Semicolon Spring 2021

SEMICOLON AN ARTS AND HUMANITIES STUDENTS’ COUNCIL PUBLICATION

L E T T E R F R O M T H E E D I TO R Dear readers and writers, Thank you for taking the time to open this publication—whether it’s a physical copy in your hands or you’re reading it online; whether you’re in London or abroad. We hope these stories inspire you.

Across all faculties, this school year has no doubt involved unprecedented challenges. When I was hired as Editor-in-Chief last March, I had no idea that our year would be entirely online. While we have certainly faced hardships, we have faced them together. I am grateful to be in a faculty—a family—like Arts and Humanities. The work in this publication is a testament to the strength, resilience, and hope that we hold inside ourselves.

To everyone who submitted their work, thank you for sharing your stories with us. Finally, thank you to the publications team whose hard work allowed Symposium and Semicolon to come together. Thank you for having me as your Editor-in-Chief.

With care, Courtney Ward-Zbeetnoff Editor-in-Chief

W H AT W E ’ R E A B O U T Semicolon is published bi-annually by the Arts and Humanities Students’ Council of the University of Western Ontario. The Publications Team would like to thank the students who submitted essays and art, as well as the rest of the Publications Committee who volunteered for the submissions review board.

Semicolon accepts A-level essays from any Arts and Humanities undergraduate course within the University of Western Ontario. To view previous editions or for more information about Semicolon, please contact the Arts and Humanities Students’ Council in Room 2135 in the University College Building. Publications can be viewed virtually at issuu.com/ ahscpubs.

Editor-in-Chief: Courtney Ward- Zbeetnoff Academic Managing Editor: Kaitlyn Lonnee Creative Managing Editor: Neha Khoral Copy Editor: Britney Forget Layout Editor: Cherin Chung

Adichie and Walker: Alienation Through Education and Its Weaponizing Effect By: Margaret Gleed

Varying levels of education in African American literature alienate those with higher education from those without. The alienating effect of education weaponizes the educated advantage, creating conflict and social unrest. As amplified in the “Afro-American” literary tradition (Gates 4), authors such as Alice Walker and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie use the divide of education to illustrate the difference between Americanized education and local education within Black communities. Adichie’s Americanah depicts how her character’s American and Nigerian education creates a divide between her and her peers, while Walker’s short stories “Her Sweet Jerome” and “Everyday Use” demonstrate the weaponizing effects of education within small communities and families. In all instances, the educational divide either subjects the protagonists to cruel treatment and alienation, or the protagonist becomes the perpetrator of cruel treatment and alienation.

African American literature concentrates on a series of traditions originating with the Signifying Monkey, a “rhetorical principle in Afro-American vernacular discourse” (Gates 49). Henry Louis Gates analyses the Signifying Monkey in his book The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism and reads into the tradition to develop “The Trope of the Talking Book.”

In slave narrative literature, the “Trope of the Talking Book” reflects the educational divide between Black slaves and the white men who owned them. The written text “speaks” to the slave owners while remaining silent to the Black slaves who were unable to read. It also bestows power to the hands of those who relay the message within the written text. Revealing the “tension between the Black vernacular and the literate white text” (143), the trope serves to display a divide between education and race.

Gates commends Alice Walker’s notable use of the “Trope of the Talking Book” in her novel The Colour Purple (183). However, Walker did not limit her use of the Afro-American trope to a singular work. Evidence of the trope exists in Alice Walker’s “Her Sweet Jerome” and “Everyday Use.” Often featuring themes of poor education within Black communities, Walker molds Dee’s university education in “Everyday Use” into a weapon which divides Dee and her family.

After gaining a university education, Dee changes her identity to fit a historic mold, reflecting on the generic past’s hardships and refusing immediate familial heritage. Receiving a formal post-secondary education, Dee defines her own

relevant Black history, effectively separating herself from her mother and sister’s heritage.

Walker establishes that Dee had a deeper understanding of education than her mother and sister in childhood.

She used to read to us without pity; forcing words, lies, other folks’ hab

its, whole lives upon us two, sitting trapped and ignorant underneath her

voice. She washed us in a river of make-believe, burned us with a lot of

knowledge we didn’t necessarily need to know, Pressed us to her with the

serious way she read, to shove us away at just the moment, like dimwits, we

seemed to understand. (“Everyday Use” 3) Dee’s manipulation of her mother and sister’s lack of literary knowledge parallels the use of the “Trope of the Talking Book” in historical slave narrative literature.

The wielding of words and their meanings to impart only selective pieces of knowledge effectively weaponizes Dee’s superior education. This act suppresses those whom it serves to manipulate in this scenario, Mama and Maggie.

Juxtaposing Dee’s superior Americanized knowledge, Mama and Maggie’s intrinsic understanding of family heirlooms’ historical significance pivots the direction of misunderstanding toward Dee. Resembling how the written text spoke to the slave owners and remained silent to the Black slaves in the slave narratives, the heirlooms speak to Mama and Maggie and remain silent to Dee. To a lesser extent, this weaponizes the familial knowledge held by Mama and Maggie and separates them from Dee.

Walker’s “Her Sweet Jerome” utilizes the “Trope of the Talking Book” to highlight the violence which results from the separation caused by dif ferent levels of education. As the protagonist does not understand the double meanings presented to her about her husband’s “extramarital” reading activities, Walker establishes how her lack of understanding creates a division between the protagonist and the community. Without an explanation, the protagonist spirals into madness as she receives punishment for her obtuseness, leading to the protagonist’s violent action in retribution. The unknown second meaning of the community gossip, a form of informal knowledge regarding her cheating husband, becomes a weapon against the protagonist, belittling her into desperation.

When the brazen and difficult words did not disappear with the books, she

hastened with kerosene to set the marriage bed afire… “I kill you! I kill

you!” she screamed against the roaring fire… But the fire and the words

rumbled against her together, overwhelming her with pain and enlighten

ment. (“Her Sweet Jerome” 8-9) Once the protagonist discovers Jerome’s Black empowerment novels, she understands that his mistress was not a woman but rather books about the Black

revolution she gave him as an enticement to stay home. She discovers the double meaning’s truth, dissembling the trope and causing the weapon to shift from the knowledge she does not possess to the education she gains and resents.

Adichie’s Americanah creates the converging storylines of Ifemelu and Obinze as they navigate Nigeria’s education before traveling to America and England, respectively. Attempting to further their academic standing, both seek to attend university in post 9/11 America. Ifemelu successfully enrolls at Princeton University and struggles with racism and how Americanized education neglects to discuss the intricacies of race. Ifemelu’s education allows her to discuss the complexities of race regarding American and non-American Black people. Using both her Nigerian and American learnings, Ifemelu artfully weaponizes her education and specific knowledge regarding race to illuminate the differences between different classifications of Black people in her blog postings. Ifemelu uses her lack of prior knowledge regarding American tribalism to expose the polarizing and objectifying traditions from an outsider’s position.

In America, tribalism is alive and well. There are four kinds — class, ideol

ogy, region, and race… Finally, race. There’s a ladder of racial hierarchy in

America. White is always on top… and American Black is always on the

bottom, and what’s in the middle depends on the time and place. (Adichie

227) Her blog post highlights the polarizing effect of skin tone within a hierarchy of race. The specification she uses when depicting the American Blacks illustrates to the reader how different hierarchies exist between subclassifications of a race when the position along the original hierarchy depends on current social trends and public opinion. Often influenced by the education level of the surrounding community, popular public opinions heavily influence the treatment of visible minorities. Adichie uses Ifemelu’s outsider-with-higher-education point of view while illuminating the subclassification differences to those who lack objectivity.

In this action of “enlightenment” through education, Ifemelu uses her education as a weapon against ignorance regarding the intricacies of race and racial issues.

Weaponizing Ifemelu’s education to create a hierarchy between educated and uneducated Black people, Adichie also illustrates the opposite use of education — to feel pleasure from the intimidation rather than from the enlightenment education provides others. Chapter one exemplifies Ifemelu’s use of higher education to intimidate and belittle. When having her hair braided, she uses her vocabulary and knowledge from post-secondary to confuse and intimidate Aisha, the stylist.

“I’ve just finished a fellowship,” [Ifemelu] said, knowing that Aisha would

not understand what a fellowship was, and in the rare moment that Aisha

looked intimidated, Ifemelu felt a perverse pleasure. (20)

When Ifemelu wields her education to discomfit others because it provides her pleasure, she weaponizes her education. As education often maintains a “higher purpose” in literature, Adichie’s writing exposes edification as harmful. Foreshadowing the separations between higher education and primary education, Adichie establishes her novel as a counterexample for the effect of education on a community. Adichie’s ability to demonstrate education’s weaponization in the opening chapter of Americanah foreshadows the importance of the theme of education throughout the novel.

She hoped her driver would not be a Nigerian, because he, once he heard

her accent, would either be aggressively eager to tell her that he had a Mas ters degree, the taxi was his second job, and his daughter was on the Dean’s

list at Rutgers; Or he would drive in sullen silence, giving her change and

ignoring in her “thank you,” all the time nursing humiliation, that this fel

low Nigerian, a small girl at that, who perhaps was a nurse or an accountant

or even a doctor, was looking down on him. (10) Using Ifemelu to cultivate an ideal education provides the reader with an understanding of how higher education separates those who have it and those who do not. Specifically looking towards those of the same Nigerian background as Ifemelu, Adichie creates the scenario where Ifemelu’s education will bond her to, or alienate her from, a Nigerian cab driver. This quote further illustrates how those with a higher education level bond together as the education often results from similar determination or privilege, allowing for connectivity between members.

For Adichie, education is something to applaud or celebrate while the alienated resent those who possess it. Fundamental to the “Trope of the Talking Book,” this portrayal of education embeds itself in works by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Alice Walker. Walker’s use of the trope reflects Adichie’s, in that her characters strive for education to move forward, but those who stay behind resent them. Both Adichie and Walker exemplify education as a division within communities, subjecting their protagonists to cruel treatment and alienation at the hands of those who resent them.

Works Cited Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. Americanah. Vintage, 2014.

Gates, Henry Louis. The Signifying Monkey: a Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism. Oxford University Press, 2014.

Walker, Alice. “Everyday Use.” In Love & Trouble: Stories of Black Women, Open

Road Integrated Media, 2011, pp. 42–51.

---. “Her Sweet Jerome.” In Love & Trouble: Stories of Black Women, Open Road

Integrated Media, 2011, pp. 24–32.

Ethics in Academia: Using Stuart Hall’s Ideologies to Analyze the Ethically Irresponsible Choices of Western University Professors By: Jack Bradley

In Stuart Hall’s essay “Cultural Studies and Its Theoretical Legacies,” he warns the reader that the exponential explosion of theoretical fluency in the United States, despite the positive connotations, may “[represent] a moment of extraordinarily profound danger” (43). Hall is concerned about the escalation of theoretical fluency because he worries cultural studies will reach a point wherein the “overwhelming textualization of cultural studies’ own discourses” will be seen as somehow constituting “power and politics as exclusively matters of language and textuality” (44). Professor Nigel Joseph at the University of Western Ontario summarizes that “these remarks have often been read as a warning against co-optation, and against the comfortable assumption that once you have analyzed something in suitable academic jargon, you need do nothing more in terms of political action.” This essay finds itself in agreement with Hall’s concerned analysis and Professor Joseph’s summative description — albeit with some stipulations and additions. This essay proposes that while some people may be comfortable with the assumption that analyzing a topic in academic jargon is an acceptable substitution for political/ethical action, others will not and never will be comfortable with such performative action. The former group is generally the systemically privileged or the historical oppressors, while the later are typically the systematically underprivileged or the historically oppressed (and their true allies). While Hall states his concern that “power and politics [is becoming] exclusively matters of language and textuality” (44), this essay stipulates that politics and power cannot become exclusively a matter of language and textuality to the groups of people who are oppressed by said politics and power. As long as there is systematic oppression, related topics in cultural studies will always be personally and politically charged regardless of the presence or absence of extreme theoretical fluency.

To quote American feminist Carol Hanisch, the personal is the political, and so long as there are power imbalances, it will remain as such. Examples of relevance to this essay are the 2019 and 2020 cases of white Western University professors, Professor Andrew Wenaus and Professor Coby Dowdell, using the N-word in lectures under the guise of academic learning and historical/ theoretical fluency. Through the lens of Stuart Hall’s ideologies on theoretical

fluency and race, this essay argues that the cases of the white Western University professors using the N-word are demonstrations of the privileged being in positions where they feel comfortable discussing power and politics as “exclusively” matters of language and textuality. In contrast, the resulting discomfort and justified anger of Black students is a demonstration of how politics and power cannot become exclusively a matter of language and textuality to those who are oppressed by said politics and power. While it is the task of university departments to maintain high standards of thinking and expression, they should simultaneously be responsive to an ethical/political imperative from the larger world; these two responsibilities are not mutually exclusive.

That theoretical fluency contributes to overwhelming textualization and political inaction beyond theoretical knowledge is only typically true for those who do not face systemic oppression related to the topic at hand. A white man may become desensitized and politically inactive while being “educated” and theoretically fluent on matters of race; a heterosexual person may become politically inactive while being educated on matters of homophobia, etc. For the systemically disadvantaged, this is less often true. So long as there is systematic oppression, the related topics will always be personally and politically charged regardless of the presence or absence of extreme theoretical fluency. I can draw from a personal perspective to explain what theoretical fluency means to me in comparison to someone with more privilege. I am Indigenous, openly homosexual, a sexual assault survivor, and from a low-income background. For myself, and many people like me, theoretical fluency is a weapon, a sword, a shield. The more theoretical fluency I gain and the sharper I hone that fluency, the better equipped I am to defend myself personally and politically in a world of increasingly elitist academic jargon and inaccessibility. Furthermore, if (and when) my intersectional community is attacked via academic discourse in an academic or political environment, I would want to have the theoretical fluency to effectively come to my community’s defence. Ismael Abu-Saad’s essay “Where Inquiry Ends: The Peer Review Process and Indigenous Standpoints,’’ states:

one of the ongoing struggles of Indigenous people against colonization

is to be able to exercise the fundamental right to represent themselves and

to speak to the dominant society with their own voices and words, rather

than to be spoken of or about. [The essay] discusses the mainstream aca-

demic peer review process and the suppression of Indigenous standpoints

by the dominant culture.

When there is no adequate representation in the conversation, it becomes dominated by the privileged who drown out the voices of the oppressed and allow themselves to become comfortable in the assumption that once they have

analyzed something in suitable academic language, they need do nothing more in terms of political action. Hall comments on representation, writing that “textuality as a site of representation and resistance, all of those questions can never be erased from cultural studies [...] It has to analyze certain things about the constitutive and political nature of representation itself, about its complexities, about the effects of language, about textuality as a site of life and death. Those are the things cultural studies can address” (42-43). This leads to the suggestion that adequate political and cultural representation is what will prevent the world of theoretical fluency — from becoming one where a mere publication with no political action is acceptable. Ensuring proper representation in cultural studies and the broader humanities is vital to preserve the politically active nature of these studies: “Textuality cannot or should not be allowed to take over the politics that is inherent in cultural studies” (Joseph).

In 2019, the white English Professor Andrew Wenaus’ choice to use the N-word in lecture demonstrated an individual being comfortable in the assumption that once he has analyzed something academically, he need do nothing more in terms of political action. Furthermore, his choice demonstrated a dismissal of his ethical and political responsibilities as an authority figure in an institution of academia. This display of ethical irresponsibility in academia is not an isolated occurrence at Western University and its affiliates. Less than one year later, white Professor Coby Dowdell at King’s College (Western affiliate) also made the choice to use the N-word during a lecture meant to highlight how racism and racist language affects Black people. The professors, in positions of privilege and power, believed they could isolate the political and historical weight of the derogatory word to analyze it academically. The Black students in attendance, however, knew that separation cannot occur — the horrific cultural impact of the word is inseparably tied to it, regardless of how much academic jargon it is surrounded by. The case of Professor Coby Dowdell possesses a heightened level of irony. Colin Butler’s CBC article titled “Use of racial slur in class got lukewarm response from King’s University College,” highlights that Dowdell’s “class explores racism in historical literature and looks at the ethical responsibilities of studying such works.” The course surveyed the ethical responsibilities of studying racism in literature, and yet the course’s white instructor made the decision to use the N-word. This was not a matter of ignorance or lack of education. Professor Dowdell, with his position in higher academia, was fully aware of the impact that the word carries and its ethical/political weight in the larger world. He made the conscious decision to attempt to academically separate the word from its cultural charge in a way that only a person of such privilege would dare. The only Black student in the lecture, Tamia Chicas, was also the only recorded student who filed

complaints to the university administration following the incident. In a Global News article titled “Western University professor apologizes after student calls out his use of the n-word” by Jacquelyn LeBel, student Chizoba Oriuwa expresses a similar sentiment toward the case of Professor Andrew Wenaus’ use of the N-word after he claimed ignorance: “‘It’s 2019. You’re a PhD recipient. You know that the N-word is derogatory’” (qtd. in LeBel). Similar to the case of Dowdell, Wenaus’ class was “a class of at least 100 people, 3 of them being Black…. [T] he only people who ‘called out the prof’ were two Black students” (LeBel). This disturbing similarity between the two cases is no mere coincidence. These cases exemplify the contrast between the privileged — in positions where they feel comfortable discussing power and politics as “exclusively” matters of language and textuality — and the position of Black students whose resulting discomfort is a demonstration of how politics and power cannot become exclusively a matter of language and textuality to those who are oppressed by said politics and power.

The previous points may, in a way, imply that it is only the historically oppressed group who can prevent cultural/humanity studies from becoming exclusively a matter of language and textuality. However, that would be a problematic takeaway. The issue with this is that it puts the responsibility of educating and “cleaning up the mess” onto the historically oppressed groups. It should not be the Black person’s responsibility to educate and fix the mistakes of the oppressors while simultaneously having to endure the damaging repercussions of those mistakes/racist acts. And yet, this is a consistent trend. As outlined previously, in both cases where racist language was used in lecture, it was only Black students who rose to protest those racist decisions. Furthermore, in the case of Professor Andrew Wenaus and student Chizoba Oriuwa, Wenaus placed the expectation of correction and education on Oriuwa, despite Oriuwa and the other Black students in attendance being the ones who were hurt by Wenaus’ choice. LeBel’s article states that “according to the student, Wenaus said it was a ‘learning experience for him’ and asked if her friend ‘had any resources to give him’ — a request that puts the onus on the person of colour to do the work to educate and provide resources to those who claim ignorance.” This is historically consistent with the concept of the “Black person’s burden.” In his essay, Stuart Hall describes his own personal experience with the concept, stating: “I want to absolve myself of the many burdens of representation which people carry around — I carry around at least three: I’m expected to speak for the entire Black race on all questions theoretical, critical, etc., and sometimes for British politics, as well as for cultural studies. This is what is known as the Black person’s burden” (34). Not only is this expectation unfair, but it can also minimize the Black person’s general presence in academia. In “Stuart Hall and Race,” an essay by Claire Alexander, Hall’s afore-

mentioned quote on the Black person’s burden is further discussed:

Gates’ description of Hall, cited earlier, as ‘Black Britain’s leading theorist

of Black Britain’ is likely to be viewed by many British academics as a nar

row, constraining and even dismissive description of his influence and

impact. In the several recent overviews of his work mentioned earlier …

both Hall’s [racial] identity and his impact on the study of race sit uncom

fortably amidst the discussion of his role as the progenitor of cultural studies.

From numerous angles, placing the burden of educating the oppressor on the Black person is unjust.

Even when the oppressed choose to take on the burden of speaking up on injustices, they are often met with yet another unjust obstacle: the attempted silencing and minimization of their voices. This is shown in the cases of Professor Andrew Wenaus and student Chizoba Oriuwa, Professor Coby Dowdell and student Tamia Chicas, and is touched on in Stuart Hall’s essay. Upon standing up and publicly speaking on the racist utterance in Wenaus’ lecture, Oriuwa was met with targeted hate speech and harassment via her university email address.

Andrew Graham explains the situation in his Global News article titled “Western University student receives racist emails after calling out professor’s use of N-word.” The article states that “late on Tuesday, nearly a week after the initial incident, a post on a Western student Facebook group revealed that Oriuwa had been receiving racist and hateful emails … The post contained five screenshots of emails allegedly sent to Oriuwa with most containing the N-word” (Graham).

