Numer 41 (2/2016)
Aesthetics and Gender
Editor: Carolyn Korsmeyer, Natalia Anna Michna
Table of contents
Pages
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Carolyn Korsmeyer
Preface
9 – 12
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University at Buffalo, New York, USA
Charmaine Carvalho
Chick Lit in India: Possibilities for a Feminine Aesthetic in Popular Fiction
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.1
13 – 32
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Keywords

chick lit |women’s writing |Post-colonialism |Neoliberalism |subjectivity |popular culture

Abstract

Implicit in the primary project of traditional aesthetics is the distinction made between “high” and “low” culture via standards that feminist critics have argued bar creative work by women from entry into the artistic canon. Since the mid-1990s these standards have been evident in the critical reception of the genre known as “chick lit” which is largely written by women using a distinctly feminine style and address. While the question of chick lit’s merit as a form of women’s writing and its claim to literary status remains undecided, chick lit has travelled a long way since Bridget Jones’s Diary and the conclusions drawn about Western chick lit cannot be seamlessly mapped onto chick lit’s others – its racially inflected and transnational iterations. Drawing on theories of feminine aesthetics, life writing, performativity, confession and memory, this paper moves from a consideration of the main arguments surrounding the aesthetic possibilities of the Western chick lit novel to the distinctive creative expression present in Indian chick lit to argue that the answer to the question of the genre’s aesthetic value may be found in some of its global transformations.


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Hong Kong Baptist University, China
Noelle Leslie de la Cruz
The Weeping Woman in the Graphic Memoir: A Derridean Inquiry into the Traces/Trait(s) of “Self”
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.2
33 – 50
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Keywords

Jacques Derrida |graphic memoirs |comics |sequential art |Memoirs of the Blind |autobiography

Abstract

In this paper, I examine how women graphic memoirists – Marjane Satrapi, Alison Bechdel, and Roz Chast in particular – attempt to draw that which remains fleeting, absent, and abyssal: the so-called “self.” I thus extend Jacques Derrida’s critique of what he has called the “metaphysics of presence” in philosophy to autobiographical comics, a popular medium that is heavily prefigured by his analysis of the self-portrait as a ruin. I believe this endeavor will help fill the gap in studies about the gendered aspects of Derrida’s work Memoirs of the Blind, as well as the potential of autobiographical comics to illuminate philosophical issues concerning the self. Finally, through my analysis of women’s graphic narratives, I hope to point to the possibility of a larger project, that of a feminist Derridean critique of sequential art.


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De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines
Zdeňka Kalnická
The Gender Metamorphosis of Narcissus. Salvador Dalí: Metamorphosis of Narcissus
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.3
51 – 76
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Keywords

Art |metamorphosis |Narcissus |Ovid |Caravaggio |Edward Burne-Jones |Salvador Dalí |Gaston Bachelard |Sigmund Freud |Carl Gustav Jung |Lou Andreas-Salomé |Julia Kristeva |Remedios Varo |androgyny |beauty |bisexuality |gender |Mirror |surrealism

Abstract

This contribution is devoted to an interpretation of the artwork, from a gender point of view, Metamorphosis of Narcissus by Salvador Dalí. Dalí’s painting is compared with the Narcissus stories to be found in antiquity, particularly in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with his stress on the beauty of a young boy, and the commensurate concepts of seeing and mirroring. The gender associations of narcissism and their changes are well-documented in the history of art (Caravaggio, Edward Burne-Jones) and in different concepts of narcissism (Sigmund Freud, Gaston Bachelard, Lou Andreas-Salomé, Julia Kristeva). The author focuses on the gender aspects of surrealism, keying in especially to the concept of Anima and Animus (Carl Gustav Jung). Dalí’s work is analyzed in terms of associating Narcissus not merely with seeing and mirroring but also with touching and metamorphosis, emphasizing his remarkable skill at transgressing gender divisions in his visionary leap towards androgyny.


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University of Ostrava, Czech Republic
Zoey Lavallee
What’s Wrong with the (White) Female Nude?
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.4
77 – 97
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Keywords

female nude |art history |contemporary art |sexual objectification |bias |nudity |race |whiteness

Abstract

In “What’s Wrong with the (Female) Nude?” A. W. Eaton argues that the female nude in Western art promotes sexually objectifying, heteronormative erotic taste, and thereby has insidious effects on gender equality. In this response, I reject the claim that sexual objectification is a phenomenon that can be generalized across the experiences of all women. In particular, I argue that Eaton’s thesis is based on the experiences of women who are white, and does not pay adequate attention to the lives of nonwhite women. This act of exclusion undermines the generality of Eaton’s thesis, and exposes a more general bias in discussions of female representations in art. Different kinds of bodies have been subjected to different kinds of objectifying construal, and the ethics of nudity in art must be extended to take such variation into account.


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City University of New York, USA
Natalia Anna Michna
“You’ve come a long way, baby:” the Evolution of Feminine Identity Models on the Example of Contemporary Language of Advertising
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.5
99 – 117
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Keywords

language of advertising |gender identity |second-wave feminism |binary sex order |genderqueer

Abstract

The article presents the evolution of the language of advertising from the 1960s to the present, presenting various images of women in advertising. Simultaneously a theoretical analysis has been carried out of the demands of second-wave feminism, which exerted significant influence on the creation of images of women in the mass media. The objective of our comparison of feminist theory with advertising practice is an attempt to answer the question of whether the present media image of women liberated from the binary sexual order and weighted towards the genderqueer and/or transgender phenomena is the desired realisation of the feminist demands for emancipation of and equality for women announced in the second half of the twentieth century.


