Apr18

Two sides to every coin: Problems with Post-colonialism

by ams11139 on April 18th, 2012 at 1:08 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

So Post-colonialism…seems like a simple enough idea, why was this reading so hard? Maybe it was just me…after all, I think I’m the only person I know who is anti-Austen, but still, for some reason these readings seemed way too difficult for a concept so seemingly straightforward. Then I read Mclintock’s “The Angel of Progress” and discovered this whole Post-colonialism thing may not be as simple as it first appeared.

I love how she begins with the description of the exhibit on Colonialism; you walk through a dark chamber that is meant to symbolize the “dark time” of man before language and progress. You walk through a door marked ‘colonialism’ into another dark space, from which you can only walk forward through another passage marked ‘post-colonialism’ which leads into a bright space marked Hybrid State. The idea being, of course, that it took these “dark roads” to get to the “ideal” state of hybridity. There is also a rabbit roaming around labeled “free” which McClintock points out is ironically, not very free. In order to leave the exhibit, one has to go backwards from “light to darkness” or from the hybrid state back to pre-colonialism. She uses this example to highlight the paradox of “progress” that occurred as a result of colonialism.  (1186).

The very term “post-colonialism” itself is inherently problematic; first, it presupposes that other cultures exist only in terms of colonization, which reduces them to a subordinate status. It creates that binary–pre-colonial verses post-colonial, which leaves out so much of the people who were colonized and focuses only upon the act of colonization. It’s a very Eurocentric way of labeling things.  Additionally, as McClintock points out, we don’t really live in a world that has surpassed colonialism. Some countries are very much still living under colonialism, even if not in name, in practice. She cites our own country, for example. Saying America is post-colonial is a huge insult to the indigenous people living here before Europeans ever settled. Thus, the term post-colonialism is a misnomer; colonialism very much exists today, simply under a different guise. (1188)

Also, the idea of post-colonialism as a progressive movement contradicts the reality of the situation for the majority of the people affected by colonization. Colonization involved the invasion of not only the physical space of another culture, but also the undermining of their cultural and economic resources. After the colonies had been stripped of any valuable resources, they were left with destruction in the name of ‘progress.’ Shaky political, cultural, and economic ground that would lead most of these developing countries into utter poverty and violence.

While we like to construct our world into these simplified categories, these binaries of “pre” and “post,” to do so is not only unrealistic, but unethical. It devalues the history of other cultures; it devalues the sense of history itself by forcing it into such absolute, restrictive terms. I think McClintock is also suggesting with this essay to remember that every epoch in history has multiple interpretations–there are “two sides to every coin” and simplifying history into these binaries reduces that complexity, it silences those other voices.

McClintock, Anne. “The Angel of Progress: Pitfalls of the Term ‘Post-colonialism.’” Literary Theory: An Anthology. 2nd Ed. Eds. Julie Rivkin, Michael Ryan. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2004. Print. 1185-96.

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Apr12

Please check all boxes that apply

by ams11139 on April 12th, 2012 at 12:43 am
Posted In: Uncategorized

I hate that every single form I fill out wishes to condemn me to approximately two things: a white woman. That’s all whoever reads official forms seems to care about. They ask my age, race, and gender–that is apparently all I boil down to as a human being.

Race has always been, and probably always will be, a very confusing concept for me. I think the earliest memory I have of awareness regarding my racial identity would be kindergarten. I remember playing in the ‘house’ section of the classroom with another little girl. There were two baby dolls–one white, one black. I wanted to play with the black baby doll, and the other little girl told me, in a matter-of-fact way, that I couldn’t have that doll. I asked why, and she told me, because you’re white. You can only play with the white doll. And in a million other subtle (sometimes not so subtle) ways I grew up in America being reinforced with the idea that I was white, whatever that meant, and it was an important part of Me. It meant I could and could not do and say certain things. It defined how other people viewed me, and how I viewed myself in relation to other people. A lot of people think being “white” is just “natural;” it does not take consideration or awareness, but as Lopez states, “White identity is just as much a racial fabrication, and Whites are equally, or even more highly, implicated in preserving the racially constructed status quo” (966). And so it goes.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I discovered in college that I am actually not white. According to the US government, I am Hispanic. Walking down the street, you’d take one look at my pasty freckled self and say “white girl” but according to the US government’s racial definition of a Hispanic person as being “of Hispanic descent, regardless of race” including people from Spain, I am indeed not white. Outside of the fact that a racial definition includes the phrase “regardless of race” (mind=blown), it begs the question, how then, do we define race? If you’re going by skin color, then you would be hard pressed to go to Northern Spain (from where my family hails) to find a truly “Hispanic” looking person. Most of the people in my family have fair skin, blue or green eyes, and even blond hair. They look pretty much like…Europeans! If, as Lopez argues, race has little to with biology, then what are they basing the distinguishing factor of Hispanics on? Language? True, Spaniards speak the same language (though with different accents and dialects) as other Hispanic countries. Is it culture? Because people from Spain have a completely different culture than that of, say, a South American. Even people in Spain itself are not the same culture–take the Basques (my family) and compare them to the Catalans. Totally different people! So what makes me Hispanic?

