INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCE RESEARCH
IN MULTIDISCIPLINARY

The paper will discuss the complex relationship which exists between class, society and gender in the writings of Jane Austen, who was one of the most influential novelists in the early nineteenth century. Placing her novels in the social context of the Regency, the study explores how Austen criticizes strict class stratification, economic dependence and restrictions on women especially through the marriage institution. By analyzing Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Emma, Mansfield Park and Persuasion through close readings, the discussion points out how social realism, irony, satire and free indirect discourse are employed by Austen both to reflect and to critique existing norms. Her heroines, Elizabeth Bennet, Elinor and Marianne Dashwood, Emma Woodhouse and Fanny Price play out their desires in the social circumstances, exposing the tensions between agency and culture. This subtle description of domestic spaces as miniature versions of the social world in general highlights the power, privilege, and gender inequality critique that Austen makes. The argument of the paper is that although the works by Austen are heavily contextualized in the socio-economic situation of her era, they still resonate greatly in their treatment of class consciousness, female independence, and the search of love and integrity.