“There Was That in Her Face and Form Which Made Him Loathe the Sight of Her”: Disfiguration and Deformity of Female Characters in 19th Century American Women’s Literature

Author

Kelsi E. Cunningham Miss, Georgia Southern UniversityFollow

Term of Award

Summer 2017

Degree Name

Master of Arts in English (M.A.)

Document Type and Release Option

Thesis (open access)

Copyright Statement / License for Reuse

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Department

Department of Literature and Philosophy

Committee Chair

Caren Town

Committee Member 1

David Dudley

Committee Member 2

Olivia Carr Edenfield

Abstract

Rebecca Harding Davis, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Mary Wilkins Freeman challenge the way that society treats and views the disabled and deformed. Through different representations of the disabled characters, the three short stories by these authors reveal the realities that women faced in the 19^th century in response to rigid beauty standards and expectations. The authors in this study address the marginalized position of the disabled characters and show how society’s attempts to “normalize” the women confine them to a fixed identity. Analyzing the texts in relation to disability studies and the authors’ perceived effectiveness of social charity will show how 19^th-century society’s fixation on the female appearance and suppressed disabled-women’s identities and autonomy.

Recommended Citation

Cunningham, Kelsi E. Miss, "“There Was That in Her Face and Form Which Made Him Loathe the Sight of Her”: Disfiguration and Deformity of Female Characters in 19th Century American Women’s Literature" (2017). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 1627.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/etd/1627

Research Data and Supplementary Material

No