Current Search: Feminism and literature (x) » Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters (x)
View All Items
- Title
- Revis(it)ing Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness: women, symbolism, and resistance.
- Creator
- Smith, Kathryn M., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is, admittedly, a text with many racist, imperialist and sexist subtexts. A feminist literary analysis, however, can extract women's empowerment and agency. This thesis takes a closer look at the Mistress (also known as the African woman) and the Intended, two women with vastly different racial and class backgrounds who, in their own ways, demonstrate resistance. This thesis analyzes Mr. Kurtz's often ignored sketch in oils, arguing that the sketch itself...
Show moreJoseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is, admittedly, a text with many racist, imperialist and sexist subtexts. A feminist literary analysis, however, can extract women's empowerment and agency. This thesis takes a closer look at the Mistress (also known as the African woman) and the Intended, two women with vastly different racial and class backgrounds who, in their own ways, demonstrate resistance. This thesis analyzes Mr. Kurtz's often ignored sketch in oils, arguing that the sketch itself demonstrates the colonial mentality of difference and the disruption of that difference. It then explores both the Mistress and the Intended in detail, positing that while the Mistress uses the colonizers' fear of the wilderness and its silence to her advantage, the Intended takes control over her own domestic circumstance. Overall, this author asserts that the Mistress and the Intended, while often dismissed, are noteworthy, important, and influential characters in Heart of Darkness.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/192989
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Feminism in literature, Racism in literature, Imperialism in literature, Literature and society, Criticism and interpretation
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Libertinage et feminisme dans les lettres du colonel talbert de francoise-albine puzin de la martiniere benoist.
- Creator
- Montonen, Jane M., Munson, Marcella L., Florida Atlantic University, Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of Languages, Lingustics and Comparative Literature
- Abstract/Description
-
In 1767, Mme Benoist published an epistolary libertine novel entitled Lettres du Colonel Talbert. Although she has received little critical attention to date, she was a prolific author who appeared with great regularity at minor literary salons. Her presence at these salons is well-established in personal memoirs and correspondences, and actively remarked upon by other authors—men and women—of the period, including Mme Roland and Choderlos de Laclos. Mme Benoist’s preferred genre was the...
Show moreIn 1767, Mme Benoist published an epistolary libertine novel entitled Lettres du Colonel Talbert. Although she has received little critical attention to date, she was a prolific author who appeared with great regularity at minor literary salons. Her presence at these salons is well-established in personal memoirs and correspondences, and actively remarked upon by other authors—men and women—of the period, including Mme Roland and Choderlos de Laclos. Mme Benoist’s preferred genre was the novel with its explicit blend of high and low literary cultures, its melding of the philosophical and the sentimental, its pursuit of formal innovation, and its deliberate marketing in multiple formats and for multiple audiences, including publication through the mainstream book market, and serial publication in revues and journals with a large female readership, such as the Journal des Dames. This study focuses on Lettres du Colonel Talbert (1767) as both a paradigmatic and privileged text inside Mme Benoist’s larger corpus, and one which explicitly engages many of the most pressing moral and philosophical debates of the period, including the legal status of women. To do so, Mme Benoist appropriates the libertine novel as specific novelistic subtype. In Les Lettres du Colonel Talbert, Mme Benoist parodies the libertine novel and in doing so, converts the libertine textual economy to one in which well-established narrative codes of femininity and masculinity are inverted. Although her depiction of the heroine, Hélène—an exceptional and courageous young woman who resists the predatory advances of a man through sheer strength of moral character—is not in itself unusual, Mme Benoist’s choice to frame her heroine’s moral struggle in a narrative epistolary exchange between two diametrically opposed male “types” in enlightenment thought—the libertine and the honnête homme— Mme Benoist effectively subverts masculine textual dynamics at the level of plot and character. More importantly, she also subverts the libertine novel’s traditional identification with masculine authorship.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004141, http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004141
- Subject Headings
- Benoist, Françoise Albine Puzin de La Martinière -- 1724-1809 -- Lettres du Colonel Talbert -- Criticism and interpretation, Feminism in literature, Libertinism in literature, Revolutionary literature, French -- 18th century -- Criticism and interpretation, Women and literature -- France -- 18th century
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Atrave(s) and fronte(i)ras: la traducciâon del Portuguâes al Espaînol de la novella Brasilîena Adeus, Rio Doce.
