FEMINIST STYLISTIC LEVEL OF WORD BY SARA MILLS’ THEORY (1995) IN LITTLE WOMEN NOVEL

This type of research is qualitative descriptive research that aims to find out the
Feminist Stylistic level of word by Sara Mills’ theory (1995) in the Little Women
Novel. The data of this research are word from dialogues of characters. The data
source in this research is the Little Women novel (1868) by Louisa May Alcott.
Little Women is a novel written by American author Louisa May Alcott shortly
after the Civil War in answer to a publisher's demand for a novel, which was initially
published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869. The technique of collecting data in this
research uses reading, understanding, analyzing, and displaying the data. The
researcher uses Sara Mills’s theory (1995). The theory itself has three main
categories, namely analysis at the word level, sentence/phrase, and discourse.
However, the researcher will focus on the analysis at the word level. The results of
this research show that 20 data were found at the word level. Based on the analysis,
four types of sexism in language were found. There are six linguistic determinism,
two generic nouns, four women as the marked forms, three gender free language.
On the other hand, the researcher found three types of sexism and meaning. There
are two naming and androcentrism, one semantic derogation of women, and two
endearment and diminutive. The findings also revealed that the depiction of women
through sexism at the level of words is marginalized and considered inferior to men.
Little Women displays several forms of linguistic sexism that emphasize the
patriarchal social structure, where language reflects and reinforces gender roles and
biases in society. This also shows that the novel, despite having strong and
independent female characters, is still influenced by the patriarchal linguistic norms
that dominated at that time.
Keywords: Feminist Stylistic, Little Women