Disturbing the Gendered Universe in Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games Trilogy

Abstract

Suzanne Collins, in Hunger Games trilogy, challenges the traditional gender roles by creating mavericks: characters that do not fit into just one gender box, but possess both masculine and feminine characteristics. Dystopian novels are all cautionary in nature—alarming us about the gloomy tomorrow—ifwe do not correct our behavior at present. Even though Collins has set her stage in a dystopian world, her gender politics find resonance in the contemporary world. Roberta S. Tries’ concept on “Disturbingthe universe” has been used as the primary theoretical lens in the dissertation along with gender theories by various mainstream gender theorists. Julia Kristeva’s Abjection Theory, Bradford et al.’s Transformative Utopianism, andArnold van Gennep and Victor Turner’s theory on Liminalityhave also been discussed.The conclusion this paper draws at is thatyoung adults must embark on the arduous journey to transform the present world state because the future world is for them to be had.