열녀 유서에 나타난 감정 규범과 감정 통제의 기제 - 신씨부 유서에 나타난 순응과 위반의 감정 언어를 중심으로

Abstract

This study is to analyze the emotional language of chaste woman’s suicide note and examine its meaning and value. The intention of this study is to investigate to emotional background of Joseon Dynasty in the 19th century, also to inquire into the woman’s deep and complex mentality who is obedient to the Yeal ideology seemingly. During the Joseon Dynasty period, the recommended emotional norm for women was “Obeisance”. ‘Chaste (Yeol)’ is an extreme obedience to die with her husband. A suicide note left by a daughter-in-law of the Shin family was written with a determination to follow her husband in his death, and it was featured that “following but violating” the rules of emotional norm forced to women in the late of Joseon Dynasty. Three of the four suicide notes left by the Shin family's daughter-in-law were left to her maiden homes’ family "her adapted son and his wife, daughter and her husband, and her brother’s and his wife. In here, the writer showed prudence and thoughtful affection, considered the situation of recipients of her suicide note first. She also showed that adjusting her feelings by considering the depth of the relationship without pouring her sadness and bitterness out first. On the contrary, the other note left to her parents-in-law revealed her condensed emotion of anger. An anger is the emotion originally hiararchical and gendered. Especially woman’s anger is regarded as the emotion negative and blameful. It was because she protested that it was all her parents in-laws’ fault and not her own while explaining why she had to died years later than her husband in the note. However, these anger emotions offended against the filial piety, that is the main value of Joseon society, and the emotional norm of women in the Joseon Dynasty. In that sense, her suicide note. especially among the chaste women’s suicide notes, showed very rare and unique emotional depth. People have no choice but to obey the norm of the society as an individual, however they can feel and express their outspoken emotion that is unjust and violent. In this article, her anger is an important background emotion of the suicide note. The expression of the woman’s anger was suppressed socially, but she couldn’t hide and showed it in her last writing called a suicide note. It was an unconscious anger on the irrationality and violence of the chastity ideology that forced to die with her the husband. Through this analysis, this article found that the female subject, the chaste women, showed her emotional energy against social order rather than conforming to patriarchal ideology.