ÉCRITURE FÉMININE: Reconstructing Social Identity and Recontextualizing the Scripture

Abstract

Écriture féminine (literally woman's writing), a term coined by Hélène Cixous, sounds like a call for women to write about themselves, define themselves, and express their feeling from their own perspective. Writing becomes a way and weapon for women to fight back to the place where they are driven away violently from their only body and right or to break free from the prison which is deeply grounded within an androcentric framework. Women need to reconstruct the past where their roles and voices have been lost. It implies that the feminist proponents not only consider the presence of women within current issues but they must also search for clues that inform the absence of women in the past because the sources about women have often suppressed by the patriarchy, male-dominated culture, and the religious tradition as well. To accomplish the idea of liberating women from the shackling condition, feminist scholars need a paradigm shift from