In the medieval and early modern periods which were dominated by the public life under the aristocratic patronage system,disgust and hatred were the main social attitude towards cats in France,as the independency of cats caused extensive suspicion and scepticism on them.Even Voltaire and other Enlightenment elites held much prejudice against cats.In the 18 th century,the French bourgeoisie became the first social group of having structurally significance to treat cats as pets.Such development was related to a novel emotional value orientation led by the emerging bourgeoisie that focused on private family feelings and pursuit of independency.Consequently,the discredited cats were pictured as a mirror of the bourgeoisie that threatened the aristocratic order.However,the fact that the bourgeoisie consciously adopted cats as pets was both a rebellion against the contemporary dominant culture and a'cultural statement'of the bourgeoisie.This indicates that they were a social class with a sense of independent identity.As the concepts of independency and freedom as well as the bourgeois lifestyle becoming increasingly popular in France,the image and status of cats changed gradually in their favour during the 19th century.Meanwhile,the French intelligentsia discussed the issues of cats in the context of their respective imagination of the French national identity because of the special relation of cats with the bourgeois lifestyle.
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