Through subtle shades of color, the cover design represents the layers of richness and that flourish within minority communities. The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 A collection of scholarly research by fellows of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program

Preface

We are very pleased to share with you the 2016 edition of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal.

Earl Lewis, president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, stated that “intentional programs designed to promote diversity are needed to maximize the development of talent, encourage full participation, and secure the benefits of democracy. We remain committed to both diversity and democracy.”i This lofty objective is at the heart of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF) program, which aims to increase diversity in the faculty of higher edu- cation, specifically by supporting students from underrepresented minority groups in their goal of obtaining PhDs.

With the MMUF journal, we further seek to introduce young students to academia through exposure to the pub- lishing experience, a critically important component of higher education. This experience offers an introduction to the journal submission process, including manuscript preparation and editor-guided revision of scholarly work for publication, and provides an audience for student work. For most students, this has been their first experience in publishing a scholarly article.

The twenty-five scholars who contributed to this year’s journal come from seventeen colleges and universities that are part of the program’s member . These students share with us a diverse range of scholarship, including research conducted under the MMUF program, introductions to senior theses, and analytical class essays. The papers presented here represent a wide diversity of subjects, from history to linguistics to gender studies, that reflect the full range of MMUF-supported disciplines.

These authors have done more than just share their scholarship with us. They also challenge us to think critically and to broaden our perspective of the world. Through their work, we must confront challenging questions regarding race, gender and sexuality, , and morality, as well as the intersection of these subjects. I have been impressed not only with the authors’ commitment to their academic work, but also by their passionate and fearless willingness to closely examine such challenging and important topics.

It has been a sincere pleasure and opportunity to work with these students to prepare their papers for publication. I hope that they have learned as much from this process as I have. It is with great pride and excitement that we share their work with you.

Elissa Krakauer Jacobs MMUF Journal Editor-in-Chief Preceptor in Expository Writing Harvard University

i https://mellon.org/about/mission/ Editorial Board

Gregory A. Llacer MMUF Journal Editorial Board Chair Director, Office of Undergraduate Research and Fellowships Harvard University

Liza Cariago-Lo MMUF Journal Editorial Board Vice President for Academic Development, Diversity, and Inclusion Brown University

Mary Laurita MMUF Journal Editorial Board Assistant Dean, College of Arts and Sciences Washington University in St. Louis

Krishna Winston MMUF Journal Editorial Board Marcus L. Taft Professor of German Language and Literature Professor of German Studies Professor of Environmental Studies Wesleyan University

Journal Administration

Margot Hanson Vona Programs Manager, Research and Fellowships Harvard University

MMUF Program / Mellon Foundation

Armando Bengochea Program Officer and Director of MMUF The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Lee Bynum Senior Program Associate and Associate Director of MMUF The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016

Table of Contents

3 47 Ariana Brazier, Spelman College Ahmad Greene-Hayes, Williams College Homelessness in Children’s Television: The Necessary Delinquent Black Women’s Legacies and Activisms: Filmic, Visual, and Vocal Sentenced to Social Death Anti-Rape Technologies Advisor/Mentor(s): Patricia Ventura, Stephen Knadler Advisor/Mentor(s): Rhon Manigault-Bryant, Joy James

7 53 Krystal Briggs, College, CUNY Gualberto (Wally) Guzman, University of Texas at Austin This Language Still Duh Gwine Down Yuh: TMA Markers A Survey of Automatic Annotation Methods and the Creole Origins of AAVE Advisor/Mentor(s): Dr. Barbara E. Bullock, Dr. Almeida J. Toribio Advisor/Mentor(s): Dr. Mark Patkowski 57 13 Lovia Gyarkye, Princeton University Sydney Brown, Smith College The Black Cosmopolitan: A Critical Examination of Cosmopolitanism Mass Effect as a Conduit: The Effect of Simulated Realities on and Exile in Teju Cole’s Open City Our Perception of Alien Individuals Advisor/Mentor(s): Simon Gikandi, Tracy K. Smith, Judith Weisenfeld, Advisor/Mentor(s): Professor Floyd Cheung, Provost Katherine Rowe, Khristina Gonzalez Professor Naomi Miller, Professor Daphne Lamothe 62 17 Tomoyo Joshi, Oberlin College Amanda Cabanilla, Whittier College A Native Feminist Theory Approach to Patricia Grace’s Tu: Form, Function, and Structure: Online Dating While Fat Heteropatriarchy, Nationhood, and the Trauma of Militarized Violence Advisor/Mentor(s): Rebecca Overmyer-Velázquez Advisor/Mentor(s): Jan Cooper, Afia Ofori-Mensa, Frank Kelderman

