*** Intersections (Vol. 6 Spring 2014) by Intersections McGill

Intersections The McGill Undergraduate Gender & Diversity Studies Journal Volume 6 Spring 2014

McGill University Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Cover Image “Vulnerable” by Vivian Gu

Letters from the Editors Dear readers, This is my third and final year as an editor for Intersections and it’s amazing what this journal has come to mean for me. I first joined Intersections because I had a skewed conception of feminism. As I engaged with all of the submissions these last three years, I’ve developed (and keep developing) a greater consciousness about issues of diversity and have come to proudly call myself a feminist. I would like to dedicate this issue, in part, to the first editorial team I worked with: Niki, Nicole, Priti, Johanne, and Madison. Thank you for the debates and your friendship. You’re the biggest reason I’m indebted to this journal. I would also like to dedicate the journal to the future editors and contributers who will ensure that the publication continues to encourage debate and discucssion for the community and the editors! Jelena Dear readers, Our continued goal as an editorial board is to produce a publication that features creative and academic undergraduate work that highlights and contributes insightfully to ongoing discussions of forms of difference, oppression, and identity. This year, we have changed the name of the journal from the “Women’s Studies Interdisciplanary Journal” to the “Gender & Diversity Studies Journal” in order to reflect the changes in this academic field and to encompass the topics discussed in the publication. We would like to thank all of our contributors, published and unpublished, for supplying a diverse body of content and ensuring that Intersections contains poignant and provocative material relevant to current students at McGill. We hope you enjoy Volume 6 of Intersections! Sincerely, the Intersections Editors Shaina Agbayani, Emily Brown, Krystin Chung, Elizabeth DeBlock, Valerie Gauthier, Nina Nintai, Jelena Stankovic, & Deena Tamaroff

Table of Contents 5

“When the World is Not Our Home: The Role of Race, Class, and Gender in the Transational Experiences of the Diaspora ” Camila Rivas-Garrido

“‘Goodbye Innocence,’ Goodbye Critical Reception” Kathryn Yuen

“Mohawk/Princess: Pauline Johnson, Performance Art, and the Perpetuation of Colonial Discourse” Marie-Claude Gill-Lacroix

“Two Faces of Eve” Alexandra Kanters

“Their Natural Element: Institutional Power and Gender Construction in P.K. Page’s ‘Young Girls’” Christy Frost

“Sitter Berthe Morisot and Painter Eduard Manet: Gender Inequalities in 19th Century Impressionism” Jewel Seo

“Finding Women’s Agency: Beauty Pageants, the ‘Indian Taliban,’ and Why Women Participate” Geneviève Boulay

“Doors of Equality” Suvij Sudershan

“Kumari Worship: Liberation or Oppression?” Kiray Jones- Mollerup

“A Real Man’s World: Why Men Need Feminism to Succeed” Jeremy Laporte

59 Our Contributers 61 The Editors

When the World is Not Our Home: The Role of Race, Class, and Gender in the Transnational Experiences of the Diaspora

Camila Rivas-Garrido

Driving to the airport on a major highway in the city of Bogota, Colombia after a family visit, I see a massive graffiti wall beautifully coloured with a man’s face drawn intricately in the middle. Considering our speed on the highway, I could only make out some of the text: “’Pais de Mierda’ Jaime Garzon.” My aunt informs me he was a beloved political/ social commentator and satirist. I was on my way back to Canada, a place I only refer to as home because it is where my mother resides (for now). Despite living there for over ten years now, I have increasingly with the years come to see Canada as an empty, lonely refuge full of false promises

and unattainable dreams for those of us seeking a (clichéd) ‘better life’ than what we got elsewhere. Despite its international reputation as an inclusive multicultural haven for people of all backgrounds, as migrants, we are treated as a threat to Quebec’s ‘distinct’ culture and who must be quickly assimilated into Quebecois society to become ‘acceptable’ and ‘competent’ members of this society. Our assimilation manifests itself in various forms of marginalization, disenfranchisement and denigration. In the words of a friend of mine from St. Vincent, Canada is my own, private Babylon. Upon my arrival to Babylon,

I become obsessed with Jaime Garzon and his brilliant work ridiculing and questioning the hegemonic social order and bourgeois norms of the ruling class of elites in Colombian (and all of Latin American) society. Even though I understood only half of his jokes and humour, I felt a deep admiration and connection with what Garzon was trying to say to Colombians in exposing the hegemony of the ruling class and their continuing oppression over the subaltern. And yet, I was in North America, a place I lived since I was two, where I learned to read, write, form opinions and argue them. What did I know about Colombia, its nation, people and culture? What right did I have to claim Jaime Garzon as a part of my nation and culture, a part of me? These are the same questions Salman Rushdie asks and, for the most part, answers in his piece “Imaginary Homelands.” In his writings, Rushdie explores the standpoint of the Indian writer writing in England on India and their rights and responsibilities in writing about their “imaginary homelands” of India.1 Rushdie explores particular themes associated with the standpoint of the diaspora such as cosmopolitan consciousness and the transnational experience and citizenship.2 However, as a member of a diaspora myself and upon reading the writings of Chandra Mohanty and Himani Bannerji, race, class and gender play a strong role in defining the transnational experience and citizenship of the diaspora and are key factors that Rushdie is missing as a male member of the

world’s intellectual elite writing about cosmopolitanism and the transnational experience. Using Prina Werbner’s framework on the “chaorder” of the diaspora as a “typical transnational formation,” this paper will analyze Rushdie’s “Imaginary Homelands” and his formulation of a cosmopolitan consciousness and the transnational citizenship/ experience of the diaspora.3 I will then critique these notions using insights from Bannerji’s writings on diaspora issues in Canada as well as Mohanty’s personal anecdotes on the role race and gender play in the transnational experiences of the Indian diaspora.4 I will also draw on my own personal experiences as a member of the Latino diaspora living in North America to ultimately problematize Rushdie’s writings on cosmopolitanism and transnational citizenship given the crucial roles race, gender, class and also, country of origin (i.e. geographical context) play in the experiences of the diaspora. In her article “The Place which is Diaspora: Citizenship, Religion and Gender in the Making of Chaordic Transnationalism,” Werbner describes diasporas as chaorders, as in “chaotic orders” that are inscribed in “space, time and objectifying practices.”5 Diasporas are “imagined communities” who are autonomous and free of any guide or command structure.6 Despite their sense of loyalty and coresponsibility to their co-diaspora of the transnational sphere as well as to their homelands, diasporas are “scattered, uncontained and uncontainable,” thereby allowing them to freely choose which political cause or ideology they

wish to participate in or ascribe to, whether it be in the politics of their homeland or in the nationstate they live in.7 Without a central command structure to follow, diasporas challenge hegemonic constructions of the nation and culture of their homeland and transgress all “constructions of national homogeneity” of the nation-state at home as well as in the countries they live in, thus creating a space and opportunities for “multiple discourses” and “internal dissent.”8 Werbner also defines the diaspora’s struggle for full citizenship status (“diasporic citizenship”) and rights in their nations of residence as a key feature of “postcolonial diasporas of the west.”9 In “Imaginary Homelands,” Rushdie discusses many of the themes Werbner covers in her article, drawing on his own personal experiences. Reflecting the pattern of chaordic transnational diaspora experiences, Rushdie admits how, as a member of the Indian diaspora living in England, his book on India is nothing more than a text about memory, his own personal memory of a place he calls home, his home, his India.10 He further admits that his India is nothing but one of “all the hundreds of millions of possible versions” of a heterogeneous Indian nation and culture filled with a multiplicity of discourses and rife with dissent, as is the reality of any other nation of the world.11 Thus, in accordance with Werbner’s framework on the chaorder of diasporas, Rushdie’s writings reflect the cosmopolitan consciousness that formulates from the transnational experience of the diaspora, autonomous

and uncontained by a command centre.12 Rushdie’s writings therefore reflect the particular standpoint of the diaspora as cosmopolitan citizens. Their experiences are crucial for exposing the heterogeneity of nations and cultures and questioning hegemonic, homogeneous constructions of nations, peoples, and cultures through their transnational experiences.13 Rushdie’s writings validate the transnational experience of the diaspora due to the double consciousness they inherently develop as members of both cultures, that of their homeland and nation of residence, living in the margins of both societies.14 Rushdie describes this double consciousness as a “broken mirror” through which the diaspora views his home, or in Rushdie’s case, India.15 Due to their experiences migrating and living in a culture and society very different from that of their homeland, the diaspora can no longer look back on their home the same way they used to; they are now “obliged to deal in broken mirrors” while relying on a “fallible memory” and “fragmentary vision” in their reflections on home and nation.16 The diaspora is a hybrid of two cultures, two perspectives and two consciousnesses, that of which they cannot deny or suppress but are free to exercise as a chaordic, transnational group. Rushdie firmly validates this “broken mirror” and hybridity of the diaspora in the formulation of a valuable cosmopolitan consciousness. He states: “This may enable [the diaspora] to speak properly and concretely on a subject of universal significance and appeal.”17

Thus, the chaordic transnational experience of the diaspora allows them to autonomously develop a hybridity of cultures and double consciousness valuable in the making of a transnational citizenship and cosmopolitan consciousness. Rushdie equally notes the responsibility of the diaspora in using their double consciousness and hybridity to expose the reality of what those in power (i.e. the Hegemon, ruling classes and state) work to alter “to fit its present needs.”18 He is particularly referring to India and how those behind the State (politicians) work to obscure the truth and reality of their oppressive, and sometimes brutal, actions against human rights.19 It is the right and responsibility of the Indian diaspora writing outside of India to “give lie to official facts” and dispel the lies of the State Hegemon in their exercise of power.20 They have a right to “be treated as a full member of British society” while retaining their Indian heritage.21 As a cultural hybrid “straddl[ing] two cultures” and forming a double consciousness, the Indian diaspora have the responsibility to critique not only the nation they live in but also the home they come from. They moreover bear the responsibility to look outward and inward in critiquing the two cultures that form their existence and which they occupy a membership on the margins.22 Rushdie concludes “Imaginary Homelands” with a declaration on the rights and entitlements of the diaspora in choosing their own home, identity and culture. In

discussing the “literary migrant,” he states: “we are inescapably international writers” who, following the chaorder of their transnational experience, have the “pleasant freedom” to choose their cultural precedents (“parents”), identity and allegiance.23 Hence, Rushdie is asserting the rights and entitlements of the “literary migrant” and international writers to use their cosmopolitan consciousness in creating their own identities, cultures and homes based on the transnational citizenship they have acquired as migrant writers. The experiences of these migrant writers are crucial to the demystification of culture and in bridging the cultural (and physical) gap between the east and the west as well as north and south.24 While Rushdie’s formulations of a cosmopolitan consciousness and transnational citizenship certainly ring true to many of the world’s displaced population, he fails to account for how context (i.e. one’s race, class, gender and country of origin) impacts one’s experiences as a member of a diaspora and further complicate his ideas of a cosmopolitan consciousness and transnational citizenship. In “Genealogies of Community, Home, and Nation,” Chandra Talpade Mohanty offers her own personal anecdotes on how race and gender are constitutive to the transnational experiences and consciousness of the Indian diaspora in the United States.25 She notes how, as a South Asian foreign student and, more importantly, a woman, she was either “dismissed as irrelevant” or “treated in racist

ways” that questioned her ability to speak English due to the many sexist and racist stereotypes in the west of the “quiet Asian woman.”26 Thus, despite being a member of the educated elites of the Indian diaspora like Rushdie, Mohanty’s transnational experiences and cosmopolitan consciousness were considerably restricted and complicated because of her race and gender. Rather than having the “pleasant freedom,” as Rushdie describes it, to choose her home and identity between two cultures, Mohanty was impelled to choose feminism as home and women of color as her identity as a woman and member of the Indian diaspora living in the west.27 Although Rushdie does acknowledge the pivotal role his “freak fair skin” played in his transnational experiences as an Indian writer living in England, he ultimately disregards how gender and race intersect and complicate one’s cosmopolitan consciousness and restrict their transnational citizenship.28 In “Geography Lessons: On Being an Insider/ Outsider to the Canadian Nation,” Himani Bannerji problematizes these notions of cosmopolitanism and transnational citizenship in describing how race and gender delimit migrant’s citizenship in Canada (as well as other parts of the west) as a white supremacist, patriarchal nation.29 In contrast to Rushdie’s declarations of the Indian diaspora’s right to be a full member of the nation they live in while retaining the heritage of their homeland, Bannerji notes how “visible minority women, black/ South Asian/Chinese women” are sexed and “othered” in Canada,

thereby severely restricting their sense of belonging and citizenship as an (un)equal member of Canadian society.30 How can one call himself or herself a transnational citizen if their citizenship is restricted even in their own country of residence? Bannerji exposes the many restrictions race and gender place on one’s access to a local and transnational citizenship, further complicating Rushdie’s ideas of a cosmopolitan consciousness. Like Mohanty, Bannerji herself felt excluded, unwelcomed and restricted in North America where she arrived “as a foreign student and would leave upon receiving [her] degree.”31 What these writers fail to acknowledge in their writings on the transnational experience and consciousness of the diaspora is how class greatly affects the context in which the diaspora migrates and experiences (or not) ‘cosmopolitanism’. Unlike Bannerji, I, for example, did not have a home to go back to when I did not like the way I was treated in Quebec. I did not come here as a foreign student with a visa ready and could not leave after receiving my degree (if I could pass high school which proved difficult for most immigrants given the poor French education we received). As a working-class, Latin American immigrant to the United States and then Canada, my ‘transnational citizenship’ and ‘cosmopolitan consciousness’ was/is virtually nonexistent. Unlike Rushdie, Mohanty, and Bannerji, I am not a member of the intellectual elite and do not come from a middle class, educated family of the third world. My movement, sense of belonging