- Creator
- Bandeira de Mello, Clarisse., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of Languages, Linguistics and Comparative Literature
- Abstract/Description
-
The translation of Geny Vilas-Novas' novel Adeus, Rio Doce emphasizes the importance of promoting a literary exchange between Brazil and the Spanish-speaking world. This study analyses contemporary Brazilian literature and situates the author in the post-modern literary movement, stressing two post-colonial fundamental themes: emigration and feminine literature. Millions of undocumented emigrants from Latin America live nowadays in the United States displaced in the American society and leave...
Show moreThe translation of Geny Vilas-Novas' novel Adeus, Rio Doce emphasizes the importance of promoting a literary exchange between Brazil and the Spanish-speaking world. This study analyses contemporary Brazilian literature and situates the author in the post-modern literary movement, stressing two post-colonial fundamental themes: emigration and feminine literature. Millions of undocumented emigrants from Latin America live nowadays in the United States displaced in the American society and leave suffering family members abandoned in their native countries. One of the roles of Latin- American women writers like Vilas-Novas is to reveal and denounce the subaltern conditions of this emigration movement in the globalization process, under the unusual perspective of those left behind. The linguistic and semantic challenges and difficulties faced during translation are a metaphor for the crossing of linguistic, cultural, social, and historical borders by Latin-Americans in search of better life opportunities.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2008
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/186336
- Subject Headings
- Brazilian fiction, Translations into English, Brazilian literature, Criticism and interpretation, Postmodernism (Literature), Feminism and literature, Criticism and interpretation
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- A good woman is hard to find: discovering the voice of the woman satirist in Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood.
- Creator
- Paxton, Virginia A., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
While Flannery O'Connor's characters and narrative landscape may share a history with those of other works often labeled "Southern gothic," her heavily judicious narrative voice utilizes the depravity of the South struggling to find its identity as a means to explore her vision of God's mercy and distinguishes her work as satirical criticism. This thesis analyzes her construction of a distinctive satirical narrative voice for Wise Blood, particularly as it deviates from how she initially...
Show moreWhile Flannery O'Connor's characters and narrative landscape may share a history with those of other works often labeled "Southern gothic," her heavily judicious narrative voice utilizes the depravity of the South struggling to find its identity as a means to explore her vision of God's mercy and distinguishes her work as satirical criticism. This thesis analyzes her construction of a distinctive satirical narrative voice for Wise Blood, particularly as it deviates from how she initially wrote the first chapters as presented in earlier short stories like "The Train" and "The Peeler." Here, the ways in which O'Connor revises her diction and syntax to create a satirical tone will be examined closely. For the purposes of this paper, satire is defined as a literary work aimed at utilizing irony, hyperbole, or sarcasm to reveal, critique, and correct some moral, ethical, or social phenomenon or situation that the author finds reprehensible.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/221951
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Feminism and literature, Didactic fiction, American, Criticism and interpretation, Symbolism in literature, Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.)
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- A queer world: feminine subversions of chivalric homosocial normativity.
- Creator
- Pitts, Jessica., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
If queer is an applicable label for that which aims to subvert or counteract normativity, then Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, The Wife of Bath's tale, and her Prologue are each, in their own ways, queer texts. I examine the ways in which the feminine presences of Morgan le Fay and the Loathly Lady influence and challenge the heteronormative, homosocial space of Arthur and his knights. The two knights in each respective tale journey away from their heteronormative spaces, in which a complex...