In essence–and according to Lopez–nothing. Race is a social construct, not a natural one. It isn’t determined by biology, but by social factors. Human beings create these racial categories, which come into being as a result of social, political, and economical reasons. Oh-and by the way, since they aren’t real, they are totally fluid and often in flux. As in gender studies, racial divisions are truly arbitrary, and serve only to create these artificial relationships between one another. These division only exist to create this idea of the “other” which in turn defines itself. “Whiteness” only exists if there is an other to tell us what whiteness is not. Being white relies on an “other” for it to come into existence. Yet despite race being completely illusory, it holds so much weight in our society. It determines much of a person’s life and their experiences within the larger society.

Race serves to fracture our relationships with one other, causing us to perceive differences where there really are none. If race is just a fabrication, you have to ask the question, who creates the idea of race, and why? It sounds an awful lot to me like Marxist ideology–that a ruling class has fabricated this idea of race to keep people from working together and rising up against a common enemy. Maybe I’m getting too radical in my old age :) but race sounds like just another mechanism to keep people from looking at the bigger picture (because we wouldn’t like what we see behind the curtain).

 

Lopez, Ian F. Haney. “The Social Construction of Race.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. Ed. Julie Rivkin & Michael Ryan.

Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2004. 964-74. Print.

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Apr05

“The Somber Madness of Sex:” Foucault and Gender Studies

by ams11139 on April 5th, 2012 at 12:49 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

In his essay “The History of Sexuality,” Foucault examines exactly that–the “recent” history of sexuality. He opens with a discussion regarding the attention paid to sexuality, particularly the maintenance of heterosexual sex, which centers on a very Marxist principle: “to ensure population, to reproduce labor capacity, to perpetuate the form of social relations: in short, to constitute a sexuality that is economically useful and politically conservative” (892). Foucault writes in this essay that recent generations have incited the idea of a multiplicity of sexualities, which was before structured in a completely different manner because of power structures.

Until the 18th century, sexuality was controlled by three factors: “canonical law, the Christian pastoral, and civil law.” These three factors determined sexual behavior, and primarily governed the area of marital relations. Society regarded anything that deviated outside of the “norm” of heterosexual marital behavior (ranging from adultery to a person who “violates cadavers”) as a perversion–not a norm–and all deviations received punishment accordingly. Although uncategorized, society denied these deviations existence unless they came to the surface on the rare occasion, and needed to be quashed by the law.

After the 18th and 19th centuries, traditional marital couples could experience more freedom sexually. The extreme focus on governing marital relationships become somewhat relaxed as other sexualities began to surface. At this time, those aforementioned “deviations” came forward to become a part of reality, to take their place in the newly forming spectrum of sexuality. Foucault suggests the allowance of these sub-sexualities suggests a shift in power. Where the old power structure sought to repress anything that deviated from the norm, the “new regime” decided not to suppress these “perversions” at all. Instead, it chose to make them a part of the conversation in order to keep watch over and control them. Since to give something a name is to acknowledge its existence, the fields of science and medicine began cataloging and labeling these sub-sexualities. This acknowledgement of existence also allowed for the creation of a hierarchy of the varying sexualities, very clearly privileging heterosexual marital relations (in some ways reinforcing and making it even more powerful by having something “less than” to compare itself to). Foucault also references that idea of the “pleasure principal” (I think that is where we read about this–maybe I’m wrong but it sounds very familiar).  The force controlling these sexualities derived pleasure from its power, while the act of “disobeying” and thus deviating from the “norm” of sexuality also creates pleasure for those sub-sexualities: “Pleasure and power do not cancel or turn back against one another; they seek out, overlap, and reinforce one another. They are linked together by complex mechanisms and devices of excitation and incitement” (899). Therefore, both parties serve to reinforce the other’s existence.

I enjoyed Foucault’s essay because as always, I find his style clear, easy to follow, and tinged with a sense of humor. I think he also raises some very good questions—one of which I will pose to all of you. Do you view our epoch as more sexually free than those that came before us, or do you think (as Foucault implies) that we are more repressed than ever because now that those “sub-perversions” have been exposed, “big brother” is always watching?

 

Foucault, Michael. “The History of Sexuality.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. 2nd Ed. Eds. Rivkin, Julie; Ryan, Michael. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2004. 892-99.

