The Representation of the New Woman in Nineteenth-Century and Twentieth-Century American Literature

我分析了新女性在美国文学中的表现，从性别观念的角度对美国女性的处境进行了论述。这种19世纪和20世纪的话语是反对男性对性别定义的人与寻求维持现状的人之间的政治讨论。因此，新女性在这一时期的表现形式变得多样化。例如，亨利·詹姆斯对新女性持批评态度，尽管他对她的描绘方式自相矛盾，而康斯坦斯·费尼莫尔·伍尔森则模棱两可地反对他的描绘。伊迪丝·沃顿不是新女性，而是一个被“女性气质”束缚的女主人公，她对现状进行了批判。威拉·凯瑟和艾伦·格拉斯哥创造了在贫瘠土地上挣扎的新女性，而男性作家，如舍伍德·安德森和辛克莱·刘易斯，则描绘了在中西部城镇试图获得自决的新女性。关于“新女性”的论述可以转化为关于种族的讨论。第一位新女性被定义为支持选举权的受过大学教育的白人女性。然后，那些有不同经历的人创造了他们自己版本的新女性，迫使这个词被重新定义。波琳·霍普金斯和杰西·福塞等非裔美国女作家创作的“新女性”就是这种类型的例子。她们的新妇女运动关注的不是妇女的权利，而是她们种族的提升。对他们来说，白人新女性是一个种族主义者，因为她把争取妇女权利放在首位。正如伊丽莎白·阿蒙斯（Elizabeth Ammons）所说，白人新女性获得与男性平等的权利意味着她同意参与一项侵略和种族主义政策，阿蒙斯认为这与白人男性相同。因此，随着作者们利用自己的个人、政治、文化和种族偏见，新女性的表现变得多样化。

I have analyzed the representation of the New Woman in American literature as a discourse on the situation of American women in terms of perceptions of gender. This nineteenth-century and twentieth-century discourse is a political discussion between those opposed to men's definition of gender and those seeking to maintain the status quo. Consequently, the representation of the New Woman during this time becomes diverse.For example, Henry James is critical of the New Woman, though ambivalent in the way he depicts her, while Constance Fenimore Woolson resists his depiction ambiguously. Edith Wharton develops, instead of the New Woman, a heroine bound by "femininity," and criticizes the status quo. Willa Cather and Ellen Glasgow create the New Woman struggling against barren land, while male authors, such as Sherwood Anderson and Sinclair Lewis, depict New Women who try to acquire self-determination in Midwest towns.The discourse about the New Woman could be turned into a discussion on race. The first New Woman was defined as a white, college-educated woman supporting suffrage. Then, those with different experiences created their own version of the New Woman, forcing the term to be redefined. The New Woman created by African-American woman writers such as Pauline Hopkins and Jessie Fauset are examples of this type. Their New Women's concern is not women's right but the uplifting of their race. To them, the white New Woman is a racist for putting the highest priority on winning women's rights. As Elizabeth Ammons argues, the white New Woman's acquisition of rights equal to men's means that she agrees to participate in a policy of aggression and racism that Ammons identifies with white males. Thus, with authors drawing on their own personal, political, cultural, and ethnic biases, the representation of the New Woman becomes diverse.