Reconsidering Margins – The Women of the Beat Generation
Reconsidering Margins – The Women of the Beat Generation

Summary/Abstract: This article analyzes the representation of feminine identities in the prose of the 1950s and the 1960s, by exploring their peripheral position in the mythology of the Beat movement. Dissociating between the category of Beat woman character and Beat woman writer, my study reveals their resistance to the masculine discourse yet, at the same timer, their surrender to the masculine hegemonic order. The article identifies the status and the position of women as depicted by Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs. It also makes references to the contribution of Beat women to the dynamics of the generation and the cultural impact of their literary productions to the formation and structuring of the Beat Generation. The study considers writers like Ted Joans, Carolyn Cassady, Diane di prima, Joyce Johnson and Hettie Jones.

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