A STUDY OF THE EXPRESSIONS OF ANDROCENTRIC IDEOLOGY CAUSING OPPRESSION IN KHALED HOSSEINI’S AND THE MOUNTAINS ECHOED

Abstract

The study is an attempt to investigate the role of language in expressing androcentric ideology causing oppression in Khaled Hosseini’s novel And the Mountains Echoed. Gender issues are constructed discursively and ideologically in such a way that they seem fictitiously factual. Lazar’s (2005, 2007) feminist views have been used as conceptual framework to analyze the issues under study. The ten tools of critical stylistics, developed by Jefferies (2010), have been applied to find out the role of language in the construction of the aforementioned issues. Analysis of a few novelistic passages can illustrate the importance of language. However, the present study takes a sample passage to critically analyze the role of language in the construction of gender issues. The discourse-producer manipulates language to construct gender-related issues, like oppression and marginalization. Several linguistic tools have been used to (re)present and construct these issues. Nouns and noun phrases are used to express gender and ideology, while material action intentional, along with other tools has been utilized to depict oppression against women.