The Subjugation of Women through Lexical Innovation in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale

  1. Paula López Rúa
Zeitschrift:
Feminismo/s
  1. Balteiro Fernández, Isabel (coord.)

ISSN: 1696-8166,  1989-9998

Datum der Publikation: 2021

Titel der Ausgabe: Women, sexual identity and language / Mujer, identidad sexual y lenguaje

Nummer: 38

Seiten: 23-51

Art: Artikel

DOI: 10.14198/FEM.2021.38.02 DIALNET GOOGLE SCHOLAR lock_openOpen Access editor

Andere Publikationen in: Feminismo/s

Ziele für nachhaltige Entwicklung

Zusammenfassung

Given the importance of novel formations in science and speculative fiction, the aim of this paper is to analyse a selection of morphosemantic and semantic neologisms that occur in the feminist dystopia The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), namely those items more closely connected with women’s lives. These items are gathered, classified and discussed by resorting to the tools provided by Morphology, Lexical Semantics, Onomastics and Women’s Studies. Therefore, the paper explores how new names for people (Econowives, Offred), activities (Particicution), artifacts (Birthmobile) and places (the Colonies) play a part in the linguistic task of female subjugation. It shows how in a fictional republic where gender roles and religious totalitarianism are taken to extremes, the forms and meanings of words are manipulated to enhance power relations and gender inequality, impose an orthodox frame of mind (comply with the system), and avoid uncomfortable truths. Neologisms provide a sense of authenticity in the narrative and show how language evolves to satisfy various needs, not only pragmatic, but also social, ideological and euphemistic.

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