The Mighty Women in Serial Story Entitled Lastri by Tien Kumalasari: A Study of Feminist Literary Criticism

Abstract

- -Women have always been an interesting topic of all the time as subject for research and discussion. Many things could be studied and discussed related to women‘s issues. Not to mention, many organizations, institutions, or individuals also make women‘s issues as their subject or object of the discussion. The women’s issue nowadays is no longer about women who are considered as secondary beings. But it has shifted to other things that show the role and strength of women themselves. This could be seen from the rising number of highly educated women who even occupy strategic positions in various fields. Thus, women are not considered as inferior people who only work in the domestic sectors. One of the literary works which brings up women‘s issues is serial story entitled Lastri by Tien Kumalasari. The women’s issue presented in the novel has been the target of this study with the following formulation of the problem: What kind of potential that female character occupies to ignite her existence? In line with the problem, the purpose of this study was to describe the existence of female character in serial story entitled Lastri by Tien Kumalasari and to elaborate the potentials of the female character so that she could ignite her existence. The researchers conducted feminist literary criticism approach in this study. The method of the study used was descriptive qualitative method. From the data analysis, the following results were obtained. One of the female characters namely Lastri was an orphan from a mountainous area who later had been taken care of by Mrs. Marsudi‘s family. Lastri had grown into a woman of many talents. Although her education only reached high school level, she grew up to be a smart, literate, hard-working, and courageous woman. She was also good at cooking.