Refashioning the Feminine: Representation of Women in Temsula Ao's Select Short Stories

Refashioning the Feminine: Representation of Women in Temsula Ao’s Select Short Stories

Dr. Suja Mathew

Since time immemorial, women have been marginalised and discriminated against in all the patriarchal societies in the world. Patriarchy believes in the domination of men over women and expects women to be subordinate and submissive to men.  Even in marriage, women are objectified and considered as a medium to give birth to their children in order to continue the legacy of their families. Traditional Indian society is not different from this; it expects chastity, obedience and subordination from its women. Marital rapes are also not that rare in a society where man-woman relationship is considered as one of power. The present paper attempts to explore the representation of women in the select short stories of renowned Naga writer and academician Temsula Ao. The paper offers a foregrounding on how the feminine self in Ao’s stories shatters the stereotypes by exercising agency even within oppressive structures, leading to a subversive stance. The stories selected for this study are “The Saga of a Cloth,” “The Tombstone in My Garden” and “Three Women,” taken from the two collections titled Laburnum for My Head: Stories and The Tombstone in My Garden. The paper explores the oppression and discrimination women, especially married women, face in their families. It also probes into the forms of resistance that these women put forth as a natural response to the exercise of power.

Keywords: Gender discrimination, patriarchy, oppression, resistance, motherhood