민담에 형상화된 ‘남장’ 모티프 연구 - ‘남장 아내’ 이야기를 중심으로 - = A Study on the Female-to-Male Disguise Motif in Folktales - Focusing on ‘A wife cross-dressed as a man’ tale -

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study examined the aspects and meanings of the ‘female-to-male’ disguise or ‘cross-dressing’ motif, in two folktales, where a female character cross-dresses as ‘wives’: <Wife imprisoned instead of her husband> and <Wife who avenged her husband’s murderer>.
In the case of <Wife imprisoned instead of her husband>, the wife’s cross-dressing does not reverse all elements of her identity that she was performing. The wife cross-dresses not as an unspecified male but as a specific male, her husband. On the other hand, <Wife who avenged her husband’s murderer> differs in terms of the existence of her husband’s survival, the object of imitation through cross-dressing, and the existence of alternative means. The wife’s cross-dressing is closer to a transformation into an anonymous person for problem-solving than to performing male gender. However, in both stories, the wives’ cross-dressing is attributed to the performance of ‘exemplary’ masculinity more than any male in the narrative due to the absence or impotence of ‘real males’, even if it is ultimately meaningful as a Confucian performance of ‘filial duty’.
Subsequently, other stories in which women cross-dress for men and stories in which men cross-dress were reviewed to expand on the issues of masculinity raised by the wife’s cross-dressing. In the legend <The trial between brother and sister>, the cross-dressed sister shows exemplary masculinity temporarily more than her younger brother, similar to cross-dressed wives, but there is a big difference in whether or not to acknowledge the qualities of cross-dressed women. In folktales where male characters cross-dress to achieve affection, it is pointed out that rather than emphasizing the performance of ‘femininity’ by men through cross-dressing, he performs ‘marginalized’ masculinity. Through this, we confirmed the issue of masculinity presented by cross-dressed wife folktales even in other cross-dressing tales and examined that female-to-male and male-to-female cross-dressing are not located at opposite ends in terms of gender performance.