“Aphasia” is originally defined as the loss of ability to articulate words or comprehend language, but after its introduction into literary criticism, it is usually correlated to women’s impediment to speech due to social deprival. In his “Under the Willow-Tree”, Hans Christian Andersen depicts the heroine Joanna as a “female aphasia”. This paper aims to explore and examine the reason why and how Joanna becomes a “female aphasia” in the story like other female characters in literary works written by male authors. Through reading the text, this paper finds that Joanna is “lost” in the story because the story is narrated from the perspective of the hero Knud. There are several ways to deprive a woman’s power of speech. Firstly, the patriarchal consciousness of speech impedes women to articulate their ideas. Secondly, in a patriarchal society, the use of language inevitably takes on a masculine consciousness and speech becomes dominated by men, thus women are depicted as objects. Thirdly, women are repelled by the formal register of speech, and they can only be active in informal domains. Therefore, women have been deprived of the ability to speak. The story of the gingerbread lovers implies the fact that Joanna is “female aphasia”, and it is the intertext of the tragedy of the two protagonists. Only by reading the two stories jointly can one manages to discover the origin of female aphasia.
| Published in | International Journal of Language and Linguistics (Volume 10, Issue 5) |
| DOI | 10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14 |
| Page(s) | 302-305 |
| Creative Commons |
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Copyright |
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group |
“Under the Willow-Tree”, Female Aphasia, Linguistic Masculinity, Linguistic Women’s Alienation, Formal Domain Exclusion
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APA Style
Lu Xingyu. (2022). Crumbling Gingerbread Lovers: Reading the Female Aphasia in Hans Christian Andersen’s “Under the Willow-Tree”. International Journal of Language and Linguistics, 10(5), 302-305. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14
ACS Style
Lu Xingyu. Crumbling Gingerbread Lovers: Reading the Female Aphasia in Hans Christian Andersen’s “Under the Willow-Tree”. Int. J. Lang. Linguist. 2022, 10(5), 302-305. doi: 10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14
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Download@article{10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14,
author = {Lu Xingyu},
title = {Crumbling Gingerbread Lovers: Reading the Female Aphasia in Hans Christian Andersen’s “Under the Willow-Tree”},
journal = {International Journal of Language and Linguistics},
volume = {10},
number = {5},
pages = {302-305},
doi = {10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijll.20221005.14},
abstract = {“Aphasia” is originally defined as the loss of ability to articulate words or comprehend language, but after its introduction into literary criticism, it is usually correlated to women’s impediment to speech due to social deprival. In his “Under the Willow-Tree”, Hans Christian Andersen depicts the heroine Joanna as a “female aphasia”. This paper aims to explore and examine the reason why and how Joanna becomes a “female aphasia” in the story like other female characters in literary works written by male authors. Through reading the text, this paper finds that Joanna is “lost” in the story because the story is narrated from the perspective of the hero Knud. There are several ways to deprive a woman’s power of speech. Firstly, the patriarchal consciousness of speech impedes women to articulate their ideas. Secondly, in a patriarchal society, the use of language inevitably takes on a masculine consciousness and speech becomes dominated by men, thus women are depicted as objects. Thirdly, women are repelled by the formal register of speech, and they can only be active in informal domains. Therefore, women have been deprived of the ability to speak. The story of the gingerbread lovers implies the fact that Joanna is “female aphasia”, and it is the intertext of the tragedy of the two protagonists. Only by reading the two stories jointly can one manages to discover the origin of female aphasia.},
year = {2022}
}
TY - JOUR T1 - Crumbling Gingerbread Lovers: Reading the Female Aphasia in Hans Christian Andersen’s “Under the Willow-Tree” AU - Lu Xingyu Y1 - 2022/10/18 PY - 2022 N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14 DO - 10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14 T2 - International Journal of Language and Linguistics JF - International Journal of Language and Linguistics JO - International Journal of Language and Linguistics SP - 302 EP - 305 PB - Science Publishing Group SN - 2330-0221 UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijll.20221005.14 AB - “Aphasia” is originally defined as the loss of ability to articulate words or comprehend language, but after its introduction into literary criticism, it is usually correlated to women’s impediment to speech due to social deprival. In his “Under the Willow-Tree”, Hans Christian Andersen depicts the heroine Joanna as a “female aphasia”. This paper aims to explore and examine the reason why and how Joanna becomes a “female aphasia” in the story like other female characters in literary works written by male authors. Through reading the text, this paper finds that Joanna is “lost” in the story because the story is narrated from the perspective of the hero Knud. There are several ways to deprive a woman’s power of speech. Firstly, the patriarchal consciousness of speech impedes women to articulate their ideas. Secondly, in a patriarchal society, the use of language inevitably takes on a masculine consciousness and speech becomes dominated by men, thus women are depicted as objects. Thirdly, women are repelled by the formal register of speech, and they can only be active in informal domains. Therefore, women have been deprived of the ability to speak. The story of the gingerbread lovers implies the fact that Joanna is “female aphasia”, and it is the intertext of the tragedy of the two protagonists. Only by reading the two stories jointly can one manages to discover the origin of female aphasia. VL - 10 IS - 5 ER -
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