Construction Of Womanhood In Seto Dharti And Yogmaya

Abstract

Amar Neupane‟s Seto Dharti (2012) and Neelam Karki Niharika‟s Yogmaya (2018) build the two complementary versions of social reality of the then contemporary Nepali society. The novels depict how the patriarchal social system has become an obstacle in the path of women‟s progress. Both the novels portray the pain and suffering of the women in Nepali society, by exposing certain events from history and contemporary Nepali society. The suffering of female characters becomes the main subject matter in both the novels. The women confront the patriarchal structure, become the victims of it, resist it, and finally pose a challenge through spiritual means. Similarly, there are functional women who are means of the larger social- political structure. The women are forced to adopt the dominant patriarchal ideology. They appear as domestic workers and the machine to bear children. This study has employed feminism as frame of analysis for the novels to examine the condition of women. Key concepts of gender and marginality of women from Gayatri Chakraborty Spivak, Judith Butler, and other relevant theorists are used to interpret the texts in both the novels. Contemporary Nepali women basically appear in three roles: social conformist, victims, and resisters. Those who pursue change in society take the form of rebel in both the texts. In fact, the study explores the role of rebels in the making of contemporary self of women in Nepal.