These verbally violent and racist emails were a direct attempt to hurt and silence Oriuwa. Additionally, on the level of microaggressions, Oriuwa’s discomfort was minimized by the language used in the presentation of Professor Wenaus’ apology that was posted on Western’s Arts and Humanities Website. The website stated that Professor Wenaus used “language that was offensive to those in attendance” (LeBel). The specification that the language was offensive to the Black students in attendance rather than a statement that recognizes the language as inappropriate regardless of the audience essentially puts the “blame” on the Black students in attendance for being offended. The language was offensive, the specification of “to those in attendance” was not necessary.

Tamia Chicas also experienced a minimization of her discomfort when she brought it forward to the administration. According to Butler’s CBC article, a majority of the discussion between Chicas and administration was in defence of Professor Dowdell’s character rather than validating Chicas’ discomfort and condemning the use of the N-word. The article states:

Chicas said she felt Melnyk-Gribble missed the point. ‘She told me she was

really good friends with [Dowdell] and he was a really good guy. That’s

fine. You can still be a good person, but as a white, male teacher you

shouldn’t be using that language knowing that it’s not a good word to be

using, especially because that course I was in was highlighting how racism

affects Black people.’ Chicas says Dowdell’s response also missed the mark.

(Butler)

Following both the racist utterance in class and the minimization of her discomfort through administration, Chicas says that “‘everyone kind of went silent and then everyone turned to look at me. I felt embarrassed … I was obviously sad and uncomfortable. I stopped showing up to that class after that happened’” (qtd. in Butler). Through her experience with racist “academic” language at Western University, Chicas experienced both minimization and silencing. White administration offers to give up time and space for marginalized groups to have a platform and speak on their experiences, yet those same administrations (through minimization, microaggressions, etc.) silence those groups. White administrations do not truly understand Black perspectives, and thus derive a tendency to see power and politics as exclusively matters of language and textuality. Stuart Hall wrote: “Talking about giving up power is a radically different experience from being silenced” (40). This Stuart Hall quote was used in the context of feminism, yet it is eclectically applicable — the topic at hand is not excluded.

Conclusively, Hall’s warnings that the exponential explosion of theoretical fluency may be dangerous, and his worry that cultural studies will reach a point in which the “overwhelming textualization of cultural studies’ own discourses” will be seen as somehow constituting “power and politics as exclusively matters of language and textuality” are accurate and relevant. This essay adds that through the perspectives of oppressors and the oppressed, there is a clear indication of who will and will not be comfortable in the assumption that analyzing a topic in academic jargon is an acceptable substitution for political/ethical action.

The cases of white Western University professors using the N-word in lectures for “learning purposes” and demonstrating historical/theoretical fluency while abandoning their ethical responsibilities in teaching such subjects are demonstrations of this. The reactions of Black students demonstrate how their identities, cultural literacy, historical knowledge, and lived experiences make them aware that analyzing a topic in academic jargon is not an acceptable substitution for action, and that furthermore, those in positions of authority must uphold their ethical responsibility in academia. However, these occurrences come with burdens such as the oppressed group being expected to educate the oppressors, the risk of being silenced further, etc. Nevertheless, Hall’s concern that cultural studies will reach a point in which the “overwhelming textualization of cultural

studies’ own discourses” will be seen as somehow constituting “power and politics as exclusively matters of language and textuality” as a whole will only come true if A) the oppressed group is silenced by the dominating power, or B) if society reaches a point in which such a disparity in power and privilege is eradicated.

Works Cited Abu-Saad, Ismael. “Where Inquiry Ends: The Peer Review Process and Indig

enous Standpoints.” The American behavioral scientist, vol. 51, no. 12,

2008, pp. 1902-1918. Scopus, https://journals-sagepub-com.proxy1.lib.uwo.

ca/doi/abs/10.1177/0002764208318939. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.

Alexander, Claire. “Stuart Hall and Race.” Cultural Studies, vol. 23, no. 4,

2009, pp. 457-482. Humanities International Complete, http://web.b.eb

scohost.com.proxy1.lib.uwo.ca/ehost/detail/detail?vid=0&sid=5985e

a2c-45fa-4904-9780-91090f95090a%40sessionmgr103&bdata=JnNpdGU9

ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#AN=43050904&db=hlh. Accessed 29 Oct.

2020.

Butler, Colin. “Use of racial slur in class got lukewarm response from King’s

University College, student says.” CBC [London], 29 July 2020, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/western-university-kings-col

lege-raψism-1.5664828. Accessed 25 Oct. 2020.

Graham, Andrew. “Western University student receives racist emails after call

ing out professor’s use of N-word.” Global News [London], 31 October

2019, https://globalnews.ca/news/6107209/western-university-student-rac

ist-emails/. Accessed 22 Oct. 2019.

Hall, Stuart. “Cultural Studies and Its Theoretical Legacies.” The Cultural Stud

ies Reader, no. 3, 2007, pp. 33-44.

Joseph, Nigel. “Assignment 1.” OWL, Western University, https://owl.uwo.ca/por

tal/site/2f512325-a493-4ed4-8e62-cd53988723a3/tool/0c0b63b8-b255-4bca-

9b56-7ea46b6c5a74?panel=Main. Accessed 20 Oct. 2020.

Joseph, Nigel. “Intro to Cultural Studies Lecture 1.” Introduction to Cultural Studies, Sept. 2020, VoiceThread, Canada. Lecture.

LeBel, Jacquelyn. “Western University professor apologizes after student calls

out his use of the n-word.” Global News [London], 28 Oct. 2019, https://

globalnews.ca/news/6091885/western-university-andrew-wenaus-n-word/.

Accessed 26 Oct. 2020.

Sight

By: Stephanie Fattori

The Glorification and Utilization of the Male Gaze in James Bond’s From Russia with Love

By: Grace Armstrong

The elevation of classic Hollywood narratives and iconography does not do enough to problematize the way they depend on the male gaze. The glorification of classic Hollywood films, such as James Bond’s From Russia with Love, blinds viewers to the harmful depictions of women within them. These depictions are often overlooked and forgotten by modern-day viewers until a closer second viewing. This glorification is also created and cultivated through various ‘paratexts’ of the films. Using Laura Mulvey’s theories on the male gaze and the issue of ‘othering’ proposed by bell hooks, the following will examine how the male gaze complicates the depiction of women, specifically in the film From Russia with Love. It will also look at how paratexts, like sequels and marketing, call upon this glorified era of James Bond for present-day features.

Paratexts are the things that surround a film but are not the actual film.

Paratexts can be created in advance of, along with, or after the release of the film.

They include things like the advertising, movie posters, and trailers. They also include fan-made items like fan art, fan fiction, cosplay, and parodies. A film can profit off the creation of paratexts long after the release of the film. For example, they can sell items like an anniversary addition release of a film, props from the movie, soundtracks on vinyl, and sequels. Paratexts, in the context of this essay, illustrate how a production company can control the image and memory of a film so that it is glorified, overshadowing any flaws it may have. For the James Bond franchise, by releasing new cuts of the film, remastered versions, or box sets, they are keeping the film relevant and maintaining the iconic status it has earned over time. They can also accomplish this by controlling the look of new movie posters and the way each James Bond character dresses. The constant James Bond sequels are another paratext of the franchise. By continually producing these movies, filmmakers are relying on the tropes of the original classics that viewers have always loved. However, these tropes include the characterization of the ‘Bond Girl,’ a heavy use of ‘othering’ when it comes to women of colour, and the overall incessant use of the male gaze.

From Russia with Love [1963] is the second film in the James Bond series.

After the events of the first movie, Dr. No, the international criminal organization SPECTRE begins training agents to kill Bond, seeking revenge for the death of Dr. No. They try to accomplish this by orchestrating a fight between British and Soviet intelligence over a cryptography device. This conflict will lure

James Bond in so SPECTRE can successfully assassinate him. The Bond Girl, Tatiana Romanova, is then recruited to work with Bond to prevent SPECTRE from obtaining the cryptographic device. While traveling the globe in search of this device, the two must avoid assassination attempts by SPECTRE. From Russia with Love is considered one of the more iconic James Bond films and is loved by many, regardless of the problematic male gaze and othering that takes place.

The male gaze’ is a term coined by Laura Mulvey in her 1975 political polemic, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. In this piece, she explains how the gaze in cinema is often constructed as male. She aims to show how the structures of patriarchy are reflected in cinema and to analyze pleasure and desire.

She analyzes how certain pleasures/desires are constructed through this use of the male gaze, whether knowingly or not. The male gaze assumes that the viewer is a single, universal spectator and that this spectator is a straight white male.

It does not account for the differences between viewers whose perspectives are influenced by subject positions like gender, race, and class. Mulvey sees two types of scopophilia —the love of looking or the desire to look — at work. The two kinds of scopophilia addressed are active scopophilia and narcissistic scopophilia.

Active scopophilia is when film viewing experiences are set up as voyeuristic. This means the viewer derives sexual pleasure from watching, is the active bearer of the gaze, and objects of the gaze are presumed to be female and exist solely for the pleasure of a male viewer (Mulvey). The most evident example of active scopophilia is the existence of the Bond Girl. The fact that the Bond Girl actresses are rarely referred to by name, usually referenced merely as the latest Bond Girl or on a list of others who had taken on the same role in previous films, is problematic. This removes their identity and shuffles them into the category of attractive women who are cast in the films to be Bond’s latest sexual conquest and to provide sexual pleasure for the male viewer. To make matters worse, in From Russia With Love, the actress’ dialogue was actually dubbed by an uncredited woman named Barbara Jefford. This not only shows the erasure of women’s work in the making of the film, but also the blatant use of an actress for her body. One can assume the producers were afraid viewers would be deterred by an actress with a heavy Italian accent and thus chose dubbing over making another casting choice. The staple of the Bond Girl is still evident in newer Bond films and something viewers look forward to. There is usually lots of media attention surrounding the reveal of who is casted as the latest Bond Girl.

In From Russia With Love, the Bond Girl is Tatiana Romanova, portrayed by actress Daniela Bianchi. The Bond Girl is usually framed as both sexy and worldly (Hutton). What makes Tatiana distinct is that she is receiving orders

from SPECTRE to woo Bond and flirt with him (Hutton). Even so, her character is ultimately unable to resist Bond’s signature charm, seen flirting with him on her own accord and eventually falling for him. This shows that while the female character may have an actual role to play in the plot of the film (in Tatiana’s case, she kills the villain), they ultimately end up occupying the role of a sex object for both Bond and the viewers.

James Bond movies are also characterized by long intro sequences featuring an original song, animation, and James Bond himself. A central trope in these sequences is the utilization of the female silhouette. Right away, images of scantily dressed belly dancers and lingering looks at their bare backs and naked thighs fill the screen. The credits are imposed over their bodies and the camera pans up and down them, disinterested in showing the viewer anything else.

There is a large focus on the women’s bare skin and sexualized bodies (Hutton).

The second type of scopophilia Mulvey discusses in her polemic is narcissistic scopophilia. This is when the viewer derives pleasure from looking at a human form they can identify with (Mulvey). The hero of the narrative provides this opportunity for identification, allowing the male viewer to vicariously live through them. This is very evident in the characterization of James Bond. Men watch the films and desire to dress like him, emulate the same allure as him, and attract women like him. Narcissistic scopophilia is a driving force of the franchise and promotes an ideal version of what a man should be: hyper masculine and obsessed with sex. This creates a myth that men are sexually desirable to women and that women are something they can control and exert power over (Sherwin). It makes male viewers subconsciously believe that if they treat women the same way Bond does, as objects to be conquered and played with, then they have succeeded.

bell hooks also complicates this framework by introducing the matter of race. The characters not only occupy the screen as a gendered subject, but also as racialized beings. From Russia With Love uses the g-slur. Granted, the movie is a product of its time, and this was not seen as politically incorrect when it was produced. Regardless, we see a significant number of stereotypes and the hyper-sexualization or objectification of Romani women within the film that is blatantly problematic.

The objectification of women and their bodies is not limited to the Romani women. This movie has a clear problem with ‘women as objects/entertainment’ throughout, as mentioned in the previous discussions of the Bond Girl.

The major difference in the treatment of women of colour is that they are treated as objects consistently throughout the film. They do not get the redeeming moment of killing the villain or a smart piece of dialogue. They are always subservient and waiting on Bond or other characters in the background. And, like

women in every Bond film, they are unable to resist his charm and openly flirt with him. To exploit these characters further, two women are depicted having a physical fight over a man. This contributes to the stereotype that people of other races are violent and ill-mannered, and the filming of the scene contributes to the highly gendered view of the camera. The women, dressed in minimal clothing, fight by pulling each other’s hair. The close-up camera shots of their bodies turn a brutal physical altercation into something almost pornographic in nature.

Additionally, they chose to cast white women to play the Romani characters.

In the essay Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance, bell hooks writes that pleasure is often found in the acknowledgment and enjoyment of racial difference. That is exactly what is being done through the use of the Romani people in this film. They are being offered as something extra for the male spectator to enjoy; it is not just the Bond Girl there for their visual pleasure. This is a common practice that hooks addresses in the essay. The commodification of otherness offers itself as a new delight that is more satisfying than the normal ways of doing and feeling (hooks). The other is being exploited and objectified for the satisfaction and sexual pleasure of both the men in the scene and the men in the audience.

From Russia With Love furthers this explicit display of othering by providing a sense of ‘mournful imperialist nostalgia’ in its representation of the Romani people as an aggressive and more primitive culture (hooks). This sense of nostalgia projected onto the other acts as a sign of the progressive political change that has taken place in Western civilizations and invites a “resurgence of essentialist cultural nationalism” (hooks). People mourn the passing of what they have transformed and gain pleasure from viewing a narrative that illustrates the success of this imperialism while also fetishizing the acts of the very people it affected.

With all these clear issues and the blatant sexism riddled throughout this James Bond film, why do they keep getting made, and why do people keep paying to see them? These movies persist, and these sexist tropes continue to be employed within them, because of the glorification and celebration of the history of James Bond films. Is it still a James Bond film if there are not conventionally attractive women constantly throwing themselves at him? The James Bond franchise owes its success to this repetitive formula. The male gaze is something that populates many films from its period and persists today. However, it is often waved off as something that is only from the past. The misremembering and glorification of these films occurs as a result of this mindset. Paratexts push the narrative that they are great pieces of cinema that should continue to be made and celebrated.

The James Bond franchise has made several attempts to rebrand through sequels and casting choices (Winterhalter). However, even films such as Gold-

enEye [1995] and Casino Royale [2006] resort to the sexist Bond Girl tropes and demeaning language in the end (Winterhalter). The attempts at rebranding to conceal the series’ fundamental denial of female agency have continually failed.

The films ultimately fall back on those tropes and try to play them off as nostalgia for the classic era of James Bond films. One can see this return to classic James Bond ideals in the marketing of newer films. In Casino Royale and Spectre, the posters are designed in a classic style and Daniel Craig is dressed to recall the sophisticated look of previous Bonds (Mendelson). The marketing ignores the problems that come from this era of films, instead using it to glorify the franchise further.

As spectators, women are forced into either passive identification with the female protagonist, always depicted as the object of male desire, or forced into masculinized identification with the male protagonist and his controlling gaze (Sherwin). In what has become one of the most quoted passages in feminist film theory, Mulvey argues that “in a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure, which is styled accordingly” (Sherwin). The James Bond franchise illustrates how problematic the subconscious use of the male gaze in film can be. It demeans women and reduces them to objects, while also furthering a sense of ‘othering’ when it comes to the depiction of women of colour. From Russia with Love acts as a catalyst to address these key issues in the franchise, while also being a prime example of why it is problematic that present-day marketing for the films glorify this particular era.

Works Cited hooks, bell. “Eating the other: Desire and resistance.” Black Looks: Race and Representation, South End Press, 1 992, pp. 21–39.

Hutton, Zina. “Bond Girl: Re-Watching and Re-Evaluating From Russia With

Love.” The Mary Sue, 13 Apr. 2015, https://www.themarysue.com/bond- girl-from-russia-with-love/.

Mendelson, Scott. “‘Spectre’ Marketing Is Rooted In 007 Nostalgia, Yet

James Bond Is More Popular Than Ever.” Forbes Magazine, 5 Sept. 2015,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2015/09/04//#5e9588547c38.

Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Feminisms, 1975, pp.

438–48, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-14428-0_27.

Sherwin, Miranda. “Deconstructing the Male: Masochism, Female Spectator

ship, and the FemmeFatale InFatal Attraction, Body of Evidence, AndBa

sic Instinct.” Journal of Popular Film and Television vol. 35, no. 4, 2008,

pp. 174–82, https://doi.org/10.3200/jpft.35.4.174-182.

To Win the War Caused By Pain: The Exclusion of BIPOC Women in White Academic Feminism and the Reclamation of the Theoretical Spaces through Qualitative Narrative and Creative Expression

By: Eva Alie

Moon marked and touched by sun my magic is unwritten but when the sea turns back it will leave my shape behind.

I seek no favor untouched by blood unrelenting as the curse of love permanent as my errors or my pride I do not mix love with pity nor hate with scorn and if you would know me look into the entrails of Uranus where the restless oceans pound.

I do not dwell within my birth nor my divinities who am ageless and half-grown and still seeking my sisters witches in Dahomey wear me inside their coiled cloths as our mother did mourning.

I have been woman for a long time beware my smile

I am treacherous with old magic and the noon’s new fury with all your wide futures promised I am woman and not white.

“A Woman Speaks” from The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde, 1970

Feminist theory as it is understood in a modern academic context was forged in the pain and subjugation of Black and Indigenous women in tandem with a conscious and systemic erasure of these voices within the institutional spaces that study the discipline; white women serve as the selective guardians of stories that are not their own, but rather the ghosts of tribulations and persons that challenge the foundation of their presented narrative. This theft has left BIPOC femmes both disenfranchised from the warped field and with very few access points to the institution itself to remedy the misrepresentation and cooption of their experiences (hooks 63). Through a myriad of factors including colonialism and its subsequent poverty trap, post-secondary and higher education are systemically out of reach for racialized women, requiring alternative modalities of expression and theoretical experimentation (64). The work of bell hooks and Audre Lorde serves as a mediation of the current academic climate in relation to race-informed feminism and scholarship, offering qualitatively-sourced and personal narrative as a method of reclamation and liberation that effectively serves to both circumvent the constraints of collegiate contexts and transform the contents of the discipline into applicable feminist practice and daily expression. Lorde in particular speaks to the metamorphic nature of creative expression as theoretical practice, suggesting that artistic freedom and BIPOC female articulation are intrinsically linked as exemplified through the creatively applied feminist theory of Beyoncé and her seminal album Lemonade.

The systemic educational barriers as a continuing result of colonialism effectively preclude a vast number of BIPOC female scholars from directing and producing traditionally academic or empirical research within their own communities, resulting in a miscredited and exploitative consultation process from white feminist intellectuals (Lorde 116). The intersectional identities and sociocultural contexts that are inherent to racialized women distinguish them as vastly experienced theoretical beings. Yet the widespread absence of these women from scholarly contexts disallows the ownership of their own experiences, hence allowing white women to claim credit for analytical propositions that are

essentially stolen biographies. Black women live in an extended and ongoing state of feminist resistance and embodied theory without necessarily identifying it as such, ultimately serving to reinforce a sense of detachment from academic spaces and vocabulary (hooks 61).

There is tremendous privilege in possessing and freely applying terms such as “theory” and “feminism” because the comprehension of these concepts implies and requires access to resources and contexts that are specifically focused on these disciplines. In turn, those who have been allowed extended proximity with the aforementioned ideologies are far less likely to directly or severely experience the hardships that inform the intellectual phrases in the first place (hooks 63). As a result, feminist theory as constructed through traditional academic institutions is not an individual practice or endeavor, but rather a continuing process through which white women are validated by the narratives of those who are unable to be directly in the room themselves (65). The separation of the research from its original source and context can result in the qualitative misinformation of the content, resulting in a distortion of the experiences that produced the very theory.

The conscientious erasure of BIPOC women in higher level scholastic spaces lends the resulting theory a distinctly elitist and passive tone that only serves to further alienate racialized femmes from engaging in conversation about the validity and implications of their encounters (hooks 67). There is a prevalent hesitancy on the part of Black women to speak about theoretical experiences in explicitly Black spaces for fear of seeming like they have “sold out” to institutions that are predicated on their own abuse and underrepresentation. In this way, their own stories are made inaccessible to them. White feminist intellectuals have effectively manipulated the testimony of their BIPOC colleagues, then used the resulting theory to further limit access to the table (64). In a hypocritical refutation of feminist epistemology, non-racialized scholars effectively control the demographics of their spaces by contending that the qualitative and anecdotal nature of the supporting evidence they collected from Black women is simply not up to par with academic standards and best practices (Lorde 117).

