Исток, Запад: Хибридни идентитети жена на маргинама модерности
East, West: Hybrid Identities of Women on the Margins of Modernity

Summary/Abstract: This paper compares the novel Nove by Jelena J. Dimitrijević and the short stories“Separation” and “After Separation” by Feng Yuanjun, focusing on their protagonists,Fatma and Naihua. The introduction provides an overview of the authors’ lives andwork, highlighting their efforts to give voice to women during periods of intensesocial transformation and the formation of national identities – an endeavor thatinevitably exposed them to criticism. Dimitrijević portrays a Turkish woman on theeve of the Young Turk Revolution, while Feng Yuanjun depicts a Chinese womanin post-dynastic China. After a brief presentation of the works, the paper identifiesthe central similarities relevant to the analysis. Both protagonists come into contactwith Europe, a contact mediated either through formal education or the presenceof European teachers. At the same time, both characters are confined – Fatmainstitutionally (in the harem), and Naihua temporarily, through physical restriction asa form of punishment. Yet, both confinements stem from the same underlying structure:patriarchal control over women’s bodies and choices. Consequently, both heroinesyearn for Europe and perceive it as a refuge of freedom, primarily understood as thefreedom to choose their own partners. This desire represents their most significantform of resistance to the patriarchal communities in which they live. These complexstories lead to an inner division within the heroines, who realize that two opposingsides, two identities, are struggling within them. For this reason, the analysis isgrounded in Homi Bhabha’s theory of hybrid identities and Biljana Dojčinović’sconcept of deep transgression. The notion of hybridity is employed to shed lighton the process of identity construction in characters torn between traditional andmodern cultural models.

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