Quote: “The concept of intersectionality has everything to do with the interdisciplinary ethos of contemporary feminist theory…As we will see in the chapters to come, contemporary feminists pay particular attention to parallel, reinforcing, and crisscrossing routes of intersectionality across gender, sexual orientation, disability, ability, class, race, postcolonialism, and environmentalism” (Parker 187).
Comment: This quote stuck out to me as, throughout our class discussions, we have talked about how different modes of literary criticism can apply to various texts and even more than one type of critique can be utilized on the same piece. From a feminist perspective, there is value in the multifaceted nature of women and how we interact with different parts of ourselves – there isn’t one right way to be a feminist or a woman; there are layers and connections to such a wide variety of life. This quote aligns with all how in literature, there might be the same type of variety that instead of pinning down one lens of critique or one right way to grasp the concept, there is a multitude of possibilities. I felt the same idea was applied in the poem “The Hill We Climb” by Amanda Gorman. We all have different ideals about what it means to be American or what democracy entails, but we can no longer define it through one historical lens and avoid the glaring subjectivity that comes from people having so much more than one characteristic to represent us.
Question: I might wonder how some of our more traditional literary critics might feel about intersectionality and contemporary feminism. For instance, structuralists think the author and the background context shouldn’t apply to the written work or new criticism where we shouldn’t try to get into the author’s head. Is there a way when taking the methods highlighted in feminist theory where those types of inquiries can interfere with the piece?
Bekler, Ecevit. “A Foucauldian and Feminist Reading of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.” Gaziantep University Journal of Social Sciences, vol. 22, no. 2, Apr. 2022, pp. 728–38. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.une.idm.oclc.org/10.21547/jss.988733.
In this article, Beckler takes two forms of critical approach, feminist and Foucauldian, to highlight how Anne Brontë’s novel The Tenant of Wildfell Hall represents a criticism and rejection of the Victorian era’s patriarchal society that diminished the power available to women. Beckler’s utilization of prominent French Philosopher Michel Foucault’s views on the localized mechanisms of repression and power structures aligns with this criticism toward Brontë’s approach to female subordination in society. From various feminist voices, such as Mary Wollstonecraft, Virginia Woolf, Kate Millett, etc., Beckler takes on the traditional literary aspect of women depicted from a male perspective versus how Anne Brontë’s piece orients the agency of her main character, Helen Huntington. By taking these two interesting forms of analysis, Beckler can take The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and identify areas where Helen’s actions, such as leaving an abusive relationship and taking custody of her child, represent a protest against those traditional gender roles and a rejection of the degradation and lack of power imposed upon her. This is incredibly significant to Beckler as it can further extrapolate to emphasize how a woman could redefine her feminine identity while still portraying rationality, intelligence, and responsibility.
In Drewer’s critique, the main problem identified is the complexities of the ideals of male and female education, but also in the analysis of the mistakes made by a female lead as she figures out the limitations of her marriage. Subsequently, the effects of traditional Victorian society and the law emerge as a conflict to how a woman could even endeavor to be independent and maintain levels of morality in line with the times. Drewery’s approach of analysis for this piece looks to evidence from the primary text, Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, and applies feminist theory to decipher the many examples of a larger message toward the discriminatory structures within the era, such as family and social life as well as legal rights. Reframing the mistakes of the main character Helen Huntington creates an avenue for examining her educational limitations and the strict confines she feels trapped by to be still moral. This develops a new perspective toward what agency and power she does have, and to Drewery, it makes Brontë’s devotion to truthful realities and representation even more impactful as it reconsiders where a woman’s place in society could be.