Black femmes are not given the same space to focus on the understanding of their own stories and how those have shaped their contexts in the same way that white women can. This is widely due to the reliance of the latter on the former to act as pro bono tutors on the nuances of racialized language and behaviour (Lorde 116); this consistent emotional labour drains energy that could be invested in self-fulfillment and theoretical exploration. Instead, BIPOC women have been required to become fluent in the semantics of their oppressors, an insurance of sorts to guarantee their safety and quasi-participation in academic study. In contrast, white women are afforded a false sense of equity to their male

counterparts. They possess an easy assurance that with a series of “correct” decisions they will be able to exist in parallel to the patriarchy and remain relatively unscathed by its violent expectations (118).

This disparity of representation can be mitigated through the reframing of theory from a distant, inaccessible ideal to an active process in which identity can be explored through a liberatory lens. However, it is crucial to note that “theory is not inherently healing…it only fulfills this function when we ask that it do so” (hooks 61). BIPOC women have effectively undermined the necessity of traditional collegiate spaces through their self-directed analyses with the specific intent of fulfillment and growth. By removing theoretical concepts from institutional settings, it becomes clear that said field of study functions most ideally within the context of daily life as it informs the conscious and unconscious ideologies held by the theorist. Unlike the white academic feminists who are reliant on the stories of Black women in order to establish working theories, lived experience is internally fundamental to overarching processes of self-recovery and communal freedom for BIPOC femmes. This effectively demonstrates that “…no gap exists between theory and practice” when applied correctly (hooks 62), creating an inherently reciprocal mechanism. Racialized women have the theoretical capability to understand their experiences and emotions on an unprecedented level that will in turn empower them to institute systems outside of the ones dominated by white, opportunistic women.

Traditional iterations of feminism and its subsequent theorization have devolved into “luxury items” (hooks 71), photogenic ideologies that have systemically failed to serve their originators on the basis that the information collected is designed to protect the unimpeachability of the institution (69). Although an externalization and embodiment of theory in the pursuit of liberation is crucial to the qualitative reclamation of the field itself, it is also critical that white “ally” scholars are accepting the emotional and practical labour of (re)educating themselves and relevant colleagues to understand the harmful history of feminist theory as well as the process required to dismantle the systemic barriers that stand in the way of racialized women freely holding space within the establishment, should they choose (Lorde 118).

Lorde speaks candidly to the recurring objection of non-racialized theorists and academics that the “literatures of women of colour can only be taught by women of colour, or that they are too difficult to understand” (118). These are undoubtedly half-hearted attempts at disguising the truth, which is that white women are defensive of their academic spaces as an acknowledgment of racial privilege threatens the foundational identity of experiencing gender-based discrimination. To be clear, any woman within academic spaces has likely faced tremendous challenges to secure their place. But white femme theorists consis-

tently fail to acknowledge that misogyny is just one of many obstacles BIPOC women will endure within or external to intellectual contexts (hooks 68). Since whiteness, especially in academia, is socialized as the norm, there is a distinct objection to move beyond the stereotypes that provide comfort in their intellectual spaces and acknowledge holistically sound and complete women who may just be fundamentally different in perspective and experience (Lorde 120).

These obvious dissimilarities challenge ingrained self-perceptions of white as socially and intellectually neutral, any alterations to that blueprint serving as a demarcation of inherent inferiority and a threat to the tenuous structure of institutionalized feminist theory.

Intersectionality within theoretical and physical spaces is not allowed for Black women the same way it is for their non-racialized counterparts; since their visible or assumed identities are already so politicised and susceptible to discrimination, it has been suggested that openly occupying a multitude of historically vulnerable positions unnecessarily demarcates oneself as a target for abuse (Lorde 121). Lorde and hooks push back against this argument for personal suppression, instead insisting that the multifaceted and nuanced experiences of BIPOC women make them even more valuable within theoretical contexts, as their perspectives have been informed on a multitude of fronts. This is particularly emphasized within Lorde’s call for creative expression as a form of theoretical liberation, with an exploration of the ways in which poetry and song have served as pieces of BIPOC theory that may not yet have classified themselves as such.

Very few artists have managed to establish themselves as theoretical forces in the same capacity as Beyoncé, particularly on her latest and most critically reviewed album Lemonade. While hooks has unabashedly labelled Beyoncé a “terrorist to feminism” due to her seeming adherence to patriarchal ideals of beauty and sexual overtones, a dismissal of her intellectual power on those grounds would be a critical error. Beyoncé’s modality and presentation of choice are ones that are clearly intended to speak to the specific era of feminism that her audience finds themselves in — a post-third wave reclamation of the traditionally feminine, with a focus on sexual liberation and expression (Ward 146).

Her self-positioning within white dominated spaces, while also manipulating Black resistance imagery, creates a fantasy of radicalistic acceptance of varying forms of the female experience, all while clearly using community-specific pain to indicate to her BIPOC followers that her work is truly for them (147). Beyoncé’s brilliance lies in the use of her aesthetic capital and appeal to secure financial merit from white women whose academic counterparts and subsequent elitism are a driving force behind her artistic choices and presentation. She takes this manipulation and refutation of white feminist expectations one step further

with her unwavering emphasis on self-expression in hopes of providing a modern Black feminist icon, while exuding indifference towards non-racialized societal acceptance or approval (153). The refusal to conform to white requirements of monolithic Blackness while also fostering an incredibly diverse fanbase that, albeit potentially performatively so, craves multifaceted demonstrations of underrepresented identities in mass and popular culture speaks to Lorde’s disdain for adherence to a singular perspective or component of oneself, and is liberatory through its practice (Ward 161).

As mediated through the aforementioned works, BIPOC feminists and theorists are reclaiming space in the narrative by subverting the contexts and institutions that barred them access via an emphasis on personal narrative, qualitatively natured data, and community-sourced and intended creative expression.

Works Cited hooks, bell. “Theory as Liberatory Practice.” Yale Journal of Law and Femi nism, vol. 4, no. 1, Fall 1991, pp. 1-12. file:///C:/Users/madam/Down

loads/4YaleJLFeminism1%20(2).pdf.

Knowles-Carter, Beyoncé. “All Night.” Lemonade, Parkwood Entertainment,

2016.

Lorde, Audre. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” Sister

Outsider: Essays and Speeches, Crossing Press, 1984, pp. 114-123.

Ward, Mako Fitts. “Queen Bey and the New Niggerati: Ethics of Individualism

in the Appropriation of Black Radicalism.” Black Camera, vol. 9, no. 1,

2017, pp. 146-63, doi:10.2979/blackcamera.9.1.09.

Deep in the Clouds By: Rabbit

Societal Trap: Independence and Creole Culture in Kate Chopin’s “The Awakening”

By: Emmy Meredith

If you’re open to it, New Orleans will teach you about yourself, but if you want to hide from who you really are, the city will help you do that too.

- Laurell K. Hamilton, “Southern Po’ Boy”

“The Awakening” is a story that depicts a woman who feels alienated from society and how she copes with this conflict. The text is set in Grand Isle and New Orleans amidst Creole culture. Edna Pontellier is a newcomer to this society, and her immersion within Creole culture shapes her behaviour, experiences, and her longing for independence throughout the text. In the following discussion, I will examine how the flirtatious and open aspect of Creole society, the patriarchal structure of that society, and the importance of the mother figure/ female role in Creole culture frames Edna’s experiences and ultimately leads to the end of her life.

People who are a part of Creole culture are very open with each other, something that Edna is not accustomed to. Edna expresses her discomfort at their openness when she claims she would never “forget the shock with which she heard Madame Ratignolle relating to old Monsieur Farival the harrowing story of one of her accouchements, withholding no intimate detail” (Chopin 17). While she is taken off guard by this open attitude, she also develops a close friendship with Madame Ratignolle because of this. During her time at Grand Isle, Edna “began to loosen a little the mantle of reserve that had always enveloped her. There may have been — there must have been — influences...to induce her to do this; but the most obvious was the influence of Adele Ratignolle” (27).

Because of this openness and her close friendship with Adele, Edna becomes aware of her longing for independence.

Edna does not understand that it is part of Creole culture to flirt and tease others. In this society, men are permitted to openly flirt with women who are not their wives. Since Edna grew up in Kentucky with a strict Protestant background, she is unaccustomed to this type of interaction. For this reason, when Robert begins to flirt with Edna on Grand Isle, she does not understand that this is normal behaviour and instead believes that Robert is in love with her.

Meanwhile, it is well known amongst those on the island that Robert chooses one woman every year to flirt with. In fact, those on Grand Isle “had predicted that Robert would devote himself to Mrs. Pontellier when he arrived. Since the age of fifteen, which was eleven years before, Robert each summer at Grand Isle

had constituted himself the devoted attendant of some fair dame or damsel” (19).

Adele Ratignolle understands that Edna is not a part of Creole culture, and even warns Robert about his behaviour. She tells him to “let Mrs. Pontellier alone….

She is not one of us; she is not like us. She might make the unfortunate blunder of taking you seriously” (38). While Robert begins a relationship with Edna that he did not intend to be serious, he soon falls in love with her. He knows that he will be unable to act on his feelings for Edna because she is already married, and Creole society does not condone such behaviour. However, Edna does not understand this aspect of Creole culture and reacts just as Adele Ratignolle had predicted. She tells Robert she will leave her husband and believes that he will marry her. Edna does not anticipate that he will refuse her. This interaction between Edna and the flirtatious aspect of Creole culture opens her eyes to her longing for independence from her husband. But Robert’s refusal is a critical moment in the text that contributes to her eventual decision to take her own life, because she understands that she will never truly gain independence. If she leaves her husband, she will be an outcast to society, and if she stays with her husband, she will feel trapped.

Edna’s independence is also restricted by the patriarchal structure of Creole culture. Women are viewed as possessions of their husbands, but Edna does not identify with this mindset. She wishes to be independent of her husband, Léonce. Instead of submitting to her husband, as is customary on Grand Isle, she begins to resist his wishes. For instance, in one scene Léonce orders Edna to come inside their home and she refuses, saying that she would rather stay outside. She notices “that her will had blazed up, stubborn and resistant. She could not at that moment have done other than denied and resisted” (60). From that scene on, Edna begins to make her own decisions, independent of her husband. While her family is away, Edna decides to move out of their house. She explains that “[t]he house, the money that provides for it, are not mine....I know I shall like it, like the feeling of freedom and independence” (152). She moves to a much smaller home down the street that she pays for herself, using the money she earns by selling her artworks. Because of her small income, she is only able to afford one servant. This is a significant step towards independence for Edna, as she is making her own living and supporting herself. But it would be highly unusual for a woman in Creole culture to leave her husband and move into a different home. Edna takes these actions because Creole culture has opened her eyes to the possibility of freedom, but at the same time, this culture frowns upon her actions.

Following Edna’s break from Creole culture, her husband consults Dr. Mandelet in the hopes that he can help her. Dr. Mandelet claims, “[t]his is some passing whim of your wife, due to some cause or causes which you and I needn’t

try to fathom. But it will happily pass over, especially if you let her alone” (126).

Léonce remains fairly supportive of Edna on the advice of the doctor, in the mistaken belief that she will eventually return to him. Creole culture informs his belief that there is no other option for Edna than to return to him, as she is his property. He looks upon his wife “as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage” (3). This conflict between the independence that Edna craves and the social pressure to remain married to her husband drives her thoughts towards suicide.

As time goes on, Edna realizes that it is the patriarchal construct of marriage that she disagrees with. For instance, after having dinner at the Ratignolle’s house, she realizes that “the little glimpse of domestic harmony which had been offered her, gave her no regret, no longing....She was moved by a kind of commiseration for Madame Ratignolle — a pity for that colorless existence which never uplifted its possessor beyond the region of blind content” (106-107).

This realization helps her to understand that she is unsatisfied with the Creole concept of marriage and how it constrains women.

Edna not only struggles with her status as a wife, but also with her role as a woman and mother within Creole culture. In Creole culture it is the women’s duty to entertain and play hostess, as the social aspect of the culture is very important. However, Edna is unwilling to maintain the social relationships and etiquette demanded of her. For instance, every week Edna hosts a social gathering at her home. But one day she decides to cancel her gathering and go out on her own. She leaves without informing her guests, and when her husband finds out he exclaims: “Why, my dear, I should think you’d understand by this time that people don’t do such things; we’ve got to observe les convenances” (96). Her husband is so agitated he decides to finish dinner at the club. Instead of trying to appease her husband as she normally would, Edna grows angry, and, “taking off her wedding ring, flung it upon the carpet. When she saw it lying there, she stamped her heel upon it, striving to crush it” (99-100). This step forces Edna to accept that she is not content in her marriage. After this, she begins to spend time with close friends or by herself instead of hosting gatherings. This is a step towards the freedom Edna craves as she is knowingly defying social customs as well as her husband.

In Creole society, the role of the mother is very important. Edna does not identify with this role, and even acknowledges this, saying, “I would give up the unessential; I would give my money, I would give my life for my children; but I wouldn’t give myself” (90). She struggles to reconcile the way she feels with the way women around her act, as is the case with Adele Ratignolle. Adele represents the ideal female figure in Creole culture. She is a loving and caring mother who

runs a household and supports and loves her husband. The difference between Edna and Adele can be seen during the birth of Adele’s child. Edna attends the birth and “[w]ith an inward agony, with a flaming, outspoken revolt against the ways of Nature, she witnessed the scene of torture” (211). This demonstrates Edna’s feelings towards childbirth and underscores her sense of separation from the rest of Creole society.

The social context is very important to character development in any text. It shapes the unique experiences of each character. In Edna’s case, her interaction with Creole culture ultimately leads to the realization that she is unsatisfied with her life and longs for independence. Without this interaction, Edna may not have come to this conclusion. She does not understand the open and flirtatious aspect of Creole culture and does not identify with the submissive and motherly role of the traditional Creole woman. Edna’s journey allows her to discover that the only way that she will feel free is through suicide. From today’s perspective, it is easy to be critical of Edna’s decision, and it may even seem ridiculous that she is unable to leave her husband. But this is to greatly underestimate the powerful influence of the prevailing culture. If Edna did decide to go against Creole standards, she would have been cut off from her children and friends and would have felt more isolated than she already did. In Edna’s case, the social context greatly influenced her choices and made it very difficult to stray from the rest of society.

Works Cited Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. New York, Everyman’s Library, 1992.

St. Pierre, Todd-Micheal. Southern Po’ Boy. Berkeley, Ulysses Press, 2013.

“Whose Mulan is it?”: The Marketing and Reception of Disney’s Mulan in China

By: Luke Lee Young

Although Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft’s Mulan (1998) received praise from Western critics for being feminist and diverse, the film was met with controversy in China. According to Jing Li, Mulan’s release “stimulated heated debates on the issue of ‘whose Mulan is it?’ in China’s intellectual circles and mainstream media” (363). “The Ballad of Mulan,” an oral ballad from the Northern Dynasty (420-559 CE), inspired Mulan. While the ballad and the film’s central plot remain the same (Mulan’s father is conscripted into the army and Mulan cross-dresses to take his place), the Walt Disney Company took creative liberty with the film, which calls into question: “whose Mulan is it?” This paper seeks to answer this question by concentrating on Mulan’s marketing and reception in Mainland China. I argue that Mulan wears a mask of diversity; it is not China’s Mulan, but Disney’s. The film, ultimately, serves Disney’s interests by diversifying their portfolio, easing their tensions with China, and providing the company with the inspiration for a tale that, when adapted, can convey their Western values.

Mulan, after Pocahontas (1995) and Hercules (1997), was Disney’s third attempt at diversifying its portfolio. The film marked the first time that Asian culture served as the inspiration for one of Disney’s animated features, and Disney highly publicized the lengths that the production team went to ensure the film’s cultural authenticity. Mulan’s production began in 1994 when several of the film’s animators and filmmakers took a three-week trip to China (“The Making of Mulan - Part 1 of 6” 0:15-0:30). The production team took “thousands of photos of trees, architecture, people and historic landmarks” (Abbott), and they drew inspiration from the Tang Dynasty, from which a large amount of sculptures, paintings and so on are available for reference. In an interview with the New York Times, Peter Schneider, the president of Walt Disney Feature Animation at the time, stated, “we even studied the way girls walked. You wouldn’t believe how many subtle differences there are” (“Going East, Quietly”). Schneider further emphasized that the film had the most “complete design style we have ever done” and was “the most internally consistent film Disney has done in years” (“Going East, Quietly”). The use of Chinese aides was also publicized, like Bao Hong Chen who was hired to teach seven hundred animators how to draw the film’s five key scenes (“Taking a Look at China to Get the Look of China”). By publicly professing their strides towards cultural authenticity, Disney’s image appears progressive, thus improving the company’s image.

Mulan also served as Disney’s olive branch to ease tensions with China and secure the company’s position in the Chinese market. In 1996, Touchstone Pictures, a production company owned by Disney, co-produced Martin Scorsese’s Kundun. Kundun is about the Dalai Lama, “an enemy to [China’s] control over the Himalayan region” (Faison). The film’s sympathetic portrayal of the Dalai Lama angered Chinese officials as it was seen as “an interference in China’s internal affairs” (Faison). Regardless, Disney released Kundun, and China responded by banning Disney films, which jeopardized Disney’s sale potential in China. China has a firm grip on its movie industry and only allows ten foreign films to play commercially per annum (Eckholm). China “served as a potentially huge and untapped market for Disney films, merchandising and even, perhaps, a theme park” (Weinraub), especially after The Lion King’s success in Mainland China. The Communist Party of China’s decision to show Mulan in Chinese cinemas, therefore, signified “the apparent smoothing over of high-stakes tensions between the Walt Disney Company […] and the Government” (Eckholm). In October 1998, before introducing Bob Iger “as the person who would carry on negotiations for a theme park,” Michael Eisner, Disney’s president at the time, apologized at China’s leadership compound for Kundun, labelling the film as a “stupid mistake” (Barboza and Barnes). Eighteen years later, the Shanghai Disneyland Park opened its doors, allowing Disney to significantly enter the Chinese market with its films and merchandise.

Disney strictly controlled Mulan’s marketing in China in an attempt to ensure the film’s box office success. The company understood that Mulan would be one of the “biggest marketing challenges ever” because “its marketing minds [were] trying to decide how to sell the world on a musical based on a Chinese fable that features a female protagonist” (Jensen). Consequently, Disney enlisted “Eastman Kodak Co., McDonald’s Corp. and Nestle USA to headline a promotional push estimated at between $100 million and $150 million” (Jensen). In general, the promotional publicity for Mulan was geared towards children and, more importantly, their parents. Parents are responsible for taking their children to the movies, and in China, Mulan’s status as an imported film meant a higher ticket price, making the movie an even harder sell for parents. Globally, Disney’s main selling points were that Mulan: (1) is based on a noteworthy cultural phenomenon, (2) contains healthy subject matter, and (3) has the star effect (Peng 11).

Lei Fei writes that in China, publicists were also instructed to stress the film’s nationalist sentiment: Mulan “is the beginning of the advance of the Chinese nation onto the world stage […] it fortifies the will of the Chinese people and raises the status of all Chinese” (18). Disney ran a wide publicity campaign in China with articles and broadcasts published in Duhe Daily and the Zhengzhou Evening News respectively (Fei 18). Disney even controlled the cinema’s organization to include a “large number of playbills and picture posters” and banners

that “celebrate the screening of the New American-Style Version of Mulan” (Fei 19). In spite of Disney’s marketing efforts, Mulan was a box office flop in Mainland China. On its first day, Mulan grossed about 8,000 yuan, compared with 80,000 yuan for Titanic (SCMP Reporter). In total, compared to the revenue of $120 million in the United States, the movie grossed $1.3 million in China and ranked the lowest among thirty-four imported American “megafilms” since 1994 (Li 362).

A reporter for South China Morning Post argued that Disney’s domination of the film industry played a factor in Mulan’s poor ticket sales in China because “it would have been a slap in the face for the mainland movie industry if a foreign-made film about its favourite heroine had been a commercial blockbuster at home” (SCMP Reporter). Disney has a reputation of being the “canonical interpreter of the fairy tale genre” (Brocklebank 270); once Disney adapts a fairy tale into a film, whether it is Snow White or Beauty and the Beast, the film becomes the definitive version of the story. “The Ballad of Mulan” is no exception. Disney is effectively plagiarizing a significant tale in Chinese culture and appropriating it into their story. Faye Wang writes, “Mulan is our legend, and we didn’t do anything about it that’s nearly as cool and beautiful. It’s like you have this hidden treasure somewhere, and you’re too lazy to use it, while someone else steals it and makes good use of it.”

