The Social Discrimination Against Chinese Women in 19th Century in Lisa See’s Snow Flower and The Secret Fan

ABSTRACT

Lisa See’s Snow Flower and the Secret Fan novel was chosen as the object of the study for several reasons: First, this novel was written by the author who has a good reputation. Second, it’s a monumental work. This is a heartbreaking story about women’s live in 19th century. At that era, women, especially young girls, had to follow the rule of a painful tradition and culture. The problems of this study are based on the researcher’s reasons in choosing this novel, they are: (1) what forms of social discrimination are faced by Chinese women in 19th century?, (2) what factors influence the social discrimination of Chinese women in 19th century?, and (3) to what extent does the novel reflect the real condition of Chinese women in 19th century as shown in Lisa See’s Snow Flower and the Secret Fan?. This study is focused on the exploration of social discrimination of Chinese women in 19th century through their custom, condition, and social class. To analyze the data text related to this study, the researcher uses the concept of feminist literary criticism informed by feminist theory or by the politics of feminist more broadly. To analyze literary work from feminist aspect, the researcher read text as a woman (reading as a woman). It is more democratic and fair for men and women. Whereas, the data of this study are taken from the Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See and the data of Chinese women and the condition of China in 19th century. All the same, the writer plays an important role and spends great deals of time reading and understanding the novel. After analyzing the novel by organizing and separating the data from the novel, exploring the real phenomenon about social discrimination against Chinese women in 19th century, and find out the similarities between the content of the novel and the real condition of China., than the researcher finds that actually the
forms of social discrimination occur in the family, i.e. the practice of foot binding. This practice makes girls lose their right to obtain equal treatment and freedom to sons in family, and in marriage status finds that the aim of marriage for Chinese society is actually to bear sons. Besides, women must obey a certain costume in society. The factors that influence the social discrimination are caused by the social stratification; it places women into different position in social group, sex differences; makes women as the object of unequal treatment, and economic poverty which indirectly places women as the object of exploitation. And the kinds of cases in Snow Flower and the Secret Fan are the portrait of life that really happened in 19th century China. The researcher expects this study may help the students of English Department to understand the literary criticism of social phenomena in the novel. And in accordance with this study, it is advisable to conduct a study on the psychological or sociological perspective.