Social Construction of Genderin This Street Doesn’t Have Speed Bump

Jahani in This Steet Doesn’t Have Speed Bump (۲۰۱۶) attempts tonarrate the challenges of a daily life of Shohreh, a divorced woman, inKermanshah who is the first female taxi-driver seeks to overturn thesocial codes of femininity on her body. Gender identity, behavioralperformances and physical appearance of Shohreh are constantlyjudged based on social constructions of femaleness. According toButler society determines subject's perception of self; she argues thateach individual is a product of its background culture and traditions. Inmale-dominant societies like Iran, women are subjugated and oppressedalthough some rebels try to subvert the patriarchal social order. Butler's'subversive performative' theory discussed in Gender Trouble (۱۹۹۰)and Lorber's so-called 'undoing gender' from her Social Construction ofGender (۱۹۹۱) are applied as theoretical frameworks to analyze theselected novels in order to get familiar with women's problems and theirresistance steps in traditional, male-dominant societies to achievefreedom and independency. Examining the possibility of resistanceagainst gender binaries and their associated concepts is the main focusof this research. The extent of women's agency and social presence ortheir voices in public are also considered. The protagonist of the novelis praised because of her bravery in undoing gender norms. Shohrehdoesn’t conform to the feminine expectations of her city; through herjob she protests the mainstream ideas of femaleness and she presentsherself as she wishes. Resisting patriarchy and gendered mindsdemands courageous personality that Shohreh has. In different subsectionof discussion part, main ideas and key concepts fordisestablishing gender norms are mentioned with quoted lines of theselected novel.

کلیدواژه ها:

Identity ، Resistance ، Gender ، Subversive acts