Show moreIf queer is an applicable label for that which aims to subvert or counteract normativity, then Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, The Wife of Bath's tale, and her Prologue are each, in their own ways, queer texts. I examine the ways in which the feminine presences of Morgan le Fay and the Loathly Lady influence and challenge the heteronormative, homosocial space of Arthur and his knights. The two knights in each respective tale journey away from their heteronormative spaces, in which a complex system of homosociality and chivalric patriarchy dominate, to a queer space where each must go against his societal norms and rely on feminine agency and talismans in order for their quests to succeed - and to ensure their survival. It is this very convergence of heteronormative and queer spaces that enables Morgan's defiance of heteronormativity and dominance over those who enter her feminine, non-normative domain.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3318679
- Subject Headings
- Characters, Wife of Bath, Feminism and literature, Gawain (Legendary character), Man-woman relationships in literature, Human body in literature, Symbolism in literature, Sex in literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- The attack of the compilator: Chaucer's challenge of auctores and antifeminism in The Legend of Good Women.
- Creator
- Babrove, Franklin., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
Geoffrey Chaucer's narrator persona in The Legend of Good Women (LGW) goes through a transformation, starting off in the Prologue to the LGW as a naèive compilator who is subordinate to his literary sources, or auctores, and eventually becoming an auctor himself by the end of the Legends. To gain an authoritative voice, Chaucer's narrator criticizes auctoritee as it pertains to the antifeminist tradition and its misrepresentation of women as inherently wicked, in the process using certain...
Show moreGeoffrey Chaucer's narrator persona in The Legend of Good Women (LGW) goes through a transformation, starting off in the Prologue to the LGW as a naèive compilator who is subordinate to his literary sources, or auctores, and eventually becoming an auctor himself by the end of the Legends. To gain an authoritative voice, Chaucer's narrator criticizes auctoritee as it pertains to the antifeminist tradition and its misrepresentation of women as inherently wicked, in the process using certain rhetorical devices and other literary strategies to assert control over his sources for the Legends, as well as over the text as a whole. Of particular importance in this process is the narrator's line "[a]nd trusteth, as in love, no man but me" (2561) occurring near the end of "The Legend of Phyllis," the penultimate legend in the LGW. At this point in the text, the narrator persona steps completely outside of the role of compilator and presents himself as auctor who can be trusted by his female readers to tell their stories fairly and sympathetically, in ways that subtly confront antifeminist texts and perceptions.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/3362330
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Literature, Medieval, Criticism and interpretation, Feminism in literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- I'll be your mirror: reflections on doubling and the processing of aggression in the post(modern) fairy tales of Hesse & Winterson.
- Creator
- Rigdon, Brittany K., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
Traditional fairy tales represent some of the oldest and most archetypal forms of literature. However, as humanity rapidly evolves, the genre and content of traditional fairy tales still operates as a prevalent socializing agent that fails to promote pluralism. Instead, traditional fairy tales illustrate and uphold limited gender roles and expectations. This paper examines Hermann Hesse's role as a pioneer in a now burgeoning movement of fairy tale revisions that blur boundaries between...
Show moreTraditional fairy tales represent some of the oldest and most archetypal forms of literature. However, as humanity rapidly evolves, the genre and content of traditional fairy tales still operates as a prevalent socializing agent that fails to promote pluralism. Instead, traditional fairy tales illustrate and uphold limited gender roles and expectations. This paper examines Hermann Hesse's role as a pioneer in a now burgeoning movement of fairy tale revisions that blur boundaries between fantasy and reality by introducing specific, everyday locations, countries, and individuals coupled with a copious use of the double. This formula draws the reader into the tale via the uncanny and prompts a reevaluation of especially violent historical moments and issues that affect all within a society. Hesse's work within this new tradition of revisions of beloved fairy tales, as well as his creation of literary fairy tales, has significantly influenced the work of key postmodern feminist fairy tale revisionists like Jeanette Winterson.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/369202
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Symbolism in literature, Feminism in literature, Postmodernism (Literature), Fairy tales, Criticism and interpretation
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Olive Schreiner on "times and seasons".
- Creator
- Carr, Mellissa M., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
Olive Schreine'rs novel, The Story of an African Farm, and nonfiction work, Woman and Labor, have compelled critics to apply the term New Woman to her main character, Lyndall, who speaks out for change against the established gender roles. The thesis proposes that by placing Lyndall in a colonial context, Schreiner creates a plot where place and language embody the possibilities for change. Considering that Schreiner's life consisted of a life in the colonies, first as a governess, later as a...
