THE DISRUPTION OF PATRIARCHY THROUGH CLASS MOBILITY IN EMILY BRONTE'S WUTHERING HEIGHTS

In Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, both male and female characters have the ability to fluidly move between classes and display behaviors that far outreach their class rank. In this thesis, I argue that Bronte uses the fluidity of class to dismantle the layers of patriarchy within the novel and larger social structures. Nelly Dean is both the narrator and a lowly housemaid within Wuthering Heights, however despite her status, she is given many privileges within the house and has a distinct sense of agency. This is a subtle queering of class structures, however Heathcliff is able to gain a massive quantity of wealth and move from a lowly stable boy to a stately land owner; this is also despite the racial stigma of Heathcliff being introduced as an orphaned gypsy. Many characters move both up and down within class structures through gaining and losing capital; both social and monetary. Despite this attempt by Bronte however, while she is successful in disrupting the patriarchy, she is ultimately unsuccessful in dismantling it because it is primarily the male characters who are able to move up within the social scale.