DISEMPOWERED ‘OTHERS’ AND THE FEMALE SOLIDARITY IN SUE TOWNSEND’S BAZAAR AND RUMMAGE (1982)

Yıl 2015, Cilt: 4 Sayı: 2, 152 - 160, 01.12.2015

Tuğba Şimşek

Öz

The patriarchal
order of the society pushes the woman behind the surface mostly by regarding
them as the secondary sex. As a result of this, they are ‘othered’ through
gender and sexuality or economic and social issues, and thus feel repressed
because their femininity, sexuality and even individuality are denied in order
to maintain only the continuance of the patriarchal order within society.

Yet not only men but also
women discriminate against the female as ‘the other’ by inheriting this
patriarchal ideology in their consciousness due to the normalisation of the
constructed process of othering. Sue Townsend in her play Bazaar and Rummage (1982) describes this construction and
internalisation of otherness imposed by both men and women. In the play, a
group of agoraphobic women try to confront their fears by organizing a rummage
sale through which the origins of their illness are explored. Agoraphobia is a
symbolic symptom to represent what these women have gone through as a result of
the repressive patriarchal order and how the fear of ‘outside’ – which is
regarded as a man’s place, not woman’s – makes them psychologically crippled
since this whole system restricting and oppressing them in so many ways do not
allow women to have their own identities and makes them subjected to this
system. However in the end, Townsend promotes a female solidarity to heal these
women’s psychological wounds by going against their fear and anxiety

Anahtar Kelimeler

Othering, imposition and internalisation of the otherness, repressive and inherited patriarchal order, agoraphobia, female solidarity

Kaynakça

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