According to "The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language", the word "femininity" is defined as "the quality or condition of being feminine or a characteristic or trait traditionally considered feminine. Furthermore, femininity is formed by various socially defined and biologically created gender roles played by women and influenced by a number of social and cultural factors. For example, traditional gender roles for women include nurturer, birth giver, housewife, and caregiver. However, marked by a series of women's rights movements starting in the 19th century, women's gender roles, as well as the way society and men perceive women, have been significantly altered. This significant change, described as a process of female awakening, has been widely reflected in many contemporary literary works. This essay will focus specifically on the construction of femininity in two short stories, Ernest Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" and Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour," examining how the authors define "femininity » in their treatment of female characters. “Hills Like White Elephants” is a classic short story first published in 1927 and written by Ernest Hemingway, who is generally recognized as one of the most influential writers in the history of American literature. Beginning with a lengthy description of the story's setting at a train station surrounded by hills, fields, and trees in the Ebro Valley of Spain, Hemingway told the story from a limited third person and omniscient, almost in the form of an entire dialogue between an anonymous character. A young American man and a girl named Jig as they sit in a bar near the train station waiting for the train to Madrid. Throughout Hemingway's direct and clear report...... middle of paper ......e took into account the traditional obligation of women to love and care for their husbands. Her love for her husband reveals part of her identity as a responsible and conventional wife, but her inner desire for freedom defines another part of her femininity as an unconventional and autonomous woman. Works Cited “White Elephants” Oxford Dictionaries http://www. oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/white-elephant “Femininity.” The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. June 22, 2014. http://www.sparknotes.com/short-stories/hills-like-white-elephants/summary.html http://www.shmoop.com/hills-like - white-elephants/title.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hills_Like_White_Elephantshttp://iws2.collin.edu/andrade/1302/HillsLikeexample.htm