Instead of accurately depicting Chinese values, Mulan reflects Disney’s Western values. Mulan’s creators “gave first consideration to the viewing preferences of American audiences, everything in that film is tied to the Hollywood pattern; the inclusion of Chinese cultural elements exists merely to satisfy the novelty-seeking mentality of those same viewers” (Peng 12). For example, reviewer Roger Ebert states, “the movie breaks with the tradition in which the male hero rescues the heroine, but is still totally sold on the Western idea of romantic love. (In an Eastern culture, the ending might have involved an arranged match between Mulan and Shang, which she has earned by her exploits).” The Disneyfication of China offended Chinese critics because cultural authenticity was not considered: “the film’s depictions of China are stripped of context and embed historical inaccuracies such as the episode with the matchmaker, the presence of the Huns, the presence of the shrine to the ancestors, the clothing, and presenting villains as darker-skinned” (Anjirbag 5). The Chinese people were displeased about “how the emperor bows to Mulan at the end of the movie, which is ridiculous in Chinese culture, and everyone hated Mushu” because he was a cultural anachronism (Wang).

Thus, “The Ballad of Mulan” and its protagonist were no longer distinctive of Chinese culture, but a tool for Disney’s capital gain. For instance, “[Chinese]

filmgoers occasionally refer to the cinematic heroine as ‘Yang Mulan,’ or ‘Foreign Mulan’ in Chinese—while complaining that she looks either Korean or Western” (Langfitt). Some mainlanders believed that “Disney’s version has more in common with Xena: Warrior Princess […] than their idea of the beloved ancient heroine” (SCMP Reporter). Zhang Yang, a China-based scholar, describes Mulan as “a Western lass who grew up eating bread and butter” and thus, “evokes little sense of identification in a movie goer” (quoted in Li 362). Maxine Hong Kingston writes about “The Ballad of Mulan” and its moral significance in her childhood: “[My mother] said I would grow up to be a wife and a slave, but she taught me the song of the warrior woman, Fa Mu Lan. I would have to grow up a warrior woman” (quoted in Brocklebank 278). By the time of Mulan’s release, however, the only “‘moral lessons’ on Disney’s website end with injunctions to buy a video or Cri-kee pet” (Brocklebank 280), which point toward facilitating mass consumption of Disney products, instead of preserving Mulan’s significance in Chinese culture.

Disney’s preoccupation with their own interests takes center stage in Mulan’s marketing and reception. The film’s marketing in China worked to improve Disney’s image by publicly professing their attempts at cultural authenticity and acting as an olive branch after the Kundun scandal. Disney also strictly controlled Mulan’s marketing to optimize revenue, albeit unsuccessfully. Furthermore, “The Ballad of Mulan” provided source material for an animated film that teaches Disney’s Westernized values and leads to profit, which contributed to its negative reception in China. For future research, one should compare Mulan and its live-action remake’s marketing and reception in China to see if Disney’s marketing strategies have evolved over time.

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If only

By: Aranyah Shanker

Duke Aubrey and Divine Imagery in Lud-in-the-Mist

By: Kaitlyn Lonnee

Considering the less savoury aspects of Duke Aubrey and his predecessors, as well as his connection to the feared Fairyland and its Silent People, it may seem apt to regard the Duke as a Lucifer-esque figure, dealing malicious tricks, associating with the supernatural, and corrupting those around him.

However, through examining Chapter II of Hope Mirrleexxs’ Lud-in-the-Mist, I will argue that Duke Aubrey is actually depicted as a Christ figure to the people of Dorimare —acting as a figurehead and spokesperson for Fairyland as Jesus Christ does for Heaven. I will also draw similarities between the fairy way of life and religion.

Duke Aubrey is the mysterious figure of interest at the centre of Lud-inthe-Mist, and readers’ first introduction to him is no less fascinating. Despite his shortcomings, the Duke is described as having “a face of angelic beauty” (15), directly associating him with holy imagery. He is also described as being “an exquisite poet” whose songs were “as fresh as flowers and as lonely as the cuckoo’s cry” (16), marking a divine ability to create something living, in a sense.

The country people fondly remember him for his “geniality and tenderness” and recall his presence “at the bedside of the dying, grave and compassionate as a priest” (16). This passage again connects Duke Aubrey to religious narratives, recalling stories of Jesus and his disciples visiting the sick, poor, and dying. Another piece of imagery that directly relates to the Duke as a Christ figure is his deliverance of cartloads of wine to village weddings, connecting him to Jesus and his miraculous ability to turn water to wine.

Moving to the religion of sorts to which Duke Aubrey is messiah, the similarities between the fairy way of life — with Dorimare’s Fairyland as a surrogate for Christianity’s Heaven — are readily apparent. Instead of going to Heaven upon dying, Dorimarites, especially in rural areas, believe that Fairies spirit away the person and leave a “fairy cheat” corpse behind (17). Fairies in this sense could be seen as angelic creatures that guide the living to the next realm once their time on Earth is up. Upon arriving, the person would join the ranks of Fairyland’s “angelic host” — indeed, the dead and Fairies alike are called the “Silent People.”

Additionally, fairy fruit can potentially be read as religious paraphernalia.

The fruit is known to inspire “poetry and visions” (17), which, alongside music, is “the language of the Silent People” (18). This evokes the theme of divine inspiration. The fruit is in fact described to produce “spiritual effects” in its consumers

and is “looked on with reverence” (21, 16). Mirrlees also draws a direct connection between fairy fruit and religion when she writes of “the most solemn event of the religious year” (16), this being the arrival of Fairyland folk bringing fairy fruit for the Duke and high priest.

This relationship between the Duke and Fairyland, a higher power, is part of the impetus for his overthrow and exile, which echoes the persecution and eventual crucifixion of Jesus. With Duke Aubrey, “all the priests had vanished also” (16), cementing the importance of his relationship to religion and pedestalling him as a figurehead of the fairy religion, especially because he vanishes to Fairyland, echoing Jesus returning to Heaven.

However, despite his removal from power and subsequent banishment to Fairyland, the Duke’s presence continues to linger in Dorimare, especially in the country with the poorer folks. Children there are still sometimes referred to as “Duke Aubrey’s brats” (23), echoing the religious phrasing “children of God” or “children of Christ.” Moreover, the Duke and Fairyland are associated with the Heavens through “falling star[s]” and the Milky Way (23, 17). As well, on the anniversary of Duke Aubrey’s expulsion from Dorimare, “maidens would fling into the Dapple … garlands woven out of the two plants that had formed the badge of the Dukes” (23), a tradition that evokes celebratory Christian holidays, such as Easter and Christmas in their ceremony and connection to Christ. To the country people, it can even be said that Duke Aubrey is not truly gone; much in the same way that found Christ imagery (such as clouds resembling crucifixes) or miracles are attributed to Jesus’ continued presence, Duke Aubrey remains a tangible figure, one who is sworn to be seen at spiritual times of the year, “galloping past [farms and villages] at the head of his fairy hunt, with harlequin ribbons streaming in the wind, to the sound of innumerable bells” (23).

In conclusion, reflecting on Duke Aubrey’s strong resemblance to Jesus Christ throughout the novel — appearing in visions, influencing human events, encouraging the fairy way of life — his return at the end of the book echoes Christianity’s Second Coming, cementing his status as a Christ figure heading the spiritual ascension of Lud-in-the-Mist and Dorimare as a whole.

Works Cited Mirrlees, Hope. Lud-in-the-Mist. Prologue Books, 2013.

Not Dead, Just Broken: The Portrayal of Disabilities in George R.R Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire By: Mackenzie Emberley

Critics have praised George R.R. Martin’s portrayal of disabilities in A Song of Ice and Fire because the ‘cripples,’ ‘bastards,’ and ‘broken things’ thrive not despite their disabled status, but because of it. From this, it might be easy to say that you need to be broken in order to reach your full potential. But Martin is not saying that whole people cannot achieve greatness; he is simply pointing out that society does not question their ability to do so. When disabled characters reach their full potential, Martin conveys the message that a disability is not a death sentence. In fact, it can improve their lives and the lives of others. Three characters demonstrate this theme: Bran Stark takes on a shamanistic role after having been crippled, Jaime Lannister can rebuild his identity once his old one is broken, and Jon Snow finds his rightful place only when he embraces his metaphorical disability. The brokenness and subsequent betterment of these characters challenges the idea that a disability is damning.

The three-eyed crow who Bran first encounters as he falls from a window, says, “Every flight begins with a fall” (GoT 135). This line is significant for the rest of Bran’s story because it describes what needs to happen in order for Bran to reach his full potential. Full potential for Bran means opening his third eye, making a connection with the weirwood network, and using that network to see through time. This is what the three-eyed crow means by ‘flight.’ What then is meant by ‘fall’? In keeping with the disability discourse, Martin uses the word ‘fall’ as the incident that cripples a character. For Jon and Tyrion this is simply their birth. For Jaime and Bran, this is the injury that changes the course of their story. Without this fall, Bran would never have met the three-eyed crow or began the journey to open his third eye. The symbolic meaning of Bran’s fall becomes truly clear in A Clash of Kings when he remarks that “[Winterfell] was not dead, just broken. Like me, he thought. I’m not dead either” (728). One way to interpret this line is to see it as Martin’s way of showing that people with physical disabilities do not deserve to die. In her essay on disabilities in HBO’s Game of Thrones, Katie Ellis states that “Tyrion is the only character who discusses Bran’s future in relation to what he can still do while others including Arya, Catelyn, Robb, and Ned focus on what he can’t, with Cersei and Jamie suggesting it is cruel to even keep him alive” (Ellis). As readers, we know that Jaime and Cersei have ulterior motives for wanting to end Bran’s suffering, but it does not negate

the fact that there is a common view that you are better off dead than disabled.

Therefore, it is important that Bran makes this hopeful comment because he challenges the stereotype that people with disabilities cannot live meaningful lives. The second layer of meaning to the line “I’m not dead either” comes from the irony that, in a way, Bran was dead but is risen by the end of the second book.

Bran is thought to have been killed by Theon, but it turns out that he is alive and hiding in the crypts at Winterfell. Bran hiding in the crypts is a significant detail because that is where the dead are. It is symbolic that he rises from the place of the dead and begins his journey to open his third eye, still with his physical disability. On his blog Race for the Iron Throne, Steven Attewell says that if “we’ve been paying attention to the shamanistic aspect of Bran’s story, the fact that Bran has metaphorically come back from the dead shouldn’t be surprising, because the role of the shaman is to stand as a liminal figure between the world of the living and the dead.” According to Attewell, it is necessary for Bran to ‘die’ in order to come back and fill the role that he is meant to take. When Bran does emerge from the crypts, he sees shattered gargoyles “strewn across the yard.

They fell just where I did, […] Nearby some crows were pecking at a body crushed beneath the tumbled stone, but he lay facedown and Bran could not say who he was” (CoK 725). The fact that Bran cannot see the figure who has fallen in the same place he did, demonstrates how some part of Bran died when he fell from the tower. If Martin decided to show the face, then readers would not have been able to make such a strong connection between this fallen figure and the Bran who fell in the beginning of the first book. The Bran that rises from the crypts is his crippled self. He is reborn and ready to begin his journey that will set him on the path of greatness that most people believe is not possible for a cripple.

Jaime Lannister’s disability is an acquired one which forces him to question his existing identity. The identity that he had before losing his hand revolved around being the ‘Kingslayer.’ It was a title that others forced on him because they did not know the whole story of why he killed King Aerys. Despite the fact that Jaime believes his actions to be right, he cannot escape his reputation. In A Storm of Swords, readers get to hear Jaime’s internal thoughts when he thinks, “And me, that boy I was... when did he die, I wonder? When I donned the white cloak?

When I opened Aerys’s throat? That boy had wanted to be Ser Arthur Dayne” (753).

By this passage, it is obvious that Jaime was not always so cocky. He wanted to be an honourable knight like Ser Arthur Dayne. We can see that he had a very different sense of self before becoming Kingslayer and it is only after acquiring a disability that he can attempt to find that same boy again. It is evident that losing his hand allows Jaime to reimagine himself because it was “The hand that made me Kingslayer. The goat had robbed him of his glory and his shame, both at once. Leaving what? Who am I now?” (SoS 419). This line could be interpreted

as self-pity and despair, but Jaime says it when confessing the truth of killing Aerys to Brienne. It is a moment of vulnerability and it demonstrates that Jaime truly is wondering, “Who am I now?” With his hand gone, he can finally begin to make his own identity for himself, not the one that others have forced on him. Whether he realizes it or not, Jaime is influenced by Brienne because less than a page later it is written, “Jaime, he thought, my name is Jaime” in response to the guards calling him Kingslayer (SoS 420). Brienne is constantly telling Jaime that her name is Brienne, not wench, because she knows who she is.

She reaffirms her identity and does not let other people take it away from her.

Eventually Jaime comes to realize that he too wants to make his own identity, but the catalyst for this character growth comes from being damaged. Jaime literally leaves behind the part of him that is poison and shows readers that a disability makes him stronger. While he may not be strong in the physical sense, Martin stresses the importance of strength of will and the power to do good.

Jaime says, “I have made kings and unmade them. Sansa Stark is my last chance for honor” (SoS 828). At the end of A Storm of Swords, it is unclear whether Jaime’s redemption arc will continue in a way that fully absolves him or proves him to be an honourable person, but it is clear that acquiring a disability has set him on the right path. When Jaime reads about his life so far, he remarks on the fact that “Ser Gerold Hightower had begun his history, and Ser Barristan Selmy had continued it, but the rest Jaime Lannister would need to write for himself.

He could write whatever he chose, henceforth. Whatever he chose” (SoS 829). In writing this section, Martin no doubt intended for it to be taken metaphorically.

The only way for Jaime to write his own history is to let his actions write for him. In earlier moments in A Storm of Swords, Jaime’s actions, not his words or his thoughts, show his true morals. On many occasions, he insults Brienne and expresses little concern for her safety, but what he chooses to do contradicts his apparent apathy. So, by becoming a cripple, Jaime can leave behind the part of him that he dislikes, and he can begin writing his own story.

George R.R. Martin challenges the notion that bastards do not have a place in society with the character of Jon Snow. This notion comes from the belief that “long term or permanent impairments (or disabilities) are feared and result in confusion, uncertainty and social awkwardness” (Ellis). Ellis explains that “disability is socially constructed as an illegitimate identity and positioned as outside of boundaries of normality.” Jon Snow’s disability is not physical, but it is nonetheless impairing because it forces him to the outside of society.

This feeling of being an outsider is made obvious when he remembers “that morning he called it first. ‘I’m Lord of Winterfell!’ he cried, as he had a hundred times before. Only this time, this time, Robb had answered, ‘You can’t be Lord of Winterfell, you’re bastard-born. My lady mother says you can’t ever be the

Lord of Winterfell’” (SoS 892). Throughout his childhood, Catelyn, Theon, and the last name Snow have reminded Jon that he is not a Stark and he does not have a place among them. He has also been told that bastards will never have the same sense of importance as legitimate people. In A Storm of Swords, when Stannis offers to legitimize Jon, Jon knows that he “wanted it as much as he had ever wanted anything. I have always wanted it, he thought, guiltily. May the gods forgive me. It was a hunger inside him, sharp as a dragonglass blade” (894). At first it seems like Jon will accept Stannis’s offer, thus continuing the trend that the only way for a character to rise is to somehow leave their disabled identity behind, but thankfully Martin does not go down this conventional path. The hunger that Jon feels is the turning point. He realizes that the hunger comes from his connection with Ghost who has

a weirwood’s eyes. Red eyes, red mouth, white fur. Blood and bone, like a

heart tree. He belongs to the old gods, this one. And he alone of all the

direwolves was white. Six pups they’d found in the late summer snows,

him and Robb; five that were grey and black and brown, for the five Starks,

and one white, as white as Snow. He had his answer then. (SoS 895) Through his connection to Ghost, Jon realizes that he does have a place at Winterfell despite what his last name is. In fact, it is his last name that helps him see this. Martin writes, “as white as Snow” with a capital letter on ‘Snow’ because he is referring to Jon, not the winter snow. Martin makes this distinction because it emphasises the link between Ghost, Jon, Winterfell, and the old gods. It is significant that Ghost has all the same features of a heart tree because it reminds Jon that “the weirwood was the heart of Winterfell” (SoS 893), and therefore so is he. Jon’s illegitimate name of Snow ensures that he does have an important place at Winterfell despite what others may believe about bastards.

Cripples, bastards, and broken things thrive in A Song of Ice and Fire so that Martin can subvert the stereotype that a disabled character cannot achieve their full potential just as a non-disabled person can. Martin reverses the trope that characters need to leave behind their disabilities in order to live meaningful lives. Bran’s disability sets him on the path to become a powerful shaman figure; Jaime’s disability allows him to reimagine his identity and start the process of becoming an honourable person; and Jon’s invisible disability is proven not to be an obstacle to his happiness, but rather it’s source. Each of these characters defy what society expects of them because, as Tyrion says in the first novel, they make their disability their strength.

Works Cited Attewell, Stephen. “Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: Bran VII, ACOK.” Race for The

Iron Throne, 7 Apr. 2016. https://racefortheironthrone.wordpress.com/

archive/cbc-analysis/cbc-analysis-a-clash-of-kings/. Accessed 20 Nov. 2020.

Ellis, K. M. “Cripples, Bastards and Broken Things: Disability in Game of Thrones.”

M/C Journal, vol. 17, no. 5, Oct. 2014, https://journal.media-culture.org.au/

index.php/mcjournal/article/view/895. Accessed 21 Nov. 2020.

Martin, George R.R. A Clash of Kings. Bantam Books, 1999.

Martin, George R.R. A Game of Thrones. Bantam Books, 1996.

Martin, George R.R. A Storm of Swords. Bantam Books, 2000.

Eyes Only By: Jack Bradley

She Was Useful, She Was Beloved: Performing Good Versus Being Good in Mansfield Park By: Elliott Kieran Cooper

In modern discourse about the varying levels of contributions people make to society, there is a prevalent idea emerging that people should not place the idea of productivity above all else. This is especially emphasized in circles that advocate for the rights of low-income workers and the disabled. In a capitalistic world, it is easy for many to forget that a person’s worth is not dependent on how much money they can bring home or what they can produce for sale or consumption. At first glance, Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park seems to present a society less advanced than our own in this regard. Fanny Price is a character that suffers somewhat from oppression and control by her wealthier relations, especially in the beginning of the novel when she is somewhat reluctantly taken in as a child. However, she also enjoys a level of privilege many people would struggle to comprehend even now. On the surface, it looks as if Fanny is complicit in both her own repression and that of others, and there are certainly some ways this is true. However, a nuanced reading of how she rejects the roles which others try to force her into reveals a depth of character and inner strength. Her moralizing approach, which at times seems self-righteous and condescending, is balanced by Austen’s skillful narration which uses layers of irony, empathy, and introspection while inviting us into her protagonist’s world. Above all, Fanny wishes to be ‘useful’ to others — and in the end, her usefulness is not as a ‘productive’ labourer or a woman of large fortune, but as a virtuous companion to her loved ones who stands firm in her own convictions and earns respect for this.

The word ‘useful’ is one which is repeated throughout the course of the novel. One early example comes not from Fanny, but from her mother, who seeks to place one of her many children with her sister’s family and asks whether her eldest son William might be “useful to Sir Thomas in the concerns of his West Indian property” (4). From the start, the family’s concern to do kindness is balanced by skepticism and worry — will the child they take in be of some benefit to the family or a liability? Sir Thomas is shown to be mindful of the welfare of the child, considering that “a girl so brought up must be adequately provided for, or there would be cruelty instead of kindness in taking her from her family” (5). Austen uses free indirect discourse here to show how thoughtful he is. He does not speak all of his considerations aloud, but they are revealed by the narrator and contrasted with the ironic tone the narration takes in describing

his sister in law Mrs. Norris. She speaks of herself as “a woman of few words and professions” just after we are told that she possesses a “spirit of activity” (4, 3). Mrs. Norris anticipates Sir Thomas’ objections and has “interrupted him with a reply to them all whether stated or not” (5). Clearly, she lacks self-awareness, wishing to present a picture of herself as deferring to Sir Thomas’ authority when she does nothing of the sort. She is placed into an antagonistic role before Fanny is even introduced, and this sets her up as a useful contrast — both she and Fanny speak often of the idea of being useful and of service to others, but only one of them is shown to be sincere and thoughtful in these aims. When Mrs. Norris says to Lady Bertram, “It is for your children’s good that I wish to be richer” (24), we are not taken in, because we have already seen how her words and actions do not match up. In the first chapter, we were already told that she has “no real affection for her sister” and that she only puts on a show of kindness — “as far as walking, talking and contriving reached, she was thoroughly benevolent” (7). As she is childless, it seems that her chief joy in life is to try to amuse herself with meddling in the affairs of others and making herself look indispensable. For instance, when the young people aim to put together a theatre, she has no objection on moral grounds because she anticipates “all the comforts of hurry, bustle and importance” (102). When Sir Thomas arrives and is dismayed by the preparations, we can see how hypocritical her justifications are — while she admits to herself that “her influence was insufficient, that she might have talked in vain” (147), she then goes on to try and redeem herself by claiming full responsibility for Maria’s connection to Mr. Rushworth. Sir Thomas is “foiled by her evasions, disarmed by her flattery” (149), but we know she is not to be trusted.

