Destabilising Men’s Perceptions: Female Voice in Selected Asian Fictions

This paper aims at investigating some selected fictions of South and Southeast Asian writers to note the occasions where their female characters tend to invalidate various forms of male-oriented assumptions embedded in social practices. It also examines the way some Asian women perpetuate the patriarchy and thereby reinforce their subjugation. It is also seen that some of them, on the other hand, do not compromise their dignity in married life even after facing humiliation and uncertainty. Their attempts of discrediting patriarchal ideologies are focused in this paper so as to determine the respective author's attitude and contribution to relocating female voices in Asian patriarchal societies. The women characters selected for this article are found challenging the stereotyped role of women in a culture that is constructed by people in power in these societies. The discussion in this paper is pursued by feminist discourses with a particular focus on cultural issues related to patriarchy in Asian societies. However, it is argued that despite writing from Asian societies, that have a stronghold of patriarchal ideologies, the selected authors attempted to represent their female characters who are found capable of debunking the cultural norms that subjugate them.