Linguistic innovation in feminist utopian fiction Linguistic innovation in feminist utopian fiction

• Main Author: Deirdre Burton
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina 2008-04-01
• Series: Ilha do Desterro
• Subjects: English Language; English
• Online Access: http://www.periodicos.ufsc.br/index.php/desterro/article/view/8779
• ISSN: 0101-4846; 2175-8026

In this paper I shall be discussing some recent feminist utopian novels and some of the more interesting implications and questions we might draw from a close study of the linguistic innovations in them. Consistently, we find that defamiliarisation of the language of the idealised world is a recurrent characteristic. I shall begin by describing four of these texts to you, in general. I shall go on to map out the types of defamiliarisation they offer the reader, linking this with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis which asserts, in its strongest form, a determining connection between a culture's language, its thought and its reality. The implications and questions I want to draw from these comparisons are two-fold. The first is socio-linguistic and concerns real life issues of whether linguistic change is a necessary part of conceptual change. In this paper I shall be discussing some recent feminist utopian novels and some of the more interesting implications and questions we might draw from a close study of the linguistic innovations in them. Consistently, we find that defamiliarisation of the language of the idealised world is a recurrent characteristic. I shall begin by describing four of these texts to you, in general. I shall go on to map out the types of defamiliarisation they offer the reader, linking this with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis which asserts, in its strongest form, a determining connection between a culture's language, its thought and its reality. The implications and questions I want to draw from these comparisons are two-fold. The first is socio-linguistic and concerns real life issues of whether linguistic change is a necessary part of conceptual change.