https://doi.org/10.67147/literariness.v1i4.046
Embodied Resistance and the Politics of the Female Body in Han Kang’s The Vegetarian
NANDHITHA U M
Assistant Professor
R S M SNDP Yogam College, Koyilandy
Research Scholar (MES Keveeyam College, Valanchery)
Affiliated to University of Calicut
Abstract: Feminist literary criticism has always paid close attention to the politics of the female body, where the body is typically seen as a site of control, discipline, and resistance. In Han Kang’s The Vegetarian is a compelling narrative in which the protagonist Yeong-hye pushes back against patriarchal expectations, mainly by transforming her body and refusing to play by the rules.. The study engages with the theoretical frameworks 0f Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Susan Bordo, and Julia Kristeva to analyse the ways in which power is embedded in the female body. It also examines the ways in which resistance is articulated through silence, acts of refusal, and forms of bodily transformation.Through close textual analysis, the paper argues that even when the female body is a site of resistance, it continues to be shaped and controlled by social and institutional forces, those who resist are often being labelled as abnormal, thereby revealing a paradox at the heart of embodied resistance.
Keywords: Embodied Resistance, Female Body, Patriarchy, Discipline, Abjection, Feminism
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