and citizenship in the international sphere is restricted due to my socioeconomic status (my passport used to be another impediment but after years of living in North America illegally, I finally attained the sacred Canadian passport). In her writings on migration and estrangement, Sara Ahmed discusses the role economic privilege plays in determining the movement and experiences of migratory subjects.32 Economically privileged migratory subjects have the luxury to move whenever and wherever they wish and stay there for as long as they wish, as both Mohanty and Bannerji did in migrating to the west for their education.33 These privileged subjects also experience migration very differently from subjects who had to migrate for their own security and/or well-being, such as refugees, migrant workers and other members of the “nonspecialist, nonacademic” and non-elite global population (i.e. the subaltern).34 Thus, the movement and entry of the “world’s intellectual elite,” like Rushdie, Mohanty and Bannerji, is facilitated in today’s increasingly globalized and neoliberal international system while the movement of underprivileged and unskilled peoples of the working class is restricted.35 Transnational citizenship and cosmopolitan consciousness are evidently not for those who cannot afford it. One final factor I feel is pertinent in discussing the experiences of the diaspora and which further complicates these notions of cosmopolitan consciousness and transnational citizenship is the country of origin/geographical

context of the diaspora. In her writings on the transnational experience of the diaspora, Werbner explores what makes a community diasporic rather than “simply ‘ethnic’” in a country.36 She answers this question by analyzing diasporas solely of the ‘old world’ (she mentions Jews, Pakistanis, Indians and many others of Asia).37 This is a restriction I find constantly in readings on diasporas who exclude much of the south. In my experience, diaspora has primarily been a title given to those of the ‘Orient,’ historically deemed as “the only category with the honour of being recognized as the other of Europe and the West” unlike the “Indians of America” nor the “blacks of Africa,” both of which were historically seen as “simply primitive” by ruling nations of the west.38 I have never seen myself as a member of a ‘Colombian’ diaspora nor a ‘Latino’ diaspora (if that even exists). I, like many other Latinos living in North America, are referred to (and dismissed) as an ethnic category and not a diaspora with an “intellectual written legacy” and culture like those of the Indian or Chinese diaspora of Asia.39 How does this affect our rights to a “diasporic citizenship” if we cannot even claim ourselves as a diaspora?40 Where does a transnational citizenship fit in all of this if we are a “simply ethnic” category of a nation (within the north American region) that limits our citizenship and mobility? These are some of many questions that arose in my readings of Rushdie and his ideas of a transnational citizenship and cosmopolitan consciousness. Using Werbner’s framework on the

chaordic transnational formation of diasporas, this paper analyzed Rushdie’s “Imaginary Homelands” and the many notions he discusses regarding the transnational experience, cosmopolitan consciousness and particular standpoint of the diaspora as an autonomous community free of a command centre, uncontained and uncontainable.41 It then critiqued these notions using the writings of Mohanty and Bannerji as well as my own personal anecdotes to expose how race, class and gender affects the context through which the diaspora migrates and experiences the transnational sphere, thus further complicating Rushdie’s notions of transnational citizenship and cosmopolitan consciousness. I also used my personal experiences as a member of a diaspora and the writings of Anibal Quijano to demonstrate how the country of origin equally affects one’s transnational experience as a member of a diaspora (unless they are dismissed as ‘simply ethnic’).

in identity, culture and allegiance (as part of Rushdie’s rights and entitlements of the “literary migrant”) have been restricted; I refuse to consider myself Canadian or Quebecois while I cannot fully claim a Colombian identity.42 However, as far as my inner, intellectual self is concerned, it is the one place where I truly have the “pleasant freedom” to choose my own interests and sense of self.43 There, I will follow Rushdie’s guidance and claim Jaime Garzon, the radical, admirable Colombiano, as part of my own individual identity.

The goal of this paper was to ultimately problematize these notions of cosmopolitan consciousness and transnational citizenship given the assumptions of privilege and freedom of mobility behind these terms. The world is not my home and I certainly am not an equal citizen of it. I, like so many other immigrants I met in a so-called ‘welcome class’ that all immigrants attended in high school to learn French, simply go and remain physically where I can, as much as my status and economic background allow me. In our world, we take what we can get and force ourselves to smile while we do it. Given the context, my choices

Notes 1

Salman Rushdie, "Imaginary Homelands," in Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 (London: Granta Books, 1992), 10. 2 Vrinda Narain, "Multiculturalism and Diaspora Issues," 2013 WMST 401 Lecture, McGill University, Montreal, 29 November 2013. 3 Vrina Werbner, "The Place that is Diaspora: Citizenship, Religion and Gender in the Making of Chaordic Transnationalism," WMST 401 Postcolonial Perspectives: Women and the State in India Course Pack, ed. Dr. Vrinda Narain (Montreal: McGill University, 2013), 378. 4 Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory Practicing Solidarity (New Dehli: Duke University Press, 2006), 125. 5 Werbner, 378. 6 Ibid., 380. 7 Ibid., 379-80. 8 Ibid., 379-82. 9 Ibid., 378; 385. 10 Rushdie, 10. 11 Rushdie, 19; Werbner 382. 12 Werbner, 380. 13 Ibid., 379-82. 14 Narain. 15 Rushdie, 10-11. 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid., 12. 18 Ibid., 14. 19 Ibid. 20 Ibid. 21 Ibid., 15. 22 Rushdie, 14-16; Narain. 23 Rushdie, 20-21. 24 Ibid., 18-21. 25 Mohanty 125. 26 Ibid., 127. 27 Ibid., 128-30. 28 Rushdie, 18. 29 Himani Bannerji, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Geography Lessons: On Being an Insider/Outsider to the Canadian Nation,â&#x20AC;? WMST 401 Postcolonial Perspectives: Women and the State in India Course Pack, ed. Dr. Vrinda Narain (Montreal: McGill University, 2013), 366.

“Goodbye Innocence,” Goodbye Critical Reception: Fantasies of Empowerment and Dominance in SHS’ Teen Clothes Ad

Kathryn Yuen

Figure 1. SHS, “Goodbye Innocence,” 2008. Advertisement.

“Goodbye Innocence” (2008) by SHS Teen Clothes is not your typical fashion editorial. For a teen clothing advertisement it takes an uncommon aesthetic approach in drawing inspiration from the violently brutal history of colonialism, and in mimicking the role of privileged whites who strategically use and powerfully dominate over what is differently ‘Other.’1 This is illustrated by displaying a young woman, shotgun in hand, sitting on a throne made out of wood and antlers, whilst being surrounded by a number of broken or skeletal looking toys and two men on either side. Produced by Callegari Berville Grey (a French advertising agency) and presented by SHS Teen Clothes under the parent Italian clothing company SASCH, this advertisement relies on a colonial aesthetic combined with popular childhood icons. Cherished fictional characters, such as Hello Kitty, Snoopy, Bugs Bunny, and a unicorn are presented in a horrific state, showing only these characters’ heads in a skeletal form. Common childhood toys, such as teddy bears, and dolls are represented in a broken and defeated way. The overall effect suggests an empowered young woman in the ad, through methods of hunting and domination over a more primitive or naïve landscape that is childhood, and, ultimately a departure from that innocence. This ad, then suggests that if you purchase SHS Teen Clothes, then the clothing will empower you as well, and release you from your innocence. The SHS Teen Clothes Ad, “Goodbye Innocence” (2008) has an unsettling nature that stems from the exploitation of a long-

standing colonial dominance over the Other in order to produce a sellable image of an empowered young woman. This paper will first analyze the problematic use of colonial dominance evident in the “Goodbye Innocence” through bell hooks’ theories on pleasure, innocence, and fantasy in “Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance” as a lens. This paper will then turn to look at the kinds of reception this particular SHS ad has received in online blogs. In relation to Susan Douglas’ notion of fantasies of power from her book “Enlightened Sexism,” this paper will interrogate why this ad has received such positive feedback that tends to deny any significant recognition of its colonial elements. Ultimately, I will argue that this image is extremely disturbing because it reproduces a colonial stereotype of the Other, yet it is often received in a decontextualized and uncritical manner, which further perpetuates a culture of dominance in a postfeminist, post-colonial, pop culture world. The theme of colonial dominance, as explored by bell hooks in “Eating the Other,” is applied in the “Goodbye Innocence” SHS Teen Clothes ad. This ad visually manifests hooks’ observation that the Other’s ethnicity and sexuality is often appropriated by a white capitalistic culture in order to produce a more appealing consumable product.2 hooks describes the appropriation of the Other’s ethnicity as a pleasurable “spice, [or a] seasoning that can liven up the dull dish that is mainstream white culture,” which does so in a particular way that “reinscribes and maintains the status quo.”3,4 In “Goodbye Innocence,” the

addition of the Other, in order to produce a more colonial look, is a “spice” because it is truly an unnecessary extra, since there seems to be no aesthetic connection, what so ever, between the Other’s ethnicity and the clothing line that is being promoted. The clothes that the young woman is wearing are simple and black. There are no primitive animal patterns or references to other cultures in her clothing. As a result, the Other is used as a pleasurable “spice” in the ad to enhance the SHS Teen Clothes brand and to make it seem more exciting, even though the clothes themselves maintain a conservative status quo that consumers expect in fashion.5 The SHS Teen Clothes and SASCH brand are made to look more exotic and worldly through a cultural appropriation of the Other in sexually suggestive terms. Desired confrontation or contact with the Other, hooks explains, is believed to provide an experience that will allow one to “leave behind white ‘innocence’ and enter the world of ‘experience.’”6 Although this ad is not sexually exploitive of its female model, it does evoke the notion of a sexual encounter, or at least a kind of transformation in the presence of the Other that results in loss of innocence through the explicit title for this ad: “Goodbye Innocence.” “Goodbye Innocence” further articulates hooks’ argument that cultural appropriation also functions as a fond remembrance of the white man’s conquest over the primitive Other in history.7 “In mass culture,” hooks explains, “imperialist nostalgia takes the form of re-enacting and re-ritualizing in different ways the imperialist,

colonizing journey as narrative fantasy of power and desire,”8 and has “led the white west to sustain a romantic fantasy of the ‘primitive.’”9 So, there is a true emphasis on the romantic fantasy in commercial constructions of the Other in mass culture, which SHS Teen Clothes picks up on. “Goodbye Innocence” presents a fantasy inspired rendition of colonial domination by incorporating fictional characters such as Hello Kitty and mythical icons such as the unicorn. This ad illustrates a narrative of a young woman has been released into a primitive territory of the Other, which is metaphoric for one’s childhood playground, where she then unleashes her mature more developed dominance over it by brutally breaking the toys. In other words, this ad portrays an “alternative playground where members of dominating races, genders, sexual practices affirm their power” over the Other.10 However, this makes “Goodbye Innocence” only eerily reminiscent of the history of colonization, rather than an accurate or real representation, since it occupies the realm of fashion, fiction, and consumerism. As a result, this “commodification of difference… denies the significance of the Other’s history through a process of decontextualization.”11 In addition to a decontextualized production, the online reception of this advertisement reveals that, for the most part, consumers are either denying this colonial background or they are simply unaware of it, since the comments are also decontextualized. On adsoftheworld.com, the comments section for “Goodbye Innocence” includes responses such as

“differently good!,” and “hahaha kick asss…liked it!”12 In general, the majority of the comments on adsoftheworld.com are positive in reception. If the SHS Teen Clothes ad is looked at in a historically decontextualized way that removes hooks’ “Eating the Other” as a lens, and it is instead examined through the perspective of Douglas’ fantasies of power, it becomes understandable why some people have mistaken “Goodbye Innocence” as something good. Fantasies of power in the media promote the fantastical idea that since the women’s liberation movement, women are now free, in control, and in power.13 And “Goodbye Innocence” certainly presents this notion to us in a number of ways. The model in the SHS Teen Clothes ad presents an image of an empowered woman due to her visual location in the centre of the page, and physical location on a throne. Yet she is not presented, as most women on thrones are in pop culture, as a princess. She rejects the royalty role, but is still able to occupy the throne as a powerful warrior-hunter instead. But there is also friction within the character of the warrior-hunter, since women could not realistically take up this role, as it was traditionally reserved for men in western history. “Goodbye Innocence” further breaks stereotypical gender norms by symbolically showcasing the destruction of the stereotypical “female” toys, such as dolls, unicorns, and Hello Kitty. What’s more is that the young woman is able to present herself as breaking from gender norms in multiple ways, and as powerful, but without looking skanky or wearing slutty tight fitting clothes. In fact, she is

barley showing any skin. This is a kind of empowerment that relies, not on sex, but on race instead. It is interesting to note, then, that there are only two comments out of thirty on adsoftheworld. com that perceive this racial and colonial aspect. All the others praise the SHS Teen Clothing ad and pick up on the young woman’s empowerment. For example, on adsoftheworld.com some of the most outrageous comments include: “Sassy little bitch comes to mind! I most definitely approve, nothing more powerful then a sassy bitch with [an] elephant gun!” and “Bad little fuckers all grown up. Love the image.”14 These comments tend to completely disregard the colonial issues at play and instead try and inject a kind of sexualized language into it, even though the ad is purposely sexually un-explicit. In stark contrast, however, the user “renzz” wrote, “what’s up with all the racism???”15 on September 7, 2008, and, the user “desailly” also attempted to trouble this advertisement on August 6, 2008 by writing, “in another country, this might look a tad colonial.”16 However, the latter comment is also problematic because it connotes the idea that it is only in another country that this ad might be an issue, but for the target postcolonial American or European audience, it is acceptable and fine. Consequently, desailly’s comment opens up “Goodbye Innocence” to Douglas’ post-feminist concept on enlightened sexism with an ethnic slant. According to Douglas, fantasies of power stem from enlightened sexism, where both of these theories share the belief that women have

