“Investigating Gendered Binary Oppositions in Indian Society in the Novels of Kiran Desai and Aravind Adiga through a Feminist and Comparative Approach

Document Type : Original Research

Authors
Roya Fatahpour 1
Hamideh Molaei 2
1 PhD Student, Indian Studies, Faculty of World Studies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
2 Assistant Professor, Faculty of World Studies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
10.48311/eijh.31.4.1
Abstract
This study aims to investigate the binary oppositions existing in the novels of Kiran Desai and Aravind Adiga. As Hellen Cixous and Luce Irigaray, two French feminists argue, gender binaries are designed in a way that women are always placed at a lower position than men. Desai and Adiga’s novels are chosen for this study because they are from a new generation of Indian writers and their booker prize winner novels suggest their popularity and prominence in Indian English literature. Choosing a male and female writer provides the opportunity to compare the works of authors of each sex as well. Finding the patriarchal binaries existing in the novels and highlighting the parts where these structures are broken by each writer based on Cixous's theory is the first step in analyzing the novels. Then comparing how the authors posited female characters in relation to the male ones is the second step taken in this analytical study. This study applies thematic analysis on two novels i.e. The White Tiger and Selection Day by Aravind Adiga and The Inheritance of Loss and Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard by Kiran Desai. Based on the findings, Desai and Adiga both suggested the existing binaries; however, Desai did it with detailed depiction of characters and relations while Adiga had a more comprehensive way to show the issues related to women and were considered so peripheral that did not worth depicting.

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The International Journal of Humanities
Volume 31, Issue 4
Autumn 2024
Pages 1-16