2 Demand
of True Love
…………………………………………
..
…
...
…………
..10
3.3 Desire for I
nd
ependence……………………………………………
..
…………
..11
3.4 Embodiment of E
quality
……………………………………………
..
…………
.13
4. Enlightenment of feminism embodied
in Jo in modern times
………
...
…
...
……
..15
4.1 Modern
Expression of Feminism in P
rofessions……
……………
.
……………
15
4.2 Modern
Expression of Feminism in Marriage L
ife
……………
..
……………
..16
5. Conclusion
………………………………………
…………
.
………………
...
………
18
References
……………………………………………………
.
…………………………
19
Acknowledgement
s
………………………………………………………………
...
….
..20
2
从《小妇人》中分析乔的女权主义
指导老师：吴素芳
（浙江中医药大学，杭州，浙江
, 310053)
摘要
：
《小妇人》
由美
国作家露易莎·梅·奥尔科特所著，
她是美国文学史上最突出的作家之一，
也被认为是以为女权主义者。
《小妇人》是她最成功最著名的作品。
《小妇人》是一部以美国南
北战争为背景，
以<
/p>
19
世纪美国新英格兰地区的一个普通家庭四个姐妹之间的生活琐
事。
此小说
与
1868
年出版后受到了极大的关注。本文旨在通过分析
《小妇人》分中的女性乔，阐述
奥尔科
特的女权主义观点。这个观点在主人公乔的身上体现的淋漓尽致。乔，酷爱写作与
阅读，独立
勇敢。
不甘心做一个家庭主妇，
选择自己喜欢的工作
-
写作，
厌恶
社会无理的要求
--
女性权力不
及男性
。本文分别从自由，爱情，平等，独立四个角度，分析乔的女权主义思想。并结合现代
社
会，剖析乔这种女权主义在现代社会中的意义。
关键词
：《小妇人》
;
乔
;
女权主义
3
The Study of Jo in
Little
Women
from the
Prospective
of Feminism
Director
：
Wu
Sufang
（
College of Foreign
Languages, Zhejiang Chinese Medical University,
Hangzhou,
Zhejiang,
310053
）
Abstract
: Little Women
is written by an American author,
Louisa May Alcott, who is one of the most
prominent writers in American
literature as well as a feminist.
Little Women
is one of the
most
successful and famous works of
hers. It is a novel which is set in the Civil War,
and based on the four
sisters‘ family
life in New England in the USA in
the
19
th
century. It received a
lot of attention when
it published.
This thesis is aimed at analyzing Jo in the
Little Women
to state the
point of Louisa May
Alcott‘s concept of
feminism. This view is reflected incisively and
vividly on the heroin Jo. Jo,
who
has a passion for writing and reading
and her characters are independent and brave. She
is not content
to be a housewife and
chooses her favorite
job
—
writing. Disliking the
unreasonable request of the
society
—women‘s power is
less than men‘s. The artic
le is written
respectively from four
perspectives
—freedom, love,
equality and independence to analyze of Jo‘s
feminism ideas. And
combining with the
modern society, it dissects the significance of
Jo‘s feminism in modern society.
Keywords
:
Little
Women
; Jo; feminism
4
The Study of
Jo in
Little Women
from the
Prospective of
Feminism
1.
Introduction
Louisa May
Alcott was born on November 29, 1832, the second
daughter of Amos
Bronson
and
Abigail
Abba
May
Alcott.
She
was
raised
in
Concord,
Massachusetts,
a
small town to the north of
Boston that was home to many great writers of the
day.
Little Women
is a novel
published in 1868 and written by American author
Louisa
May Alcott. The story concerns
the lives and loves of four sisters growing up
during the
American
Civil
War.
It
is
based
on
Alcott's
own
experiences
as
a
child
in
Concord,
Massachusetts with her three sisters,
Anna, May, and Elizabeth. The novel tells of their
progress into young womanhood with the
additional strains of romance. It is a story of
their growing maturity and wisdom and
the search for the contentedness of family life.