made plenty of progress, and are now considered equal since “all has been won” and women “have it all.”17 However, enlightened sexism further declares that it is now okay and it is even encouraged to resurrect pre-feminist, often sexist, stereotypes of women.18 When enlightened sexism is applied to race and ethnicity for the purposes of this paper, rather than sex and gender, it becomes evident that there is a similar rhetoric at play in the SHS Teen Clothing ad. In both “Goodbye Innocence” and desailly’s comment there is the sense of ‘enlightened colonialism,’ in that because we live in a postfeminist and post-colonial world it is now acceptable to re-evoke these colonial images. But it is not. All has not been won, and there is still so much to work towards.19 Fantasies of power and ‘enlightened colonialism’ only contribute to the false assumption that there is nothing left for women to fight for.20 One of the most glaringly obvious examples that contradicts this, is how “enlightened sexism [and ‘enlightened colonialism’] ignores girls and women who are not middle class, upper class, or rich and, for the most part not white, [plus] it is empathetically heterosexist.”21 “Goodbye Innocence” exemplifies this because it presents a young white woman, who is probably middle to upper class and heterosexual. So, equality as not been achieved in this ad, since it suggests that this empowerment is only reserved for a specific kind of woman, rather than all kinds of women. “Goodbye Innocence” is even more problematic because it is not just some random image. It is an

advertisement that speaks to a large audience of young teens, and is made relatable because of its pop culture references to childhood characters such as Hello Kitty, or Snoopy. This means, as both a product and producer of pop culture, this SHS Teen Clothes add holds cultural weight. Pop culture is not just fluff.22 It has a power because it provides “the material from which young people’s impressions of their world are moulded” in that it informs everything from what we wear, to how we act, and what we believe in.23 So, for an advertisement directed at a teen audience (who may, or may not, be able to fully comprehend and critically filter the nuanced ideas about gender and race presented by bell hooks and Susan Douglas), the twisted message that “Goodbye Innocence” is putting forward is being consumed and is influential on some level. Ultimately, the promotion of women’s empowerment at the cost of reinscribing colonial hierarchies and binaries is not the kind of message any young teen should be exposed to in any way. In conclusion, “Goodbye Innocence” by SHS Teen Clothes is a problematic and unsettling advertisement because it presents a powerful image of a young woman by exploiting colonial dominance and by putting down other people of colour in order to do so. But what is truly disturbing are the ways in which this ad is received. The online reception of this image tends to only read into the fantasies of empowerment that it presents, and, it tends to forgo any significant critical reception of the explicitly racist and colonial message that is clearly being displayed.

Notes 1

bell hooks, “Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance (1992),” in Media and Cultural Studies: Key Works, edited by Gigi Gigi Durham Meenakshi and Douglas Kellner (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2006), 366. 2 hooks, “Eating the Other,” 424-5; 428. 3 Ibid., 424. 4 Ibid., 425. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid., 426. 7 Ibid., 427. 8 Ibid. 9 Ibid., 428. 10 Ibid., 425. 11 Ibid., 431. 12 “SHS Teen Clothes Ad: Gal,” Ads of the World: An All Creative World Site, commented 5 August 2008 22:57, and 7 August 2008 01:33, http://adsoftheworld. com/media/print/shs_teen_clothes_gal. 13 Susan Douglas, “Introduction: Fantasies of Power,” in Enlightened Sexism: The Seductive Message that Feminism’s Work is Done (New York: Times Books, 2010), 5. 14 “SHS Teen Clothes Ad: Gal,” Ads of the World, commented 6 August 2008 11:10, and 6 August 2008 21:13. 15 Ibid., commented 7 September 2008 02:15. 16 Ibid., commented 6 August 2008 10:55. 17 Douglas, “Introduction,” 9-10; 12. 18 Ibid., 9. 19 Ibid., 10; 22. 20 Ibid., 8; 12. 21 Ibid., 11. 22 Andi Ziesler, “Prologue,” “Pop and Circumstance: Why Pop Culture Matters,” and “Women Under the Influence: Pop Culture Now and Beyond,” in Feminism and Pop Culture (Berkeley, CA: Seal Press, 2008), viii. 23 Ziesler, Feminism and Pop Culture, viii.

Mohawk/Princess: Pauline Johnson, Performance Art, and the Perpetuation of Colonial Discourse

Marie-Claude Gill-Lacroix

In her 1991 lecture, “Linoleum Caves,” Margaret Atwood provided Oxford’s academics with a parcel of information, which, despite having the potential to become instrumental in the field of art history—more precisely, Canadian Art history—was left, unexamined by both her and the faculty. While speaking of Canada’s “Indians,” Atwood briefly mentioned Pauline Johnson, a 19th century NativeCanadian elocutionist whose magnitude has shrunk to near nonexistence since the 1950s.1 Atwood described Johnson as having been “what would now be known as a performance artist.”2 Envisioning Johnson’s persona as encompassing something

other than her talent as poetess is a challenge made especially difficult by the small body of work dedicated to her time on the stage and her absence from Canada’s sole feminist performance art anthology.3 Caught in the Act: an Anthology of Performance Art by Canadian Women makes no mention of the “Mohawk Princess” and claims that performance art in Canada officially took root in 1953 Vancouver, leaving no opportunity for Johnson’s career to be considered worth investigating by the anthology’s editors, Tanya Mars and Johanna Householder.4 Knowing of Atwood’s contention and assuming that Mars and Householder are frank when

stating that their work is meant to redress the lack of historical recording accorded to performance art by Canadian women, a puzzle begins to form.5 Who is Pauline Johnson? Was she a precursor to Canadian performance art? Should she have been included in Mars and Householder’s anthology? What can be taken (if anything) of her absence in regards to the dialectic of Canadian art? In answering these questions, this essay will show that Johnson’s absence from the anthology was the result of (1) the racism and patriarchy that permeated 19th century Canadian culture, which forced Johnson to produce performances that conformed to the demands of her white audience, and (2) her subsequent biographies, which systematically undermined her work and ultimately rendered her unfit for the Canadian art historical discourse. Emily Pauline Johnson was born in 1861 near Brantford, the daughter of an upper class English-Canadian mother (Emily Howells) and a Mohawk father (George H. M. Johnson).6,7 Though George was raised on a reserve, his father, Chief John Smoke Johnson (born Tekahionwake), was an employee for the British Indian Department of Affairs, which gave him access to European culture.8 George soon found himself enthralled by the mythology of European conquerors and colonialists, Napoleon in particular.9 This enthusiasm directed George toward the Church of England, where his stature and popular reputation afforded him the position of interpreter for the

Church’s missions, during which he oversaw the Christianizing of Native pagans.10 Once married to Emily (1853), high rank gave George the ability to endow her and their four children with “everything they would have had [had he been] a white man.”11 Indeed, the nights spent entertaining celebrities at Cheifswood, the Johnson family home, were a far cry from those of Canada’s Aboriginal communities, who throughout the 19th century had been pushed onto reserves and forced to spend their nights accommodating European squatters.12,13 Pauline entered young adulthood a gifted amateur poet and actress well versed in the etiquette of Victorian femininity.14 Upon her father’s death in 1884, she was able to utilize these talents to earn a living.15 Her call to fame occurred on January 16th, 1892 when Frank Yeigh, an old school friend, invited her to recite the poetry she had penned at a literary benefit held in honour of the Young Men’s Liberal Club of Toronto.16 Following her poem “A Cry from an Indian Wife,” the audience of four hundred leapt to its feet, demanding an encore and consequently denoting her skills as a performer.17 Recognizing the marketability of her triumph and of her race, Yeigh organized Johnson’s first reciting tour, billing her as the “Mohawk Princess.”18 Thus began seventeen years of touring across Canada, the United States, and Britain.19 In order to assess whether or not Johnson’s presentations over the course of those seventeen years

can be constituted as ‘performance art’ requires that the genre be defined. To do so, this essay will rely on the explanatory articles that preface Mars and Householder’s anthology. According to these, women’s performance art ought to: be political, emit a general feeling (anything from grim to comedic representations of the artist’s cause), utilize some type of costume, prop, or art object and make use of the artist’s body, often through reclamation of sexuality.20,21 For starters, Pauline Johnson was no stranger to politics. Early in her teens, she “elected to make her way as a New Woman in North America.”22 The movement of the “New Woman” aimed to advance the female sex through the expansion of “acceptable” behaviour for women.23 Though many who took part in the movement’s first incarnations were ridiculed, Johnson found great success in deviating from the politically correct.24,25 Live performance was widely considered improper by the 19th century’s middle class.26 The few genteel women who did perform were expected to maintain a certain level of decorum and command respect through social propriety.27 The “Mohawk Princess” did no such thing. Many of her performances were very political in nature, often entailing some kind of reprimand for its spectators.28 Despite her performances’ acknowledgement of socio-political issues like the treatment of Canadian Natives, she was showered with “the loving appreciation of [her] audience.”29 For example, after a performance in 1892 England, wherein she recited

her seminal “A Cry from an Indian Wife,” one journalist from the Globe stated that Johnson’s performance moved the “complaisant whites” in the audience by “[awaking] their thoughts [and bringing] penitence [at the sight of] the other side of the story.”30 The socio-political awakening of her audience was without doubt a difficult feat to accomplish. Not only was Johnson a Native woman (a double minority) delivering a political message, but she was doing so in front of large English-Canadian audiences. Said audiences often perceived themselves as fair to Aboriginals, bringing them closer to civilization and further from the barbaric customs they believed would impede on their ascendance toward the “true faith”; Christianity.31 The above example makes it apparent that Johnson fulfilled performance artistry’s political and sentimental requirements. However, one would be wrong to assume that her performances were solely grim presentations of Canadian Aboriginal life. Her act encompassed a “mixed program of comical skits and stories” as well.32 She made a point to present her most sober material during the show’s first half so she could send her audience home calmed by the comedic input of the second act.33 In one skit, she would address and poke fun at the nature of Canada’s Mounted Police: “that excellent corps, the Mounted Police, scour the prairies and seize any whiskey they find […] they drink it themselves I am told.”34 One reporter from Kingston found the jokes made at the expense of Mounties so witty

Fig. 1 Pauline Strikes a Pose (1895) Publicity Photograph, 7.62 x 10.92 cm McMaster University Library Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

that he thought it appropriate to publish them verbatim.35 Though the Canadian Mounted Police was often understood to characterize Canada’s (mythologized) identity as a benevolent and omnipotent Northern presence, Johnson was unafraid to address the shortcomings of its officers.36,37 For this, she rarely received any criticism, emphasizing once again her ability to artfully question Canadian culture and politics.38

trying to get an Indian dress to recite in, and it is the most difficult thing in the world. Now I know you know [emphasis in original] what is feminine, so you can tell me if the Indian stores in Montreal are real Indian stores […] if you see anything in Montreal that would assist me in getting up a costume […] I will be more than obliged to know of it […] but I want one that is made up of feminine [emphasis in original] work.46, 47

Billed as the “Mohawk Princess,” it was made apparent to Johnson that a large segment of her audience solely attended her presentations in order to be “brought into personal contact with […] Indians.”39 As a result, Johnson determined to devote a large portion of her recitals towards her dual nationality.40 In 1893, she began dividing her performances into two sections.41 During the first act, Johnson would enter the stage donned in her best gowns, appearing as a lady– a Princess.42 In the second, so as to complete the foretelling of the “Mohawk Princess,” she would change into what one reporter described as a “strikingly picturesque Indian dress.”43 However, achieving the look of an “Indian” was a difficult task for Johnson.44 Having had a genteel upbringing, she owned very few Mohawk artefacts and garments.45 In her desperate search for a costume capable of encapsulating the “look” of the Mohawk, she began correspondence with Montreal history and literature aficionado, W.D. Lighthall:

The most telling aspect of Johnson’s correspondence with Lighthall was not her desire to acquire aboriginal clothing. Rather, her requisite that any garments found in Montreal be feminine provides insight into the ways in which she utilized her female physicality to advertise and enhance her performances.

For my Indian poems I am

Although Johnson was very much aware of the sexual etiquette expected of Victorian women like herself, she did not hesitate to emphasize her beauty and sexuality when performing as a Mohawk.48 The “Indian” costume, making visible her left arm and ankles (uncommon sights for wealthy white men and the women they courted) as well as her long curly hair, actively enticed the men in her audience.49 The sexual charm she exuded while dressed as a Mohawk can be best appreciated when her double identity (Mohawk/Princess) is understood in comparison to the “aesthetic[s] that [have come to structure] the female body in Western art.”50 Through the use of publicity photographs, Johnson promoted her performances with an iconography similar to that of

painted nudes.51 Her flowing hair, her modestly averted gaze, her arms placed at the back of her head (making it appear as though she is laying on her back) were spectacles, invitations for male voyeurism, which men undoubtedly accepted seeing as she was a coloured woman unworthy of their high esteem (Figure 1).52 In a manner similar to the promotional representations of Saartjie Bartman (d.1815) as the “Hottentot Venus,” it is probable that the men who received Johnson’s publicity photographs assumed that the “Mohawk Princess” was an oxymoronic term used to advertise an upcoming show aiming to ridicule Native women through the emphasis of their presumed promiscuity.53,54 Thus, the on-stage appearance of Pauline Johnson as a demurely dressed member of Canada’s literary community during her performance’s first act must have been a shock for those hoping to see a savage.55 In promoting herself as an object worthy of male lust, then subsequently refuting this lust by performing half her set as someone who presumably resembled her male audience’s female relatives, it is likely that Johnson was attempting to reclaim the sexual respectability she and her paternal relatives had lost at the hands of European colonialism.56 Were she to set foot on a stage today, Pauline Johnson would without doubt be recognized as a performance artist. Her act was political in nature, relied on both comedic and dramatic storytelling, and utilized costumes to present the Native body as both an object

