The Goddess As A Curved Line: Coding Women's Wisdom Pamela Collins We have rolled the stone away from the cave, stood together or alone in the sacred groves, among the circled stones, illuminated by moonlight and crystals and there we have called her name: Diana, Isis, Morganna, Ishtar, White Buffalo Woman. In Cerridwen's cauldron the blood, milk and tears of our body are held safely now, no longer poured on the ground and wasted but collected and transformed into music, art and poetry -- a way of knowing. The reawakening of the Goddess has been a boon to women, the extent of which we continue to explore. But everything that enters our lives, even (and perhaps especially) those things which are gifts, must be watched carefully, used with caution, and protected. As we move our consideration of the Goddess from the sacred grove to the academy, we should be aware of the co-optation of Goddess imagery by the patriarchy. Classical mythology, from which we draw many of our Goddess images, derives from an already misogynistic society. If some of the "Goddess" philosophy that comes from that mythology doesn't always feel quite right, there are some very good reasons for it. Adrienne Rich, in Of Woman Born, cites some of the misogynistic attitudes that cover themselves with a false cloak of Great Mother worship, and notes that "feminists have sometimes become polarized between the ‘matriarchal' and the ‘Amazonian' ideal..." (p. 85). Eve or Lilith, Angel or whore, the age-old dichotomy that drives women into impossible choices and the fragmentation of the self is as easily supported by Goddess imagery as any other system or mythology. As in the case that Rich cites, the polarization supported by these images contributes to divisiveness within the feminist movement. While radical, separatist feminists and non-separatists struggle to maintain a dialogue based on mutual respect, anti-feminists claim evidence for their edification of the "matriarchal" or "love Goddess" image at the expense of the Amazon who is falsely represented as monstrously independent, man-mutilating and child-gobbling. The ease with which Goddess imagery can become co-opted is evident everywhere from Disney to the swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated. Despite their vulnerability however, literal images of the Goddess can be wonderfully vivid and useful. They compel creativity, visualization and identification. Like a totem, they embody characteristics and ideas we may wish to keep at a conscious level during our everyday activities. Sometimes when I daydream at my window, I let myself imagine the tall greycloaked women of the Irish Sidhe folk wandering among the birch and scrub pines of the woods behind my house. Before long, I find that I am out-of-doors myself, wandering the trails of Volume 13, Number 1
SPRING 2001
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