As Julia Kristeva stated in the Stabat Mater, the maternal image of the Virgin Mary does not provide an adequate model of maternity, therefore with the Virgin as a role model, the maternal body is reduced to silence. Moreover, she apparently implies interrelations between desexualizing and silencing women (Kristeva 145). Thus, the name of the poem doubly attacks the Catholic rules—if women are reduced to be mothers, a homosexual love act is an act of disobedience, and the detailed description if the act with “thighs” and “back” and “your breasts and belly” (Dorcey 1120) emphasizes that the scene in the poem is purely lustful, it is an act of desire and passion, what contradicts the religious model. The line “Blood on our thighs” may have two …show more content…
off. (Dorcey 1121)
With this closing lines, Dorcey suggest “the possibility of a society which re-creates itself from the ruins of an outdated cultural and value system” (Schrage-Früh, “‘My Being Cries Out to Be Incarnate’: The Virgin Mary and Female Sexuality in Contemporary Irish Women’s Poetry” 136). But her hopes probably will never be fulfilled. As Moane writes:
. . . rapid social change does not necessarily imply marked psychological change. In the case of homosexuality, for example, it is apparent that fear and prejudice is alive and well in Irish psyches and society, despite important legislative changes, the unprecedented inclusion of lesbians and gay men in progressive social agendas, and increasing depiction of lesbians and gay men in art and culture. (431)
With this poem, the author shows that violence, unreal idealized expectations of the woman and prejudice towards the lesbians are related. From the lines “she was always— / no one would have though— / always a quiet girl” (Dorcey 1121) “one infers . . . the indictment of those ideologies that propound the image of the woman as docile, quiet and asexual by making it responsible for violence against women” (González, “Contemporary Women’s Poetry in Galicia and in Ireland: An Introduction”
Describe and evaluate two definitions of abnormality [16 marks] One definition of abnormality comes from statistical infrequency. We typically define what is seen as ‘normal’ by referring to statistical values. For example, from statistical evidence, we can be informed of things such as the average shoe size of 11-year olds, the average age of a first-time mother, and so on. As we can define what is ‘normal’ through statistics, we can also define what is abnormal. For instance, it is seen as abnormal for a first-time mother to be over the age of 40 or under the age of 20.
Human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere”. There is so much bad form and enduring, shouting out for attention victims of yearning, of racism and political abuse in Chile, for occasion, or in the occasion journalists and artists, prisoners in such a large number of terrains administered by the left and by the
Tina Alvarado SPA222-A5 3/52017 WAC 5: Response to Sor Filotea The letter that Sor Juana wrote was a biography about her life and rationality. It was a declaration of her scholarly, innovative freedom, and rebut of censorial intrusion. Sor Juana was known as the world’s first women with the artistic and intellectual privilege to publish, write, study, and teach freely. She wrote the letter to inform Sor Filotea who was trying to silence her that she would not go still into the night.
In the book In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez there are many times when feminism is present, along with the many stereotypes found in the Dominican culture. Julia Alvarez had many elements within her writing, when she developed a character she made it so
Although the world has managed to bring significant changes toward women’s empowerment, there is still more to do. It’s important to see that Rafael’s actions and attitude do not come from his own intentional choices, rather he acts this way due to the generational transmission of this ideal from father. To stop this cycle, change must come from the root which means men need to be better educated about the negative impact of machoism. They ought to understand the role of the women, the freedom a child needs and the consequence of machismo. Henriquez’s goal with her book is to portray the reality of these unknown Americans.
“The women in Harwood’s poems are always shown as victims of a male-dominated world. Discuss.” Throughout her poetry, Gwen Harwood often revisits and challenges the statement that women are victims of a male dominated world. The expectation that women would only serve as domestic housewives and child bearers is thoroughly rejected as Harwood identifies the repressive and restrictive cultural and social ideologies in which women were restrained too.
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, a self-taught philosopher, poet and forward thinker, wrote many empowering poems that captured how she felt during the time she was living in. Two of which “Foolish Men” and “On her Portrait” express how she didn’t like the stereotypical roles women were put in during her life. These poems show true anguish and express a slight distain for men. In the poem “Foolish Men” Cruz starts off by explaining how men are so quick to blame women for their ailments but in actuality it is themselves causing them.