of sexual attraction and worthy of the respect given to EuropeanCanadian women.57 The fact that Johnson was not included in Mars and Householder’s anthology is problematic. How could two adamantly feminist Canadian scholars and ex-performance artists overlook one of their art form’s major female precursory performers?58 When researching Johnson, seldom references are un-plagued by some type colonial discourse.59 Of course, this is especially true of her two earliest biographies, The Mohawk Princess (1931) and Pauline Johnson and her Friends (1947). Both were written at a time when their respective authors could only discuss her work in the context of gender and race (as opposed to poetic talent and showmanship) seeing as these were anomalies and that the theoretical perspectives of Bhabha, Nochlin, and Pollock did not yet exist.60 What is surprising, however, is that a similar sense of dominance still permeates throughout modern works dedicated to Johnson.61 Both Pauline (1981) and Paddling Her Own Canoe (2000) represent her in terms of her race and gender, only this time, the claims are that she used her Mohawk lineage and beauty to manipulate her audience. For example: “Johnson developed several performance strategies to exploit power structures on her own behalf,” and “[Johnson] willingly capitalized on her […] identity to keep bringing in the customers” are direct quotes from these works.62 The sense gathered is that Johnson was a phony “Indian,” a sell-

out who utilized the trope of the “Noble Savage” to her advantage and thus perpetuated Eurocentric considerations of race and gender.63 Modern claims concerning her manipulative inclinations serve to undermine her contributions in Canadian art history as a performance art pioneer.64 The fact of the matter is that Johnson, because of the colonial context in which she lived, had no choice but to indulge her audience with tropes, no matter how sexist or racist these might have been.65 In accordance to Canadian law, her father’s aboriginal origins classified her as a “half-breed,” effectively rendering her unfit for marriage with men among her social class.66 It is unlikely that the prospect of marrying an Aboriginal man appealed to Johnson, seeing as such an occurrence would result in the loss of her social magnitude and her confinement to a reserve.67 After all, in the same year Johnson rose to great acclaim, the Federal government of Canada released a statement asserting the need to “persuade Indians to give up their wondering habits.”68,69 It becomes understandable, then, that a woman brought up in luxury and wealth would deliberately adopt colonial stereotypes in order to remain economically afloat and relevant within the population in which she was raised.70 But the fact that contemporary biographers emphasize her adoption of Eurocentric ideals, as opposed to her ability to inform the consciousness of Euro-Canadians in regards to the treatment of the Native community, in itself acts

as a continuation of a colonial discourse. It precludes Johnson from her own self-determination (“she had always considered herself Indian”) and consequently undercuts her importance as a performing activist.71 The long-term effect of this new type of colonial discourse has been the erasure of Pauline Johnson from the Canadian Art canon, which can explain her absence from Caught in the Act.72 Why should a “phony Indian” (assuming Mars and Householder were actually aware of her existence) be considered in a work aiming to outline pioneers in Canadian performance art?73 Though Johnson fits well in the “performance artist” categorization provided by Atwood and, as consequence, should have been included in the anthology, her gender, her race, and Victorian upbringing (first perceived as threats and later as scapegoats by biographers) have actively stunted her ascendance to national recognition as precursor to Canadian performance art.74 In terms of the dialectic of Canadian art history, what one should take from Johnson’s stratification is that the contemporary Canadian art historical discourse remains inundated with gendered and ethnic subjectivities, despite the presence of feminist and post-colonial theories of reinterpretation. That many more like Johnson have been overlooked because of their gender, ethnicity and social class is more than a possibility. It is a certainty.

Notes Margaret Atwood, “Linoleum Caves,” in Strange Things: The Malevolent North in English Literature (Oxford: Clarendun Press, 1995), 91. 2 Ibid. 3 Tanya Mars, “Preface,” in Caught in the Act: An Anthology of Performance Art by Canadian Women, eds. Tanya Mars and Johanna Householder (Toronto: YYZ Books, 2004), 10-11. 4 Johanna Householder, “Ap·o·lo·gia,” in Caught in the Act: An Anthology of Performance Art by Canadian Women, eds. Tanya Mars and Johanna Householder (Toronto: YYZ Books, 2004), 16. 5 Mars, “Preface,” 11. 6 Betty Keller, Pauline: A Biography of Pauline Johnson (Vancouver: Douglas and MacIntyre, 1981), 10; 13. 7 Sheila M.F. Johnston, Buckskin and Broadcloth: A Celebration of E. Pauline Johnson-Tekahionwake, 1861-1913 (Ontario: Natural Heritage Books, 1997), 38. 8 Johnston, Buckskin and Broadcloth, 21-22; Keller, Pauline, 47. 9 Marilyn J. Rose, “Johnson, Emily Pauline,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, http:// www.biographi.ca/en/bio/johnson_ emily_pauline_14E.html (accessed on 26 November 2013); Keller 19. 10 Christine Lowella Marshall, “The ReRepresented Indian: Pauline Johnson’s Strong Race Opinion and Other Forgotten Discourses,” PhD Dissertation, English Literature (Arizona: The University of Arizona, 1997), 11. 11 Keller, 17. 12 Johnston, 38; 54. 13 Eva Mackey, The House of Difference: Cultural Politics and National Identity in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 28. 14 Rose, “Johnson, Emily Pauline.” 15 Walter McRaye, Pauline Johnson and Her Friends (Toronto: The Ryerson Press, 1947), 35-36; Keller 43. 16 Johnston, 76; 98. 17 Keller, 57-58; McRaye, Pauline Johnson, 36-37. 18 McRaye, 37. 19 Rose. 20 Householder, “Ap·o·lo·gia;” Tanya Mars, “Not Just For Laughs,” Elizabeth Chitty, “Asserting Our Bodies,” Jayne Wark, 1

“Dressed to Thrill,” in Caught in the Act: An Anthology of Performance Art by Canadian Women, eds. Tanya Mars and Johanna Householder (Toronto: YYZ Books, 2004), 13; 20-24; 68-69; 81-84; 86-87.

It should be noted that the anthology also lists the use of multi-media like video and sound as prominent features of performance art, however, in the context of Johnson’s time period, such features will not be considered. 21

Veronica Strong-Boag and Carole Gerson, Paddling Her Own Canoe: the Times and Texts of E. Pauline Johnson Tekahionwake (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2000), 59. 23 Strong-Boag and Gerson, Paddling Her Own Canoe, 59. 24 Ibid., 60. 22

Prominent McGill University professors Stephen Leacock and Andrew Macphail stated that women who took part in the movement were akin to “blacks” since they were perceived as attempting to displace young men for the sake of their “unnatural desires.” Being a “New Woman” was understood by Canada’s white male elite as cupid, selfish, and unbecoming. Ibid., 60-61. 25

Ibid., 104. Ibid. 28 Ibid., 114. 29 Ibid; Keller 60. 30 Ibid., 107. 31 Mackey, The House of Difference, 35-36. 32 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 105. 33 Ibid., 107. 34 Ibid., 108. 35 Ibid., 109. 36 Mackey, 34-36. 26 27

In The House of Difference, Mackey utilizes a large portion of her text to criticize the myth of the Benevolent Mountie, claiming “the formation of the North-West Mounted Police in 1873, to act as a quasi military agent of the government in Western Canada, is one of the most romanticized events in Canadian popular history.” Johnson’s statements make it evident she would have wholly agreed with Mackey. 34. 37

Strong-Boag and Gerson, 109. Johnston, 100. 40 Ibid., 99-100. 41 Ibid., 99. 38 39

Ibid. Strong-Boag and Gerson, 113. 44 Ibid., 110. 45 Ibid., 110. 46 Johnson to Lighthall, 18 September 1892, Lighthall Papers, #17, CN 3, MS 216, McGill Rare Books and Special Collection (MURBSC), McGill University, Montreal, Canada. 47 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 110. 48 Johnston, 112; Keller, 33. 49 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 113; Johnston, 113. 50 Lynda Nead, “Theorizing the Female Nude,” in The Female Nude: Art, Obscenity and Sexuality (London: Routeledge, 1992), 5. 51 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 113. 52 Lisa Farrington, “Re-Inventing Herself: The Black Female Nude,” Woman’s Art Journal 24, no. 2 (Autumn 2003-Winter 2004), 15. 53 Farrington, “Re-Inventing Herself,” 16-17; Mackey, 28. 42 43

Following the Canadian Confederation of 1867 (twenty-five years prior to Johnson’s rise to fame) cultural and racial boundaries caused negative stereotypes concerning Native-Canadians to emerge. Among these was the belief that Aboriginals presented hypersexual tendencies. Mackay, 28. 54

Keller, 64. Mackey, 28 57 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 60; 105-109; 113; Johnston, 99; Farrington, 15. 58 Mars, 10-11. 59 Marshall, “The Re-Represented Indian,” 49-84. 60 Ibid., 55-56. 61 Ibid., 74. 62 Strong-Boag and Gerson, 113; Keller 64. 63 Marshall, 74; Strong-Boag and Gerson 115. 64 Marshall, 71. 65 Ibid., 49-84. 66 Keller, 16; 54. 67 Johnston, 99. 68 Ibid. 69 In this same statement, Canada’s indigenous population is described as “ignorant and lazy.” Johnston, 99. 70 Marshall, 74. 71 Ibid., 50; Keller, 35. 72 Marshall, 71. 73 Ibid; Mars, 11. 74 Marshall, 49-84. 55 56

Two Faces of Eve Alexandra Kanters

Pencil crayon and graphite

Their Natural Element: Institutional Power and Gender Construction in P.K. Page’s “Young Girls”

Christy Frost

P.K. Page’s poem “Young Girls” depicts the coming of age and education of a group of females. Initially, the poem seems to present the girls’ maturation as a natural evolution that culminates in the young girls accepting their gender identities and becoming more human. The poem’s structure seems to present adolescence as a transitory stage when young girls’ identities are fluid and uncontrollable, a time that must be passed through in order to be at home in the world. Page, however, undermines the idea that the girls’ maturation is a wholly natural linear process that culminates in a fixed gender identity by suggesting that the girls’ final identities are

socially constructed and shaped by a disciplinary institutional context. In the poem she continually depicts the girls in school or under adult supervision to underline that the girls’ developmental narrative is not natural but scripted and controlled by social institutions and authorities. Moreover, Page’s depiction of adolescence as a time of gender limbo draws attention to the constructed nature of the girls’ final identities and the prescriptive artificiality of the poem’s surface evolutionary narrative. As Page exposes the socially constructed nature of the girls’ identities, she also uses diction that reveals some of the possible justifications that institutions create for their

restrictive supervision of the girls’ development. By using the language of animality and pain to describe the girls’ tumultuous maturation, the poem reveals the ways in which language itself can be complicit with restrictive social institutions; by talking about the girls as needing to be trained or helped, society justifies its desire to contain and observe the young girls. Page uses the language of animality and hurt to demonstrate the ways language itself is culturally regulated by oppressive forces and used to subjugate people. Ultimately, Page’s poem suggests that the very “naturalness” of the girls’ identities is socially constructed, and culturally, verbally and institutionally regulated. On the surface, Page’s poem presents the girls’ coming of age as an evolutionary narrative where the girls are water creatures that cannot survive on dry land until they evolve into humans and earth becomes “their natural element” (31).1 She draws on the idea of the first signs of life appearing in the ocean when she describes how, before “earth becomes home” (31), the girls are “partially amphibious / and always drowning a little and hearing bells; / until the day the shore line wavers less” (27-29). Through this narrative, the poem presents the girls’ state, where “adolescence tumbles about in them” (6) and “a shoal of them in a room makes it a pool” (16), as a transient and less-human stage that will naturally develop into full human maturity. By saying that when the girls mature, “earth becomes home” (31), the poem seems to equate the girls’ full

maturity with the solidification of a traditional female identity that centers on the domestic “home.” By culminating in the solidifying of the girls’ traditional female identities, the poem’s evolutionary narrative presents fixed gender identities as naturally occurring. Page undermines the idea that the girls naturally develop gender identities and suggests instead that society carefully attempts to controls the girls and the development of their identities. While the poem initially seems to paint the girls’ early years as a time of freedom where “nothing, not even fear of punishment / can stop the giggle in a girl,” (1-2), Page’s language continually presents the girls’ irrepressible adolescence as constrained by different social structures. For example, when “adolescence tumbles about in them” (6), the girls are depicted as being contained “on the cinder schoolyard or behind the expensive gates” (6-7). Moreover, Page describes the girls as being “in class” (8), “in a room”(16), and “on a field” (20). In the poem, girlhood is paradoxically both a time of fluidity and freedom, and a state that is continually policed by societal institutions. Foucault’s description of institutionalized discipline in his book Discipline and Punish, provides a useful framework for understanding the ways the societal authorities in “Young Girls” attempt to control the young girls’ development. Foucault puts forward the idea that after 1840, disciplinary centers of power in society employ “technicians of behavior”2 and attempt to

control people through “training … accompanied by permanent observation.”3 Similarly, in the poem, the irrepressible young girls are continually depicted in institutions like the classroom where they are both trained and observed. When Foucault describes this “new type of supervision— both knowledge and power—over individuals who resist disciplinary normalization,”4 he highlights the way that societal institutions gather knowledge about non-conforming people in order to “supervise” them. When the speaker in “Young Girls” describes a teacher’s difficulty in “find[ing] the springs and taps / of their tempers and tortures” (18-19), the speaker highlights the fact that the teacher feels she must understand the girls in order to discipline and supervise them. The poem’s injunction to the reader to “see them in class” (8) implies that even though the adolescent girls seem uncontrollable and “deep in their daze” (14), “in class” (8), the girls are the constant subjects of disciplinary observation. Furthermore, Foucault’s idea that “there is no outside” to the disciplinary system and that society “takes back with one hand what it seems to exclude with the other”5 can apply to the girls, who are shaped and controlled within societal institutions rather than being rejected by society. As in Foucault’s disciplinary “carceral system,”6 the institutional structures in “Young girls” “exercise a power of normalization”7 on the girls through observation and discipline. Page undermines the apparent naturalness of the girls’ final gender identities not only through her

suggestion that the young girls are under constant disciplinary supervision but also by presenting their adolescence as a liminal space that exists prior to the solidification of their gendered identities. Myra Jehlen describes how in Huckleberry Finn, Huckleberry Finn disguises himself as a girl and experiences a “limbo of gender”8 that opens up space in the text for gender to be revealed as constructed rather than natural. Similarly, at the beginning of the poem, the young girls experience a kind of “limbo of gender” where no one can classify them or “land them neatly in a net” (22) and where they seem more animal than female. Like in Huckleberry Finn, the girls’ space of gender identity flux, even though the poem depicts it as necessarily temporary, draws attention to the constructed nature of the final vision of the girls’ final fixed gender identities. In the first stanzas the girls are not completely defined by their sexed bodies and are often described in gender neutral terms associated with fish and “porpoises” (8) and “water” (16). Page describes how they are In class like porpoises with smiles and tears

loosed from the same subterranean faucet; some

find individual adventure in the obtuse angle, some in a phrase

that leaps like a smaller fish from a sea of words

(8-13)

