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영어

This paper explores Jane Austen's feminist writing in Northanger Abbey. Northanger Abbey contains elements that Austen could be seen as a feminist writer in that it is centered on women. She wrote Northanger Abbey in reaction to conservative ideas about gender roles and relations. She critiques the recommended code of feminine decorum popularized in 1790s while undermining the established notions of idealized feminine passivity, and challenges the gender role stereotypes. She also demonstrates men's views of and behavior toward women and criticizes tyrannical male power highlighting the potential cruelty of a patriarchal figure like General Tilney. Austen allows the heroine, Catherine Morland to act upon her own instincts and judgement, and presents her as an alternative role model who acts beyond the sexist notions of male supremacy and female subordination for readers. Austen furthermore insists that women's novels are the means of education for men and women while defending women writers and novels written by and about women.