Normality/Normativity

LISA FO NORMALITY/NORMATIVITY brings together essays from L a number of different fields that challenge the self- KMARSON ormality/ evidence of normality and bring to light its normative dimensions. Exploring how normative boundaries of normality are established, reinforced and disrupted in ormativity various ways, the essays demonstrate the co-depend- K Ä ence and intimate intermingling of normality and nor- LL mativity and show how lines of demarcation between (ED.) the normal and deviant are not always clear cut but often characterized by ambiguity. | NORMA n L ITY/NORMATIVITY Skrifter från Centrum för genusvetenskap LISA FOLKMARSON KÄLL (ED.) / Crossroads of Knowledge 12 Universitetstryckeriet, Uppsala 2009 12 Centre for Gender Research INTRODUCTION | 1 LiSA FOLKMARSon KÄLL (ED.) 2 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 3 Normality/Normativity Lisa Folkmarson Käll(ed.) Crossroads of knowledge Skrifter från Centrum för genusvetenskap Uppsala universitet Uppsala 2009 ISBN 978-91-978186-1-2 This publication was made possible with financial support from FAS. © Authors and Centre for Gender Research Printed in Sweden by University Printers, Uppsala, 2009 Can be ordered from: Centre for Gender Research, Uppsala University Box 634, SE-751 26 Uppsala, Sweden Telefax: +46 (0)18 471 35 70 E-mail: [email protected] Layout and Typesetting: Håkan Selin 4 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 5 Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 7 INGVIL HELLSTRAND | Normative body identity in science fiction: Reading gender in “Battlestar Galactica”.....................................................................17 JennY BJÖRKLund | Lovesick: Lesbianism in Vigdís Grímsdóttir’s Z—A Love Story ...........................................................................................................................................41 VARPU LÖYttYnieMI | Professional identity and sexual difference .................63 MAriA JÖNSSon | The never-ending pause? Representations of menopause in the writings of Kerstin Thorvall, Simone de Beauvoir and Doris Lessing ...................... 89 HILde BondeVIK | Hysteria and metagynesis: Female malady between normality and normativity .............................................................................................................107 JenS EriKSSon | Race mixing and contradiction: Kant’s ambivalence toward hybridity................................................................................131 Gunn EngeLSrud | Aerobic exercise and health – a tenuous connection? ..................................................................................................................155 JESSIKA GRAHM | Wo/man – a social construction of meaning and matter: Steps to an ecological framework integrating the human body and mind .............................................................................................................187 LiSA FOLKMARSon KÄLL | “…looking at myself as in a movie…” Reflections on normative and pathological self-objectification .........225 List of Contributors .............................................................................................................................251 4 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 5 Introduction The terms normality and normativity which make up the title of this book share the same Latin root norma, meaning rule, pattern, precept. The term norma also signifies a carpenter’s square, the square providing a standard to ensure the reproduction of right angles, straight edges and corners. The normal is in this sense the perpendicular or that which is according to a square. The right angles, straight edges and corners of the carpenter’s square mark out principles of normality and determine everything not conforming to the standard of the square as deviations of different degree and quality. These deviations serve both to reinforce the boundaries and fields of normality and to shake their very foundation. In a more extended sense the normal is that which is according to rule, that which is conventional, customary, habitual and routine. The normal, in short, is that which conforms to norm and has been established as normative. It is interesting to note that Modern Greek uses the word kanonikos for normal which marks the link between normal and canon giving the normal a dimension of tradition and historicity. The normal is that which has been habituated and canonized through tradition. Further, according to Websters Word Histories the Latin norma is thought by some lin- guists to be derived from the Greek gnomon which designates the pointer on a sundial that casts a shadow to indicate the time of day but which also means one who knows.1 This connection be- 1 Webster’s Word Histories (Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, Inc. 1989), p 321f. 6 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 7 tween norm and know adds an obvious dimension of power and it rather forcefully pulls notions such as normality and normativity in a certain (normative) direction. While one who knows may be thought of in quite general and inclusive terms, we are repeat- edly reminded that with few exceptions the Western intellectual tradition displays a long line of white men as the ones who know something that is seen to be considered worth knowing. In everyday language, that which is normal seems to be self-ev- ident and this is partly due to the proliferation of meaning. Terms such as norms and normality have different technical meanings in specific fields but are also widespread in most areas of life and society. In states of crisis, normality may appear as a distant and desirable ideal but it may equally appear to be a sphere of con- finement which is the ground of crisis. In both cases normality is normative, but in each case it carries a different meaning and value. While normality is constituted as that which conforms to a normative standard, normativity is in turn constituted as that which is normal. Normative standards, marking out fields of normality, are always authoritative and given within a network of power relations. This volume gathers a collection of essays that all deal in different ways with questions concerning normality and normativity. The authors bring to light how normative boundaries of normality are constructed and deconstructed, established, reinforced and disrupted. The articles show that the lines of demarcation between the normal and deviant are not always clear cut at right angles, straight edges and corners of a carpenter’s square but at times governed by uncertainty and ambiguity. 8 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 9 In the first article Normative body identity in science fiction: Reading gender in “Battlestar Galactica” Ingvil Hellstrand deals with representations of non-human, yet humanoid, bodies em- bodied as female in contemporary Science Fiction. Her analysis is grounded in specific, textual representations of humanoid char- acters found in the TV-series “Battlestar Galactica”. In the article she investigates the way representations of humanoid bodies por- trayed in “Battlestar Galactica” are subject to identity categoriza- tion based on corporeal features and gendered patterns of iden- tification. She argues that the gendering of non-human bodies as female results in a representation of women as doubly Other. In the article Lovesick: Lesbianism in Vigdís Grímsdóttir’s Z—A Love Story Jenny Björklund studies the representation of lesbianism in the novel Z—A Love Story (1996) by Icelandic writer Vigdís Grímsdóttir and shows how love between women is con- nected to ill-health in the novel. Drawing on the work of Julie Ab- raham who claims that the lesbian novel is governed by a heterosexual plot in which lesbianism becomes a problem, Björklund demonstrates how Grímsdóttir’s novel at first seems to challenge this idea. At the same time, however, it establishes a connection between lesbianism and ill-health. On the one hand, the novel contains an ambition to normalize lesbianism, mainly through juxtaposing lesbianism and heterosexuality. In doing so the novel is politically important in the struggle to overcome judgmental attitudes toward homosexuality. On the other hand, the link between lesbianism and ill-health, and even death, is brought out clearly in the novel through the lesbian protagonist Anna’s suf- fering a terminal illness. Following Abraham’s suggestion that the lesbian novel includes strategies to get rid of lesbianism, Björk- lund argues that connections to disease and death could be viewed 8 | norMALitY/norMAtiVitY INTRODUCTION | 9 as such a strategy. She concludes that while Grímsdóttir’s novel strives to normalize lesbianism and depict love between women in a positive way, such a project becomes impossible because of the narrative power of the heterosexual plot. Varpu Löyttyniemi’s article Professional identity and sexual difference attempts to theorize the equality of the maternal and the feminine as professional identities without accepting them as the norm for a woman professional. In the article is presented a self-portrayal of mother-physician as a case in point that neces- sitates the need to constitute a true professional identity out of the culturally feminine. Löyttyniemi suggests that feminisms of difference, particularly Luce Irigaray’s philosophy, can provide a way of understanding professional differences without adhering to one (masculine) norm of career

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