Fanny’s trustworthiness and modesty represents a threat to Mrs. Norris and those who share her duplicitous, performative nature. Fanny is in a disadvantaged position and Mrs. Norris is keen to remind her of this. Mrs. Norris does not hide her scorn, saying to Edmund while Fanny is in the room to hear: “I shall think her a very obstinate, ungrateful girl, if she does not do what her aunt and cousins wish her — very ungrateful indeed, considering who and what she is” (116). This is outrageously cruel given that Fanny is already keenly aware of how much she owes to the Bertrams and shows just how far Mrs. Norris is willing to go to remind her of her place, elevating herself in comparison. This cruelty is so blatant that it is off-putting to others, and by the end of the novel the narrator is the only one to show her any pity at all by calling her “the greatest sufferer” when Maria falls from grace (351). As for the inhabitants of Mansfield, she is “regretted by no one” when she departs (366).

While Mrs. Norris is the most obvious foil due to her lack of power and wealth, which mirrors Fanny’s situation, other characters are shown to be disingenuous in their attempts at doing good or being useful to others. Henry

Crawford is described by his sister Mary as someone who “loves to be doing” (46).

Mary refers to his desire to be involved with improvements to properties, but we see that he enjoys making himself busy in other endeavours such as acting, business deals, and romantic pursuits.While there is certainly nothing wrong with a young man wanting to be involved with such things, his selfishness becomes apparent in scenes such as the one where he listens to William Price talk of his career as a sailor. Austen’s narration gives us a glimpse into his thoughts: “The glory of heroism, of usefulness, of exertion, of endurance, made his own habits of selfish indulgence appear in shameful contrast” (185). At first this may seem like a moment of self-awareness that will lead to greater reflection and a desire for self-improvement, but this is quickly swept away in the next paragraph: “The wish was rather eager than lasting” (185). We know Henry wishes for the glory without the actual effort and risk inherent in a sailor’s life. It makes sense that acting appeals to him more — he can play a dashing role without suffering harm.

Fanny’s discernment of his true personality can be seen later when he speaks of the clergy. Henry disregards country preaching of the sort Edmund is considering, but very quickly reveals his own faults: “I could not preach, but to the educated; to those who were capable of estimating my composition. And, I do not know that I should be fond of preaching often” (267), he admits. Fanny thinks she will shock him when she says, “Sir, I thought it was a pity you did not always know yourself as well as you seemed to do at that moment” (269), but this only seems to strengthen his resolve to prove her wrong as to his constancy. He mistakes the reason for her disapproval, however — he believes she is worried that he is unsteady in his affection for her, while she is already resolved in believing him inferior to Edmund. She lacks interest in him and believes he is morally inferior to her cousin, who legitimately wishes to serve his community as a clergyman.

Henry’s desire to preach beautifully crafted sermons to the well educated in a city displays once more that he is more concerned with bringing attention to himself than being of actual service. Still, the access we are given to Henry’s inner thoughts paints a more nuanced picture than we might otherwise get from his self-serving, performative behaviour and scheming actions. It is easy to see how much he desires commendation and favourable attention, which can lead us to feel compassion for him. He displays a certain lack of self-esteem, since he relies on the good opinion of others to feel worthy and is self-aware enough to realize he lacks motivation to follow through on his wishes.

This complexity carries through to Henry’s sister Mary Crawford as well,whose relationship with Fanny is a source of tension throughout much of the novel. Mary’s interactions with her brother display that they are partners in crime, speaking to each other candidly of their intentions. Henry lets his sister know of his plan to “make Fanny Price in love” with him even though she

objects to this at first (179). Later, she advocates for him, praising him to Fanny and encouraging their potential romance. Mary is manipulative.

At times, she treats Fanny with what seems to be true warmth and regard, but we know from her conversations with her brother that she is duplicitous. This contrasts with Fanny’s innocence when Fanny repeatedly tries to believe the best of Mary. Fanny eventually confesses to being “unsuspicious” of Mary’s involvement in presenting her brother’s necklace to Fanny as a gift (284). However, even the narrator makes some allowances for Mary by declaring Fanny to have feelings so strong they verge on unfairness: “impartiality would not have denied to Miss Crawford’s nature, that participation of the general nature of women, which would lead her to adopt the opinions of the man she loved and respected, as her own” (288). This approach softens a character that could otherwise become one-dimensional by showing that it is reasonable to expect that Mary could learn something from a relationship with Edmund as she is truly interested in becoming his wife and would aim to please him. The implication is that she is not so shallow as Fanny might believe, even if she is very focused on Edmund’s looks. Fanny later thinks critically of how Mary speaks of Edmund in a letter: “The woman who could speak of him, and speak only of his appearance! What an unworthy attachment!” (327).

Is Fanny herself immune to such superficial considerations?

Evidently not. When she is removed to Portsmouth, we can see how high Fanny’s expectations are and how bitterly her family disappoints them.

While Fanny may speak of moral concerns, many of the things she finds disagreeable about Portsmouth have more to do with differences of lifestyle than with bad behaviour. The tone of the narration grows quite wry, observing that Mrs. Price “might have made just as good a woman of consequence as Lady Bertram, but Mrs. Norris would have been a more respectable mother of nine children, on a small income” (306). The impression this gives is that there is no real moral failing here, only a difference in circumstance. Fanny’s disappointment in her family appears quite judgmental and unfair in this light. Fanny finds a way to be useful in Portsmouth as a moral guide and friend to her younger sister Susan, and we are told that Susan has an eagerness to please, a desire to appear educated, and “an innate taste for the genteel and well-appointed” (329).

Susan, then, strives for higher education, more refined surroundings, and to be taken seriously. How is this so different from Henry Crawford’s desire for attention, or Mary’s regard for Edmund’s attractiveness? Is it a sincere desire for self-improvement that sets them apart, or only Fanny’s partiality? We are not told that Susan truly desires more knowledge. In

fact, she lacks the desire to read that Fanny herself had at a young age. Yet, Susan “had so strong a desire of not appearing ignorant” (328). This hints at some superficiality, perhaps an interest in society rather than actual enlightenment. Fanny clearly fancies herself an educator and advisor here, so perhaps she believes Susan can be guided to more sincere reflection in time. However, she shows little such concern for her other siblings, choosing to spend the bulk of her time with the one she most sees herself in.

Time spent on education, in the end, is a focus for Sir Thomas Bertram.

He laments that he did not get to know his daughters better, feeling that he had brought them up with much monetary expense, but not enough of his own time and attention:

Wretchedly did he feel, that with all the cost and care of an anxious

and expensive education, he had brought up his daughters, without their

understanding their first duties, or his being acquainted with their

character and temper. (364) Edmund, too, blames a lack of care rather than innate evil for Mary Crawford’s behaviour towards him: “This is what the world does. For where, Fanny, shall we find a woman whom nature had so richly endowed?” (357). He goes on to state that “hers is not a cruel nature” (357), though Fanny disagrees. He blames instead a “perversion of mind” brought on by bad influences: “She was speaking only as she had been used to hear others speak” (358).

Fanny’s usefulness, then, is proved by her success where Sir Thomas has failed. Yet Sir Thomas finds “repeated reason to rejoice in what he had done for them all, and acknowledge the advantages of early hardship and discipline, and the consciousness of being born to struggle and endure” (371-2). Fanny’s worth in his eyes and in Edmund’s is not due to her birth, but her work to improve herself and remain true to her principles. Though Sir Thomas wished her to accept Henry Crawford’s proposal to the extent of shaming her for refusing it, she stood firm and was proved correct in her early judgment of her potential mate’s character. Her marriage to Edmund is certainly not depicted as a passionate affair, but it is one of security: “She was returned to Mansfield Park, she was useful, she was beloved; she was safe from Mr. Crawford” (362). Edmund leaves off his “unconquerable passions” and there is a “transfer of unchanging attachments” (369). The ironic tone of the narration at the conclusion implies that this is a mere companionate marriage rather than a very romantic one. Yet it is also stated: “She was of course only too good for him (…) nobody minds having what is too good for them” (370). Where passion may be lacking there is at least mutual satisfaction, security, and contentment — a just reward for two characters who have good intentions despite their flaws. They can be useful to one another and to their communities by serving as good examples, rather than

through backbreaking work or showy displays of worth. Fanny and Edmund are shown to be good because of how they are, not who or what they are — that is why they deserve happiness even though their relationship is not a typical romance.

Though there is much about their marriage that is old-fashioned, their refusal to comply to what is expected of them is surprisingly in line with progressive ideals of happiness and fulfillment, not monetary gain, being what makes a relationship and a life worthwhile.

Works Cited Austen, Jane. Mansfield Park. Oxford University Press, 2008.

Analyzing the Progression of Black Identity Throughout Time and the Family By: Julianna Taylor

Families and their histories clearly contribute to the establishment of one’s self-image. This essay examines the various points of intersectionality between time, identity, and family as experienced by Black protagonists in the novels Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid, Kindred by Octavia Butler, and Tar Baby by Toni Morrison.

These novels all center a Black female perspective to reveal how time shapes identity as it intersects with age, race, and gender. More specifically, these novels demonstrate various categories that Black women have historically been, and continue to be, forced into. In Annie John, Kincaid illustrates the restrictive conditions placed on Black female youth under the scope of British colonization.

Alluded to in the novel as ‘young-lady business’ (which primarily consisted of education in manners and piano skill), colonial influence imposed new standards of ‘admirable’ qualities in young women of colonized nations such as Annie John’s home island Antigua. Professor Chie Ikeya analyzes the reformation of female education in British-colonized nations, finding that “‘better education’ entailed an instruction in Eurocentric and often Christian conceptions of femininity, morality, and domesticity….[C]olonial-era educational reforms all saw female education as a vehicle for inculcating what they understood to be respectable womanhood according to their notions of “civilized” living.” Thus, Euro-colonized nations such as Antigua developed a female education system geared towards domesticity; for example, “while female students in Anglo-vernacular middle schools took the same courses as their male counterparts, they were required to take ‘domestic economy’ and ‘needlework’ in lieu of geometry” (Ikeya). Annie John also provides glimpses into the harsh nature of colonial socialism aimed at

native female youth. For example, when Annie John’s mother tells her that “she observed me making a spectacle of myself in front of four boys…it had pained her to see me behave in the manner of a slut in the street” (102), the mother’s shame over witnessing this simple interaction reveals the restrictive and intolerable attitudes towards female sexuality. These harsh social policies emerged from British influence and hindered the social development and emerging identity of female youth in colonized areas.

Additionally, Tar Baby explores how time intersects with age, race, and gender to define identity through the character Jadine who sees herself as a modern young Black woman. Yet, others continuously attempt to dismantle this self-proclaimed identity and instead impose a traditional ‘Black woman’ archetype.

Jadine defines herself by her beauty, model lifestyle, and independence; others ridicule these defining characteristics in order to dismantle her self-proclaimed identity and push her to adopt a ‘traditional’ Black woman identity. This ridicule is also often employed to demoralize her, such as when Son tells her to “Feed, love and care for white people’s children. That’s what you were born for; that’s what you have waited for all your life. So have that white man’s baby, that’s your job” (269-270). This reference to the historic role and abuse of Black women under slavery involves intersecting forces of sexism and racism that Black women are constantly subjected to. Son’s insults model how hyper-sexualization and Black history is deployed against Black females with the intent to harm. Thus, Jadine exemplifies how young Black women are never seen or accepted as their individual selves; instead, they are constantly subjected to historical narratives and the social category of ‘Black women.’ Scholar Bakary Diaby touches on this harmful tendency to categorize Black women:

“[A]s a Black man, race circulates throughout the space I currently occupy

and is partially anchored in my singular embodiment and the visual

field. But I do not automatically bring racism into the room when I bring

race. Racism’s psychological and emotional registers—like anger or

resentment or perceived ingratitude—are not the product of my physical

being but my embeddedness in racist culture.”

Diaby advocates for this awareness because it allows for Black individuals to be seen as who they uniquely are, rather than being automatically categorized under a homogenized ‘Black identity.’

Octavia Butler’s Kindred demonstrates how time and history have forcefully dictated the role and identity of Black women. Specifically, Dana is forced to adopt the ‘slave identity’ when she finds herself in the antebellum South.

Butler’s portrayal of slavery represents not only the extreme physical, mental, and emotional abuse of Black people in this period, but also highlights the normalcy of sexual violence perpetrated against Black women. For instance, Rufus (who

claims to love Alice) fails to understand the immorality of his own actions after he attacks and rapes her, saying “I wouldn’t have hurt her if she hadn’t just kept saying no” (123). His incomprehensibility of his own wrongfulness is largely due to the staggering prevalence of sexual violence against Black women in the nineteenth century. Frank Wilderson’s essay “Reciprocity and Rape: Blackness and the paradox of sexual violence” sums up the predicament of slaves: “the withdrawal of consent is never an option for Black women, because hegemony is not constitutive of Black people’s subjection.” Saidiya Hartman further analyzes this paradox:

“if the definition of the crime of rape relies upon the capacity to give

consent or exercise will… [and] the legal definition of the enslaved negates

the very idea of ‘reasonable resistance’ … [then] the enslaved could neither

give nor refuse consent… yet they were criminally responsible and

liable…[I]ronically, the slave’s will was acknowledged only as it was

prohibited and punished.”

The history of allowing sexual violence against slave women communicates the severity of dehumanization and injustice Black women faced. Overall, Annie John, Tar Baby, and Kindred demonstrate the prevalence of forcing young Black females into categories of being; colonial, ancestral, and historical standards are imposed on these protagonists to reveal the various roles that Black women are pushed to identify and conform with. These categories are rooted in the progression and archive of time while constantly affecting the social conceptualization of Black women.

How time can degrade family ties and thus alter identity is also critical to consider. The story of Annie John models the family dynamic changing over time as a child matures, resulting in a newly established ‘adult’ identity. In Annie John’s case, her maturation has a degenerative effect on the mother-daughter relationship, which manifests in deceit and secret loathing. Many literary critics have interpreted the relationship of Annie John and her mother as mirroring the struggle of colonialism, where Annie “tends to be celebrated as a rebellious spirit who embodies hope for the ex-colonies” (Rampaul). In My Brother Kincaid writes, “being a child is one of the definitions of vulnerability and powerlessness” (8). Kincaid compares this state to “Antigua’s . . . dependent relationship with the colonial motherland” (27). The strain of colonial standards and responsibilities placed on Annie John by her mother breeds feelings of resentment and insecurity.

Thus, the mother-daughter bond weakens over time and Annie John turns towards constructing her own identity and life independent from her family unit. In Tar Baby, the motif of time influencing the family and consequently the identity of characters is witnessed again through dysfunctional bonds of motherhood.

Margaret is obsessed with being a good mother for her adult son Michael because she is plagued with guilt for being neglectful and abusive when he was

young. She desperately attempts to recapture her mothering role; however, the passage of time has closed the opportunity for developing a strong mother-child bond, leaving a void in Margaret’s identity. Kindred also focuses on the nature of family ties through a framework of abuse and oppression via the slavery era. For example, Dana realizes that “Rufus’s fear of death calls me to him” (50). Thus, she is linked to her ancestor against her own will, continuously tasked with saving a horrible racist man from death because her existence is dependent on him raping Alice. Dana’s predicament and the emotional attachment she forms with Rufus despite his immoral character is a metaphor for family entrapment; even when we do not align with the views of our family members or wish to reject them, the bonds that stem from a family connection are difficult to break free of. Moreover, family ties are used as a tool of oppression against the slaves in Kindred. A common punishment white slaveowners used against slaves was the selling of their children to other far-off plantations. This is what pushes Alice to kill herself. In “The Passage of Slavery and its Afterlife in Narratives…” Meg Samuelson analyzes various literary texts that deal with the detrimental loss of filial bonds as instituted by the slave trade. She inquires: “What is motherhood in the life of a slave…when faced with her inability to protect her children. She [the slave woman] has… been purchased as a ‘childbearing’ woman, to ‘increase [her owner’s] stock’... Hartman notes that this ‘stamp of the commodity haunts the maternal line and is transferred from one generation to the next’” (Samuelson).

As Kindred reveals, the constant threat of separation from the family was used to demoralize and oppress slaves of all ages. Overall, Annie John, Tar Baby, and Kindred display how family ties are bound by both present and historical time and are damaged by those internal and external to the family itself. The result of a degraded family unit is a psychological break within individuals that splinters their sense of identity to the point of self-abandonment — leaving homeland in the case of Annie John, desperation for Margaret in Tar Baby, and death for Rufus and Alice in Kindred.

Furthermore, these novels provide insight into the intergenerational trauma Black people experience from historic colonialism and racism; these intersecting ‘isms’ throughout time are a reality that critically shapes the identities of the Black protagonists. In Annie John, intergenerational trauma is present in the aftermath of colonialism’s disruption of Caribbean culture. English influence penetrated all areas of life when Antigua was colonized, and many modes remained present on the island even after British authorities officially left. One thing that colonialism critically altered is the perception of Obeah in Caribbean culture. In Annie John, the ways of Obeah are presented as suspicious and less important than Western healing practices. For example, Annie John’s father openly dislikes/avoids the Obeah woman and later rearranges the medicines so that the Doctor’s are displayed up front while the Obeah’s are hidden behind.

Diana Paton’s essay “Obeah Acts: Producing and Policing the Boundaries of Religion in the Caribbean” examines the two-fold history of criminalizing Obeah that still influences present attitudes towards it. Initially, Obeah was outlawed for being ‘witchcraft’ and in conflict with religion. Parton notes that “the concept ‘religion’ has acted as a race-making category: a marker of the line between supposedly ‘civilized’ peoples (who practice religion) and ‘primitive’ peoples (who practice superstition or magic).” Second, to justify a continued ban of Obeah, “in the post-slavery period, the legal construction of obeah shifted from being primarily about witchcraft to being primarily about fraud” (Paton). The colonial criminalization of Obeah has had lasting effects on the Caribbean identity and “in some places, including Jamaica, the legislation still stands today” (Paton). The Obeah laws and other areas of colonial influence intergenerationally inserted the idea that Caribbean culture lacks modernity and thus needs to be reformed.

Annie John conforms to this notion when she abandons her life on Antigua (and metaphorically her Caribbean identity) to go study nursing in England.

In addition, Kindred represents intergenerational trauma by having twentieth-century Dana experience slavery firsthand in the company of her ancestors. In the slave-community Dana enters, she experiences “cultural trauma, in which group consciousness is key to an individual’s future identity, which is also referred to as collective trauma” (Barlow). This experience irrevocably changes Dana physically and mentally, signifying the brutality of ancestral trauma.

Lastly, through Jadine, Tar Baby brings into focus intergenerational trauma that specifically targets Black women. In article on Black healing, Patricia Broussard identifies “Black Women’s Post-Slavery Silence Syndrome” as a condition that “engages in the ‘contentious discourse’ of how collective traumatic events resulted in a culture of silence for Black women, in which Black women experience trauma yet remain silent about their experiences with sexual abuse, assault, and rape” (qtd. in Barlow). Jadine in many ways embodies this pattern of silencing Black women; not only is she routinely pressured to reform her individual identity, but she is also routinely silenced by Son, her counterpart, who “is often credited with being connected to African American ideals of community and nature” (Moffitt), though he fails to realize how severely he oppresses and hurts Jadine. Their relationship is passionate and heartbreakingly abusive and Son’s fury over the history of Black oppression is undercut by his active oppression of Jadine. His deep-rooted anger ultimately manifests in committing a horrible violence against her that has historically been a common mode of oppressing Black women: rape. This sexual violence towards the end of the novel is often missed because it is not mentioned outright in the text and Morrison herself has never confirmed it. The clues of it lie in their disjointed dialogue while fighting; Son takes off his clothes and tells Jadine a story while she repeatedly screams

“Don’t touch me” and “You better kill me. Because if you don’t, when you’re through, I’m going to kill you” (270). Later Son worries “he went too far” and “her nakedness below embarrassed him now. He had produced that nakedness and having soiled it, it shamed him” (272). An essay by John Duvall voices how this rape “is rhetorically constructed to deny the reader’s awareness of the violence.”

