부산대학교 도서관

This study investigates the emergence of the New Woman figure in Britain and the Arab world at the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and the cultural transformations that brought the phenomenon to prominence in both contexts around the same historical moment. This argument directly challenges the common perceptions held regarding the appearance of the Arab New Woman during the second half of the twentieth century and traces the origins of the phenomenon to the fin de siècle. The latter was significant in both cultural contexts, for it witnessed a transition from the Victorian to the modern in Britain and tensions of the Arab Awakening (Nahda) in the Arab world. The transitional nature of the 1880s and 1890s is well documented in the heated debates in the periodical press and literary production of the period. The thesis focuses on the Arab New Woman and the cultural anxieties linked with the newness of this figure. Progressive modes of thinking were rising during the second half of the nineteenth century, and the Muslim and Christian reformers of the period were associated with a multitude of influences. The references to the cultural transformations happening in Britain stand out in particular. Narrative fiction and polemic writing were employed as a means to deal with the Woman Question and feminist literature drew reactions from middle-class readers. The feminist interventions I explore in this thesis are especially related to the Middle East region with some reference to diasporic Arabic literature. The comparative approach and integration of the British New Woman, along with discursive analysis of primary and secondary sources, aim to enrich the scholarship on pioneering Arabic feminist literature, especially that which was produced by women writers at the fin de siècle and in the early twentieth century. The thesis provides a reading of the historical, sociological, and literary contexts in which the New Woman appeared. The first chapter sets the scope for this study and justifies the choice of topic, historical period, and geographical considerations. It also contextualises the New Woman phenomenon and shows the variety of forms she embodied, as critics often associate the term with semantic instability. The second chapter deals with the New Woman in Britain during the 1880s and 1890s and explores the debates that surrounded the figure in fiction and in the periodical press. The third chapter similarly investigates the construction of the New Woman identity in the Arab world and women's pursuit of their rights in the fields of political legislation, formal education, and access to work, among others. The fourth and fifth chapters provide literary and socio-historical readings of early Arab women's fiction: short stories and novels, respectively, with examples of male-authored literature as well. The two chapters also make comparisons with British New Woman fiction. The sixth chapter provides the conclusions and limitations of the current study and suggestions for further research in this field.