Show moreOlive Schreine'rs novel, The Story of an African Farm, and nonfiction work, Woman and Labor, have compelled critics to apply the term New Woman to her main character, Lyndall, who speaks out for change against the established gender roles. The thesis proposes that by placing Lyndall in a colonial context, Schreiner creates a plot where place and language embody the possibilities for change. Considering that Schreiner's life consisted of a life in the colonies, first as a governess, later as a wife, one sees Schreiner's personal interest in change. Analyzing Schreiner's style of representing Lyndall's relationship with nature and other characters, one discovers the way Schreiner balances a feminist (and hence radical) shadow discourse of masochism with the discourses of nature and evolution. Schreiner registers an interest in change in her language by turning the linguistic-mental neighborhoods of Jane Austen inside out in favor of a more extrinsic language, the dialect of real South African neighborhoods. In her personal details, furthermore, Schreiner brings to life the language and landscape of her beloved country, creating the conceptual groundwork for political change. Read in this way, Olive Schreiner's work can be seen as creating space for more literature about social change like the award-winning work of the South African writer, Nadine Gordimer.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3332188
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Feminism in literature, Imperialism in literature, Political fiction, English, History and criticism, In literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Edith Wharton: self-actualization through characterization in The Age of Innocence.
- Creator
- Feuerberg, Betty., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
Edith Wharton uses characterization in the primary three characters in The Age of Innocence to explore the aspects of her life. Early adulthood is represented by May Welland Archer, who was born into New York 400, where society suppressed an individual's emotions, aspirations, and freedoms. The intermediate phase of her life is depicted in Newland Archer, who tests the confining limits of the society to which he belongs and strives to understand the role of emotions in achieving personal...
Show moreEdith Wharton uses characterization in the primary three characters in The Age of Innocence to explore the aspects of her life. Early adulthood is represented by May Welland Archer, who was born into New York 400, where society suppressed an individual's emotions, aspirations, and freedoms. The intermediate phase of her life is depicted in Newland Archer, who tests the confining limits of the society to which he belongs and strives to understand the role of emotions in achieving personal satisfaction. Wharton rejected and craved the ties of the New York 400 in the final phase of her life as portrayed in Ellen Olenska who left the 400, lived in Europe, and returned to New York. By developing these characters, Wharton attempts to retrospectively reconcile the transformations she experienced. Indeed, it will be clear that Wharton's work serves as a personal assessment of her self-actualization.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/3360784
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Women and literature, History, Feminism in literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Housing identity: re-constructing feminine spaces through memory in Virginia Woolf's The Years and Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca.
- Creator
- Derisi, Stephanie, Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
This thesis represents a study of The Years by Virginia Woolf and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. Both novels attempt to redefine the role of women in patriarchal society during the 1930s. The domestic role women had to fill within a masculine household constrained their ability to form an independent "self," apart from fathers and husbands. I argue that these novels articulate the possibility for women to access an independent self by examining the meaning behind domestic objects in and of the...
Show moreThis thesis represents a study of The Years by Virginia Woolf and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. Both novels attempt to redefine the role of women in patriarchal society during the 1930s. The domestic role women had to fill within a masculine household constrained their ability to form an independent "self," apart from fathers and husbands. I argue that these novels articulate the possibility for women to access an independent self by examining the meaning behind domestic objects in and of the house. Lucy Irigaray asserts that women were, and still are, associated with being valued as a desirable "commodity". Since women have no choice but to work within the symbolic order and are already labeled as "object," women writers have manipulated the system by examining the subject/object dichotomy. The relationship women have with inanimate, and particularly domestic, objects shows how time (the past and the future) manipulates freedom in the present moment. Woolf's reflection on how "moments of being" function as gateways to a heightened sense of awareness is prevalent in her last published novel, The Years. I invoke Friedrich Nietzsche to consider notions of how an antiquated past hinders identity in du Maurier's Rebecca. In the literary texts of Woolf and du Maurier, women have a unique relationship with material objects in relationship to subjectivity. By examining the spatial constructs of the home, women are able to construct themselves as free "subjects" in a male dominated world.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3342046
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Feminism in literature, Identity (Psychology) in literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Gender, Myth, and Warfare: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Women Warriors.
