Silenced Spaces, Rebellious Voices: The Madwoman Trope In Global Feminist Literature

Abstract

The concept of the "madwoman in the attic" is revisited in this article as a crucial metaphor for gendered resistance in postcolonial, Palestinian, and Western women's literature. The study examines how literary depictions of madness serve as intentional rejections of patriarchy, silence, and colonial epistemologies using feminist and postcolonial [1]frameworks, such as Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar's theory of narrative madness, Helen Cixou's concept of ecriture feminine, Gyatri Spivak's subaltern critique, and Chandra Talpade Mohanty's dismantling of Western feminist universalism. The paper makes the case that madness is a symbolic form of ontological and political rebellion rather than psychological dysfunction by closely examining Sahar Khalifeh's Wild Thorns and the Inheritance, Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions, and Charlotte Perkin Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper. While narrative fragmentation and broken chronologies reflect the suppressed agency of women denied discursive authority, the home sphere—traditionally seen as a zone of containment—is reframed as both carceral and rebellious. The paper suggests a global feminist approach that reclaims madness as an expressive, resistant grammar, presenting the madwoman as a potent symbol of ideological and narrative disruption rather than a marginalized figure.