Women on the Margins: Abjection and Sublimation in Aysha Baqir’s Beyond the Fields

Abstract

Aysha Baqir’s Beyond the Fields (2019) explores women’s struggles under Zia-ul-Haq’s dictatorship in 1980s Pakistan. Pakistani women’s subjugation stems from the intersection of colonial legacies, patriarchal and feudal authority, military rule, and socio-spatial hierarchies, which limit their educational opportunities, freedom of choice, and individual agency especially in non-urban, conservative contexts. Women’s choices, especially under Zia’s regime, were seen as threats to patriarchal structures and were systematically stifled. Central to this repression is the cultural rationale of honour and shame, where women’s bodies and conduct are regarded as custodians of family dignity, while men use legal, cultural, and religious frameworks to enforce sanctions against transgression of male authority. Although Beyond the Fields has been analysed from feminist and intersectional perspectives, limited attention has been paid to its representation of abjection and the formation of female subjectivity at the psychic and symbolic levels. This paper addresses this gap through Kristeva’s concepts of abjection and sublimation, contributing a psychoanalytic dimension to existing scholarship on the novel’s representation of women’s experiences in Pakistan. Kristeva’s framework of abjection highlights how patriarchal power structures exclude women psychically and symbolically, through religion and law and norms about honour and shame. The paper suggests that Zara, the protagonist, sublimates her response to abjection through reading, redirecting repressed drives into symbolically legitimised acts of agency to reclaim her sense of selfhood. The study also shows how Zara resists the patriarchal symbolic restrictions imposed on her, develops creative agency and self-empowerment.

Keywords: abjection; Beyond the Fields; honour; Julia Kristeva; sublimation

Beyond the Fields (2019) karya Aysha Baqir menelusuri perjuangan wanita di bawah pemerintahan diktator Zia-ul-Haq di Pakistan pada dekad 1980-an. Penindasan terhadap wanita Pakistan berpunca daripada gabungan warisan kolonial, kuasa patriarki dan feudal, pemerintahan ketenteraan, serta hierarki sosio-ruang yang membataskan mereka daripada peluang pendidikan, kebebasan membuat pilihan, dan agensi individu, khususnya dalam konteks luar bandar yang konservatif. Di bawah rejim Zia, kebebasan wanita untuk membuat pilihan dianggap sebagai ancaman terhadap struktur patriarki dan dikekang secara sistematik. Penindasan ini didasari oleh pemahaman budaya tentang maruah dan aib, di mana tubuh dan kelakuan wanita dilihat sebagai penjaga kehormatan keluarga, manakala lelaki menggunakan kerangka undang-undang, budaya, dan agama untuk mengenakan hukuman terhadap sebarang pelanggaran autoriti lelaki. Beyond the Fields telah dianalisis melalui perspektif feminis dan interseksional, namun masih kurang perhatian diberikan terhadap representasi abjeksi dan pembentukan subjektiviti wanita pada tahap psikis dan simbolik dalam novel ini. Makalah ini mengisi jurang tersebut melalui konsep abjeksi dan sublimasi oleh Julia Kristeva, serta menyumbang dimensi psikoanalitik kepada wacana sedia ada tentang representasi pengalaman wanita di Pakistan dalam novel ini. Melalui kerangka abjeksi, Kristeva menekankan bagaimana struktur kuasa patriarki menyisihkan wanita secara psikis dan simbolik melalui agama, undang-undang dan norma berkaitan maruah dan aib. Kajian menunjukkan bahawa Zara, watak utama novel, menggunakan pembacaan sebagai bentuk sublimasi dalam menghadapi abjeksi. Melalui pembacaan, Zara mengalihkan dorongan terpendam kepada tindakan yang boleh diterima dalam aturan simbolik, sekali gus membolehkannya membina semula jati dirinya. Dengan cara ini, Zara menentang batasan patriarki dalam aturan simbolik, bertindak secara kreatif dan memperkasakan dirinya.

Kata Kunci: abjeksi; Beyond the Fields; Julia Kristeva; maruah; sublimasi