Page continues to use language related to animals and fluidity to describe the girls until the moment when the girls are finally “caught and swung on the bright hooks of their sex” (31) and they accept their domestic female identities. The fact that Page uses the metaphor of an artificial object—a “hook”— to de-

scribe the solidifying of the girls’ gender identities suggests that femininity does not arise naturally from the girls’ interiority but is something forcefully imposed on them. Just as in Huckleberry Finn, the depiction of a “limbo of gender,” even one that is temporary, allows the text to suggest that “the sexed nature of both women and men is not natural but cultural.”9 Moreover, by using the “hook” metaphor to suggest that fixed female identity is externally and culturally imposed on the young girls, Page opens up the possibility that the evolutionary narrative that structures her own poem is prescriptive rather than descriptive. In her book Gender Trouble, Judith Butler examines how sexual identities are discursively and culturally created. Butler describes how “prohibitions… produce identity along the culturally intelligible grids of an idealized and compulsory heterosexuality” and create “a false stabilization of gender.”10 While, in this passage Butler specifically addresses how heterosexuality structures societal ideas around sexual identity, the neat ending of Page’s poem, where “the shore line wavers less, / and caught and swung on the bright hooks of their sex, / earth becomes home, their natural element” (29-31), can also be seen as “a false stabilization of gender” that relies on “culturally intelligible grids” of idealized femininity in order to create the illusion that the girls have arrived at a coherent and natural gender identity. Butler discusses how “the construction of coherence conceals the gender discontinuities…in which gender does not necessarily follow from sex.”11 The evolutionary narrative that

frames Page’s poem can be seen as a kind of “construction of coherence” that conceals the artificiality of the state the girls reach after they are caught “on the bright hooks of their sex” (30). A developmental narrative is an especially efficient “construction of coherence” as it implies that all that comes before the girls’ final state is simply part of a long coherent process. Butler describes how when gender and sex are shown to diverge “that regulatory ideal is exposed as a norm and a fiction that disguises itself as a developmental law regulating the sexual field that it purports to describe.”12 In “Young Girls,” the evolutionary narrative is a kind of “regulatory ideal” that ensures the creation of fixed gender identities by passing itself off as a natural “developmental law.” This “regulatory ideal” enforces the creation of traditional female identities even as it claims to simply describe a natural developmental process. Through her language of artificiality, Page draws attention to the way the evolutionary narrative imposes a false “coherence” on the girls’ final female identities. Even as she exposes the artificiality of the girls’ final female identities, Page’s poem draws attention to the way that language itself is a tool that justifies and perpetuates societal control. In her poem, Page describes the girls’ “limbo of gender” in language associated with animals. The speaker’s comparison of the girls to “porpoises” (8) works to justify the harsh and controlling metaphors of “reel[ing] them in on a line of words / or land[ing] them neatly in a net” (21-22). Moreover, by suggesting that before the girls’ gender identities are solidified, the

girls’ fluid identities are somehow less human, the poem’s language suggests that girls need to be controlled or guided by the more fully human adults. The language of animality works like the “teacher” (17) and the “mothers’ trim/ shapes” (3-4) to both control the girls and to present the girls as needing to be disciplined. Furthermore, by describing the young girls’ “female cries” (20) the poem suggests that in their state of limbo the girls’ efforts at communication are nonverbal and unintelligible. This further naturalizes and justifies the speaker’s desire to “reel them in on a line of words” (21). By using the language of animality, in a poem interested in societal control of gender identity, Page highlights the way language and metaphor can easily be used to justify the act of limiting girls’ freedom and controlling their developments. Another way that the poem’s language works to justify the societal control of the young girls is by associating emerging female sexuality with hurt. Page’s language suggests that society teaches girls that their emerging sexuality makes them vulnerable and in need of help and supervision. In their book, The Madwoman in the Attic, Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar suggest that girls are taught by society that being female means to be sickly. They state that “a young girl is likely to experience her education in docility, subservience, selflessness as in some sense sickening.”13 In this poem where young girls are being educated and disciplined by society, many of the signs of the girls’ burgeoning sexuality are associated with the language of sickness. For example, the speaker associates

female sexuality with being injured when she describes “their little breasts like wounds beneath their clothes” (15). Moreover, when the speaker states that too much weeping in them and unfamiliar blood / has set them perilously afloat” (25), the speaker defines the weeping as unhealthy by saying it is “too much” and describes the process of menstruation as dangerous or “perilous.” By constructing femaleness as inherently “perilous”, society understands it as something to be fixed or controlled or regulated. The language of sickness suggests that unless the girls are disciplined until they accept traditional gender roles and “earth becomes home” (31), they will be unable to function in society because “on the dry ground they goggle, founder, flap” (23). The poem’s language of hurt associated with female-ness justifies the institutional intervention in the young girls’ lives. P.K. Page’s poem “Young Girls” initially seems to present the girls maturation as a linear, developmental process that creates coherent female identities and makes earth “their natural element” (31). Page’s language, however, and her creation of a space of “gender limbo” in the girls’ adolescence undermines the straightforward developmental narrative and suggests that the girls’ final identities are not natural but socially constructed. Page’s poem reveals the developmental narrative that culminates in a gender identity defined by a sexed body as a regulatory, prescriptive framework rather than an objective description of reality. Page’s language itself, through associating femininity with the diction of pain and animality, reveals

the way language and metaphor can participate in justifying the repressive institutional control that the schools enforce over the young girls. Page’s poem taps into the complexity behind the ways society discusses young girls’ development into women. By revealing the artificiality of the poem’s surface developmental narrative in language that itself is complicit with restrictive societal forces, Page underlines the near impossibility of discussing gender without drawing on language that is itself dependent on deeply entrenched societal inequalities.

Notes P.K. Page, “Young Girls,” in The Glass Air: Selected Poems (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1985), 12. 1

All subsequent in-text citations refer to the lines of the poem, and are from this source. Michel Foucault, “Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison,” in The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, ed. Vincent B. Leitch (London: Norton & Company, 2010), 1491. 3 Ibid., 4 Ibid., 1492. 5 Ibid., 1496. 6 Ibid., 1490. 7 Ibid., 1501. 8 Myra Jehlen, “Gender,” in Critical Terms for Literary Study, ed. Frank Lentricchia and Thomas McLaughlin (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 266. 9 Ibid., 265. 10 Judith Butler, “Gender Trouble,” in The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, ed. Vincent B. Leitch (London: Norton & Company, 2010), 2548. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid. 13 Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, “The Madwoman in the Attic,” in The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, ed. Vincent B. Leitch (London: Norton & Company, 2010), 1933. 2

Sitter Berthe Morisot and Painter Edouard Manet: Gender Inequalities in 19th Century Impressionism

Jewel Seo

Eduard Manetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s painting The Balcony (figure 1) exhibited at the French Salon in 1869 depicts four figures that have been identified as close acquaintances and friends of Manet. The figure in the forefront on the left is the painter Berthe Morisot, the center male figure is the painter Jean Baptiste Antoine Guillemet, on the right is the violinist Fanny Clause, and the little boy in the background is speculated to be Manetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s illegitimate son Leon Leenhoff. Of these four figures, there is a particular emphasis placed Manetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s depiction of Morisot. Her facial features are clearly articulated with distinct outlines that define her jaw line, nose and her eyes. The other two

figures in the light, Jean Baptiste Antoine Guillemet and Fanny Clause, are depicted with facial features that are outlined in softer lines and around their eyes the paint appears as if it has been smudged. Morisot is also positioned leaning in the railing in the foreground, while the other figures behind her are progressively receding into the dark interior space. The particular attention placed on Morisot in this painting is replicated in ten others, indicating that Manet had requested a large dedication of time from Morisot as his sitter. Despite the laborious sitter role that Morisot occupied for Manet as well as the fact that she was a painter

herself exhibited at the French Salon, Manet does not appear in Morisot’s painting once. This can be attested to the fact that as a young bourgeois woman in nineteenthcentury Paris, it would have been unacceptable for her to produce a representation of male figures, especially like Manet, who were married.2 The following paragraphs will examine how the social context of nineteenth century Paris only catered to a one-way painter and sitter relationship between these two equally well established artists. Berthe Morisot was one of the original members of the Impressionist group and she exhibited with them every year from 1874 except for the 1878 exhibit when her daughter was born.3 She regularly attended Manet’s Thursday evening soirees where the group met and talked with each other and critics, and even participated in their group auction at the Hotel Drout in 1875.4 This evidence indicates that contemporary critics attested and celebrated Morisot’s skill as a painter. A review from the newspaper La Revue Politique et Litteraire published on April 8, 1876 stated that “Berthe Morisot was born with a real painter’s talent.”5 However, despite her credibility as a painter, her gender still singled her out from her fellow male artists. Many Impressionists and their friends frequently modeled for each other, interchanging their roles as painter and sitter.6 But Morisot was limited to only one side of the canvas as a sitter due to her female gender. It was seen as inappropriate for young unmarried

Figure 1. Eduard Manet, The Balcony, 1868-1869, oil on canvas, 170 x 124.5 cm, Paris, Musee d’Orsay.

women like Morisot, even with her successful artistic status, to have a married man of Manet’s class sit for her to paint for hours.7 There is no doubt that even though she was an active member within the Impressionist group, there was still a demarcation that could be erased due to the normative expectations from the society towards the appropriate activities affiliated with each gender. To further deconstruct how social context impacted artistic production, it is necessary to consider how Manet stopped painting Morisot once she got married to his brother Eugene in 1874.8 Morisot appears more than any other subject in Manet’s paintings, including his wife and his other frequently used model Victorine Meurent.9 Additionally, seven of the portraits of Morisot

were listed in Manet’s estate inventory at his death in 1883.10 Her frequent appearance illustrates that Morisot was an accessible model who Manet was fond to depict. After a heavily concentrated period of painting her, it seems to be that the only concrete factor that might have contributed to this sudden stop is Morisot’s marriage. Morisot’s change in status no longer made it socially acceptable for Manet to spend long hours painting non-commissioned portraits of a married woman of her bourgeois class. Another factor to consider in how social context influenced Manet’s artistic production is how he decided to portray Morisot in his paintings. In all of the eleven known representations of Morisot, she is never depicted in the act of painting. Instead, she is often sitting down in a static position in clothing that indicates her bourgeois status – well-fitted dresses, jewelry, hats, fur, and fans. She is usually staring back at the viewers or out at the world, as seen in the painting The Balcony. As she was not an unknown figure in the art world, her identity would have been affiliated with Manet’s depictions. Yet by removing her agency as an active painter, the paintings are more of a reflection of Manet than Morisot. Upon seeing this painting exhibited at the Salon, Morisot wrote to her sister Edma, “I am more strange than ugly.”11 The fact that she felt that it was a strange depiction of herself indicates how this painting was truly an image projecting the way Manet wanted to depict her. In Manet’s paintings, he is the artist in control and Morisot is stripped of her title as a painter and instead

becomes merely a bourgeois sitter. Art historian Griselda Pollock, in her work “Modernity and the Spaces of Femininity,” asks viewers to recognize the genderspecific conditions of paintings’ existence by imagining a female spectator and a female producer of paintings.12 If historians apply Pollock’s question to how Morisot might have depicted Manet, they can question whether she would have depicted Manet as completely alienated from his defined role as a painter. It is clear that Manet’s painting The Balcony along with his series of representations of Morisot was made possible because of Manet’s class and gender as a prominent male artist. It can also be suggested that these paintings might not have existed if Morisot and Manet had met when she was already married. Morisot’s status as an unmarried bourgeois woman appropriated Manet to use her frequently as his

Figure 2, Berthe Morisot, On the Balcony, 1871-2, oil on canvas, Private Collection.

subject without being frowned upon by the society. It was the gender specific social context of nineteenth-century Paris that influenced the outcome of these two artists’ productions. Perhaps, if the social context had differed, Morisot’s painting Woman and Child on the Balcony (figure 2) would have depicted an image of Manet and her fellow male Impressionist painters on the balcony looking out at the world as Morisot is captured in Manet’s painting The Balcony.

Notes “Eduard Manet The Balcony,” Musee d’Orsay, accessed November 30, 2013, http://www.musee-orsay. fr/en/collections/works-in-focus/ painting/commentaire_id/thebalcony-7199.html?tx_commentaire_ pi1%5BpidLi%5D=509&tx_commentaire_ pi1%5Bfrom%5D=841&cHash=ed0bf50 b6e. 2 Whitney Chadwick, Women, Art, and Society (New York: Thames and Hudson, 1990), 214. 3 Ibid., 216. 4 Ibid. 5 Joel Isaacson, “The Painters Called Impressionists,” in The New Painting (Washington: University of Washington Press, 1986), 372-93. 6 Marni R. Kessler, “Unmasking Manet’s Morisot,” 473. 7 Ibid. 8 Ibid. 9 Ibid. 10 Ibid. 11 Berthe Morisot, The Correspondence of Berthe Morisot, with her family and her friends: Manet, Puvis de Chavannes, Degas, Monet, Renoir, and Mallarmé (London: Lund, Humphries, 1957), 39. 12 Griselda Pollock, “Modernity and the Spaces of Feminity,” 246. 1

Finding Women’s Agency: Beauty Pageants, the ‘Indian Taliban,’ and Why Women Participate

Geneviève Boulay

Skin lightening. Botox. Limiting women’s roles to mothers and wives. Barring women from pursuing economic independence. Popular and academic feminist discourses have done their job of critiquing these existing trends, ideas and practices while simultaneously showing how they harm women individually and as a group. This paper contends that feminists must ask an important question: why would women actively involve themselves in activities and movements that they recognize to be potentially limiting or harmful to their gender? Using the case studies explored in the 2012 film The World Before Her this paper will depart from patronizing women as

naive victims in order to show how Indian women who participate in Miss India pageant and the Durgha Vahini do so with a large degree of agency and a consciousness of the concessions they are making. Through arguments grounded in the voices of the women explored in the film, this paper seeks to let the subaltern theorize for herself why she has chosen to participate in the beauty industry or the Hindu fundamentalism movement.