In this article, Priti Joshi recognizes the issue of gossip and unpleasant truths as a mechanism within Anne Brontë’s novel The Tenant of Wildfell Hall as a source of negative criticism of her work. Examining the extent of differentiation between Brontë’s novel and Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women – Joshi uncovered a distortion in the meaning of Brontë’s use of gossip and theories of femininity. Taking this approach, Joshi compares these works and calls attention to the assumptions made about Brontë’s alignment with Wollstonecraft’s denouncement of inconsequential gossip or chat as a setback to more critical feminist inquiries. This reformation takes shape as Joshi points to the fact that Brontë actually had a much more in-depth view of gender politics and femininity which examined the idea of idle chat as a source of power in what a masculine scope suggested it was not. Analysing Brontë’s piece in this manner allows for stereotyped assumptions to be given a new platform and perspective to the agency women had achieved while embedded in deeply patriarchal definitions of knowledge and truths.
Ross, Shawna. “Disconsolate Tenants of the Metabolic Rift: An Anthropocene Feminist View of Farming in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.” Victorians: A Journal of Culture and Literature, no. 138, Dec. 2020, p. COV13. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.une.idm.oclc.org/10.1353/vct.2020.0019
This article by Shawna Ross identifies a point of focus toward Anne Brontë’s piece, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, belonging to an ecofeminist perspective. To approach this topic, Ross draws support from Marxist’s take on ecology that brings in this aspect of the metabolic rift – referring to the division created between humans and their environment under capitalistic endeavors. Connecting this to Brontë’s novel, Ross takes a feminist recount of the Anthropocene, land management, and rural locations, as well as the emphasis on the state of women’s vulnerabilities during the Victorian period. From these methodologies, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall presents an opportunity for a feminine perspective on essential inquiries into ecological effects and a critique of the British Agricultural revolution. Scenarios within the novel that are imperative frames of reference include the encounters between tenants and the land, the conceptualization of what human interactions with the land produce, and Helen’s diary to reflect on past experiences to understand the present. Ross’s choice of examining the novel in this way provided insightful information that ecofeminists may align with when discovering the variety of narratives, storytelling, and representation that shape the ecological world.
Shaw’s piece of secondary criticism toward Anne Brontë’s literary works finds an issue with the remembrance of her work as opposed to those of her sisters. Going further with this problem, Shaw defines that some characteristics and accounts of Anne lead to assumptions that she was simple-minded, passive, and reserved. Through this article, Shaw instead wants to identify how Anne was courageous and practical in her literary pursuits and could subtly provide thoughtful examples of feminist literature. Another point addressed in the overall critique by Shaw is the effects of Anne’s moral and religious sentiments, which perhaps explain the separation of her work by contemporary feminists again from her sisters. The fact that her novels had more moral and familial affairs as topics should not negate the vastly insightful examples of how she questioned the ideas of womanliness and manliness and, more broadly, how gender roles are perceived in family life. The approaches in this article take the novel The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and Agnes Grey as primary sources to base the critique. By looking at Anne’s work in this light, it becomes essential to distinguish how though her subject matter was highly personal, touching on the impacts of these gender relations on children, and morally just with many religious sentiments, it still became a way to advocate for the moral and social rights of women. From Shaw’s critique, the significance lies in how Anne’s underlying and somewhat “quiet” display of feminist rhetoric is equally as radical and thought-provoking as her sisters, and framing her work as such should be well known.
Looking at the opening scene of Rear Window, I found it to be incredibly in line with Mulvey’s claims from her discussion of “Feminism and Visual Pleasure”, especially regarding the “masculine spectator, the subject, and what we might call a feminine spectated, the object”(Parker 173). In the film, the male main character, played by actor James Stewart, is viewing the world around him through the literal frame of his window, but taking it one step further in line with what Mulvey might suggest, also the frame of a male heterosexual gaze. The objects of his gaze are his neighbors, but primarily in this opening scene, the young ballerina. Connecting to Mulvey’s discussion of the female as the spectator’s object, we are viewing the woman in, again, a very framed setting, her apartment window. I felt this might play into her claim to the “abusive version of masculine heterosexuality” as she has no agency in the view of the audience except for how Stewart is gazing at her; she is doing things we cannot hear, there is no dialogue that we can witness besides what is showed to us by Stewart.
