本文一篇英语论文，本研究从西蒙娜·德·波伏娃（Simone de Beauvoir）《第二性》中的女权观和尤尔根•哈贝马斯（Jürgen Habermas）《公共领域的结构转型》中的公共领域观出发，运用文本细读和文化分析的方法，尝试提出 “女性公共领域”（Female Public Sphere）的新概念，对吉尔曼乌托邦三部曲中的三个维度加以挖掘，从中梳理出女性公共领域的转型过程。
Chapter One Introduction
1.1 Research BackgroundC
harlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) is an essential American writer, theorist, and sociologist at the turn of the twentieth century who devotes her life to awakening females and calling for females to emancipate themselves from the oppression of patriarchal society to realize their potential. Gilman is a prolific writer with works of different genres. What Diantha Did (1909), The Yellow Wall-Paper (1989), and the utopian trilogy, namely Herland (1915), Moving the Mountain (1911), and With Her in Ourland (1916) are her representative literary works; Female and Economics (1898), The Home: Its Work and Influence (1903), and The Man-Made World (1911) are her representative non-fiction. Gilman has been highly praised for her achievements both in literature and sociology. The National League of Female Voters has called Gilman ―one of the greatest females of her time‖; Estelle B. Freedman argued that Gilman is ―the most important feminist theorist in the United States‖ (2002:68); and Alice Stone Blackwell praised her as ―one of the great sources of mental stimulus and ethical inspiration‖ (Lane, 1990:7).
Gilman‘s achievements in literature lie in her incredible number of feminist works, among which the utopian trilogy - Herland (1915), Moving the Mountain (1911), and With Her in Ourland (1916) stands out. These three novels are brought together in one volume as a utopian trilogy due to their commonality in portraying ideal societies with equality, justice, and humanity for females. Simply differentiating, Moving the Mountain, depicting the American landscape in 30 years, is a female utopia built by the two sexes in harmony, which emphasizes the social changes made because of females‘ awakening; Herland, displaying a ―female country‖ that does not exist on the map, is a female utopia built by the female independently, in which the female run the country with the highest rationality; With Her in Ourland, portraying a silly, irrational American society, is a dystopia under patriarchal power, which paints a bleak picture of America.
1.2 Research Questions and Objectives
Gilman‘s utopian trilogy presents her vision of a female homeland, a beautiful world without poverty, crime, disease, and other suffering. She tries to provide the recipes for social improvement, by which the roles of males and females and the organizational principle of society have changed dramatically. Concerning the value of Gilman‘s utopian trilogy in providing possible paths for the female‘s awakening, this thesis proposes a concept of the ―female public sphere‖ (simplified as FPS), through which the following two questions will be addressed:
i)What are the dimensions of the ―female public sphere‖ in Gilman‘s utopiantrilogy?
ii)What are the transformation processes of the ―female public sphere‖ inGilman‘s utopian trilogy?
The first question focuses on the representation of FPS in Gilman‘s utopian trilogy, which is the basic information about FPS. By answering this question, how females in the utopian trilogy reshape themselves can be known. The second question deals with the transformation of FPS in Gilman‘s utopian trilogy, which is reflected in the structural transformation and functional transformation. The transformation follows the improvement of the females‘ social status and values in FPS, which functions within the social context. By adopting the methodologies of text close reading and cultural analysis, this thesis aims to analyze three dimensions of FPS in Gilman‘s utopian trilogy and explore its transformation processes, thus disclosing the underlying route in the novels of constructing female utopias.
Chapter two Literature Review
2.1 Studies of Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Generally speaking