Context The Indian postcolonial state has been permanently marked simultaneously by anxieties to

modernize as well as anxieties to return to a constructed traditionalized golden age. Colonialism and globalization have changed India not only by generating the importation of Western norms of beauty and ways of being, but also by creating a political and cultural backlash from the Hindu nationalism movement through a call for traditionalism. One thing that has not changed is the status of women, though the forms and the processes by which this status is perpetuated have shifted. The female disadvantage in India takes many forms including gendered violence, a widespread rape culture, and a cultural valuation of men over women as demonstrated in the high number of “missing women” due to sex-selective abortions and female infanticide.1 The beauty industry has been critiqued by feminists for contributing to this patriarchal context while the Hindu right-wing organization Vishva Hindu Parishad, of which the Durgha Vahini is the women’s wing, has contributed through acts of patriarchal terror, including beatings of women found drinking at bars or in the company of men for “defiling Hindu culture.”2 India can be treated as a case study of how women actors within a patriarchal context consciously decide to participate in institutions participating in their continued subordination.

Theoretical Perspectives This argument relies on a feminist standpoint theory which recognizes that “knowledge is socially situated,” and research about power and marginalized groups

should begin from the voices of those marginalized people, as they are “socially situated in ways that make it more pos-sible for them to be aware of things and ask questions than it is for the non-marginalized.”3 Simi-larly, the postcolonial methodological strategy of inclusion deliberately seeks out those perspec-tives that have been excluded from traditional history and theorizations in order to create new understandings of history and lived experiences. Leela Gandhi’s proposal for postcolonial femi-nists to combine the messages of two theoretical perspectives to work “against the aggressive myth of both imperial and nationalist masculinity” , a project to which this paper contributes by letting the voice of the subaltern woman be the primary block for theorization about women’s agency and options in the postcolonial state of India.4

Discussion The film The World Before Her juxtaposes the stories of young Indian women involved in the Miss India beauty pageant alongside young women involved in the annual camp run by the Durgha Vahini, the women’s wing of the militant Hindu fundamentalist movement. The film frames two of the ways the postcolonial Indian state has been marked by twin anxieties, one being to modernize and keep up with a rapidly changing world, and the other, to return to the perceived golden age. The film illustrates how these anxieties are battled out over women’s bodies in patriarchal debates over beauty, modesty, and national pride. Following the presented stories of nineteen-year-old Ruhi Singh and

twenty-four year old Prachi Trivedi can help us to answer the question of why women would consciously insert themselves in the middle of this battle. As Ruhi, Prachi and their peers show us, women may wish to participate in these seemingly oppressive institutions for many reasons. First of all, participation offers them an escape from their own material reality. Secondly, the beauty industry and the Hindu nationalist movement may help them gain status in a context where they have no power. Finally, these women may choose to participate because it enriches their lives with meaning and aspiration. Women may choose to participate in patriarchal institutions given that they offer an es-cape from their own material reality. For some young women, Miss India and the larger fashion industry are platforms from which they can leave their hometowns where there are limited op-portunities for success. The film opens with a subtitle: “In India, few avenues offer women finan-cial stability and equality with men. The beauty business is one of them.”5 This statement is highly questionable considering the amount of feminist scholarship critiquing the beauty industry and also considering how another contestant, Ankita Shorey, illustrates disillusionment with her utterance “you want to be successful, and you don’t realize eventually it’s at the cost of your dig-nity and morals.”6 However, it is true that for some women in India and elsewhere, the industry is one way for women to gain economic and personal independence. Miss India is a way for Ruhi to get out of her town and

gain economic independence and a career, as winning the contest “means instant stardom, a lucrative career path and, for some girls, freedom from the constraints of a patriarchal society.”7 This is further highlighted in how even her parents support her in the industry as a way of providing their daughter with a better life, as opposed to pushing her to pursue other avenues, such as marriage. While Ruhi seeks to leave her town and sees Miss India as her way out, Prachi does not envision herself taking on a traditional role as wife and mother. Instead, she sees the Hindu na-tionalist movement as an alternative path. Prachi finds herself in a world where she is told that “girls should be married by age eighteen because by age twenty-five they become so strongwilling.” Twenty-four-year-old Prachi states in the film that “this is the age […], if [she’s] stubborn now, nobody can stop” her; even in her platform of preaching hearth and home for women, this movement is a way for Prachi to get out of the marriage trap to which she does not subscribe. Paradoxically, the traditional nationalist movement idealized women’s place in the home, regard-ing it as the “principal site for expressing the spiritual quality of the national culture.”8 Prachi’s father himself says that “the obligation of girls is something that God designed” and “a woman is complete only after becoming a mother.”9 Though Prachi is quick to point out that her father has let her live in a context where female infanticide is common, he beats her and should she get mar-ried to an abusive husband, “so be it;” she is self-aware enough to notice that

entering a marriage may be more dangerous for her since she cannot count on her family for support.10 Similarly, the annual camp of the Durgha Vahini camp teaches young girls what it means to be a good Hindu woman through lectures and physical combat training, teaching them to erase from their mind the thoughts of having a career. However, Prachi herself says that her life “is not to get married, to produce children,” as she sees herself divinely intended for greater things by devoting her life to the fundamentalist movement.11 Though the movement itself emphasizes women’s roles as wives and mothers, Prachi finds an alternative to this role and her own material reality in her involvement with the fundamentalist movement. Women may also actively express their agency by participating in organizations that offer them leadership opportunities and positions of relative power. This is best illustrated through Prachi’s own words: “everyone likes when someone is scared of them, I like commanding the girls.” For women who feel powerless and have limited control of their own lives, they may choose to participate in militant camps, beauty contests, or even blatant hate speech for how it gives them a sense of control. Prachi herself may enjoy commanding pre-teen girls at the Durga Vahini camp, as even though the camp teaches that she must be married as soon as possible, her own superiority is affirmed daily through military-style commands and respect. While Prachi’s father is insistent upon eminent subservience to a future husband,

Prachi acts out and regains a sense of agency not by control of her diet, but through loyal dedication to the Durgha Vahini movement and their annual camps, through which she can exercise some form of control at the expense of these adolescent girls. These girls themselves can also find relative power in the nationalist construction of citi-zenship at the expense of others. The movement simultaneously gives them a sense of strength and dominance in their “fight against Islam, Christianity and Western influence by any means necessary.”12 The Indian government has recognized these camps for promoting terrorism and Islamophobia among other forms of racism and is trying to ban them, but for these girls like Prachi who find themselves at a gendered disadvantage, they have a lot to gain by marking others as "Others" to gain status for themselves. By conceptualizing Miss Indian and its contestants as a dishonoring “attack on Hindu culture” and promoting the West as culturally inferior, it offers women in the movement symbolic status of “cultural superiority” to westernized Indian women.13 Discourses of racial, religious and cultural superiority at the expense of "Others" effectively afford these young girls a sense of power when they themselves are typically afforded a second-class citizenship. In telling young girls that in their Hindu tradition “all gods have weapons” and giving them the tools to physically exert power and dominance over other human beings through combat or weapons, this discourse sends a message of power to young girls who are used to hearing that they

are powerless. For the young girl who said that she was “very proud of having no Muslim friends,” she is certainly internalizing those lingering nationalist Islamophobic anxieties, but she is also internalizing a message about how adhering to this movement’s ideals can give her status and relative power.14 The portrayal of the beauty industry through the words of pageant officials also reveals how Miss India can be considered a source of empowerment for young women. Just as the na-tionalist movement offers women a chance to belong to an exclusive group, beauty pageants are a way for women to feel superior to their sisters and peers who do not fit into idealized forms of beauty. The Miss India pageant further makes these girls feel superior and more attractive than their peers, as it systemically “polishes” the contestants like “a little factory,” recreating them in to modern Indian women.15 The pageant perpetuates not only beauty norms but creates new conditions for the body and a new form of citizenship, making contestants feel as if they have risen above their traditional sisters in this “new” and “very competitive” world.16 The pageant works like “a little factory, polished like a diamond to the best you can be polished to... a modern, Indian woman.”17 This new Indian woman is characterized by still inherently being Indian at her core, as she is “not becoming an American because [she wears] jeans” just as there is not “an Indianization happening in America” because of the rise in popularity of yoga.18 The beauty pageants place her firmly in

the modern of two Indians, which is seen as superior to the “old” India. Though these girls competing in Miss India may not be able to make big decisions in their lives and live in a context where they are valued for their humanity, some girls may choose to participate in pageants for the sense of superiority, power and self-esteem it affords, as well as access to the status of “modern” Indian woman. Certainly the feminist, anti-racist, and postcolonial literature has provided ample critique for beauty norms, the fashion industry, Islamophobia and nationalists. However, it is important to also note that women are not being completely brainwashed, and they do choose to participate in these institutions with an agency of self-awareness. Finally, women may exercise their agency by participating in pageants and fundamental-ist movements because it gives them meaning and something to aspire to. While neither avenue may be truly empowering, we can better understand these patriarchal institutions and the women who choose to participate in them when we employ Henry Morgentaler’s famous “trust women” slogan. Women and girls are human beings with rights and intellectual capacities inherent to that reality, and we cannot assume that they move through life without consciousness or consideration for the implications of their decisions; rather, we must stop and ask women themselves why they choose these paths. For Pooja Chopra, the 2009 Miss India, the contest was and is not only about external beauty, but also “a platform,” a way to go from “person to personality;” to give her identity “a voice” and offers

an alternative to the traditional life path. Without such options and choices, women lose their identity and become “someone who can always be oppressed.”19 For Prachi too, even in the context of her fundamentalist father telling her she must get married, as well as the movement telling that her careers are unnecessary for women, she says that “the movement is life” for her; her life is not “to get married, to produce children.”20 While extreme, to the extent she would inflict violence upon herself or others for its sake, her passion for the movement brings meaning to her life.

Conclusion The film The World Before Her is a case study that shows how Indian women who partici-pate in Miss India pageant and the Durga Vahini camps participate in these events with full awareness and agency. As the official website reads, Prachi and Ruhi “may represent opposing extremes,” but “in their hearts they share a common dream: to help shape the future of India as she meets the world before her.”21 For Prachi and Ruhi, who must live in the world in which they find themselves, Miss India and Durgha Vahiti may seem like attractive alternatives, and we cannot infantilize women for making their own decisions. Rather, we must make sure that “the faces and voices of India’s young women remain front stage centre.”22

Notes UN Human Development Indicators; Saheri’s Choice; Sen. 2 The World Before Her, directed by Nisha Pahuja (2012), DVD. 3 “Feminist Standpoint Theory,” The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http:// www.iep.utm.edu/fem-stan/. 4 Leela Ganhdi, “Postcolonialism and Feminism,” in Postcolonial Theory: A Critical Introduction (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998), 98. 5 The World Before Her. 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid. 8 Pattha Chatterjee, “The Nationalist Resolution of the Women’s Question,” Recasting Women: Essays in Indian Colonial History, eds. K. Sangrari and S. Vaid (New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1990), 243. 9 The World Before Her. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid; Chatterjee, 245. 14 The World Before Her. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid. 19 Ibid. 20 Ibid. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 1

The Doors of Equality In India, crimes against women (including female infanticide and dowryrelated violence), low employment, and literacy rates have been problems since it won independence in 1947. The woman here sits before â&#x20AC;&#x153;unflinching doors / Of equality / Well-locked / By the nervous hands of / A Society.â&#x20AC;?

Suvij Sudershan

Kumari Worship: Liberation or Oppression?

Kiray Jones-Mollerup

The tradition of worshipping the goddess in the form of young girls is known as Kumari, and is most popular in Nepal.! The term â&#x20AC;&#x153;Kumariâ&#x20AC;? refers to a young girl who is viewed as the living incarnation of the goddess, and is worshipped as such. The Kumari, representing the goddess in living form, is held first and foremost to an extreme set of standards to maintain her purity. This fact is exemplified by the controversial stripping of the Kumariâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s title after she visited the United States to view the film Living Goddess in 2007, although her title was later reinstated. While the association of this human girl with the goddess suggests a narrowing of the gap between the goddess

and women in the Hindu tradition, the contradiction between her dual roles as pure human and goddessreincarnate arguably serves to emphasize the discrepancy between the goddess and women in the Hindu tradition. This paper will argue that ultimately Kumari worship only serves to further strengthen the rigid gender structure for Hindu women, as even the Kumari herself is not afforded the same freedom that has traditionally been granted to the goddess. Thus, a further divide is created between women and the goddess.