Judith Butler’s Gender Troubles emphasizes gender as the constant repetition of non-existent ideals to uphold a masculine-dominant culture. Likewise, “Body Politics” highlights this belief within the overtly feminine qualities of city women. As a whole, the poem contrasts idealized feminine “city women” with a “real woman” who possesses both feminine and masculine qualities. The mother figure challenges both the gender binary and the patriarchal order by rejecting the feminine gender norms of the society. This feminist reading of the poem makes many valuable and probable claims, however the feminist approach contains some weaknesses.
Lorena Garcia wrote “She is Old School Like That,” this piece is about sex talks between mothers and daughters in the Latin American community. She examines the way which these talks are given and at what point in the life of the daughters they are given. Garcia points to the different methodology the Latina mothers used when talking to their daughters, and their reactions when they found out their daughters were engaging in sexual activity. Garcia claims that there is a certain pattern in which the Latina mothers behave. These women are the operation with a new definition of sexuality influenced and shaped by the heteronormative and patriarchal society.
She has been brainwashed by the patriarchal society of her time to worship the man, her husband, and perform her duties and daily rituals as a means to please him. Welter outlines several characteristics that constitute the perfect or true woman; however, the most crucial and detrimental so-called “virtues” exhibited by Gilman`s the narrator are her submissiveness and domesticity. Although the artistic narrator clearly has her own desires to be free and write as she pleases, her desire to satisfy the patriarchal construct of the household by attending
In comparison to the rigid patriarchal society portrayed in “My Last Duchess”, Keats’ “La Belle Dame sans Merci” illustrates how the freedom of individual expression in the romantic period affects people’s perspective on love. While the narrative persona in “My Last Duchess” demands his wife to devote her love to him, the protagonist of “La Belle Dame sans Merci” devotes to the woman he loves even though the love is unrequited. This is evident through the repetition of the line “On the cold hill side.” throughout the poem. The noun phrase “cold hill” suggests that the knight is lonely and depressed when he waits for the woman solely, however unlike the narrative persona of “My Last Duchess”, he would not demand the woman to love him instead he would wait patiently until the day his affection towards her is accepted.
Apparently, men do fear of women; and they put their fear on display with various exhibitions of hatred, which is sweeping broadly, cross-culturally, consecutively over time as a result of mental perturbation, not an endeavour to generate and elevate beneficial environment for a male-biased system. Described as one of men’s psychological anxiousness, misogyny owes its origin to “identical experiences of male’s development cycle, rather than causes by the environment alone” (2001). In other words, men’s development cycle is to blame for their inner struggle; and without uttering it directly, the implied word is “mother” and/ or “wife”. Ultimately, his work on misogyny itself is misogynistic because the underlying message is clear: despite being left with no voice and just a few choices, being victims of brutality, violence and hatred, women themselves are the root of the
The role of women in literature crosses many broad spectrums in works of the past and present. Women are often portrayed as weak and feeble individuals that submit to the situations around them, but in many cases women are shown to be strong, independent individuals. This is a common theme that has appeared many times in literature. Across all literature, there is a common element that causes the suffering and pain of women. This catalyst, the thing that initiates the suffering of women, is essentially always in the form of a man.
This directly corroborates society’s viewing of her as the description only includes her sexual physical assets. Duffy writes this because she is trying to convey the sufferings of women in society as they are consistently objectified, devaluing their nature as a human being, and she invokes people to make a change. This theme of valuing women in a restrictive way as one only notices the physical elements of a female is continued throughout the poem, for example when the artist “is concerned with volume, space”, or “You’re getting thin, Madame, this is not good”. This directly references the corporeal elements of a body. The purpose of this quotation is consistent with the aforementioned one.
This novel is also autobiographical. Throughout history, women have been locked in a struggle to free themselves from the borderline that separates and differentiate themselves from men. In many circles, it is agreed that the battleground for this struggle and fight exists in literature. In a