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Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland
Carla Milani Damião
Women as Constellation in Walter Benjamin’s Aesthetics
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.6
119 – 134
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Keywords

women |Aesthetics |montage |constellation

Abstract

In seeking to combine the concept of the ‘Feminine’ and ‘Aesthetics,’ the approach here is to carry out an initial examination of Walter Benjamin’s aesthetic theory, then delve into his texts on Eros, leading to his personal correspondence. These combined references will indicate his change of mind, moving from the feminine, as unique, towards its ‘constellation formation’. Montage is the medium of leading with quotation as a mosaic incorporating the image of constellation. The use of montage has parallels in certain avant-garde art movements, its purpose being to disrupt a purely linear approach, in order to cope with the reality of the fragmentation of experience. Although we have little evidence of Benjamin’s theory being connected to Gender Studies, we can take his theory on Eros as an example of how this philosopher foresaw some of the contemporary questions concerning women, amalgamating these with his Aesthetics theory.


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Federal University of Goiás, Brazil
Adrian Mróz
Imagined Hierarchies as Conditionals of Gender in Aesthetics
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.7
135 – 154
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Keywords

gender |imagined hierarchies |conditionals |media |behaviorism |Sex

Abstract

The attributes of gender in the media are disputable. This can be explained by a conflict generated by culturally acquired alternative imagined hierarchies which are not compatible or may be even contradictory. This article is a philosophical enquiry that examines the representation of gender and the environment in which it is conditioned.


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Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland
Sheryl Tuttle Ross
(500) Days of Summer: A Postmodern Romantic Comedy?
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.8
155 – 175
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Keywords

romantic comedy |postmodern love |analytic aesthetic film theory

Abstract

By considering the film (500) Days of Summer a postmodern romantic comedy, we can see the film as offering philosophical insights about the nature of love and its implications for the changing social institution of marriage The overarching idea is that this film is different from many other romantic comedies, and the ways in which it differs are indicative of a change in the genre and are relevant to changes in the concepts of love and marriage. We first consider more specifically the relationship between modern and postmodern aesthetics as well as a brief history of the genre of romantic comedy. Next, we will explore how the film might be read as a postmodern film, considering the plot, dialogue, sound, and look of the film. I contend that the cinematic properties are integral to the emergence of a new romantic comedy genre and to how this change reflects broader cultural changes. All told, this analysis will provide insights into how the currency of the conception of love has changed, which has likewise changed the marriage plot as experienced by new audiences in this new millennium.


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University of Wisconsin La Crosse, USA
Marta Tużnik
Blood, Death and Fear – Philosophy and Art in Relation to the Myth of Womanhood
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.9
177 – 189
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Keywords

nature |mythology |feminism |culture |womanhood |sexuality |blood |menstruation

Abstract

Mythologies from different parts of the world have always used female characters. Most of these are not positive ones, quite the reverse. Nowadays, our generally accepted attitude towards womanhood and women has barely anything to do with the emotions which were triggered by such mythical creatures as lamias, mermaids or vampires. Furthermore, equal rights are perceived, today, as integral to a healthy society. Yet, there are some aspects of womanhood that are not only absent in public discourse, but also trigger such extreme emotions as fear and disgust. One such trigger is menstrual blood. The aim of this article is to present negative images of the woman in mythology, with all their consequences, as well as to show how feminist reflections and artistic activity negate this understanding of womanhood and sexuality, frequently employing controversial and inconvenient themes in the furtherance of that goal.


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Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin, Poland
Natalia Yakubova
Phantasies of Restored Innocence: Traces of the Actress Irena Solska (1875–1958) in the Dramas of Jerzy Żuławski (1874–1915)
DOI: 10.19205/41.16.10
191 – 206
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Keywords

Irena Solska |Jerzy Żuławski |female creativity |matrilineal heritage |constructions of innocence |women’s autobiographical writing

Abstract

Psyche in Eros and Psyche (1904) by Jerzy Żuławski was one of the most important roles of Irena Solska (1875–1958), which she played for twenty years. The playwright confessed that he also had written The Myrtle Wreath (1903) and Ijola (1905) specifically for this actress. In spite of the fact that reviewers often criticized the texts and tried to “protect” Solska from being associated with the author’s intentions, she probably identified herself with them to a great extent. Given the lack of detailed accounts of Solska’s performance in the criticism, these texts become the most important source, although also a controversial one. They reveal some important impulses of Solska’s creativity. Her desire “to restore innocence” in her onstage creation was a way to overcome the repressive reality of her past and the burden accumulated through “the matrilineal heritage.”


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The State Institute for Art Studies, Russia
Mary Edwards
Aesthetics and the Feminine Conference Report
207 – 212
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Abstract

The first Society for Women In Philosophy Ireland (SWIPI) Summer Conference was held at University College Cork, Ireland, from the 17th – 18th July 2015. The aim of this conference was to provide a supportive, engaging environment for researchers working on the topic of the feminine in aesthetics or the thought/work of female aestheticians/artists as well as for artists concerned with gender issues, to present their work. Openness and cross-disciplinarity were the major ambitions of the conference organizers, Áine Mahon and I, and this was reflected by a generalist call for papers.


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University College Cork, Ireland
Pobierz cały numer
1 – 216
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Instytut Filozofii
Grodzka 52
e-ISSN 2544-8242
Uniwersytet Jagielloński
31-044 Kraków