Similarly, in the opening scene of Psycho, the usage of the window brings in elements of an invasion of privacy and some gaze we cannot yet identify. To point to the visual perspectives of this scene that align with Mulvey, I found the first shot of the two characters very telling and connected to the abusive heterosexual gaze. When we see the male character standing and moving beside the bed where the female lead is stationary, her sole purpose in this scene is to be observed. Additionally, throughout the scene, he moves back and forth from the window to around the room while Leigh stays stationary as their discussions occur. I did find that perhaps this scene could be elaborated on by later assertions of Mulvey that highlight the increasingly critical nature of watching these films and how “actresses who characters often look at men as the men look at them”(Parker 183) can be viewed not in an inherently masculine nature but as an equal agent in the gazing.
QCQ on video “Visual Pleasure at 40” from Mulvey
Quote: …found that I was detached from the screen, detached from the story and that blissful sense of loss of self into the world if the cinema, and suddenly became a woman looking at films which I’d loved and now began to irritate me”(Mulvey 15:21)
Comment: This passage from the video “Visual Pleasure at 40,” where Mulvey re-examines her early work, really stuck out to me as I think of my own experiences with films I used to like, and then suddenly, one day, I would think of all these questions and complaints about the female characters I hadn’t before. I think this ties into the latter part of Parker’s discussion of Mulvey when it stated how “…popular film may not be pervasively demeaning to women as it used to be, it is hardly a paragon of feminist equality”(183); as more voices and critical approaches are applied to film, we can get out of this passive acceptance of whatever gaze or focalization curs and insert our views and judgments. I also felt this connected with a later quote from the video where Mulvey explained that there was a shift from woman’s spectacle being naturalized into popular culture to the patriarchal psyche that is the very construction of that spectacle.
Question: After hearing how Mulvey explained the many phases her work went through, such as the political catalyst of the women’s rights movement to then the academic context and how she feels it resembles a historical document, I wonder if she feels that films themselves can be perceived through a historical lens that identifies a specific period; bringing in her point that Hollywood did have its own specificity around the female objectiveness and the way that gaze was modified and absorbed (19:00ish). I also wonder how we can connect newer methodologies like the Bechdel test to her theories. Would it seem like the culture itself is still steeped in this patriarchal lens, and they insert certain criteria to appease growing complaints and keep critics quiet? It would be interesting to pick out contemporary examples where women direct films and stars leading women and compare the effects of gazing.
Quote: “…she never had married, and yet, judging from the mask-like indifference of her face, she had gone through twenty times more of passion and experience than those whose loves are trumpeted forth for all the world to hear. Under the stress of thinking about Isabella, her room became more shadowy and symbolic; the corners seemed darker, the legs of chairs and tables more spindly and hieroglyphic”(Woolf 216-217).
Comment: From an early feminist interpretation of Woolf’s story “The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection,” we could look to an example like this and point out all the characteristics of Isabella, our primary focal point, and discuss how she is either a good or bad role model. Taking a more comprehensive look at later modes of feminist critique, we could go beyond those limiting factors and address what is being said about gender that is not explicitly coming directly from her actions or being. I would put a great deal of emphasis on recognizing how the writing identifies a cultural feeling toward unmarried women as being somewhat negative or irregular and then changes the narrative to place a new perspective. The elements of this quotation that can relate to Isabella’s objects or possessions also can indicate how specific descriptors or observations can connect to that of the descriptions and analysis of women; by her furniture suddenly seeming “darker,” “shadowy,” or “spindly,” perhaps one could take that as a change in how society views a woman when her path veers from that culturally normalized, well-established path.
Question: I wonder if Woolf’s narrator sympathizes with Isabella and maybe recognizes some of that shared understanding from a woman’s perspective of always being looked at and judged out of context with the humanness of experience …but then I asked how and why I assumed the narrator was a woman? Does that in and of itself hold any weight as we look at this piece of literature from a feminist critique?
