Social stratification during the French revolution in Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities

Among hundreds of social phenomena and problems, social stratification is the most common issue discussed by sociologists, anthropologists and even artists. Throughout history and in all societies, social stratification is considered the most complicated social problem which causes an endless conflict between the dominant group and the minority one or superior and inferior community. Discussions concerning social stratification are widely elaborated in many scientific books, references, and literary works. One of the literary works which exposes such phenomenon is Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

The story within the novel takes place in the French revolution in the late of ninetieth century (1789-99). It tells about social classes’ relation among upper, middle and lower. Aristocrat as the superior group, others as the inferior group, and aristocrats, as the dominant and powerful group. The relation between both classes runs unequally in which the lower class (proletariats) are placed in an inferior position before upper class (aristocrats). The proletariats always become the victims of the aristocrats’ exploitation, inequality and discrimination. Thus, this study is aimed at finding the forms, of social stratification (class struggle of social classes) against exploitation, oppression and freedom that done by the powerful groups as portrayed in the novel. The researcher, then, tries to compare between the phenomena of social stratification found in the novel and that in the real life of French revolution.

To achieve the above objectives of the study, the researcher applies a genetic structuralism approach which insists on linking the novel with the social context of the French revolution. Since this study is emphasized on the analysis of a literary work, it is, then, classified as literary criticism. The primary data of this study are collected from Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, and the secondary data are gathered from the social phenomena of social stratification relations in French revolution. The researcher himself becomes the research instrument in the process of data collection and data analysis.