Document Type : Research Paper

Abstract

Stories and fictions are important cultural resources which in many cultures are narrated by women.These storiescan bea reflection of ideals and desires of women in different levels of a society. Therefore, reviewing these stories and fictions would bebeneficial to better understand the various aspects of women’s life in a society.This research aims to study women’s positionin Bakhtiary’s culture usingthirty written stories. Bakhtiary’s culture is patriarchal anddespite positive attitude towards women in this culture, they are still looked upon inferior.In such a culture women have less contribution and influence in economical and political activitieswhere are dominated by men. However, Bakhtiary’s women have challenged discriminating attitudes ofthe patriarchal setting and rejected the existing sexual discriminations particularly in social settings.In this respect, theyhave even succeeded in altering some traditional views of their men toward themselves.  The most significant preoccupations of women in these types of stories include marriage and combatingpatriarchal thoughts. For instance, women have been culturally obliged to obey men’s will on the matter of marriage, whereas,  on many occasions, they have rejected this and married on their own choice. In this paper, the presence of women in these stories has been subjected to qualitative and quantitive analysis. In addition, the presence of women in the political and economicalactivities, struggling patriarchal thinking, partaking in naming their children, marriage, womanly issues, women characters, andthe number of women in the stories are thosethat have been dealt with in this paper.

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