Kate chopin’s criticism on society’s expectation toward women as seen in the awakening

Oleh :
Suryaningtyas Pujiastuti - C0398065 - Fak. Sastra dan Seni Rupa

ABSTRAK This thesis is a study of Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening. This research was a descriptive qualitative research. The main data of the research were taken from Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening published by David Campbell Publisher Ltd. in 1992. The main data were words, phrases, and sentences in the novel that related to the research, while the supporting data were taken from essays, critical reviews and articles from the Internet that related to the research. The purposes of this research were to describe Kate Chopin’s criticism on society’s expectation toward women and to explain how The Awakening reflected Kate Chopin’s criticism on society’s expectation toward women. In order to reach these purposes, Genetic Structural approach was applied. The essence of the approach is to explore the history of literary work's creation process by means of correlating both literary work and its writer and her social background. Chopin’s other works that were closely related to The Awakening were short stories entitled The Storm and The Story of an Hour. Both short stories showed Chopin’s interest in women’s infidelity, passion and women’s capacity of independence. Firstly the researcher mentioned the society’s expectation toward women expressed in The Awakening. Secondly the researcher analyzed the plot, theme and character of The Awakening to reveal Kate Chopin’s criticism on society’s expectation toward women. Women were expected to put their feelings, needs, and wishes aside. They were expected to sacrifice themselves, to give up what they wanted to do and did what they did not want to do. From the analysis it could be concluded that Chopin’s criticism was that the expectation the society had upon women had restrained them from being themselves. What women really wanted or felt had never been heard by society and by being obliged to fit in the expectation women had to efface themselves as individuals. Kate Chopin’s criticism on society’s expectation toward women was reflected on the theme, the plot and the character of The Awakening, mainly the main character, Edna Pontellier.