Dissertations and Theses
Date of Award
2019
Document Type
Thesis
Department
English
First Advisor
Renata Kobetts Miller
Second Advisor
Amir Ahmadi
Keywords
Hysteria; Madness; Females; Doctors; Conflict; Subjugation.
Abstract
In this research paper, I intend to focus on Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper (1892) and Sigmund Freud’s Dora: An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (written in 1900 and published in 1905), with an aim to represent the prevailing attitudes of men, especially male physicians, towards women in the Victorian era. I intend to demonstrate how the Victorian social system placed women in a subordinate position through patriarchal ideals of femininity and unapologetically labeled them “insane” if their behavior and personality dared deviate from the prevailing social norms and conventions. In addition, I hope to shed light on the way male authority figures attempted to control women’s growing demands and desires and perpetuated the patriarchal ideology of “separate spheres” through the feminization of mental illness and the stigmatization of female sexuality. Both The Yellow Wallpaper and Dora provide us with prominent examples of women who are labeled “insane” or “hysterical” as they rebel against traditional gender roles and male dominance in the public sphere; additionally, both texts demonstrate the way psychiatry can be used as a tool to discourage women from having their own free will and achieving personal liberty. Thus in my thesis paper, I hope to focus on the institutional domination and oppression of women through culturally constructed notions of femininity and mental illness.
Recommended Citation
Jumana, Rumaisa Nasim, "Mental Illness and Psychiatry in the Victorian Era: An Analysis of the Prevailing Power Dynamics Between Women and Male Authority Figures Through Gilman and Freud." (2019). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cc_etds_theses/740