小词语,大文章——帕特里夏·斯帕克斯思想述评

帕特里夏·斯帕克斯是美国杰出的女性文学评论家,对文学评论的贡献主要有两点。一是指出社会主流文化推崇的女性形象与真实女性不符,剖析女性人生面临的种种问题,为女性的自由发展拓宽空间;二是对"漫谈"、"无聊"、"独处"等社会文化中充满贬抑色彩的高频词语进行历史性研究,正本清源,批驳词语误读催生出的消极文化,劝谏人们树立正确积极的人生观。斯帕克斯从小词语入手做出大文章的研究方法,值得学者借鉴。

Small Words,Great Implications——A Review of Patricia Spacks’ Thoughts

Patricia Spacks is a distinguished American literary critic who is reputed for her two outstanding contributions. One is her feminist study which points out that the socially worshipped image of women does not confirm to the life of real woman. A study of novels written by female writers exposes women’s problems. The other is Spacks’ social and cultural studies which examine such negative words as gossip, boredom, and privacy to trace back the origin and changing implications of the words so as to refute the negative culture brought by the abused use of the words. Spacks’ methodology, hairsplitting small words to dig out their big implications, is worthy of an ardent recommendation.