I think this concealed rape can be linked to Barlow’s intergenerational concept of abusing and silencing Black women. In times of slavery, rape was used to dominate and demoralize Black women. Here Son also seeks to dominate and oppress the Black woman, Jadine, and he does so through sexual violence. This complicated betrayal between the Black man and Black woman breaks Son and Jadine’s relationship irrevocably. Overall, this signifies the ongoing struggle of Black women to process the oppression and harm done to them not only by the racism of white people, but also by aggression and concepts of race held by Black men. Thus, these three novels show intergenerational trauma as a force that curbs self-discovery and the identity of its Black female characters, whether it be as a consequence of colonialism, slavery, or dissension within the Black community.

In conclusion, by centralizing Black female perspectives, family relations, and intergenerational trauma, Annie John, Tar Baby, and Kindred provide insight into long-standing and critical issues that Black people are confronted with in regard to the complex relationship between identity and history. These issues mainly stem from the constructs of colonialism, slavery, assimilation, racism, and sexism. The effects of such systemic targeting of Black people persists as a harmful social reality to this day. Thorough analysis and deconstruction of these harmful attitudes and practices is vital for social reconciliation, growth, and health.

Works Cited Barlow, Jameta Nicole. “Restoring Optimal Black Mental Health and Reversing

Intergenerational Trauma in an Era of Black Lives Matter.” Biography, vol.

41 no. 4, 2018, p. 895-908. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/bio.2018.0084.

Broussard, Patricia A. “Black Women’s Post-Slavery Silence Syndrome: A

Twenty-First Century Remnant of Slavery, Jim Crow, and Systemic

Racism—Who Will Tell Her Stories?” The Journal of Gender, Race & Justice, vol. 16, 2013, pp. 373–421.

Butler, Octavia E. Kindred. Beacon Press, 2003.

Diaby, Bakary. “Black Women and/in the Shadow of Romanticism.” European

Romantic Review, vol. 30, no. 3, June 2019, pp. 249–254. EBSCOhost,

search.ebscohost.com/login aspx?direct=true&db=mzh&AN=20191625311

1&site=ehost-live.

Duvall, John N. “Descent in the ‘House of Chloe’: Race, Rape, and Identity in

Toni Morrison’s ‘Tar Baby.’” Contemporary Literature, vol. 38, no. 2,

1997, pp. 325–349. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1208786.

Hartman, Saidiya V. 1997. Scenes of Subjection: Terror, Slavery, and Self-Making in

Nineteenth- Century America. New York: Oxford University Press.

Ikeya, Chie. “The Scientific and Hygienic Housewife-and-Mother: Education,

Consumption and the Discourse of Domesticity.” The Journal of Burma Studies, vol. 14, 2010, pp. 59–89. EBSCOhost,search.ebscohost.com/login.as

px?direct=true&db=mzh&AN=2011421156&site=ehost-live.

Kincaid, Jamaica. Annie John. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1991.

Moffitt, Letitia. “Finding the Door: Vision/Revision and Stereotype in Toni

Morrison’s Tar Baby.” Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, vol. 46, no. 1,

2004, pp. 12–26. EBSCOhost, doi:10.3200/CRIT.46.1.12-26.

Morrison, Toni. Tar Baby. Vintage International, 2004.

Paton, Diana. “Obeah Acts: Producing and Policing the Boundaries of Religion

in the Caribbean.” Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism, vol. 28, Mar.

2009, pp. 1–18. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&

db=mzh&AN=2009640579&site=ehost-live.

Rampaul, Giselle. “The West Indian Child as Subject/Object: Interrogating

Notions of Power in Annie John.” Journal of Caribbean Literatures,

vol. 7, no. 1, 2011, pp. 153–160. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.

aspx?direct=true&db=mzh&AN= 2013397805&site=ehost-live.

Samuelson, Meg. “‘Lose Your Mother, Kill Your Child’: The Passage Of Slavery

and its Afterlife in Narratives by Yvette Christianse And Saidiya

Hartman.” English Studies in Africa, 1 Jan. 2008, pp. 38–48. Web. Wilderson, Frank B. “Reciprocity and Rape: Blackness and the Paradox of Sexual

Violence.” Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory, vol. 27, no. 1,

Mar.2017,pp.104–111.EBSCOhost,search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=tr

ue&db=mzh&AN=2019440956&site=ehost-live.

Pathways

By: Bilquees “Billie” Hafeez

The Class Conundrum By: Sara-Emilie Clark

Ireland, 2011. Three years have passed since the 2008 economic catastrophe, the financial crisis of the decade. After enjoying a period of relative peace and prosperity throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, Ireland once again teeters on the precipice of total collapse. Unemployment has sky-rocketed, with more than sixty percent of people struggling to find short or long-term positions (Bergin et al.). Such bleak prospects have sparked a wave of emigration amongst young people who have expanded their occupational search to the outer reaches of the European Union (Bellec). Increased taxes and a decrease in welfare leave the working class few options for comfort and security. Household income has dropped, particularly amongst single parents and those with children. The middle class has shrunk considerably, with the rich now ten times wealthier than the poor. While the government has pulled itself out of a deficit, the people remain indebted to banks who swallow money and spit out loans simply so families can provide for themselves (Bergin et al.).

It is an Ireland in turmoil that is the setting for Sally Rooney’s novel Normal People. The story begins in Carricklea, a small townland within the Civil Parish of Ballindoon near Galway. Here, the reader meets main characters Connell and Marianne. They are two sides of the same coin — both are children of single mothers, with no present father figure in either of their lives, and both are intelligent, with a clear brilliance that sets them apart from others. They are magnetically, undeniably drawn to each other. These characteristics make the pair nearly indistinguishable. And on a surface level, perhaps they are. But he is the son of a blue-collar worker, and she is a trust-fund daughter. He is lowermiddle class; she is upper. This base distinction creates a conflict between the two that yields an unconscious shame neither character is able to fully grasp as they navigate their relationship through the waters of a class-driven society.

Connell begins his literary life as the well-respected star of the local school’s football team. A member of the working class in small-town Ireland, he is far from socially abnormal; rural Ireland is built on the backs of the workers.

For years, Ireland depended on agricultural sectors and the unskilled worker to maintain the nation’s finances and tradable resources. As a result, rural areas have a lesser sense of internal social alienation than the major urban centers (Bergin et al.). The vast majority are lower-middle class, a clear source of fascination for Connell. Throughout the novel, Sally Rooney weaves a Marxist element into Connell’s character, exploring the subtleties of his affiliation with class to show that he is, at the very least, a Marxist sympathizer. In one of the novel’s first exchanges between Connell and Marianne, he lends her a copy of the Communist

Manifesto. This is the first direct insinuation of Connell’s positive affiliation with the ideology; his political views fall towards the left, with a certain contempt for the affluent. Ironically, however, Connell shows this same disgust towards himself and those of his own class, particularly his mother.

Although having a single parent is not always met with judgement, Connell is hyper-aware of the effect his mother, Lorraine, has on his social standing.

He is the result of an unplanned teenage pregnancy, and his mother’s youthful beauty often provokes unsavoury comments from his male friends. While he is largely able to ignore this salaciousness, Lorraine’s occupation as a cleaner for the upper-class household of Connell’s friend-with-benefits, Marianne, further humiliates him. The discomfort felt by Connell regarding his mother is evident in several of his interactions with her, but most notably in his failure to refer to her as a mother at all. Instead of entertaining the more conventional titles — ‘Mum’ or ‘Mom’ — Connell calls her by her first name. He refers to her as if she is nothing more than an acquaintance to him, a connection he would rather not disclose as personal. It is not unreasonable to infer that the complexities of Connell’s relationship with his only significant relative stem from an innate shame surrounding their social class. Although in Carricklea, the idea of class is generally not as divisive, Lorraine’s subservient career and dependency on the wealthy for livelihood increases Connell’s aversion to his socio-economic situation.

In Dublin, however, Connell experiences a new sense of class separation he has not fully encountered before; the lines are drawn clearly in the sand at Trinity College. The conflict between classes is at the same time implicit and explicit.

During his first year at university, Connell attends a party with his friend, Gareth.

While Connell retains but a shadow of his former popularity, Gareth continues to earn admiration from other students. A previous attendee of a Dublin private school, Gareth exemplifies the typical well-off student. Such students are easy for Connell to spot: he describes them as an identical breed, sporting “the same waxed hunting jackets and plum-coloured chinos” (Rooney 73). Connell feels self-conscious when around these students, as if he is “forced to acknowledge that his own clothes are cheap and unfashionable” — indeed they are, for the reason that neither he nor his family has the income to support the fashionable and expensive over the practical (73). Connell’s thick accent, characteristic of his rural upbringing, is ammunition for those who ridicule him, and further exposes him as a member of the working class. Connell was not fully cognisant of this discord in Carricklea, but is now that he lives in the city. Dublin has, after all, historically been regarded by Marxist philosophers as the center of the capitalist bourgeoisie and the foundation for the class war in Ireland. It was considered both the base of Irish nationalism and the original birthplace of Irish socialism,

a dialectical dispute culminating in a legacy of class-based division (Haugh). The keen uneasiness felt by Connell is a reflection of years of tension between the lower and upper classes, which contributes to his sense of alienation in the city.

Connell is highly aware of where he stands in society; he feels more so than ever before that he is wholly defined by his class.

By way of contrast, Marianne pays little heed to the effect class has on her life. It is an underlying element of her narrative, something she perhaps only unconsciously comprehends. Marianne is the main representative of wealth and fortune in the novel. In Carricklea, she lives in a large, stately house run by employed staff. Her needs are taken care of by her mother’s bank account.

Finances are of no consequence to her; they have never existed as points of concern. Social imbalance, therefore, is not something she realizes inherently affects her. However, it has widened the divide between rich and poor for years.

Rational action theory, a micro-sociological form of research, dictates that the Irish upper-class has secured a ‘comparative advantage’ in the labour and educational markets. The structural inequalities of the class system produce faults at a molecular level that foster aggravation between social rankings (Gray).

Whether she is aware of it or not, Marianne’s money is what sets her apart, far more than her intelligence or character.

Marianne is seen as an oddity in Carricklea. She is cold, proud, and private.

The naturally prosperous black sheep in a herd of working-class ruminants, she stands out. At first glance, her perceived strangeness does appear to be a result of her personality; she is described to be “mentally deranged” by her peers (Rooney 55). There is evidence to support this: she has few friends, has not experienced a romantic relationship prior to Connell, and references a tumultuous history with her family. One can infer, however, that it is her advantageous financial situation which creates a distance between herself and others. Physically, her sizeable home is not located in ordinary neighbourhoods and is separate from the rest of Carricklea. Beyond that, she fails to fully comprehend what offends and upsets the working class due to her elevated status. For example, during the scene in which she and Connell explore the ghost estate — an abandoned residence used for underage drinking purposes — he laments the fact that such a significantlysized home could go unused. Marianne is able to put forward no real response to this, other than saying, “it’s something to do with capitalism” (36). She feels foolish: it would never have occurred to her, a member of the upper class, that such a flagrant display of unattended wealth would be considered objectionable by the working class.

At Trinity, this same unconscious entitlement follows Marianne. She enters seamlessly into a group of affluent acquaintances and dates Gareth, the same boy for whom Connell showed such distaste. As previously mentioned,

with Dublin’s roots in materialism and conventional riches, the rich feel at home, while the poor feel out of place. Marianne, however, is just as conspicuous as she was in Carricklea. Being upper class, her peers have a similar relationship with her as Gareth’s do with him: respect and affection to the point of awe.

She has become exponentially more popular than in the past. People, lowermiddle class included, feel drawn to her. Although she is a figurehead of an oppressive capitalist bourgeoisie, this in itself seems to lend her an aura of power and influence to which the general student body — many of whom are working class — is automatically attracted. Marianne derives little joy or happiness from this and is still separate and detached, even during times where she refuses to admit it out of a perverse fear of not being considered ‘normal people.’ Though Connell feels, to a certain extent, circumscribed by his class, Marianne is truly defined by her social ranking: it is the wall between her and others in Carricklea and the superficial, magnetic force that surrounds her in Dublin.

The bond between Connell and Marianne is a unique, classist conundrum.

Despite their socio-economic differences, the two manage to find their way to each other over and over again. But their relationship is not without fault. At the start of the novel, when their partnership is based just on sexual interaction, Connell is compelled to keep what they are doing a secret; he attempts to justify this by way of not wanting to be associated with Marianne’s aforementioned oddity. In reality, however, it is the Marxist element of his character rearing its head in response to the wealth and extravagance represented by Marianne. As suggested earlier, Marianne’s perceived eccentricity stems not from herself, but from her class. Connell is a budding Marxist. His discomfort with Marianne’s upper-class status is clear to see. He goes so far as to pose the questions: “Do you think there’s any other person I would do this type of thing with? Seriously, do you think anyone else could make me sneak around after school and all this?”

(Rooney 37). On the surface, these inquiries appear almost romantic, as if he is singling Marianne out. But the fact remains that if Connell was involved with someone more similar to his own social class, the sneaking around would not seem necessary to him. There would be nothing to hide. Although Marianne appears to be unable to understand this, she allows the relationship to remain clandestine. The idea of class is not as consequential to her as it is to Connell.

Whereas Connell feels ashamed of his association with the upper-class, the shame felt by Marianne is more a result of Connell’s emotions toward her regarding her place on the socio-economic hierarchy than her own sense of class conflict or division.

Later on, the pair’s personal views of social status and classism divide them again. Both Marianne and Connell are exceptionally bright students, and their above-average intelligence puts them in the running for the Trinity College

scholarship, which would allow them to continue their education with every expense paid and handled. They are both recipients, but the award carries very different connotations for them. For Connell, it is akin to a windfall. He can carry on his degree with no concern for his accommodations, finances, tuition, or food. Money, therefore, is associated with opportunity, freedom, and fortune.

Without it, he would not be able to continue with his studies. For Marianne, on the other hand, the scholarship is a symbol of her excellence; she requires it to affirm her talent and skill in the academic field and to validate her as a person.

It is “just a matter of reputation” (Rooney 143). She associates accomplishment, more so than excess funds, with opportunity. While the scholarship “made everything possible” for Connell, it is merely a boost of self-esteem to Marianne, who has never had to consider the effect money has on her life or that of others (165). These differing outcomes and opinions negatively affect her and Connell’s relationship: both fail to understand the other’s point of view, and although they are aware of this, neither face nor attempt to solve the issue. Connell is unable to explain the impact of the scholarship on his life to Marianne, and she is unable to understand it. This is indicative of the characteristics of their relationship: misunderstandings rooted in the divide between their classes.

Normal People follows Marianne and Connell as they weather adolescence and early adulthood in the context of an Ireland healing from severe social, political, and economic wounds. As the country works to rebuild itself, the young on-and-off-again couple experience the pleasures and pitfalls of university life and deal with internal and external issues originating from their social class.

Connell struggles with identity, torn between his own class and Marianne’s; a Marxist trapped in a capitalist society. Marianne searches for belonging, having felt alienated in Carricklea and Dublin for equal and opposite reasons. In their unpredictable and oft-confusing lives, the two have only each other to guide them — and only each other to lose. Their connection goes beyond romance: it is deep, innate, and vastly complex. It brings them both great joy and great sadness.

Connell and Marianne are a paradoxical pair. Their relationship is less about glamour and affection and more about the secret, harboured shame stemming from the impact of social class that draws them together and drives them apart.

Works Cited Bellec, Laurent. “The Economy.” Ireland-European Commission, European

Union, 10 Oct. 2017, ec.europa.eu/ireland/news/key-eu-policy-areas/

economy_en.

Bergin, Adele, et al. “The Irish Fiscal Crisis.” National Institute Economic

Review, 2 Aug. 2011.

Gray, Jane, and Aileen O’Carroll. “Education and Class Formation in 20th

Century Ireland: a Retrospective Qualitative Longitudinal Analysis.”

SAGE Publications Ltd, 2012.

Haugh, Dominic, and Michael O’Flynn. Marxist Perspectives on Irish Society.

Cambridge Scholars, 2012.

Rooney, Sally. Normal People. Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2018.

Standing With Other Stars: Black and Indigenous Constellations in Wayde Compton’s “The Lost Island” and “The Boom” By: Chris Chang

Leanne Simpson of Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg descent writes of a conceptual framework for co-resistance organizing within grounded normativity in her work, “Constellations of Co-resistance.” In the text, Simpson says, “constellations are place-based relationships, and land-based relationships are the foundation of Indigenous thought” (203). This understanding can be seen within Wayde Compton’s “The Lost Island” and “The Boom.” Using Simpson’s piece as a lens, an analysis of Compton’s work shows how both of his texts revolve around people’s relations to Pauline Johnson Island, a fictional, newly-formed land mass off the coast of Vancouver. Analysis also reveals how the characters in “The Lost Island” represent proper mobilization and a constellation of Black and Indigenous solidarity.

It is important to have a clear understanding of Simpson’s theory to fully see how Compton’s work manifests this knowledge in speculative fiction.

Simpson grounds her conceptualization of constellations in Nishnaabeg thought by describing them as “opaque” and “unreadable” to those not positioned within grounded normativity, or not positioned within decolonial thought and practice (213). Simpson references and credits Jarret Martineau, who is Plains Cree and Dene Suline from Frog Lake First Nation in Alberta, for this application of opacity.

However, Simpson acknowledges that there are Black and brown communities and individuals in their own struggles against the forces of settler colonialism, such as “dispossession, capitalism, white supremacy, and heteropatriarchy” (228).

She identifies the potential strength in allyship and solidarity between Black and Indigenous communities by looking at the intersectionality found in Toronto as a Canadian city settled on Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg territory with “[t]he largest community of Black people in Canada” (229). Furthermore, she raises the question of how to ensure Indigenous peoples’ relation to the land does not “replicate systems that restrict Black spatialities or replicate geographies of

domination” (230). For Simpson, the way forward is influenced by her Nishnaabegcentered knowledges, which remind her how her people and the Wendat lived in peace and recognition of one another’s sovereignties and jurisdictions (230).

She identifies the problems which Black and Indigenous communities need to collectively tackle to live in solidarity:

I think then we would have to figure out political mechanisms to respect

each other’s governance, sovereignty, and jurisdiction while committing

to take care of our shared ecosystems. I think we would have to figure out

how we can support each other so both of our peoples could live free on

the north shore of Lake Ontario. To me that’s what solidarity could look

like under grounded normativity. (231) She calls for solidarity between Indigenous resurgence movements and the Black Radical Tradition because, under Nishnaabeg thought, these groups can together form land-based relationalities—constellations—that work collectively to bring about a decolonial future.

Both “The Lost Island” and “The Boom” revolve around Pauline Johnson Island. A closer look at the island is therefore warranted. “The Lost Island” reveals how, in the same sentence or breath, the Canadian settler government declares the emergent island “a restricted ecological reserve,” while acknowledging Indigenous peoples’ inherent claim to the land by naming the island “after the Mohawk poet” (Compton 36). It is telling that the settler government chooses to name the island “after the Mohawk poet” and yet uses the poet’s settler name instead of her adopted Mohawk name, Tekahionwake (Rose). The Canadian Parliament in “The Lost Island” represses any Indigenous claim to the island by demonstrating its power to designate any piece of land as accessible or not to the general populace. It is this blatant act of enforcing settler colonial structures that spurs Fletcher Sylvester in “The Lost Island” to perform a collective act of resistance with his friends. In other words, it is an issue of land that inspires radical resurgence in Fletcher and solidarity in Jean. After Fletcher’s murder by the police, “The Boom” shows how Pauline Johnson Island continues to be the filter through which the reader is confronted with the reality of the settler state.

This is seen in the first poster of “The Boom,” where Fletcher’s death is likened to the death of Dudley George, another Indigenous political activist silenced by the settler state because of land relations (Compton 103). Dudley George was murdered by the Ontario Provincial Police for peacefully refusing to cede his ancestral Stony Point territory in an act of reclamation (Dubinski). In response to these injustices, the first three posters of “The Boom” call for different kinds of mobilization—a rally, a commemoration, and a demonstration—as constellated acts of resistance. The posters accomplish this by having addresses on them to gather people in physical locations, generating place-based relationships (Compton 103-107).

