Jurgen Habermas argues that in the early modern period western culture increasingly divided itself into separate spheres: the public sphere and the intimate domestic sphere. Michel Foucault has demonstrated that sexual discourse proliferated during this time period--mainly because of a 'determination on the part of agencies of power' to have sex discussed. This dissertation explores how sexual discourse, specifically sexual violence, was used in the production of this new dichotomized society. Therefore, after placing women in the larger cultural context, the dissertation first examines the uses of rape in the works of Samuel Richardson in order to expose the cultural (and often conscious) use of rape to control women's behavior and, thereby, to produce Mary Poovey's proper (and, now, private) lady. Fielding, discussed next, uses rape in an effort to maintain the older, classical, male homo-social order. For example, he uses rape as a way to punish educated women, and he uses rape as a means to figure his dissatisfaction with fluctuations in social class. Frances Burney, discussed in chapter four, expresses her condemnation of and reaction to this new social order. The conclusion argues that Eliza Haywood, Elizabeth Inchbald, Tobias Smollett, and Sir Walter Scott prove that the discourse of sexual violence is widespread and needs more exploration
