The Sentiment of Honour in William Shakespeare’s Mediterranean Play Othello (1602): A Sociological Approach

Abstract

This dissertation studies the sentiment of honour in William Shakespeare’s Mediterranean play Othello: the Moor of Venice (1602). It aims to demonstrate the way Shakespeare regards honour as it is perceived in the Mediterranean societies. Borrowing the analytic tools from Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological theory developed in his book Masculine Domination (1998), this research paper tries to analyse two fundamental types of honour namely: male honour and female honour. My analysis has shown that though Othello was written by an Englishman, the way Shakespeare manoeuvres the sentiment of honour demonstrates that he knows much about the Mediterranean codes of honour. Through Othello’s reaction towards chastity, it appeared that it does not reflect an Anglo-Saxon attitude, but a purely Mediterranean one.