“The Lost Island” depicts Jean finding her positionality as a Black Canadian woman in relation to her Indigenous friends as they resist settler colonialism. In the beginning of the narrative, “the island is nothing personal” to Jean until she is drawn into the constellation of co-resistance through her relational ties with Fletcher and the others (Compton 33). At the first meeting for the Liberation of the New Pan-Indigenous Territory, Jean addresses the supposed elephant in the room by saying to the group, “I’m not Native… should I be here?” (35). Fletcher responds with a roll of his eyes, and the group moves on without discussing her question further. This response is interpreted to mean that Jean’s question is considered inconsequential to the point of not even warranting an answer by the Indigenous members. Jean’s non-Native status does not mean she cannot stand in solidarity with others. After her time with the group, she even begins to dream about Pauline Johnson Island where “she transforms into some class of life in the island’s ecological succession,” and “[s]he’s a starfish rotating in the untouched shallows, near, but not of, the rippled land, circling around and around it (38).

Jean imagines herself a part of the island’s ecology because her relationship to the land has been fundamentally changed. She is a ‘starfish’ circulating near the land but not directly on it, a powerful image of how solidarity between Black and Indigenous communities is predicated on being in a shared system—an ecosystem—but with a respect for each other’s roles in that system. Furthermore, not only is Jean’s relationship to the land changed, but so is her relational ties with Fletcher. He is at first only her roommate, but as the story progresses, Jean becomes confused about her growing relationship with him: “She can’t tell whether or not they are together… she’s not sure what all it is, what more it might be” (40). There are no easy definitions for Jean and Fletcher’s relationship, which is a reaction against heteropatriarchal and heteronormative desires for concrete definitions of gender and race. Jean’s pregnancy with Fletcher’s child at the end of the story hints at a possible future where Black and Indigenous lives can intersect beyond solidarity when proper relationships are built around the land, as seen in the occupation of Pauline Johnson Island.

By centering Pauline Johnson Island at the heart of the events of “The Lost Island” and “The Boom,” Wayde Compton promotes relational ties between oppressed communities through the lens of land-based issues. Both “The Lost Island” and “The Boom” demonstrate Leanne Simpson’s theory of constellations of co-resistance because of the fiction stories’ focus on land, on ethical relationships built around and between land, and grounded normativity.

Works Cited Compton, Wayde. “The Boom”. The Outer Harbour, Arsenal Pulp Press, 2015, pp.

103-109.

---. “The Lost Island.” The Outer Harbour, Arsenal Pulp Press, 2015, pp. 33-48.

Dubinski, Kate. “25 Years after His Death, Dudley George’s Fight for the Land

Continues.” CBCnews, 6 Sept. 2020, www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/

dudley-george-kettle-stony-point-25-anniversary-1.5708055.

Rose, Marilyn J. “Johnson, Emily Pauline.” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol.

14, 2003, www.biographi.ca/en/bio/johnson_emily_pauline_14E.html.

Simpson, Leanne. “Constellations of Coresistance.” As We Have Always Done:

Indigenous Freedom Through Radical Resistance, University of Manitoba

Press, 2017, pp. 211-231.

“The Story of Changing Woman.” Changing Woman Initiative, www.changingwo maninitiative.com/the-story-of-changing-woman.html.

Perspective By: Cherin Chung

The Hardest Pill to Swallow: The Advocate and the Radical of Female Birth Control By: Nicole Paldino

In order to give the women of today choice, the women before us had to advocate for our rights and agency. Birth control is a contraceptive that gave women the right to choose if or when they wanted to have children after centuries of viewing women as reproductive functions who only bear and rear children.

While birth control has given women agency, the path to this privilege was not aligned with modern liberal feminist practices. Marie Carmichael Stopes was a birth control activist whose advocacy was problematic and Shulamith Firestone was a radical feminist whose views of reproduction far surpassed the limits of birth control. While I believe that feminism is all about choice and that women should get to decide what they want to do with their bodies, both Stopes and Firestone do not share the same sentiment. I will be analyzing the arguments of both Stopes and Firestone and critiquing them through a modern feminist lens that prioritizes choice and agency above all else. For the purpose of this essay, I will be referring to cisgender men and women as “men and women” and will differentiate between cisgender and transgender when referring to the latter.

Marie Carmichael Stopes was an unyielding advocate for birth control, but perhaps for all the wrong reasons. Stopes fought for birth control and birth control clinics, but she was also a eugenicist and member of the Eugenics Society.

In her book Marie Stopes’ Sexual Revolution and the Birth Control Movement, Clare Debenham describes Stopes as a scientist, “which later benefitted her sexually revolutionary and birth control campaigns” (3). It is also fair to say that because Stopes was the birth control pioneer, without her work, women’s agency when it comes to reproduction could look very different today. However, it is unfortunate that we cannot fully celebrate Stopes’ accomplishments for birth control, as her work also has a complex relationship with eugenics. It is clear in her book Radiant Motherhood: A Book for Those Who Are Creating the Future, that Stopes believes that birth control should be used to regulate the reproduction of the “unfit.”

In chapter 20, “A New and Irradiated Race,” one of Stopes most eugenicist writings, she argues that certain groups of people should not be allowed to procreate. She compares the parenthood of the upper and middle-class to ancient slaves. According to Stopes, ancient slaves were only allowed to raise about one or two children per union. Today, she argues, the most qualified people to parent are also the people who are having one or two children and raising them in a distinguished, loving household (235). Stopes views the healthy (physically and mentally sound) and the upper middle-class as superior and wants to prioritize their genetics. She states that “society allows the diseased, the racially negligent,

the thriftless, the careless, the feeble-minded, the very lowest and worst members of the community, to produce innumerable tens of thousands of warped, and inferior infants” (235). The word ‘allows’ here is significant. It makes it clear that not only is she entirely against these communities procreating, but she also believes that it is a pressing dilemma that needs to be resolved quickly. And the quickest way to preserve one community over the other is to control the reproduction of the latter.

Stopes is not advocating for a woman’s right to choose whether or not or when she decides to reproduce. Instead, she is advocating for birth control to regulate what she refers to as the inferior communities and to carry out her eugenicist agenda. Stopes insists that parenthood is a right that not everyone should be able to receive, and that it should only be encouraged if that union will produce a healthy child and therefore a healthy future citizen (236). In short, Stopes believes that the diseased or the lower class should not be allowed to reproduce in order to preserve the superior genes. If her arguments sound similar to that of Adolf Hitler’s, it may come as no surprise that she supported him and even sent him her poetry (Debenham 128). While Debenham’s book on Stopes is shockingly biased in that she defended Stopes’ involvement with eugenics, she does include facts about Stopes’ questionable engagements before justifying them. For example, Debenham encourages readers to view eugenics from a 1920s lens where anything radically scientific was seen as progress for society, instead of a New Socialism lens that highlights the brutality of eugenics (123). Despite birth control revolutionizing female reproductive choice, we must also acknowledge why it was advocated for in the first place, even if Debenham insists we forget. Debenham also discusses Stopes’ relationship with Francis Galton whose “work stressed the inequality of human beings which he explained was hereditary” (123). Referring to biological reproduction as if humans are born unequal because of nature and not because of society is dehumanizing. It is scary to think that my family and I would be considered ‘unfit’ to parent and that Stopes would be advising us to take birth control so that we would not pass on any defective genes. Stopes maintains that ignorance lives inside the “degenerate, feeble-minded, and unbalanced who are now in our midst and who devastated social customs” that will continue on if it is bred (243-244). The more the inferior groups reproduce, the more the superior structures will fall. In a private interview, the official highlighted Stopes’ point that the birth control she advocates for is not only controlling birth rates but is also contributing to producing healthy children (Debenham 126). It is evident that Stopes does not see birth control as a way to give women choice, but to control women’s bodies with select-breeding.

Stopes also adds emphasis to parenthood and motherhood. She believes

that pregnancies should be planned in order to continue the superior race of the future citizens she speaks of:

Also myriads of children are born of parents to whom they can feel that

they owe nothing, because they know or inwardly perceive that they

were not desired, that they were not profoundly and nobly loved throughout

their coming, that they were hurled into this existence through accident,

self-indulgence, or stupidity. (239) Whether it is her scientific background or her own values that lead her to this judgement, Stopes fails to recognize that it is natural to have an unplanned pregnancy. When asked if they were trying to have children, I have heard many couples respond with “sloppily.” Sex is pleasurable and a part of life and relationships. ‘Surprises’ or ‘accidents’ occur, and if the woman wants to keep it, she can. Her keeping the baby and raising it when she was not trying for it does not mean that she will love or treat that baby any less. But it also becomes increasingly more apparent that Stopes has extremely high standards for who can procreate. She outlines a list of ways in which the best possible race can be preserved: 1) a woman only bears children she and her partner want; 2) she takes time between births to recover; 3) she somehow uses her motherhood powers to rid any deadly diseases; and 4) remain racially pure (243). Not only is Stopes attempting to sterilize certain groups who she feels are unfit to reproduce, but she also wants to control the births of those who do not follow her recommendations to ensure a woman births a ‘perfect’ baby. Debenham states that the beliefs of eugenicists tied womanhood to racial health and purity and that the primary objective of a woman was to reproduce (125). Women were expected to bear and rear children, while also following Stopes’ guidelines. Stopes advocated for birth control in order to prevent certain groups (the unfit, diseased, feeble-minded) from procreating, but she also advocates for it to control upper and middle-class women’s fertility to ‘improve’ the human race (Debenham 129).

If Stopes was considered radical during the 20th century, then the 20th century was not prepared for Shulamith Firestone and her ideas about cybernetic communism. Even to this day, Firestone’s theories about reproduction are considered extreme. Firestone wrote and published The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution. While all of Firestone’s ideas are not accepted, they are, without a doubt, revolutionary. Unlike Stopes and Sanger, Firestone is not advocating for the use of birth control, but to completely transform the concept and act of birth as humans know it. Firestone believes that childbearing can and should be taken over by technology since a woman’s role to biologically reproduce inhibits her from gaining true equality. In fact, Firestone calls reproduction the “tyranny” that women need to be freed from (213). Firestone makes a valid point.

Society can treat men and women as equals, but it cannot account for the fact

that there are extreme biological differences between us. The best that women can fight for is equity, unless they implement Firestone’s revolutionary ideas.

Firestone is not against birth control because of religious or misogynistic values but recognizes that it would not play a role in her cybernetic communist utopia. Her aim is to eradicate pregnancy and childbirth entirely and therefore eliminate ‘sex class,’ which she argues is the type of class Marx and Engels left out. Firestone argues that before birth control, women “were at the continual mercy of their biology — menstruation, menopause, and ‘female ills,’ constant childbirth, wetnursing and care of infants” (8). This is less an argument and more a fact. In order to reproduce, women need to get pregnant. Some women may not be as fertile, and treatments can be expensive. At the end of the pregnancy, the woman will give birth. Again, both pregnancy and child labour can lead to health risks, pain, and cause both permanent physical and mental health conditions that men never have to experience (Pregnancy and Birth Sourcebook). After giving birth, women are then expected to care for the new baby. Sore nipples from breastfeeding, sleep deprivation, and postpartum depression are just some of things women should expect after bringing the baby home (Pregnancy and Birth Sourcebook). Firestone is right: “human infants take an even longer time to grow up than animals, and thus are helpless and, for some short period, at least, dependent on adults for physical survival” (Firestone 8). The baby is completely dependent on the mother for food, milk, and shelter. This dependency obviously leads to a bond that the mother and the child share. It is natural for the infant and the mother to feel this way and this will shape their relationship (Firestone 9). Because of this interdependence, it becomes natural for the mother to assume a certain role that differs from the father. Therefore, each parent’s responsibilities become gendered, which is why Firestone states that “the natural reproductive difference between sexes led directly to the first division of labor based on sex, which is at the origins of the all further division into economic and cultural classes and is possibly even at the root of all caste” (9). My partner’s sister is a lawyer whose income is higher than her husband’s. Before she gave birth in 2017, her and her husband divided the household labour equally when it came to cooking, cleaning, laundry, and grocery shopping. However, once she gave birth and was on maternity leave, she found herself alone with a baby in a house full of chores and with a husband who was at work. She told me that since she was at home, she thought she might as well do the laundry and cook dinner before her husband came home. Because of her role in her baby’s life, she stopped working to care for her daughter, thus commencing the cycle of a woman completing traditional gender roles. This example is just a modern-day anecdote illustrating the division of labour based on sex that stems from women reproducing. However, in Nina Power’s essay “Toward a Cybernetic Communism:

The Technology of the Anti-Family,” she argues that the “atomization of the female worker and her inclusion into the workforce is predicated on the idea that her reproductive life is her concern . . . until such time as it impacts upon her job, of course” (158). Powers calls into question whether the radical act of eliminating sex would result in equality without looking at other alternatives first. She states that the capitalist society in which we live has not dealt with reproduction. Capitalism needs women to reproduce so that there will always be more workers, yet it simultaneously does not tolerate systems, such as maternity leave, to help these women. Indeed, Firestone’s hope for cybernetic communism would fail as capitalism would exploit the manufacturing of babies, who would be allowed economic freedoms and all the rights of an adult, including joining the workforce at a very young age (Power 158). Firestone’s idea of communism seems to benefit the capitalist system she is fighting against.

In order to release women from the mental and physical torture that is pregnancy and child labour, Firestone suggests we use technology to procreate; for example, bottled babies. She argues that if women do not bear children, then human nature can transform, and sex class can be eradicated. Firestone believes that the reproduction of babies and then the production (the raising of the children) would no longer be repressive (216). Even if that child were to be born from a woman instead of a machine, the mother and father would disband when the child became independent. However, even if this were the case, there would still be the early years of a child’s life wherein someone would have to raise and care for them. This task would still most likely fall on the mother.

But Firestone continues to argue that if the unit that begins to raise that child suddenly lets them have their own agency, then “the blood tie to the mother would be severed” and “[f]amily chauvinism, class privilege based on birth, would wither away” (216). Firestone predicts that if we are able to reproduce without sex (this was before in-vitro fertilization), then pregnancy would become as archaic as women wearing “virginal white to their weddings” (216). Moreover, if children become independent from their parents and create their own agency, then they will have the same rights as adults do now which include political, economic, and sexual freedoms (214). The children may even develop ties to adults other than their parents or other children since all connections to their mother would be severed. Firestone also argues that this will lead to sexual liberation. No one would have to fight for sexual freedom because women, men, and children alike would be able to do what they wanted sexually. Even the children would be having genital sex (Firestone 215). Power’s essay describes how Firestone’s implication of equal sharing of childrearing would radically threaten the family dynamic (Power 143). Power finds it problematic that Firestone is convinced that the “technological emancipation from childbirth” would completely ‘free’ and

reorganize the family structure as it stands now (Power 143). It is also problematic that Firestone attributes changing human nature to removing biological female reproduction. She does not take into account people who are proud of their gender or sexual identity. Firestone disregards the lives and identities of trans folx who actively feel and want to perform their sex/gender. Power makes a wellgrounded point that invalidates Firestone’s transformation of nature idea: “it is not clear that Firestone is justified in imagining that the death of one nature will lead to the emergence of a second nature—why would technology destroy one and unleash another?” (144). There is much more to sex and gender than men and women having different reproductive organs. Reducing people to their reproductive functions dehumanizes us and contradicts what Firestone argues against.

Firestone also does not take into account that bottled babies are moving towards Stopes’ territory of eugenics. If babies are reproduced like products are manufactured, then there is nothing to stop scientists from categorizing certain traits and genes as superior or inferior and cutting out certain characteristics entirely. This is partly why Firestone’s ideas for a revolutionary utopia remind me of Aldous Huxley’s utopian novel Brave New World. Huxley’s novel also depicts a society where there is no more live birth; humans are created in test tubes in a method called ‘Bokanovsky’s process’ where the eggs are split in vitro into identical copies, a process that sounds very similar to what Firestone imagines.

All of the women and children in the novel are sexually liberated, having frequent, shameless sex. No one gets pregnant since pregnancy is “acknowledged as clumsy, inefficient, and painful” (Firestone 216). However, the women wear Malthusian belts which hold their contraceptives. Brave New World portrays the world Firestone imagines, and yet it proves that there is still the need for birth control.

Firestone makes a convincing argument about the advancement and transformation of female reproduction. It is not fair that women are the ones who have to sacrifice their bodies and go through pain in order to support the human race. However, it is part of the human experience to suffer. And just because there has to be sacrifices or pain, does not mean that something should not be done. For example, Firestone does not take into account that there are women who want to get pregnant, give birth, and raise that child. Some women want to be mothers, and that is their prerogative. If the fight is for women to be free, then women should have the freedom to choose if they want to have children or not. Power reinforces this idea of choice, stating that “the privatized understanding of contraception (whether you are on the pill, use condoms, do not have sex, are trying for a child) is precisely that — a matter for the individual.

Pregnant female workers are pitted against childless women who are asked to

resent those who ‘choose’ to have children” (158). Instead of eradicating female biological reproduction, society should invent systems that protect women. If women had more aid while pregnant or raising the children, especially by their male counterparts, then maybe female reproduction would be less of a burden.

Choice is why birth control should still be produced and accessible. It allows women to choose if they want to engage in sexual activities without the outcome of procreation. And if they feel ready to have a baby, then there is that option too.

For example, IVF has become a reproductive technology, and one that Firestone theorized about. IVF has been used to help women conceive who have delayed getting pregnant to focus on their careers (Power 159). While Firestone might not agree with this, I believe that she would agree with male birth control becoming as popular and frequently used as female birth control. She is, after all, for equality, and male birth control would take some of the onus of reproduction from women and unto men. Firestone’s cybernetic communism would take away the choice of a woman, which is not feminist or radically feminist at all.

In fact, the “idea of regarding one woman’s reproductive choice as any business of anyone other than her and her family is unthinkable as part of a progressive project” (Power 159).

It is undeniable that birth control has allowed women access to their own autonomy in regard to reproduction. Birth control stands for choice, which is why I heavily critique both Stopes and Firestone in their works. Birth control should not be used to stop certain groups from procreating and passing on their genes, nor should it be used to carefully ween out any ‘bad’ traits in ‘superior’ groups. Taking away birth control while also removing full biological reproductive functions is also problematic as that takes away women’s choice as well. Birth control gives women the opportunity to decide if or when she wants to have children. And that is a choice that each individual woman has to make for herself, without anyone else’s influence. There is still inequality when it comes to policing bodies and reproduction. But instead of forcing or removing birth control, we need to create systems that value women’s agency. To answer Firestone’s question, “[w]hy should a woman give up her precious seat in the cattle car for a bloody struggle she could not hope to win?” (224), she should not.

We still need to continue the revolution until our bodies are ours and ours alone.

Works Cited Debenham, Clare. Marie Stopes’ Sexual Revolution and the Birth Control Movement.

Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

Firestone, Shulamith. The Dialectic of Sex: the Case for Feminist Revolution.

Bantam Books, 1973.

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. Vintage Canada, 2007.

Power, Nina. “Toward a Cybernetic Communism: The Technology of the

Anti-Family” Further Adventures of the Dialectic of Sex: Critical Essays on

Shulamith Firestone, edited by Sandford Merck, 2010, pp. 143-162.

Pregnancy and Birth Sourcebook: Basic Consumer Health Information About

Pregnancy and Fetal Development…. Fourth edition, Omnigraphics, 2019.

Stopes, Marie Carmichael. Radiant Motherhood: A Book for Those Who Are

Creating the Future. 1921, pp. 234-251.

Language, Art and the Nihilistic Pursuit of Truth By: Rabbit

What language truly is and how the economy of language influences human cognition is one of the major themes in Nietzsche’s philosophy. In the essay “On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense,” Nietzsche investigates what language is, how it functions with truth, and why we create it. For Nietzsche, language is a metaphor that fails to correspond to truth; it invents an illusional reality that is detached from the truth, a fact which human cognitions forget after the invention. Language reflects our instinct for the invention and creation of reality — it is our epistemological desire that leads us to learn, survive, and protect ourselves from the uncanny world. Art, as another form of creation, offers an alternative view of real invention. Oscar Wilde argues, in his essay “The Decay of Lying – An Observation,” that “life imitates art far more than art imitates life” (65).

