A New Structural Model on the Representation of Women from Traditional to Modern Narratives: Structural Female Representation Model

The representation of female characters in the Turkish narrative tradition spans a broad spectrum, from folk tales to modern novels. Traditional narratives generally cast women in stereotypical roles such as the devoted mother, the waiting lover, or the evil stepmother, whereas modern novels grant female characters more independent, strong, and individualized identities. This study takes a comparative approach to the representation of women across traditional and modern Turkish narratives and proposes a new structural model that analyzes female characters according to thirteen criteria, including the level of reality, female willpower, independence, social status, perception of beauty, and conformity to social norms. The model synthesizes six theoretical perspectives: Luhmann’s systems theory, Giddens’s structuration theory, Hall’s cultural representation, Foucault’s power-discourse analysis, Bourdieu’s field theory, and postmodern thought. It is applied to selected Turkish tales, the minstrel stories Kerem and Aslı and Tahir and Zühre, and the modern novels Handan, Aşk-ı Memnu, Vurun Kahpeye, and Fatih Harbiye. The analysis reveals how female figures shift from passive, fate-bound roles toward self-determining agency while remaining subject to newly constructed social constraints. By systematizing this transformation, the study offers an analytical framework specific to the Turkish narrative tradition and contributes a theoretical basis for future narratological studies of female representation.