 

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Mar28

Girls: We run the world! A discussion on Feminist Theory

by ams11139 on March 28th, 2012 at 9:48 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

You said it Beyonce. Unfortunately, we can’t all be as powerful as you, so do we really run the world? Is Feminism as simple as Men=evil, which society would have us believe, or is there more to it than that? Let us see…

According to the Introduction to Feminism by Rivkin and Ryan, there were two stages of early Feminism: 1-the critique of misogynist stereotypes in male literature, 2-recovering a “lost tradition” and “historical reconstruction” (766). Rivkin and Ryan go on to break down the theory into two camps: Essentialist and Constructivist. Both groups contain echoes of theories that we have already encountered this term. For example, Essentialist feminism reflects Post-structuralist ideas of Derrida, namely the interconnectedness of everything, which undermines the concept of a gender binary. Gender- that is, our definition of “feminine and masculine”  -isn’t rigid, but more fluid. To these Feminists, the means to get beyond this false concept of gender is through feminine writing-which we encountered when reading Cixous. This writing undermines the binaries, and allows us to get beyond the misogynistic world.

Also, the Constructivist Feminists maintain a definite Marxist influence, and some of Althusser’s idea of ideology-particularly in the way that they view the establishment of gender, which in their view is “assigned to women in a capitalist culture to make them better domestic laborers” (768).  i.e. What we as a society view as ‘naturally’ feminine or naturally masculine really ISN’T natural at all. They also take a Post-Structuralist tack in the idea that  language creates identity, not just reflects it (since language creates thought, not vice-versa). To get out of this cycle we need to view how all gender assignations are constructed. “Gender is performative” or mimicked, and is thus a social assignation. This also treads along the path of Freudian psychoanalysis, which I saw to be present in small manifestations to both sects of Feminist theory.

The big “issue” then resides in language, since as Derrida said, you cannot get outside of language. Because every single utterance has social weight, “assumptions and values” within it, one aspect of which is bound up in gender, how can women use it to escape this idea of “patriarchy” when the language itself is conditioned to privilege the masculine and suppress the feminine? (769).

Irigaray plays with this idea of mimicry that relates back to the constructivist theory of Feminism and touches upon some features of Freudian psychoanalysis. She argues that women mimic this social representation of femininity outwardly, but have an interior “true” self. They do this because it is instilled within them by society (Freud). In her opinion, escaping this cycle requires “jamming the theoretical machinery itself, of suspending its pretension to the production of a truth and of a meaning that are excessively univocal” (796). Again, going back and changing the way that ideology is formulated and dispensed within a society. How do we do this? Language! Irigaray also discusses feminine writing, commenting that the style/writing of women writers is often seen as lacking; not because it actually lacks style, but because we are led to believe so by a patriarchal language, which is so busy defining everything that it can’t even conceive of the feminine style. Why? Because the feminine style goes against the very “machine” of language that privileges everything masculine. We must, then, change culture to change language, or the reverse.

Gilbert & Gubar’s “The Madwoman in the Attic” explores the interesting Madonna/whore idea; women are represented as either angels or monsters in literature, which we as a society internalize (this harkens to the Gaze theory-what do you guys think about that?) All the traits valued in men become evil in women because they go against this patriarchal construction of femininity, and any woman who defies this structure is dubbed a mutant, evil, etc. This very archetype keeps women from overcoming it, but somehow they did, and began writing in ways that completely broke the masculine code.

Audre Lorde brings to light a sub-issue of Feminism, namely the factors of race, culture, and social class. She also touches on a Marxist theory of how a subordinate class is created, but applies this idea of oppression to conflict in the area of Feminism. She argues that Feminism is often thought of in terms of white, middle class womanhood, which alienates women of color and differing social class. Rather than unify women together, making them stronger, these socially constructed myths of “one-size-fits-all” womanhood alienate different groups of women, thereby serving to continue to weaken and fragment the feminine gender.

All of these women brought up interesting points; when thinking of Irigaray, I think of Bishop. She’s often glossed over by her earlier critics as lacking in certain areas, but more modern critics disagree. They tend to view her writing as being “before her time” in that she doesn’t adhere to that “masculine” protocol-she wrote in a way that went beyond or around that protocol, and at the time, people couldn’t understand it or see it because they were programmed to value only the norm (masculine writing). I could also see some of Gilbert and Gubar’s image of the angel vs. the monster in Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train. We are met with Miriam, who is presented as this bad awful women, self-absorbed and almost dangerous (to Guy’s future goals and life), and then she is sharply contrasted with Ann-the angelic, perfect angel. Lorde also brought up a good point-black female authors are rarely taught in mainstream literature courses, and even in multicultural courses they get left to the wayside. She also brings to the surface the question of who is “allowed” to teach race-she suggests that many professors are white and feel therefore they shouldn’t be teaching African-American lit, yet they are totally comfortable teaching Shakespeare even though they have no context for being a white man during the Elizabethan era…so what is it about race and gender that makes things different?I think I have a potential answer, but let’s explore that together.