Tradition of the Kumari The term Kumari is derived from the Sanskrit word “Kaumarya,” meaning virgin. The Kumari is an integral part of Durga puja, and is worshipped as the human incarnation of the goddess. Kumari worship is prominent in the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal.2 Several stories as to the origin of Kumari worship are in circulation. One such legend states that Kumari worship began as early as 1560, when King Trailokya Malla forfeited his right to see Durga in person after making sexual advances toward her human form, Taleju.3 Feeling remorse, the King dreamt of Taleju. Taleju told him in the dream that every year, she would appear as a virgin girl from the Sakya caste and grant him a boon of protection if he worshipped her as the goddess. Since then, Kumari worship has been a large part of Nepalese culture. It is typically thought that Taleju resides within the Kumari after her selection. Taleju is identified as the “fierce emanation of Durga.”4 Kumari are selected from the Sakya caste, and at any given point there are eleven Kumari; the standards applied to all Kumari are quite similar, although the Royal Kumari typically has the strictest set of rules she must adhere to.5 In light of this fact, this paper will focus on the Royal Kumari as an example of all Kumaris. The process for selecting the Kumari includes examination of physical appearance, horoscope, and courage.6 The Kumari must exhibit thirty-two perfections expected of female deities, including various physical traits such as forty teeth.7

However, due to the young age of the potential Kumaris (many are as young as four years old, and some are younger), a truncated list is used. The primary characteristic necessary is perfect health, and no history of serious illness. After the appropriate Kumari candidate has been selected, a priest performs a ritual to make room for the goddess within her.8 He gradually removes her impurities through a combination of mantra and symbolic use of a bundle of plants, and as each impurity is removed, the spirit of the goddess enters into her. After this ritual is completed, she is given the hairstyle, jewelry, and third eye of the Kumari. She is then allowed to sit upon her throne, and to hold the sword of Taleju. She is now officially regarded as the Kumari, and will be regarded as such until she first menstruates, assuming no extenuating circumstances arise.9 Identifying her with Taleju or Durga gives her an important function as the living embodiment of sakti.10 Her role is especially important in ritual puja such as Indra Jatra, and she is expected to grant her blessing to the president (formerly to the king of Nepal) after he offers her worship and kisses her feet.11

The Goddess The goddess is representative of sakti, or “power,” in Hinduism. In light of this, the goddess becomes a key element of Hindu religious power. Not only existing as an independent entity, but also existing within gods as their own power, the goddess becomes a requirement for all divine action. The goddess can be represented in many forms,

but in the context of this paper she will be addressed predominantly in her form as Durga. Durga is one of very few goddesses without a consort, and because of this is seen to “embody absolute sakti.”12 The goddess is directly linked to the idea of femininity as independent power. Although the goddess is sometimes shown as a consort to a god, she is also clearly labeled as an independent entity.13 Stephanie Tawa Lama directly states that the “dominant image of authority… has always been feminine.”14 Within various scriptures, the goddess is seen as a commanding being; in light of this, India as a country is actually personified as Bharat Mata, or “Mother India.”15 Thus, the goddess is the most visible expression of female power in Hinduism; as a female deity, she is glorified in her role as mother of all and as the fundamental power that Hindu gods draw their strength from. Although this recognition of the deity as a direct link to human women has not reached its peak as of yet, the goddess exists as a tangible link between femininity and power. Specifically addressing Durga (of whom Taleju is a form), it is important to note that she directly arose from the anger and tejas of the gods when they discovered that they were unable to slay the demon Mahisasura.16 Although ultimately she is brought into being by the volition of the male deities, she is created to perform actions which they are unable to; namely, to slay Mahisasura. This gives her power unparalleled, emphasizing the role of feminine sakti in giving the gods power.

Hindu Gender Structure: Women The duties of women can best be summarized in Tryambakayajvan’s Stridharmapaddhati.17 Written in the eighteenth century, this text exemplifies the strict gender roles applied to Hindu women. Drawing from religious texts, Tryambakayajvan divides his text into five categories, including an introduction, a list of daily duties for Hindu wives, an essay extolling the nature of women, a section on duties applicable to all women, and a final miscellaneous section that includes various stories. Ultimately the most important duty that arises from the Stridharmapaddhati is servitude to one’s husband. This is emphasized by Tryambakayajvan’s conception of the three kinds of devoted wives.18 The first, and ideal, wife is the one who dies prior to her husband and awaits him in heaven. The second wife is the one who commits sati and burns herself on her husband’s funeral pyre rather than face life without him. The third devoted wife is the one who remains alive as a widow to care for her remaining family until she dies naturally and then joins her husband in heaven. This emphasis on the three devotional wives highlights the negative concept of woman as a stand-alone entity. According to Tryambakayajvan, it is only possible to alleviate the negativity of womanhood by becoming the perfect wife. In light of the limiting role of women as wives, it becomes clear that mortal women are held to very different standards than the

goddess.19 Whereas the goddess is revered as the driving power behind all deities, the universal mother, and the protector of the world, human women are seen as supporting characters for male dominated stories.20

Standards of Purity for the Kumari The Kumari infallibly comes from the Sakya caste of Buddhists in Nepal. As mentioned above, the Kumari must meet the criteria for feminine perfection. Great emphasis is placed on the quality of her skin and the proportions of her body. She also must be premenstrual and have lost no teeth. Beyond her physical appearance, her horoscope also must be auspicious, not only for her, but also in relation to the king.21 Perhaps most interestingly, though, is the criteria of courage. Allen reports that the Kumari candidate’s courage is tested in the following manner: on the eighth evening of the festival of Dasain, a sacrifice is made of eight buffaloes in a courtyard near the Taleju temple. Shortly thereafter, fiftyfour additional buffaloes and fiftyfour goats are slain. The heads of the slaughtered animals are placed throughout the courtyard around Taleju’s temple, and candles are lit. The Kumari candidate is then brought to the courtyard; she is required to walk around the courtyard until she reaches the shrine to Taleju, where she must enter. She must do so with a calm composure; if she expresses fear, she is deemed unsuitable for the role of Kumari, and a new candidate is selected. In addition to menstruation, there

are various other instances in which a Kumari may inadvertently renounce her position.22 With the loss of blood (as in through menstruation), it is thought that the goddess is leaving the Kumari’s body. Thus, if she loses blood in other ways, it is also thought that the goddess has left her body. Additionally, serious illnesses are cause for the revocation of a Kumari’s title. An interesting final cause for the removal of a Kumari is highlighted in the 2007 visit of the presiding Kumari to America.23 The Kumari at the time, Kumari Sajani Sakya, visited the USA to view and promote the documentary Living Goddess about the tradition of Kumari worship. This was, however, a direct violation of tradition, as typically the Kumari is expected to stay within her country in order to maintain her purity. In light of this, she was immediately stripped of her title due to tainted purity. Immediately, overwhelming public outcry against this decision arose. In light of this, the elders in Kathmandu released a second statement, saying that Kumari Sajani would instead go through a cleansing ritual to absolve her of her sins, thus allowing her to maintain her title.24 The Kumari is also required to live away from her family in an official residence built for use by the Kumari.25 This serves to help maintain her purity. It is expected that the Kumari remains in this building, excluding when she is allowed to attend public festivals. She is washed, fed, and dressed by a family of caretakers; through their supervision, information is collected regarding her behaviour. If she begins to exhibit disruptive

behaviours, she will likely be dismissed from her role. These strict standards for purity arguably go beyond the standards to which women are expected to adhere, thus causing an immediate contradiction. While parallels do exist between the standards applied to the Kumari and the standards applied to other women, the Kumari is arguably held to even stricter standards. For example, women are expected to live respectable lives in their homes until they are married. This same standard applies to the Kumari, but is intensified; not only is she expected to live in her home, but she is expected to separate herself from her family and rarely leave her abode. If her behaviour violates any of the rules in place for her, she will entirely lose her role as the goddess’s incarnation. The contrast between the standards of the Kumari, the goddess, and mortal women appears to only deepen the trench separating human women from the divine.

Furthering the Divide As Miho Ishii states, “it follows [from accepting the Kumari as the goddess herself] that it is not adequate to interpret her simply as an index through which a divine prototype is inferred.”26 In other words, by directly associating her with Taleju or Durga, it is implied that she literally becomes the goddess. The standards to which she is held, however, are incongruous to the standards that a goddess would be held to. It is suggested that by placing the power of the goddess in a virgin girl, sexual maturity is conveyed

as a danger.27 Allen argues that the selection of a young virgin girl directly serves to juxtapose the unparalleled power of the goddess with the restrictions placed upon mortal women. Chiara Letizia’s paper “Shaping Secularism in Nepal” draws significant attention to a variety of issues surrounding the incompatibility of Kumari, goddess, and human standards. Recently, various human rights activists have directed their attention toward the Kumari, stating that it is a direct violation of child rights. As can be seen through the emphasis on the rigid maintenance of the Kumari’s purity, the standards applied to her are much stricter than standards applied to any other figurehead within Nepal.28 This plight was brought to the court system in Nepal; after much deliberation, however, it was determined that the Kumari tradition was an integral part of the Newar culture and did not violate human rights. However, it was determined that various past Kumaris have, unfortunately, been deprived of their fundamental rights. In light of this, a committee was created to study how Kumaris’ rights can be promoted. This deprivation of fundamental rights highlights the discrepancy between the standards to which the Kumari are held and the standards applied to other women. Although the tradition of Kumari worship was not labeled as discriminatory, it is important to address the possibility of reconceptualising Kumari worship to account for greater congruency between the standards applied to women, the goddess, and the Kumari.29

While the Kumari is viewed as the living reincarnation of the goddess, it is unquestionably clear that she is held to unique standards. As the Kumari is selected when she is quite young (as early as two years old), a standard of feminine subjugation is immediately instilled in the Kumari. The most obvious aspect of this is the fact that selection is largely based in physical appearance; though the Kumari is still just a child, she is expected to have various characteristics in congruence with the goddess. It is important to note that the goddess is typically portrayed as a grown woman, and thus it is somewhat contradictory to suppose that a young Kumari could have the stature and attributes required of the goddess.30 It is important to take a moment to note positive progress that has been made surrounding the Kumari. In 2008, Nepal’s Supreme Court ruled that the Kumari should be able to go to school.31 The thencurrent Kumari immediately began school. Although this is substantive progress, it is still important to note that the court only chose to address restrictions on education as opposed to a variety of other restrictions more directly related to maintaining the Kumari’s purity. Issues also exist surrounding the fate of ex-Kumaris.32 A myth exists that it is bad luck for a man to marry an ex-Kumari. This is potentially disastrous for ex-Kumaris, as the Stridharmapaddhati explicitly states that a woman’s ultimate goal and success in life is found when she takes on the role of wife. Here lays a huge discrepancy between the Kumari, the goddess, and

human women. While a goddess is seen as empowered on her own (i.e. she does not need a consort to have power and clout), a woman is seen in a positive light only when she becomes a wife. Thus, ex-Kumaris find themselves in a double bind; they may struggle to find a husband once they are no longer Kumaris, but because they are no longer associated with the goddess, they will lack the power of being the living embodiment of sakti. In addition to this, exKumaris are cited as saying that when they are returned to their families they have no conception of normal life, or how they are now expected to behave outside of their role as Kumari.33 In light of this, it is important to ensure that future Kumaris are given instruction in living a “normal” life before being returned to their families so as to avoid remaining trapped in the role of ex-Kumari, which is portrayed negatively in society. One interpretation of the strict rules surrounding the Kumari is an attempt to gain metaphorical control over the goddess. In a society that is largely patriarchal, it is interesting to note that the driving divine power is female.34 As it is quite obviously a challenge to directly restrain the goddess, to instead apply this restraint upon the Kumari is more feasible. Although the goddess will always remain an inherently powerful aspect of the Hindu tradition, imposing a strict set of rules over her worshippers and living embodiment can maintain an unequal power balance between males and females. It is interesting to note that a similar phenomenon occurs in the attempt to exert control over women

involved in Sakta Possession once their power reaches a particular level or temporal duration.35 The exclusivity of Kumari worship also poses an issue; very few girls may serve as Kumari at any given time, which adds a layer of elitism to the position.36 Not every girl is eligible to be selected as a Kumari; she must fit a very select set of requirements, and usually only comes from the Sakya lineage. This exclusivity marginalizes many women who come from different lineages or do not live up to the expectations for a Kumari.

the divine goddess. The Kumari herself is expected to maintain a level of purity beyond that of an average human girl, and risks social disgrace if she deviates from the strictly prescribed set of traditional norms.

