Women’sSelf—IdentifyReflectedintheMovieTheHours

李詩莉

【Abstract】From the feminist point of view，this paper first makes a detailed analysis of the womens chase and desire of self-identity in each generation to show the growth and development of feminist movement.Meanwhile，to make readers better understand the development of womens thinking and the womans pursuit of spiritual liberation and self-identity benefits to awake the females who are still in the weak position in todays society.

【Key words】The Hours； feminism； self-identify

Ⅰ.Related Research on background

With the beginning of enlightenment in 18 century and the experience of womens status of history，they had activated the living consciousness that they buried long.The voice of equality of men and women is strong in the western countries such as French，British and America.From the first publication of The Feminism in 1791，the western feminism movement launched rapidly and broke up again in Europe in 1960s.In the same time in China，women began to on the trip of liberation.In the low degree of own quality，self-consciousness and socialization，Chinese women had widely participated the social life.In order to seek for equality of men and women，they discarded the feminine characteristics and tried to undertake the mens works.It illustrates that women performed the masculine characteristics.

Ⅱ.Structure

The whole thesis will be divided into six parts.The first part introduces the movie The hours research background as well as the significance of the thesis.The second part is the information of the creative background and its characters.The third part illustrates the relevant time.s background and the three waves of Feminism.The fourth part analyzes the shared thoughts among these three main characters.The fifth part illustrates the ways of how these three heroines to self-identity.Finally，it concludes the contemporary women.s identify how to influence the development of society.

Ⅲ.The Three Waves of Feminism

A.The First Wave of Feminism

The first wave of the feminist movement which is from the 19th century to the mid-20th century，is the active period of British and American feminists and it has also been regarded as period of female. s achieving of enfranchisement in the Western democracies.And after a serious feminists.struggling，more and more women started to take up the position of school boards and local organizations.More women can be seen gaining access to higher education in this period.In 1910，women were admitted to many leading medical schools，and in 1915 the American Medical Association began to admit women members.A Matrimonial Causes Act 1923 gave the same right to women as men to divorce with men.All these phenomenon indicates that women have increasing power in the society.

B.The Second Wave of Feminism

Then the movie turns to the second wave of Feminism，which is a period of feminist activity that first began in the early 1960s in the United States.At a time when mainstream women were taking up a professional job in military，media，and sports，the large part of reasons owe to the second-wave feminist advocacy.The second-wave feminism also emphasized on fighting against violence with proposals of marital rape laws，establishing rape crisis and battered womens shelters，and changes of custody and divorce law.Its major effort was passage of the Equal Rights Amendment（ERA）to the United States Constitution，in which they were defeated by anti-feminists that led by Phyllis Schlafly，who argued as an anti-ERA view that the ERA meant women would be drafted into the military.To mention Clarissa，she was a modern lady living with her girlfriend.Being a lesbian，Clarissa didn.t seem mind others using the traditional eyes on her.Reasons for this might be there still being some inhabitations that left during the second-wave feminism.During the Second-wave Feminism，women pursued the true love and ignored the gender differences.In addition，Clarissa lived in the generation that gave birth to the third-wave feminism，which helps women in that period to get more equality.As a result，Clarissa was a typical signal that woman gradually got senses of presentence and self-identify.

Ⅳ.The Ways to Self-Identify

Then we turn to this movie characters.Virginia Woolf finally committed suicide to achieve her self-identity，and death was not a self-destroy，but her final destination—a total liberation.Then，her suicide could be regarded as the result of her subjectivity—she conducted her life all the time.And the last one was modern version Mrs.Dalloway， different from sick Mrs. Dalloway，Clarissa was a healthy woman.She was neat and confident，which could be easily known from her dressing：all hippie style，and always wearing mens cotton shirts.“She has made up her mind before a long time ago； not to mind but let herself fully enjoy the bohemian life” From heterosexual to homosexual，and even both， her career was successful as an editor.She lived in a luxury block where upper class people inhabited.Apparently she had stepped into the upper classes of society， thus she realized the self-identity as well as womens self-worth.

V.Conclusion

The movie The Hour was seen as the new era of feminism； it reveals and stimulates the weakening of the feminism.However，the study of women.s self-identify also exist some limitations.The most feminism study is focus on western feminism，it can.t completely reveal the female problems and trigger a large arrange of awakening of women in China.