 

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Mar24

Political Criticism-Elizabeth Bishop?

by ams11139 on March 24th, 2012 at 9:14 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

In the spirit of interdisciplinary study, I thought it might be interesting to share with you a project that I am working on in another class. For my research project in my 1930′s fiction class with Dr. Hoare/Rippy, I am examining fiction produced in the 30′s and 40′s by American writers regarding the Spanish Civil War.  It sounds like an easy task, but in truth a lot of these writers are basically unknown to modern readers for several reasons-the most important being political. Many of the Americans who got involved with opposing the Fascists during the Spanish Civil War either died, were jailed later for being Communist, or were blacklisted and scorned by society. It wasn’t until the 1970′s, when Franco finally left Spain that the American volunteers who fought for the Spanish cause were honored in Spain, and even today they have not officially been recognized by their own country for the work that many argue was a humanitarian effort to stop the second world war-and many agree they may have been successful in that task had America as a county gotten involved sooner. Along with the brave volunteers who fought in the trenches, many American writers at the time got involved in the cause-either by raising money, writing to spread awareness, or going to Spain and fighting themselves. At any rate, much of their work is in obscurity these days, and I’ve had a heck of a time digging them up.

One excellent book I found (The Wound and the Dream: Sixty Years of American Poems about the Spanish Civil War) contains a plethora of American poetry regarding the Spanish Civil War, edited by Cary Nelson. There were two quotes from the forward written by Nelson that made me immediately think of our class and this particular theory. First, Nelson states: “The Spanish Civil War is not simply a historical context that enriches and complicates the poems written under its influence. It is a historical conjuncture that reshapes the very activity of reading and writing poetry, making poems into something they had not been before and would not be afterward” (10). I felt that this was reminiscent of our discussion on Historicism, in that the war (in this case) isn’t just a context for reading the poem, it IS the poem. I also really loved this quote: “Moreover, even though many Spanish Civil War poems do not have explicit hortatory moments-overt calls to arms, slogans, calls for commitment-enough of them do so that the will to international political solidarity is part of the implied context of any poem about the war” (28). Particularly the last part “is part of the implied context of any poem about the war,” makes me think of political theory. I mean to say, when reading these poems you simply cannot pretend that the political aspect of the poetry isn’t there, or isn’t an influence, when the political situation is what CREATED these poems in the first place. I would LOVE to share with you some of these wonderful poems that I found,  but I think perhaps more interesting for our class would be something I discovered about our dear friend, Elizabeth Bishop.

Elizabeth Bishop DID spend time in Spain-although not much, and basically from what I’ve read, she was more on vacation that worrying herself with the Fascists. However, some critics point out that later she volunteers to translate some Spanish works into English, and also volunteers for a cause involved orphaned Spaniard children from the war. This suggests that she perhaps cared more about Spain than she had been comfortable admitting, which makes a lot of sense if you look at what happened to many of the writers voicing publicly for the cause. The essay I read, entitled “‘A curious Cat: Elizabeth Bishop and the Spanish Civil War” by Jonathan Ellis looks at several of Bishops poems, searching for that underlying political relationship to Spain. (Ellis) Specifically, I would like to show you the poem “Lullaby for the Cat” which is on page 204 in our text:

Minnow, go to sleep and dream,
Close your great big eyes;
Round your bed Events prepare
The pleasantest surprise.

Darling Minnow, drop that frown,
Just cooperate,
Not a kitten shall be drowned
In the Marxist State.

Joy and Love will both be yours,
Minnow, don’t be glum.
Happy Days are coming soon-
Sleep, and let them come…

According to Ellis, this poem remained unpublished until after her death because it would be too controversial. He suggests that it alludes to what will happen if people do not take action, namely the advent of a second world war: “Curiosity kills the cat in the popular saying, and it is likely that Bishop felt the same would happen to her were she ever to write about the Spanish Civil War directly. This is why in “Lullaby for the Cat” Minnow is encouraged to go back to sleep rather than pursue the cause of Events outside” (Ellis 147).

Again, this is only a brief glimpse into the work I’m doing for my 30′s class, but I thought it was interesting as it relates both to a political critical theory of literature AND Elizabeth Bishop, who we have studied in class. I thought it might be something interesting to add to our conversation on Monday with Rebecca’s presentation!

 

Bishop, Elizabeth. “Lullaby for the Cat.” The complete Poems: 1927-1979. New York: Friar, Stratus, and Giroux, 1979.

204. Print.

Ellis, Jonathan.”‘A Curious Cat: Elizabeth Bishop and the Spanish Civil War.” Journal of Modern Literature 27.1/2 (Fall

2003): pp. 137–148. Web. 17 March 2012.

Nelson, Cary. Introduction. The Wound and the Dream:Sixty Years of American POems about the Spanish Civil War. By

Nelson. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2002. 1-62.Print.

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