Ai-Lee Cho. Symbolic Violence and Consciousness Raising: Small Changes. The
New Studies of English Language & Literature 33, 2006. 153-168. This article
examines Marge Piercy’s Small Changes in terms of Bourdieu’s symbolic violence
and consciousnes ...

Ai-Lee Cho. Symbolic Violence and Consciousness Raising: Small Changes. The
New Studies of English Language & Literature 33, 2006. 153-168. This article
examines Marge Piercy’s Small Changes in terms of Bourdieu’s symbolic violence
and consciousness-raising of 70s’ feminists. Symbolic violence builds on the binary
logic and ultimately connects a more fundamental polarity: the dominant/dominated
paired opposition. The vertical classification of male/female becomes internalized
into the cognitive structure of women, who, in turn, reproduce male domination.
Consciousness-raising begins with the unmasking of symbolic violence that
legitimize and hide male domination. Small Changes is an attempt to produce in
fiction an equivalent of a full experience in a consciousness-raising group. Piercy
takes pains with her story to show us how feminity is socially constructed: how
gender socialization is the process through which women internalize male
domination. While traditional novel shows life patterns resolved by marriage, this
novel subverts these patterns.