THE TRAJECTORY OF WOMAN’S OBJECTIFICATION IN JAMIL AHMAD’S THE WANDERING FALCON

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore the objectification of South Asian women in Jamil Ahmad’s novel The Wandering Falcon, particularly with reference to the manner in which women are objectified in South Asian culture after independence in day-to-day life. Moreover, the study outlines the ways in which South Asian women are suppressed in terms of their desires and needs, and it reveals the effects, suppressing the women. The research highlights the ways in which the socio-domestic advancement of South Asian women is impeded in the name of culture, society, and family where women have been oppressed and marginalized. This is accomplished by employing the theoretical paradigm of postcolonial feminism, with an exclusive focus on women objectification, which is supported by the theoretical assumptions of Nussbaum (1995) and Ashcroft et al. (1995). The objectification of women features into seven distinct characteristics, according to Nussbaum. These characteristics are instrumentality, denial of autonomy, inertness, fungibility, violability, ownership, and denial of subjectivity. These characteristics are reduction to body, reduction to appearance, and silencing.  In conclusion, the research investigates the capacity of South Asian women to transform their adversities into opportunities within their own lives. That being the case, it is a representation of both their strengths and their faults. This research is a qualitative study that does not rely on empirical evidence. In the course of the investigation of the selected novel, the deductive method has been utilized, and textual analysis has been used as a research method, showing that women have been throughout marginalized and oppressed from the perspective of objectification.