- Creator
- Boomer, Anne-Louise Lyttle, Brown, Susan Love, Florida Atlantic University, Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of Anthropology
- Abstract/Description
-
A combination of cross-cultural and symbolic methodologies suggests that women warriors occur in societies where there is both an emphasis on the sacred feminine that allows women greater access to positions of power and authority (as per Peggy Sanday) and where marital residency rules permit female fighters (following David B. Adams´s theory on women warriors). While neither theory can stand alone in explaining the existence of women warriors, when combined both theories give a solid picture...
Show moreA combination of cross-cultural and symbolic methodologies suggests that women warriors occur in societies where there is both an emphasis on the sacred feminine that allows women greater access to positions of power and authority (as per Peggy Sanday) and where marital residency rules permit female fighters (following David B. Adams´s theory on women warriors). While neither theory can stand alone in explaining the existence of women warriors, when combined both theories give a solid picture of societies that allow for female combatants. In this paper I propose that by combining Sanday’s work on female power and Adams’s work on women warriors we can come to a better understanding about just what makes the cultures that allow for women’s participation in warfare unique, and perhaps what characteristics must be in place in order for a culture to have women warriors.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2016
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004571, http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004571
- Subject Headings
- Sanday, Peggy Reeves.--Female power and male dominance--Criticism and interpretation., Adams, David B.--Why there are so few women warriors--Criticism and interpretation., Feminism in literature., Sex (Psychology)--Cross-cultural studies., Symbolism (Psychology)--Cross-cultural studies.
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Rhetoric in mirrors: the rising image of conquest.
- Creator
- Gregory, Courtney N., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
This project examines the blending of verbal and visual discourse in three of Christopher Marlowes early works: Dido Queen of Carthage and Tamburlaine the Great, Parts I and II. Through the process of appeals, both Dido and Zenocrate become more than feminine counterparts in a heroic tale and ultimately engage in rhetorical conquest themselves. Marlowe's treatment of Dido and Zenocrate portrays them as dynamic figures whose ambitions emerge upon the stage. In each drama, the feminine agency...
Show moreThis project examines the blending of verbal and visual discourse in three of Christopher Marlowes early works: Dido Queen of Carthage and Tamburlaine the Great, Parts I and II. Through the process of appeals, both Dido and Zenocrate become more than feminine counterparts in a heroic tale and ultimately engage in rhetorical conquest themselves. Marlowe's treatment of Dido and Zenocrate portrays them as dynamic figures whose ambitions emerge upon the stage. In each drama, the feminine agency legitimizes the action of the play. Dido utilizes visual appeals to contest the fate of the gods and persuade Aeneas to become the male counterpart in her empire. Zenocrate serves as the focus of Tamburlaine's appeals because she will become the legitimating presence for his ambition. I show that these Marlovian women hold a significant place in his canon and that the force of their presence is undeniable.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3332261
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Feminism and literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Reconfiguring the classic narrative of pulp fiction.
- Creator
- Gray, Alexandria S., Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, Department of English
- Abstract/Description
-
This project considers four writers that have used postmodern narrative strategies to reconfigure classic pulp science fiction tropes. The primary texts are Catherine L. Moore's "Shambleau," Eleanor Arnason's "The Warlord of Saturn's Moons", Robert Heinlein's "The Rolling Stones", and Margaret Atwood's "The Blind Assassin". Each experiments with narrative voices or uses a story-within-a-story structure. These strategies enable the authors to engage and comment on the process of how...
Show moreThis project considers four writers that have used postmodern narrative strategies to reconfigure classic pulp science fiction tropes. The primary texts are Catherine L. Moore's "Shambleau," Eleanor Arnason's "The Warlord of Saturn's Moons", Robert Heinlein's "The Rolling Stones", and Margaret Atwood's "The Blind Assassin". Each experiments with narrative voices or uses a story-within-a-story structure. These strategies enable the authors to engage and comment on the process of how traditional tropes and narratives are brought into a new context through appropriation and reconstruction.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3332251
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Pulp literature, Criticism and interpretation, Popular literature, Criticism and interpretation, Postmodernism (Literature), Feminism and literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)