Female Homosociality Refers to All Kinds of Female Bonding And
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Durham E-Theses Hostility and Solidarity: Female Homosociality in the Fiction of Toni Morrison ZANGANEH, MOTAHHAREH How to cite: ZANGANEH, MOTAHHAREH (2015) Hostility and Solidarity: Female Homosociality in the Fiction of Toni Morrison, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/11031/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 Hostility and Solidarity: Female Homosociality in the Fiction of Toni Morrison Motahhareh Zanganeh Doctor of Philosophy Department of English Studies Durham University 2014 Table of Contents Statement of Copyright ii Acknowledgment iii Introduction 1 Chapter One Friendship and Age: Homosociality in Toni Morrison’s Sula and Jazz 49 Chapter Two Revolving Around Men: Patriarchy and Women’s Identity in Song of Solomon 114 and Love Chapter Three Female Homosociality and the Impact of Slavery in Beloved and A Mercy 169 Chapter Four Collective Female Bonding in Paradise: Reviving Hurt Women 222 Conclusion 261 Bibliography 265 i Statement of Copyright “The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without the author's prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged.” ii Acknowledgement First of all, I would like to thank Dr. Jennifer Terry for her unconditional support and unlimited kindness. She has done a great job and consistently helped me through the labyrinth of PhD. She has never limited her supervision even after when I have entered into the continuation year. Her enthusiasm has always been a great inspiration and also motivation to move forward. I would also like to thank my lovely, educated, and open- minded parents who have never limited my enthusiasm and let me grow beyond the restrictions that a patriarchal society normally forces upon women. They have always been the greatest support and source of inspiration for me. Special thanks to my mother who has culminated feminist thoughts in me since childhood; and always stood by me to fight for my rights as a woman. Huge thanks to my dear father who helped me to discover the vast world by his financial and emotional support. Many thanks to my five- year- partner, Iman Hami, who has always stood by me during this tough journey and has given me inspirational thoughts. I could never been able to do this without his support and love. And finally I would like to thank my dear sister and niece who suffered the distance between us but always motivated me to move forward. Thoughtful thanks to my brave teachers Roghayeh Ghanbaralizadeh and Devika Rani L. who taught me invaluable knowledge of feminist thoughts during my B.A. and M.A. in Iran and India respectively. iii iv Introduction The term female homosociality refers to all kinds of female bonding and relationships such as those between mothers and daughters, sisters, female friends, female classmates, female colleagues, lesbians etc. Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick in her groundbreaking book Between Men: English Literature and Male Homosocial Desire defines homosociality broadly as a term occasionally used in the study of history and the social sciences, where it describes social bonds between persons of the same sex.1 Sedgwick continues by explaining her choice of terms for the subtitle, Male Homosocial Desire: her intention in selecting the word ‘desire’ over ‘love’ is to discuss a structure and not a particular emotion. She also writes that she employs the combination of desire and homosociality: ‘not for a particular affective state or emotion, but for the affective or social force, the glue, even when its manifestation is hostility or hatred or something less emotively charged, that shapes important relationships’ (2). Borrowing the term homosociality from Sedgwick, I will use it hereafter in this thesis to indicate a form of cohesive social relation, including two sides of solidarity and hostility, which brings women together. Although Sedgwick’s main focus is upon male relations she also comments on female homosociality, stating It seems at this moment to make an obvious kind of sense to say that women in 1 Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Between Men: English Literature and Male Homosocial Desire (1985) (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), p. 2. 1 our society who love women, women who teach, study, nurture, suckle, write about, march for, vote for, give jobs to, or otherwise promote the interests of other women, are pursuing congruent and closely related activities (2–3). When one considers female to female bonding, the first thing which comes to mind is perhaps lesbianism and sexual relationships among women, but as Sedgwick correctly points out, any common activity which helps women support each other can be regarded as a manifestation of female bonding. According to her, homosociality and homosexuality are distinct entities, although they may also overlap. She writes, ‘the adjective “homosocial” as applied to women’s bonds […] need not be pointedly dichotomized as against “homosexual”; it can intelligibly denominate the entire continuum’ (3). Sedgwick’s definition and ideas are an influential source of inspiration for this thesis. Having studied the fictions of African American writers such as Alice Walker, Toni Morrison and Gloria Naylor among others, I observed the fact that female friendship and female homosociality are prominent and pervasive in most of these works. This notion seems especially pronounced in Morrison’s novels which will form the main focus of my thesis. In a formative interview with Morrison, Sandi Russell points out Toni Morrison wanted to capture the relationship that black women have historically shared with one another. In Afro-American culture, and in the black church, sisterhood has a larger meaning than that of contemporary usage. “The term Sister,” Toni explains, “has a deep old meaning – it was valid, never 2 secondary. Black women had to be real and genuine to each other, there was no one else”. 2 In an attempt to revitalize the historical meaning of sisterhood among black women, Morrison shows interest in female bonding in most of her works. She explores an expansive and loose definition of the term, in order to stimulate the reader to delve into the significance of female homosociality as a potential source of power in the face of patriarchy for women. In her own words she tells Nellie McKay why she has portrayed female friendship in all of her books: because the world knows that women don't choose each other's acquaintanceship. They choose men first, then women as second choice. But I have made women the focal point of books in order to find out what women's friendships are really all about.3 The main objective of this study can be described as identifying different manifestations of female bonding in Morrison’s novels and drawing out the wider consequences of such relationships among female characters for their lives, communities and self understandings. While the terms sisterhood and bonding may tend to have positive associations, by investigating broader ‘homosociality’ my thesis is able to also highlight and explore Morrison’s repeated engagement with damaged and/or damaging female units and relations. Examining important scholarship on Morrison’s fiction, I identified a lack of criticism encompassing of the wide variety of female bonds found in the majority of Morrison’s works, 2 Sandi Russell, ‘It’s OK to Say OK’, in Critical Essays on Toni Morrison, ed. Nellie Y. McKay (Boston, Mass.: Hall, 1988), pp. 43-47, p. 45. 3 Nellie McKay, ‘An Interview with Toni Morrison’, Contemporary Literature, 24/4 (1983), 413-29, p. 428. 3 including her most recent novels. Most critics either focus on the primary mother-daughter relationship or on selected prominent friendships in the early novels.4 I will explore Morrison’s works with a larger scope to include all kinds of female-female relationship, friendly and hostile, and the underlying causes behind the formation of such homosociality. I will take a broadly feminist approach and, in particular, will draw on critical studies that have looked at homosociality and on black feminist theory.5 My main focus will be seeking answers to the following questions: why is Morrison preoccupied with female connection in her fiction and to what extent does she offer a unique outlook on it in each work? What part is it shown to play in processes of self-actualization and resistant gender politics? How do male figures fit into this picture and what purpose is served by recurrent portrayals of them as barriers to the formation of female homosociality? How does the reading of female-female bonding relate to and inform the depiction of heterosexual relationships? How do the narratives work and interact with such thematic and political concerns? This thesis will hence attempt to add to and expand on existing scholarship on Morrison, offering a more comprehensive examination of female homosociality in seven of her novels. In Toni Morrison’s novels such as Sula, Beloved, and Song of Solomon the recurring image of a household in which a female is the head of the family reinforces the author’s interest in bonding among female characters.