In this situation, the
paper tends to analyze the pursuit for freedom and
demand of
true
love,
embodiment
of
equality,
and
desire
for
independent
personality
and
independent rights to
make special analysis of feminism on Jo in
English. In doing so,
the
readers might have a deep understanding of the
feminism.
2. Literature
Review
Little Woman
, one of
the classics of American literature, was written
by American
woman
——
Louisa
May
Alcott.
Woman
in
the
19
th
century
were
still
limited
to
traditional opinions that they were
opposed to belong to
the family, obey
their husbands‘
orders .They could not
have the chance to compete equally with men in
many fields of
society. However, Louisa
May Alcott did not look upon herself as the
adjunct of the men.
She was determined
to break the fetters on the women, and tried to
choose a profession
to
make
a
living
on
her
way
through
this
rough
and
tumble
world.
Hence,
there
is
no
doubt
that
Little
Women
occupies
an
essential
position
in
the
history
of
American
literature in the
19
th
century.
5
2.1 Definition and Features of Feminism
As to the meaning of feminism: ―most
people think ?feminism‘ is about equality of
the sexes, and activism t
o
achieve equality of women‖.
(Johnson,
2011, p30)
This theory
is
called: ―Socialist
feminism and was
used increasingly during the 1970s to describe a
mixed theoretical and practical method
to achieving women‘s equality. In addition, this
theory analyzed the relation between
the oppression of women and other oppression in
society.
‖
(Linda,
2011, p22)
In
the
Cambridge
dictionary,
the
definition
of
feminism
is
the
belief
that
women
should be allowed the same rights as
men and be treated in the same way, but also when
it
is
used
to
describe
a
man
that
means
the
behavior
of
man
is
similar
to
women.
―According
to
MS
magazine,
feminism
sounds
like
a
negative
word
for
most
women
.
T
hey don‘t like it or use
it‖
.
(Karol, 2011, p28)
However, a very interesting article
which
is
from
Men
in
Feminism
said:
―some
men
seem
to
be
interested
in
Feminism;
they
prefer
to
acquire
more
knowledge
of
it
and
encourage
more
of
them
to
realize
that
fem
inism benefits
everyone.‖
(Lizzie, 2003, p19)
Therefore, to some extent, the readers
can find that males and females still
have different attitudes to this word.
For the features of feminism, the first
one
is to stress women‘s gender
differences
and their expression in
literary texts and texts interpretation, that is,
gender poetics and
gender reading.
Secondly, it puts emphasis on the expression of
gender symbol difference,
advocating
women‘s
discourse
and
maternal
instinct
discourse.
Besides,
it
establishes
women‘s equality
of political rights on the basis of female social
difference and d
iscourse
difference.
2.2Relevant Studies
of Jo’s
Feminism in
Little
Wome
There
are
many
scholars
who
throw
some
light
on
the
feminist
interpretation
of
Litter
Women
.
Although the book is
filled with submissive women who are content with
domestic
life, a
great deal
of feminist attention concentrates on women‘s
influences on men. For
6
example,
in
―The
Influence
of
Little
Women
‖,
Carolyn
Heilbrun
argues
that
the
fascination
Little
Women
holds
lies
less
in
Jo‘s
ease
in
adopting
male
manners
and
behavior , than in the facility with
which her whole family restructures itself on a
female
pattern
.(
Kress,1997,p23)
G
. K. Chesterton noted that
in
Little Women
, Alcott
thirty
years,
and
that
Fritz's
proposal
to
Jo,
and
her
acceptance,
one
of
the
really
human
things
in
human
literature.
(Fritz,
1987,
p67)
Gregory
S.
