A Study of Ibsen's A Doll's House

'Power and Inequality'

Abstract

Dualism as a philosophy of ecofeminism can be used as a tool to study the relationship of 'power and inequality' between individuals. This paper presents textual analysis of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House to see how conversations between characters create dualisms that are indexical of the social status of the participants. Unlike other critiques of A Doll's House, this paper attempts to focus on the 'description of humanity'. Those in power have a right to maneuver and manipulate others who are weak. Much of the focus is on the central characters Helmer and Nora for they are representative, respectively, of society and individual. Through the conversation of these two characters, dualisms of powerful/weak, man/woman, human/woman, center/individual, objective/subjective and finally the dualism of higher/lower scales is located. These dualisms help in understanding the unequal relationship of the characters.