A final point to illustrate the patriarchal basis of the institution of the Kumari is that the Kumari appears to have come into being only to provide another method of communication between the king and the goddess. She does not exist as a symbol of empowerment or communication for all women, although many women do choose to worship her now.37 Talejuâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s presence in the form of the Kumari exists mainly to bless the king and grant a boon of protection to him.38 Samuel Geoffrey suggests that the choice of a young girl to embody this formidable goddess is entirely intentional as it serves to minimize the divine power of the feminine. Beyond this, he also highlights that the Kumari also embodies the Newar peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s submission to the Nepalese king. While on the surface the Kumari does appear to be a pro-feminist initiative, directly involving a human female in the worship of the goddess, the strict set of standards that she is expected to adhere to serves to further the divide between human women and

Notes Michael R. Allen, “Kumari or ‘Virgin’ Worship in Kathmandu Valley,” Contributions to Indian Sociology 10 (1976): 295. 2 Ibid., 295. 3 Ibid., 302. 4 Jeffrey Lidke, The Goddess Within and Beyond the Three Cities: Śākta Tantra and the Paradox of Power in Nepāla-Mandala (Santa Barbara: University of California Press, 2000), 87. 5 Allen, 300. 6 Ibid., 306. 7 Ibid., 305. 8 Miho Ishii, “Acting With Things: SelfPoiesis, Actuality, and Contingency in the Formation of Divine Words,” HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 2, no. 2 (2012): 377. 9 Allen, 308. 10 Lidke, 88. 11 Samuel Geoffrey, “The Effectiveness of Goddesses, or, How Ritual Works,” Anthropological Forum: A Journal of Social Anthropology and Comparative Sociology 11, no. 1 (2001): 84. 12 Stéphanie Tawa Lama, “The Hindu Goddess and Women’s Political Representation in South Asia: Symbolic Resource or Feminine Mystique?” International Review of Sociology 11, no. 1 (2001): 5. 13 Ibid., 8. 14 Ibid., 15. 15 Suruchi Thapar-Bjorkert and Louise Ryan, “Mother India/Mother Ireland: Comparative Gendered Dialogues of Colonialism and Nationalism in the Early 20th Century,” Women’s Studies International Forum 25, no. 3 (2002): 301. 16 June McDaniel, Offering Flowers, Feeding Skulls: Popular Goddess Worship in West Bengal (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 214. 17 Julia Leslie, Roles and Rituals for Hindu Women, (India: Motilal Banarsidass Publishing, 1992), 183. 18 Ibid., 188. 19 Lama, 11. 20 Ibid., 6. 21 Allen, 306. 22 Ibid., 308. 1

“‘Goddess’ Sacked for Visiting US,” BBC News, 3 July 2007, accessed on 14 April 2013, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/ south_asia/6264014.stm. 24 “Nepalese ‘Goddess’ is Reinstated,” BBC News, 19 July 2007, accessed on 14 April 2013, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/ south_asia/6907007.stm. 25 Allen, 309. 26 Ishii, 384. 27 Geoffrey, 85. 28 Chiara Letizia, “The Goddess Kumari at the Supreme Court: Reflections on the Shaping of Secularism in Nepal,” European Bulletin of Himalayan Research 39 (2012): 92-93. 29 Ibid., 93 30 Allen, 306. 31 Randeep Ramesh, “Nepal Court Scraps ‘Living Goddess’ Tradition,” The Guardian, 20 Aug. 2008, accessed on 14 April 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/ world/2008/aug/20/nepal. 32 Melissa Ashley, “Kumari,” Journal of Australian Studies 26, no. 73 (2002): 147. 33 Ibid. 34 Kathleen M. Erndl, “Is Shakti Empowering for Women? Reflection on Feminism and the Hindu Goddess,”in Is the Goddess a Feminist?: The Politics of South Asian Goddesses, eds. Alf Hiltebeitel and Kathleen M. Erndl, (New York: NYU Press, 2000), 95. 35 Mary E. Hancock, “The Dilemmas of Domesticity: Possession and Devotional Experience Among Urban Smarta Women,” in From the Margins of Hindu Marriage: Essays on Gender, Religion, and Culture, eds. Lindsey Harlan & Paul B. Courtright, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 80. 36 Allen, 300-301. 37 Ibid., 310. 38 Geoffrey, 84. 23

A Real Man’s World: Why Men Need Feminism to Succeed

Jeremy Laporte

Feminism is a surprisingly controversial topic in our modern age. While it is easy to attack some specific actions of the feminist movement, it is almost impossible to construct a legitimate argument against the ideology’s overall goal of social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. That said, many men still have qualms about identifying themselves as feminists because it is a cause that, on the surface, holds no concrete benefit for them. In fact, many feminists also appear to hold this belief, at least implicitly. A quick look at the Facebook page of McGill’s “Who needs Feminism?” movement reveals a cover photo with outlines of women holding signs explaining

why they “need” feminism, while men hold signs explaining why they are “pro-feminist.” It may be that these figures were not meant to be male or female at all, but, even so, it is not unreasonable to believe that women are feminists to fight for their own rights, while men are feminists to fight for the rights of others. This is not an irrational conclusion, given that women are faced with the immediate institutionalized discrimination in almost all areas of their lives, but it is one that ignores feminism’s implicit benefits for men. While feminism looks to give women the liberty they inherently deserve, it does so by challenging

the antiquated gender roles of our society. For most of feminism’s history, it has focused on combatting the traditional view of women as the passive sex, who exist in order to care for the home and children. This is a struggle that should continue, but in undermining the definition of a woman, feminism indirectly undermines what it means to be a man, specifically, a “real” man. The exact definition varies, but there are some common factors in the description of a “real” man. For example, he often does not express emotions. When my greatgrandfather died, I could not stop crying at the wake. There I was, twelve years old, on the cusp of manhood (or so I thought), bawling like a small child. I knew I was not being a man; looking at the stoic faces of the men around me, my father, uncles, grandfather, I felt ashamed of my own tear-streaked face. I determined then that, to be a “real” man, I had to learn to inhibit my emotions. In many ways, I succeeded, even when I no longer had the motivation to do so. Last year, in a strange twist of fate, my great-grandmother died. When I was first told the news, I sat on my bed, wanting to cry, to let out the sadness I felt, but no tears came. At some point, in trying to conform to the equation of masculinity to an inexpression of emotionality, I had lost some ability to express emotions at all, even when I realized that the expression those emotions out was exactly what I needed. I may not represent the male population in general, but humans are not meant to deny their emotions. In teaching

boys and men to do so, society may cause harm by pressuring men to deal with those emotions in unhealthy ways. For instance, the theory of “masked depression” states that the higher levels of diagnosis of depression in females and the higher levels of substance abuse in males are related. Men are less likely to seek help for emotional problems, turning instead to drugs or alcohol. While unproven, this theory coincides with our society’s masculine value system of emotional indifference, a system unreflective of the affective realities of being human. Similarly, we have the myth of a “real” man’s sexual activity. In the media, men are mostly portrayed as voracious sexual beings whose sole dream is a never-ending string of one night stands, experiences that do not include emotional connection. A man’s value apparently comes from the number of notches on his bedpost. Although this is not true experience, this does show how, for men, emotions are supposed to matter less in their romantic relationships. A man who chooses to spend time with his romantic partner is called “whipped,” as if caring for his partner and wanting to be with her is negative. Importantly, a “real” man is always heterosexual because homosexuality is often viewed as the antithesis of masculinity. It is not an accident that actions not in line with the masculine norm are often called “gay,” though, fortunately this is becoming less frequent. For this reason, feminism is often aligned with the gay rights movement in opposition to the traditional patriarchal institutions that portray the pursuit of

extensive, heterosexual conquests as normative behaviour for men, and, if we do not want that, we are abnormal, but sexuality is too complex and personal for this one view to represent all men. Of course, a “real” man does not have to inhibit all emotions; he can express anger. Where women and “weak” men respond to frustrating circumstances with tears or complaining, a “real” man pushes back against those frustrations. Unfortunately, “pushing back” often means violence. There was a well-covered story in the NFL this year of a player bullying a teammate, reportedly to make him “tougher.” Many pundits in the media openly wondered why the player being bullied did not stand up for himself against his aggressors. In a sport where causing concussions borders on good behaviour, one can only imagine what “standing up” entails. In the real world, situations like these escalate to the point of serious damage to one or both of the men involved, because no “real” man backs down from a fight. These themes refer to the most important quality of “real” men: Power. To express emotions is to show weakness. Men must be the dominant force in their sexual and romantic lives. Two men being in a relationship means one man must have less power. One man proves his masculinity by physically battering another. The pursuit of power itself is not wrong. Humans, male and female, enjoy feeling powerful and dislike feeling powerless. However, when power is a necessary component of being a man, a man can never feel secure in

his masculinity if he does not have control. The problem, then, is twofold. First, the concept of a “real” man is far too narrow to include any actual men. I could not deny my emotions, and my attempt to inhibit them led to unforeseen, unhealthy consequences. One normative view of male sexuality is not enough to encapsulate the range of preferences in such an intricate topic. I should not feel like less of a man because of my limited sexual experience, any more than a woman with more extensive experience should be called a slut. Sexuality and how a person expresses it should be that person’s choice, based on what they are personally comfortable with, not on a standard society sets based on the organs with which one was born. Similarly, not all men are going to be aggressive and, in a world where interpersonal aggression is increasingly problematic, it could be argued that lacking aggressive tendencies is beneficial. Second, power is very difficult to obtain and, when men inevitably feel powerless in some areas of their lives, they may try to assert power in different ways, leading to problems such as relational abuse, rape, racism, and homophobia. A man’s abuse of his partner can be seen as an attempt to physically assert the dominance he thinks he needs to feel secure in his masculinity. One often hears that rape is done more for the feeling of power than the sexual pleasure, with the perpetrator trying to forget the powerlessness felt at other points in their life by exerting power over another, and addressing why so many men commit rape is an important step in

defeating our rape culture. Racism, at its core, is one group of people feeling inherently superior to another. Homophobia can similarly be seen as one way of life being valorized, with the added impetus that homosexuality implicitly confuses traditional gender roles. Obviously, our society’s definition of a “real” man is not the sole cause of these complex problems, but, at the very least, it is a contributing factor and redefining what it means to be a man can expose the other causes. Luckily, I have found comfort in the way feminism challenges these traditional beliefs. I now know that I do not have to act a certain way because I was born a man. Feminism denies that being a “man” involves a systematized definition, allowing me to choose the person I want to be without conforming to a societal norm. If feminism succeeds across our society, men will no longer be held to an impossible standard and will no longer feel the need to prove that they are “real” men, allowing them to feel secure in the people that they are. In fact, many phenomena used as bases for arguments against feminism, such as the uneven results of custody battles, are in many ways due to ideas about gender that feminism is trying to defeat. So, I am not “profeminist.” I need feminism, as do all men, so we can stop trying to be “real” men and start trying to be real people.

Our Contributers Geneviève Boulay is a graduating Honours Women’s Studies student.

Her Honours undergraduate thesis is titled “Getting What Women Deserve: Evaluation, Negotiation and the Pay Gap.” She is an involved member of the McGill community as the Communications Coordinator for the WSSA (Women’s and Sexual Diversity Studies Student Association), and a proud active member of Kappa Kappa Gamma (Delta Delta chapter). Next year she will be pursuing graduate studies at McMaster University.

Christy Frost is a U3 Honours English Literature student from

Montreal. She has an abiding love for Modernist poetry and Can Lit. Christy edits The Veg Literary Magazine where she hopes to discover fresh new poetic voices.

Marie-Claude Gill-Lacroix is currently studying Political Science and Communications at McGill University. She will receive her Bachelors in 2015. As an undergrad, Marie-Claude has pursued studies related to institutions and policies capable of hindering the political participation of minority groups; Aboriginal communities being one of these. She also enjoys learning about art history and has taken several courses in this field.

Vivian Gu is a U2 Psychology major. As a die-hard West Coast girl, she

loves doing pilates and hot yoga, indulging in desserts, and going to cool concerts. She gets her inspiration for artwork from raw emotions, and each piece she does conveys a message about the human experience.

Kiray Jones-Mollerup is a U3 psychology student at McGill

University. She adores tea, winter, and the Canadian prairies. Her name rhymes with “hurray.”

Alexandra Kanters is a U1 Honours Philosophy student minoring

in Social Studies of Medicine and Women’s Studies. Her main areas of interest are in bioethics and public health, and she hopes that her studies in philosophy will one day lead her to understand what it actually means to live a moral life.

Jeremy Laporte is a second year psychology student. His other interests include making attempts at humor in McGill’s Red Herring, watching movies (good and bad), and reading, with a particular interest in 19th century Russian Literature.

Camila Rivas-Garrido is studying Women’s Studies but is interested in critical race theory, postcolonial studies, indigenous governance, and migration issues, particularly in issues surrounding identity and decolonial strategies. Her dream is to decolonize the colonized mind, particularly in her motherland of Latin America.

Jewel Seo is graduating this year with a major in Art History and

a minor in English Literature. She is interested in exploring ways to concretize the role that art occupies in the public sphere. She loves to talk about medieval architecture, minimalist art, and penguin books. Previously, Jewel has contributed a number of editorial pieces to Leacock’s and Tea and Biscuits.

Suvij Sudershan is a U0 student in the Faculty of Arts. His interests

include Literature and Political Science, in which he hopes to major. He also enjoys watching movies and quiet Friday evenings.

Kathryn Yuen is in her final year at McGill, pursuing a double

major in Art History and English (Cultural Studies), with a minor in Communication Studies. In her spare time, she enjoys volunteering at Redpath Museum, curating with the Fridge Door Gallery, and editing the art history undergraduate journal Canvas. On occasion, Kathryn diverges from her art historical background and partakes in classes from the IGSF in order to apply her visual analysis skills to feminist media artefacts.

The Editors Shaina Agbayani is a part-time songstress, part-time head-scratcher, full-

time culinary visionary (a nice way to say she thinks about food all the time), and full-time queer Filipina-Canadian feminist. She is also trying to finish her last year as a student in Equity Studies and Political Science.

Emily Brown will be graduating next year with a degree in History and Political Science. Contrary to popular assumptions, she will neither be a historian nor a politician. In addition to editing for Intersections, she is an AUS Essay Center tutor, consultant at Netroots, and fan of 16th century British history, New Deal-era photography, and Islamic art.

Krystin Chung is a second year student at McGill, studying Art History

and Communication Studies. She cares deeply about embracing the diversity in our world and believes in nothing more strongly than this: one should use their passion—whatever it is—to make the planet a more welcoming place.

Elizabeth DeBock is a U3 student graduating with a double major,

double minor degree in History and English Literature, and Linguistics and Russian. She loves to read, write, and enjoys editing papers. Next year she will be attending University of St. Andrews in Scotland to being her M. Litt. degree in History of the Book. She has enjoyed working with this paper and hopes everyone enjoys it. She gives her thanks to her friends and family!

Valerie Gauthier is in the final semester of her (beloved) Art History degree and working towards a career in archives. She especially enjoys dragging friends to museums, an institution she has a strong love/hate relationship with. She will defend Caravaggio’s aesthetic at all cost.

Nina Nintai is a U1 student studying sociology and economics. She was

born in Cameroon and lived in Cote d’Ivoire and Tunisia. Following that, she lived in Ottawa for 3 years. She got involved in Intersections because she is very interested in all aspects of social justice and wants to contribute in some way.

Jelena Stankovic reads books and spends her days in the sincerest

pumpkin patches she can find. In between finishing her last year of the Honours English Literature program and trying to make sense of H.D., she spends her time adding Oxford Commas and watching Community.

Deena Tamaroff is in her fourth year at McGill and studies Psychology and English Literature.

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