This provides a similar view to Nietzsche’s in that the human mind is considered prone to create a reality through its cognition. Since what we know about reality is merely our invention, there is no approach to understand the truth; or, as Nietzsche states, language pushes us in the pursuit of truth “towards nothing at all” (Strong 249). Truth is not a concept. Language’s conceptualization cannot provide access to the truth because it is a realm beyond human understanding.

Truth is dynamic. There is no absolute, certainty, or regulation of truth; it is human minds that invent this sense of “truth” which produces “some degree of peace, security, and consistency” (Nietzsche 758). Since the nature of truth is inconceivable, impenetrable, and incognizable, the invention of language or regularity is nihilistic. Through exploring Nietzsche’s argument that language constructs reality rather than representing the truth, I argue that Nietzsche rejects the existence of a single truth. It is the language, as a thinking form, which creates the reality that is considered to be the truth. Through examining Nietzsche’s linguistic view, I argue that what Nietzsche implies about the world is the “nothingness” of our cognition, and how we might interact with the world is through this “nothingness.”

What is language? Nietzsche first separates language from the truth, defining all language we use as a metaphor. Metaphor, from Greek metaphora, etymologically refers to “a transfer, carry over, change, alter, to use a world in a strange sense” (OED). Metaphor functions as a transformation of the “thingin-itself” rather than the real thing. Nietzsche asserts that we can merely appreciate the representation of the world because the “thing-in-itself” (which would be, precisely, pure truth, truth without consequences) is impossible for even the creator of language to grasp, and indeed this is not at all desirable (754). What the inventor of language does is “[designate] only the relations of things to human being, and in order to express them he avails himself of the boldest metaphors” (Nietzsche 755). Metaphor here is not only a semantical but also an epistemological meaning — it refers to human cognition of the world and the human-nature relation. It is the transformation from the “thing-in-itself” to the “thing to the human being.” For Nietzsche, language does not conceptualize the thing itself, but conceptualizes the human relationship with the thing. It is the symbolization of experiences and the abbreviation of the “thing-in-itself.”

To depict how metaphor transfers the real thing to human cognition, Nietzsche identifies a three-stage metaphorical translation from the empirical experience to logical conception: we first transfer the “thing-in-itself” into an image through the stimulation of a nerve, then translate this image into sound. The third stage, although Nietzsche does not mention it explicitly, is from sound to concept.

A few years after Nietzsche’s linguistic view was published, Ferdinand de Saussure made a similar argument about semiology. In Course in General Linguistics, Saussure divides the sign into two components: the signifier (‘sound-image’) and the signified (‘concept’). For Saussure, the combination of signified and signifier creates a sign, and “their combination produces a form, not a substance” (113). Like Nietzsche’s metaphor, Saussure’s sign also contains the process from image and sound to a concept that comes from our nerves’ reaction; the concept is merely a “form” rather than the “substance.” In Rhetoric and Language, Nietzsche describes metaphor that “does not produce new words, but gives a new meaning to them” (23). What we gain, through this process of transformation, is a “new sphere” and “metaphors of things which in no way correspond to the original entities” (Nietzsche 755). Nietzsche defines language as a metaphor, a translation, or even an aberrance of truth, stating that through language we create concepts — the conceptualization that necessarily falsifies the reality. In this discovery, Nietzsche splits the connection between language and the world we live in because language is a human cognization product; the source of language is our experience and cognition.

Knowing that language is a metaphor or translation that falsifies the truth, Nietzsche argues that our language creates reality, which we use to achieve

knowledge, epistemology, and existence. Nietzsche explains that when we use language to talk about reality, we have already presupposed reality because we are a species of “clever animals [which] invent cognition” (752). Language, for Nietzsche, refers to something beyond the linguistic meaning — language is the structure of human cognition, it reveals our epistemological approach towards the truth. Language shapes the thought, a thought that creates a reality that we think is the truth. It reveals human nature — that our existence requires a certain degree of creation, invention, and lying (either to others or lying to ourselves). Nietzsche exposes this human nature:

This art of dissimulation reaches its peak in humankind, where deception,

flattery, lying and cheating, speaking behind the backs of others, keeping

up appearances, living in borrowed finery, wearing masks, the drapery of

convention, play-acting for the benefit of others and oneself — in short,

the constant fluttering of human beings around the one flame of vanity

is so much the rule and the law that there is virtually nothing which defies

understanding so much as the fact that an honest and pure drive towards

truth should ever have emerged in them. (753) Nietzsche believes that the nature of humanity is full of “art of dissimulation,” and there is no “honest and pure drive towards truth.” Our mind innately functions as a filter that distills things that have been perceived, while the unperceived part is automatically ignored. Language acts as this filter. Human minds can only perceive the relativized reality, which contains only relativized truth. As Tracy B. Strong argues, there is no absolute truth because “the mind is only seeking to persuade itself that the world it knows is the one true world”; our language projects the “world with a distorted lens, yet the vision is taken as real” (246).

Language reveals the limitation of human understanding and our epistemological prejudice: we are apt to believe what we have recognized and conceived is the reality and invent this “reality,” designating it as the truth. Truth, therefore, is inscrutable, incomprehensible, and dynamic for human understanding; it is never an absolute or static concept like what we create. The evidence lies in the fact that there are many languages paralleled to many worldviews: “Where words are concerned, what matters is never truth, never the full and adequate expression; otherwise, there would not be so many languages” (Nietzsche 754).

Since there are many languages, the perceived truth looks different in different languages. If each language represents reality, none represents the single truth.

There is no single truth, but merely an illusion and the multiplicity of truths.

What is the truth? Nietzsche seems to reject the existence of a “true world.”

Languages do not only represent different views of the world but create their world. If our languages are multiplied, then the reality is multiplied, which means there is no absolute truth in the universe we live in:

What, then, is truth? A mobile army of metaphors, metonyms, and

anthropomorphisms — in short, a sum of human relations, which have

been enhanced, transposed, and embellished poetically and rhetorically,

and which after long use seem firm, canonical, and obligatory to a people:

truths are illusions about which one has forgotten that this is what they are;

metaphors which are worn out and without sensuous power; coins which

have lost their pictures and now matter only as metal, no longer as coins.

(Nietzsche 756) We have unconsciously “forgotten” that language is indeed metaphorical; instead, we take these metaphors to be true. Truth, for Nietzsche, is an “illusion” that is created by congealed metaphors. Similarly, in his book, Human, All Too Human: A Book of Free Spirits, Nietzsche suggests that “Mankind set up in language a separate world beside the other world, a place it took to be so firmly set that, standing upon it” (I:11). Human beings construct an epistemological prejudice through languages and through this “forgotten” fact that we create the conscious reality and situate it as the truth. The creation of reality shows the instinctive pursuit of human nature for order, regularity, and direction of life.

Not only language but also art creates an illusion of truth. Language is a product of the human mind, while art also reflects the state of human understanding. John Dewey argues that “thinking is preeminently an art; knowledge and propositions which are the products of thinking are works of art, as much so as statuary and symphonies” (1: 283). As the reason for creating languages is to recognize the world, creating art is also a way to find some degree of direction. Oscar Wilde, in “The Decay of Lying: An Observation,” provides his understanding of new aesthetics. As Nietzsche does, Wilde first separates the roles of art and the world, stating that “art never expresses anything but itself,” and asserting that “all bad art comes from returning to Life and Nature” (64). As a form of human cognition, art is detached from nature and represents its own world; it is an artistic world of human aesthetic, doing nothing with the truth of nature. Wilde famously declares: “Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life” (65). If there is a relation between the human mind and reality, it must be the reality that imitates the human mind; that is, we create art, and art provides the notion of truth. Therefore, art, as a revelation of human minds, pictures a sense of direction for life.

Both language and art are forms of human creation that mirror our epistemological purpose.

We create language and art to achieve some degree of security and regulation:

Only by forgetting this primitive world of metaphor, only by virtue of the

fact that a mass of images, which originally flowed in a hot, liquid stream

from the primal power of the human imagination, has become hard and

rigid, only because of the invincible faith that this sun, this window, this

table is a truth in itself — in short only because man forgets himself as

a subject, and indeed as an artistically creative subject, does he live with

some degree of peace, security, and consistency. (Nietzsche 758) It is our instinct to pursue this constancy, necessity, and logic to predict the unknown and exist in the world with recognition. Human beings cannot act or live without thinking, and the creation of regularity enables them to think, act, and live. For Nietzsche, language provides this order and protects human beings from the uncertainty of the world. In Strong’s words, “The regularities which are our life are engendered and supported in language” (242). Language is the apparatus of regularity, a law, a rule that human minds create — it is the certainty that provides a sense of security in our epistemology and self-consciousness.

Strong states that, “for Nietzsche, then, language serves a double function:” it is both the “means by which we construct the world” and the “tool by which [we] must deal with the world” (242). The two functions are intersectional and complementary: we use linguistic structures to frame the world and understand the world through this framework. However, the framework that we use to understand the world is, as Nietzsche defines, an “illusion.” A language is a tool, but a deceitful one. Language is both the problem and the solution.

Through an exploration of language’s economy, Nietzsche develops an existential phenomenology that privileges intuition over conceptualization. What Nietzsche suggests is intuition — an uncertain way of understanding the world. Nietzsche laments the person who “seeks only honesty, truth, freedom from illusions and protection from the onslaughts of things which might distract” them because they perform “a masterpiece of pretence” (762). Since language fails to represent the truth, what they do with the creation of language is lying. Therefore, the true world, the “realm which could not be shaped by language and which would not be coterminous with language” (Strong 242), would be unspeakable and unknowable. Moreover, as Strong concludes, there might not be such a world. If the truth is beyond the possibility of regulation, then our language, reason, and will to pursue the truth might be ultimately nihilistic. Nietzsche’s examination of language, epistemology, and the nothingness of truth provides us with both the idea that there is no truth and that we should continue seeking it. We still need this regulation of language to survive. Yet Nietzsche’s philosophy indicates that the “nothingness” is how we can interact with the world.

Work Cited Dewey, John, and Jo Ann Boydston. “The Later Works, 1925-1953.” Amazon,

Southern Illinois University Press, 2008.

Nietzsche, Friedrich. Friedrich Nietzsche on Rhetoric and Language, edited by

Sander L. Gilman, Carole Blair, and David J. Parent, Oxford University Press,

1989.

---. Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits, translated by R. J. Hollingdale,

Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Nietzsche, Friedrich. “On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense.” Norton

Anthology of Theory and Criticism, edited by Vincent B. Leitch, et al., W.W.

Norton & Company Limited, 2018, pp. 752–762.

Onions, Charles T. The Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. Clarendon Press,

2006.

Saussure, Ferdinand de. Course in General Linguistics. McGraw-Hill, 1959.

Strong, Tracy B. “Language and Nihilism: Nietzsche’s Critique of Epistemology.” Theory and Society, vol. 3, no. 2, 1976, pp. 239–263. JSTOR, www.

jstor.org/stable/656848. Accessed 30 Nov. 2020.

Wilde, Oscar. Decay of Lying: and Other Essays. Penguin Books Ltd, 2010.

#IgnoranceIsBliss By: Aranyah Shanker

“Goodbye to Sandra Dee”: How Grease Changed from A Subversive, Postmodern Play to a Metamodern Movie Musical Romp By: Holly Calnan

Grease (1978), directed by Randal Kleiser, is a movie musical that is a popculture icon. The original Broadway musical is also influential because of its part in a wave of musical theatre excellence during the 1970s; other musicals that represent this period include A Chorus Line and The Rocky Horror Show. However, the original theatre production of Grease and the movie adaptation differ in terms of tone and artistic style. This difference can be seen when evaluating how the original play and Broadway musical constructs the sexual revolution and how it relates to ‘postmodernism,’ in contrast to how Grease the movie changes the tone of the play and relates to ‘metamodernism.’ This contrast is connected to how Grease represents pastiche and its reaction to nostalgia. While the original play of Grease presents a postmodern pastiche of the 50’s, Grease the movie turns the original postmodern piece into a metamodern representation.

Grease the Play Constructs the 50’s Through a 70’s Perspective

Grease, the original play, was written by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey and debuted at the Kingstone Mines nightclub in Chicago, Illinois in 1971. The play was based on Jacobs’ high school experiences in the 1950s and was described as aggressive and profane. Unlike the movie, the original play was focused on cutting through the aura of the Golden Age of America and accurately portraying what teenage life was like at the beginning of the Sexual Revolution. At this stage, the play included plot lines involving teenage pregnancy and abortion. The play also had more cursing and allusions to the hypocrisy of the glossy image of the 50’s constructed by the advertising firms and popular television of the time. A major metaphor for the Golden Age is the play’s reference to Sandra Dee: a huge teen idol who was a role model for many young girls, but also suffered from depression, alcoholism, and anorexia (Miller). While the metaphor of Sandra Dee remains in later reproductions of the musical, the play also had more sexually explicit references that later productions omitted for a larger audience. Sandra Dee also functions as a metaphor for Sandy’s character arc; once a sexually repressed young girl, Sandy blossoms into a mature woman who feels free to express herself as she would like, not according to what society imposes on her as being proper.

While Sandra Dee was, for many girls, a role model, Sandy is offended when Rizzo calls her that name. This is because Sandy either understands that image is a construction or knows that her individuality does not authentically come

from that image. The original play made great efforts to depict teenage life in the 50’s accurately not only by including large amounts of swearing and sexually explicate references, but also by alluding to the revolt against sex norms at the time. This was achieved through the metaphors of hypocritical and cultivated images of the 50’s that were once believed to be symbols of ideal behaviour.

Grease the Play as a Postmodern Piece

As alluded to in the previous paragraph, Grease is a postmodern piece because of its critical dissection of teenage life in the 50’s. Grease was one of the first pieces of art that looked past the nostalgia and propaganda of the 50’s, a fantasy perpetuated by television shows and movies like Leave it to Beaver and Gidget. Including a plot line about teenage pregnancy and specifically dedicating a song and scenes to talk about Rizzo’s pregnancy from her own perspective were integral to making this point. As Scott Miller puts it in his article, Inside GREASE, “Grease’s subplot with Rizzo and her fear of pregnancy was a real part of life in the 50’s for many unmarried, sexually active women.” Birth control was not a widely embraced idea yet, and the contraceptive pill, the catalyst for the sexual revolution, was yet to be invented during the events of Grease. Bringing a taboo issue to the forefront is a direct infringement on the image of the 50’s, removing the romanticism of that period. Not only is the romanticism removed, but simply looking to the past through a critical lens is postmodern as well. Linda Hutcheon writes about postmodern parody — parody referring to a satirical recall of past art or pastiche — saying, “Postmodernist parody, be it in architecture, literature, painting, film, or music, uses its historical memory, its aesthetic introversion, to signal… this kind of self-reflexive discourse” (204). Modernism refuses to look to the past and has an idealistic attitude towards art, leaving no room for reflexive discourse about the past. Because Grease directly contradicts modernism literally and in spirit, it can be viewed as a postmodern piece.

Grease the Movie and the Change

Grease was moved to Broadway in 1972 and was rewritten as a musical.

However, its message stayed close to the original play for the most part. The original musical still contained a lot of swearing and sexual innuendos, but as Jim Jacobs says, “we were told it was necessary to make the characters lovable, instead of scaring everybody. The show went from about three-quarters book and one-quarter music to one-quarter book and three-quarters music” (quoted in Jones). In 1978, a film adaptation of Grease was released to critical acclaim, and it receives a lasting reverence from each new generation that watches it.

However, Grease the movie and Grease the musical are very different. Where the original musical was still very critical of the 50’s, Grease the movie relies largely on nostalgia for the 50’s. The film had locations, costumes, and characters that were lively and colourful. Moreover, there is an added car race and new dynamics

like rival gangs that were only previously mentioned in the musical. Characters have stronger bonds, and new musical numbers like “Hopelessly Devoted” and “You’re the One That I Want” were added specifically to enhance Olivia NewtonJohn’s performance as Sandy Olssen, a sweet Australian immigrant. The name and character changed from Sandy Dombrowski, the new girl who was rejected from attending a private, catholic school. The tone of Grease is softened; while Rizzo’s pregnancy is still a plotline, the movie is more focused on the 50’s aesthetic, whereas the musical and play were quick to dismiss this as pastiche. Grease was turned into a happy summer flick instead of showcasing the raw points of the original piece. This was unfortunately to the detriment of the legacy of Grease.

Because of the success of the movie, all subsequent theatrical productions have become adaptations of the film instead of the original musical. The “Burger Palace Boys” are now the “T-Birds,” the new songs for the movie are now a part of the theatrical shows, and the musical has been significantly edited down to make it more family-friendly. On the New Line Theatre website, you can find a comparison of all the lines changed according to the most current published script; these include lines changed to “you’re gonna get a knuckle sandwich,” from, “it’s gonna be your ass,” and to “son of a ‘bee,’” from “son of a bitch.” Grease has changed meaning entirely. However, the remnants of the realistic look at teenage life in the 50’s are still slightly present with Rizzo’s pregnancy and other characters’ sexualities still being openly displayed. Is Grease still a postmodern work?

Grease the Movie as Metamodern

Grease the movie takes on both characteristics of postmodernism and modernism. Grease still has the backbone of what the original play was — a somewhat realistic glimpse into the 50’s with some criticism of the constructed 50’s image. The metaphor of Sandra Dee and the Rydell High students’ sexuality, including Rizzo’s pregnancy, is still present and the movie still ends with Sandy becoming sexually liberated and free to be herself. The postmodern attitude of the play is built into the story and cannot be completely shed unless the entire script is rewritten to change major plot elements. However, the film, as stated before, clearly does not have the same attitude about the 50’s as the original play. Because of the focus on romantic features of the 50’s aesthetic, the film comes off as idealistic. Timotheus Velmeulen and Robin van den Akker created the concept of ‘metamodernity,’ and write in the article Notes on Metamodernism, that “metamodernism practices set out to fulfill a mission or task they know they will not, can never, and should never accomplish: the unification of two opposed poles” (7). The two poles refer to modernism and postmodernism, two concepts that were thought to be contradictory, but that can somehow come

together to create a new artistic style. Grease the movie tries to appease the audience’s response and love for nostalgia while being forced to keep to the original critique that Grease the play was trying to make about nostalgia. Because of its modern influences, Warren Casey has stated that with the creation of the movie, they “created a new Jazz Age. It’s just like the ‘20s; the ‘50s have been romanticized beyond recognition” (quoted in Kogan). Grease’s depiction of the sexual revolution, once made realistic by the use of vulgar and shocking humour, is now watered down to incorporate the 50’s that audiences know: a time of greasers, drive-ins, and wholesome family values before America was informed on what was happening in the Vietnam War. Conclusion

Grease the original theatre production and the movie differ in terms of tone and artistic style, changing the meaning and intent of the original play to incorporate a larger audience through nostalgia.This can be seen when evaluating how Grease the original play constructs the sexual revolution and how it relates to postmodernism, as well as how Grease the movie changes the tone of the play and how the movie relates to metamodernism. This is connected to how Grease represents the pastiche of the 50’s and its reaction to nostalgia. While this essay acknowledges its own limitations, perhaps it can inspire a new way to analyze Broadway musicals and their film adaptations.

Works Cited “Grease the Original Dialogue.” New Line Theatre, www.newlinetheatre.com/ grease-dialogue.html.

Hutcheon, Linda. “The Politics of Postmodernism: Parody and History.” Cultural Critique, no. 5, 1986, pp. 179-207, doi:10.2307/1354361.

Jones, Chris. “Bring Back Our Own, Original R-Rated ‘Grease.’” Chicago Tribune, 9 Jan. 2009, https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2009-

01-09-0901070168-story.html.

Kogan, Rick. “The Original ‘Grease’ Was Born in Chicago, Wild, Funny and

New in 1971.” Chicago Tribune, 29 Jan. 2016, https://www.chicagotribune.

com/entertainment/theater/ct-grease-live-original-stage-play- fox-ae-0131-

20160128-column.html.

Miller, Scott. “Inside GREASE.” New Line Theatre, 2006, www.newlinetheatre. com/greasechapter.html.

Vermeulen, Timotheus, and Robin Van Den Akker. “Notes on Metamodernism.”

Journal of Aesthetics & Culture, vol. 2, no. 1, 2010, doi:10.3402/jac.v1i0.5677.

V O LU M E 8

ISSUE 2

Spring 2021

Copyrights remain with the artists and authors. The responsibility for the content in this publication remains with the artists and authors. The content does not reflect the opinions of the Arts and Humanities Students’ Council (AHSC) or the University Students’ Council (USC).