Jackson
argued
that
Alcott's
use
of
realism
belongs
to
the
American
Protestant
pedagogical
tradition
that
includes a range of
religious literary traditions with which Alcott
was familiar. (Jackson,
2009, p14) The
nineteenth-century images he produces of
devotional guides for children
provides
an
interesting
background
for
the
game
of
pilgrim
that,
in
part,
comprises
Book
One's
plot
structure.
Elbert
argued
that
Little
Women
did
not
―belittle
women‘s fiction
( Sarah
，
1987
，
p11)
As
we all known, Jo is the representative of Louisa
May Alcott in the
Little
Women
,
so in
―Closing
the Garret Door: A
Feminist Reading of
Little
Women
‖, scholars
Deborah
Thacker and Jean Well mention that the
women writer
‘
s place has
been marginalized and
consigned as
―
the
attic
‖
(Thacker &
Well,1989
，
p3)
the
room of her own where a woman
could
express
and
liberate
herself
undisturbed.
In
Little
Women
Louisa
May
Alcott
playfully enabled her
girls‘
readers to look
within her inner room, her center of repressed
imagination.
The
heroine Jo is a unique woman in this book. Her
unconventional opinions and
deeds
differ much from her sisters.
The first
chapter talks about Jo‘ process of forming
the
sense
of
self-identity.
It
consists
of
four
parts
in
self-
shaping,
self-reflection,
self-fulfillment
and
self-control.
The
second
chapter
details
about
Jo‘
sense
of
responsibility
to
play
four
different
roles
in
her
life.
As
a
new
woman,
she
flourishes
personality.
The third chapter discusses Jo‘s
equality
thoughts, and her struggle to
get her
properly rights.
Based
on
the
summaries
of
the
previous
researches,
naturally,
a
new
woman
in
7
Alcott‘s
Little
Women
should
independent,
self-identity
and
self-denial;
a
new
woman
should have her ability, and create her
career; a new woman should live an equal life with
her husband; the combination if family
life and independent existence can open various
probability for a new woman‘ individual
development.
3.
A comprehensive analysis of feminism on Jo in
Little Women
3.1 Pursuit of
freedom
From the ancient period to
modern society, all the people are seeking
freedom, no
matter
what
the
person
is
man
or
woman,
old
or
young.
The
author
of
Little
Woman
—
Louise
May Alcott who also wants
to own freedom. In her famous novel
Little
Woman,
through the
main actor
—
Jo express the
pursuit of freedom.
Jo is a girl who
wants to be a boy. ―I wish I was a boy,‖
s
ays
Jo. ―Then I could go
and fight beside father.‖
(Alcott, 1987, p38)
Jo wants to escape
from the full dress and
puts on the
uniform to fight beside her father. Meg always
says to Jo in this way,
―You‘ve
been running, haven‘t you? Jo, when
will you start to behave like a young
lady?‖
(Alcott,
1987,
p98)
Although at that time, every girl
want to behave like a young lady, Jo behaves
like a boy. For her perspective, a boy
can do many things that the girls also can do,
such
as skating and then talking about
the skating with them. She never fells shy to play
with
boys. She believes that boys
possess freedom and they can do everything they
want to do.
In the book, Jo does many
things which can only be done by boys.
The reason why Jo stood out can be best
illustrated by her characteristic. It
is her
characteristic that
makes her different from all the other girls in
the family. Unlike other
girls
who
behave
like
quite
water,
Jo
was
neither
soft
nor
gentle.
She
is
just
like
a
vigorous flame giving
endless happiness.
In the beginning of
the book, she claims that:
―I hate to
think I‘ve got to grow up and be Miss March, and
wear long gowns,
an
d look as
prim as a China Aster. It‘s bad enough to be a
girl, any way when I
like boy‘s games
and work and manners. I can‘t get over my
disappointment in
8
not being a boy, and it‘s worse than
ever now, for I‘m dying to go and fight with
papa,
and
I
can
onl
y
stay
at
home
and
knit
like
a
poky
old
woman.‖
(Alcott,
1987, p43)
Jo
also
likes
literature,
both
reading
and
writing
them.
