Garassi states that Marxist feminist agrees that capitalism oppresses wome
n to be in lower class than men‘s class since they will live under patriarchy and economically are not independent. Class difference and dependency force
them to allow men to take their power away from them. In addition, women use their sexuality, in some cases like being a prostitute, sex worker, and other
related works because they need to survive. Womens sexuality and sexual energy is appropriated by the men who buy
or control the sexual services exchange i.e., pimps just as any workers energy is appropriated to the capitalists for their profits, leading to
alienation of ones bodily capacities and very bodily being. Gerassi, 2015: 3
Therefore, women would likely experience alienation due to the possibilities of men as capitalists to take profits from women as workers. The
exploitation, whether in domestic or public sphere, can happen because of the contribution of the class oppression in economic system.
B. Review of Related Theories
In this part, the writer discusses the theories applied in the thesis to answer and analyze the problems formulation.
1. Theory of Character and Characterization
Theory of character and characterization is applied to the thesis because this theory is important to reveal and identify the persons being told and engaged
in the story for a better and deeper analysis. A character is a person, can be the major or minor, who is being told and engaged throughout the story. As it is
written by M.H. Abrams in A Glossary of Literary Terms:
Characters are the persons represented in a dramatic or narrative work, who are interpreted by the reader as being endowed with particular moral,
intellectual, and emotional qualities by inferences from what the persons say and their distinctive ways of saying it
—the dialogue— and from what they do
—the action. Abrams, 1999: 32 Then, the way the persons are described, told, and reflected in the story is
a characterization. ―A broad distinction is frequently made between alternative methods for characterizing i.e., establishing the distinctive characters of the
persons in a narrative: showing and telling‖ Abrams, 1999: 33. Showing refers
to the way the author presents a character through hisher words in dialogs and action. Telling refers to the way the author values a character, by stating the
characteristics or commentary towards the character‘s manner, action, or conversation.
Getting to know better about what kind of a character described in the story and the way they are described helps the writer to make analysis.
2. Revisiting Gender Perspective
Gender is a system which is culturally or socially shaped based on the sex to refer to what is appropriate for each sex in the life within society. In other side,
it can be said that gender is socially constructed, not natural, but often considered as something natural.
For although femininity may be defined as a set of attributes ascribed to biologically sexed females, what exactly those attributes are, and the
extent to which any given version of femininity is natural or cultural, have been debated long and hard by women themselves. Glover and Kaplan,
2000: 1
The explanation about gender above emphasizes the point that there is a doubt of belief that gender is natural. It is more related to social system and
concept. Therefore, gender has no biological relationship since it is constructed by social values and cultures.
Gender constructs behavior, expectation, and role in the interaction and within situations. It limits ones‘ choice, especially for women because once they
realize the difference between their sexes from others, they begin to act and behave as what society teaches them so.
Of course, it is a testimony to our culture‘s deep commitment to gender differentiation that people are so careful to follow social rules about how
males and females should dress, wear their hair, gesture, and thus present themselves in a manner that clearly indicates their sex. Ridgeway, 1993:
183
There are expectations from society towards men and women. For example, the figure of women is supposed to be calm, motherly, beautiful, and
function as men‘s property whereas men are supposed to be active, independent, controlling, and served by women. The idea of being a gentle man, related to
noble, authority and respect, free, fearless, and determined. These expectations shape both men and women‘s psychology and they always bring these ideas to
determine their action or how they should present themselves in the society. Gender-role is part of both men and women have to play in the interactions
and within situations. It shows what each of them should do in their interactions. In the interactions, men learn to be instrumental, so as to say to be goal and task-
directed, while women learn to be social, expressive, and more related to interpersonal relation for they are considered less valuable than men. It drives
women to be less interested in the instrumental act and it contributes to women‘s behavior in society.
―He points out that it is ‗inadequate…to make masculine behaviour coincide with activity and feminine w
ith passitivity….‖ Glover and Kaplan, 2000: 2. It gives disadvantages for women and taken for granted by men
since it supports men to have rights over the women, while women do not even have rights to power themselves or the men. Within the situations, there are
beliefs, which associate gender with specific skills, about the idea that men will be more able than women in most situations.
When one realizes that she has different sex, then gender is activated. By knowing their different gender, women and men have expectations for themselves
and from others. Therefore, gender could be said as the basis for women and men‘s act and performance. Further, context plays important role in determining
the gender. It takes women to realize in what particular context or situation she is in and lead her to take an appropriate behavior according to the context or
situation, but it cannot be detached from the presence of her realization of her identity such as race and class and other person‘s identity too.
3. Theory of Class
In America, as the capitalist society, people are believed to be divided into class system. However, people are not just divided into two classes; the rich and
the poor or the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, yet it is more complicated because in the society there are some distinctive layers, which cannot just be defined as
belong to the rich or poor. Money cannot explicitly define people into classes
easily. ―The point is that money alone doesn‘t define them, for the way they have their money is larg
ely what matters‖ Fussell, 1992: 29. Therefore, there is one other important thing supporting the division of class, it is how they get their
money which refers to their jobs in society, what kind of job they have is more important than the amount of money they get out of it.
According to Fussell, people are divided into 9 divisions of class based on the way they earn their money. There are top out-of-sight, upper, upper-middle,
middle, high proletarian, mid-proletarian, low proletarian, destitute, and bottom out-of-sight.
Top out-of-sight people refer to those who inherit money and business from their parents or grand-
grandparents. ―The top out-of-sight class Rockefellers, Pews, DuPonts, Mellons, Fords, Vanderbilts lives on inherited
capital entirely‖ Fussell, 1992: 29. People from the top out-of-sight group do not earn their own money from their own effort and struggle, yet they inherit the
wealth or called as rich- born. Besides, they are also ‗invisible‘ and hardly
recognized. Their houses are never seen from the street or road. They like to hide away
deep in the hills or way off on Greek or Caribbean islands which they tend to own, safe, for the moment, from envy and its ultimate attendants,
confiscatory taxation and finally expropriation. Fussell, 1992: 30 Their invisibility is derived from their attempt to not to expose themselves
in richness in public. They tend to hide somewhere where people cannot easily find them.
Upper class refers to those who inherit money but also earn it and they are visible. ―First, although it inherits a lot of its money, it earns quite a bit too,