She
composes
plays
for
sisters to perform and
writes stories that published. She imitates
Shakespeare, and when
she
doesn‘t
need
to
do
chores,
she
reads
a
book
in
a
corner
of
the
attic,
or
outside,
completely absorbs a good book. She
also says
: ―Not being a genius, like
Keats, it won‘t
kill me…when I am
ready, I will up again…‖Jo is not the oldest
daughter in the family,
but she put
herself in the position of the man of the family
when her father is absence.
She devotes
her literature works to support the family. When
her father is hurt during the
war, she
cuts her lovely, sick, long hair to help her
mother to look after her father. She
says
:
―I just
want to do something for father, and selling my
hair was the only thing
I
could think of
doing.‖
(Alcott, 1987, p105)
Because of her character
–
boyish, Jo has intense
equality thoughts, and her struggle
to
get her properly rights. When she is young, her
unique behaviors express her desire to
break the fetters on the women. Her
choices of career stand for her dreams of being
equal
as men. She does not obey the
traditional view on marriage to find a rich
husband, but
establishes her love on an
equal base. On work, Jo has achieved her dream and
become a
writer.
In
life,
she
is
not
the
only
one
to
do
the
housework
and
her
husband
will
also
undertake it. For
example, her husband prepares the cakes for dinner
and look after their
children.
Jo
also
appeals
to
the
equality
of,
so
do
she
and
her
husband.
Though
she
returns home, Jo gives a
new definition of new women that the combination
of career and
family is the best home
for a new woman.
At
the
same
time,
she
is
a
girl
who
has
the
courage
to
pursuit
her
ideals.
She
believes
that
a
new
circumstance
has
advantages
for
her
writing;
she
follows
to
New
York to teach children,
or sometime stays in the bookroom to read books to
absorb new
knowledge. She accepts new
things and comes being into new ideas.
All of her characteristics and her
behaviors show that she pursuits of freedom and
doesn‘t care about others‘ vision. She
just does the things she wants to do, not bind by
9
secular.
3.2Demand of true love
As a girl, Joy is lucky because of a
boy, Laurie, who loves her; as a little woman,
Joy is beatific because of a man,
Bhaer, who loves her; as a mature lady,
Jo is felicific
because of a
gentleman, Bhaer, her husband.
As a female, Jo knows clearly that she
is going for a true love rather than a rich life.
Most people who read the
Litter Woman
always think
that Jo ought to marry Laurie,
who is
her childhood sweetheart and has a happy marriage
with Jo. However, it is
unbelievable
that she turns down his offer and gets married
with Professor Bhaer, an old,
poor man.
A host of people take the view that Jo is foolish
for she has done, but Jo is
certainly
understand what she really needs than anyone else.
For Laurie
Jo‘s
fell in love
with Laurie at the first
sight of Laurie and the true love is pretty
pure and beautiful. Without a doubt
that she loves Laurie, and many mothers are
willing
to small Mr. Laurie becomes her
son-in-law, but when she finds Laurie is like
guileless
elegant girl, don't mention
how happy she is.
Actually,
Laurie loves her, but Jo has a sober understanding
of the differences
between them:
―I'm homely and awkward and
odd and old, and you'd be ashamed o
f
me, and we
should
quarrel
—
we can't help it
even now, you see and I shouldn't like elegant
society
and
you
would,
and
you'd
hate
my
scribbling,
and
I
couldn't
get
on
without it, and we should be unhappy,
and wish we hadn't done it, and everything
would be horrid!
(Alcott,
1987, P278)
Jo realizes that
they are not suited to one another, although they
are too much alike
and too fond of
freedom.
After Jo refusing Laurie, Jo
knows that would never come again because he
leaves
her without a look. And Jo
decides to cut off the relationship, because
it‘s impossible for
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