22 66 Walter G. Chacón, Bowdoin College Caroline Martínez, Bowdoin College A Case Study of the Experiences of Students of Color Formation of Female Indigenous Leaders in the Highlands of at a Selective American Prep School Advisor/Mentor(s): Ingrid Nelson Advisor/Mentor(s): Craig McEwen, Nancy Riley 71 26 Iman Masmoudi, Harvard University Andrea Clark Gómez, University of Texas at Austin The Secular Speaks to the Sacred: The Challenges of Western-Islamic “Eso Ya No Se Consigue”: The Effects of Economic Shortages on Communicative Action in of Piety Women’s Everyday Lives in Venezuela Advisor/Mentor(s): Bonnie Talbert Advisor/Mentor(s): Dr. Juliet Hooker, Dr. Jonathan Brown 76 31 Gissell Alexis Montoya, Bryn Mawr College Benjamin Diego, Stanford University “Denied Their Gender”: The Impact of Medical Tourism on Access to “Necessary Failures”: Reproducing , Transgression, and Gender Reassignment Surgery by Kathoey Communities in Thailand Violence in Late-Medieval Male Pregnancy Narratives Advisor/Mentor(s): Carol Schilling, Megan Sands-Lincoln Advisor/Mentor(s): Elaine Treharne, Fiona Griffiths 81 36 Briana Payton, Princeton University Daniel Dominguez, Stanford University The Most Costly Gift: An Exploration of the Potential Risks and Rewards What Good Is It, Anyway? Moral Lessons from Literature in Cortázar’s of Double Consciousness and Second Sight in The Souls of Black Folk Rayuela by W.E.B. Du Bois Advisor/Mentor(s): Professor Vincent Barletta, Professor Joan Ramon Advisor/Mentor(s): Judith Weisenfeld, Eddlie Glaude Resina, Patricia Valderrama 86 40 Jocelyn Proietti, Smith College Cassandra Flores-Montaño, Wellesley College Towards a Black Women’s Romantic Ideology: Theorizing Black Women’s Mujeres en la Lucha: Health Activism and the Devaluation of Women’s Cultural Production in the 1980s/’90s Labor in the Brown Berets’ Free Clinic Advisor/Mentor(s): Daphne Lamothe, Kevin Quashie Advisor/Mentor(s): Irene Mata, Maria Josefina Saldaña-Portillo, David Rainbow 90 Lauren Richardson, University of Chicago 44 Moral Dilemmas and Modality in Kratzer’s Semantics: Thomas Ray Garcia, Princeton University Must “Ought” Imply “Can”? Introduction to “The Speculative Fiction of Jack London” Advisor/Mentor(s): Malte Willer Advisor/Mentor(s): Alfred Bendixen, Sarah Anderson

1 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016

Table of Contents

95 109 Melissa Sarmiento, Cornell University Jiemin Tina Wei, Princeton University John Paul II and Political Catholicism in Chile Gender in Francis Bacon’s Philosophy of Science: Marriage, Procreation, Advisor/Mentor(s): Raymond Craib and Dominion Advisor/Mentor(s): Daniel Garber 100 Georgia Soares, University of Southern California 113 To See Is to Feel: Feminist Symbols of Perception in Woolf and Lispector Cary Allain Williams, Harvard University Advisor/Mentor(s): Elda Maria Roman, Beatrice Bennett On Becoming the Little Allain Girl, Introduction to “At Least We Have Our Name”: Free People of Color and the Struggle to Survive in 104 Antebellum Louisiana and Mississippi Jermaine Stewart Jr./Stewart-Webb, Grinnell College Advisor/Mentor(s): Timothy Patrick McCarthy, Glenda Carpio, Lynne Black Female Sexuality and Gender Subjectivity in Ballroom : Feeley, Emily Owens Sexual Expression beyond Respectability Politics Advisor/Mentor(s): Shanna Greene Benjamin

2 Homelessness in Children’s Television: The Necessary Delinquent Sentenced to Social Death Ariana Brazier, Spelman College

Ariana Brazier is a 2016 graduate of Spelman College. two such populations (Power 66). In this paper I analyze At Spelman, she studied English and developed an interest in Cartoon Network’s cartoon series Adventure Time (2010– the application of theory to real-world problems. Ariana is a present), Regular Show (2010–present), and The Amazing first-year English PhD student at the University of Pittsburgh. World of Gumball (2011–present). These shows have enjoyed long runs on television and have received the highest awards for television programing including Emmys, Peabodys, and Abstract Kids’ Choice Awards. I have chosen these shows largely because of their popularity amongst elementary-aged chil- This paper analyzes representations of homelessness dren as well as college-aged adults nostalgically reliving in children’s television in order to discuss the implications of their childhoods. Moreover, each of these children’s shows simplistic characterizations of class in children’s television. contain one or more episodes in which stereotyped carica- Neoliberal ideology successfully functions in these shows as tures of isolated homeless people are employed to enhance the homeless are stereotypically depicted as flat characters the normalness, morality, and/or heroism of the “housed,” without depth or purpose. This one-dimensional charac- middle-class protagonists. terization rooted in the false perception of the undeserving poor allows for the television audience to remain socially Television portrayals juxtapose the homeless, who and emotionally disconnected from the homeless. I argue appear to be lacking material wealth and social status, against that the stereotypical portrayals of homelessness in chil- ideal neoliberal citizens, who visibly contribute to their com- dren’s television serve as a site of deployment for neoliberal munities through education and labor. Because neoliberalism ideologies that exclude America’s homeless on the basis of is both an economic system and an ideology that uses wealth their socioeconomic and behavioral . Neoliberalism and an economic analysis to determine an individual’s social necessitates the social death of the homeless in order to and moral value (Cacho 19), the homeless are deemed value- define and maintain the . The homeless are, at less because they are not presented as competitors in the best, castigated and at the worst, socially assassinated for the global economy, or members of society more broadly. The benefit of the controlling neoliberal community. This article juxtaposition of the homeless and neoliberal citizens inten- is a part of a larger thesis. sifies the dichotomy of causes as structural or individual, as well as the social perception of homeless individuals as either the deserving or undeserving poor. The homeless characters Homelessness is a socioeconomic and political issue in each of the aforementioned shows become categorized that is portrayed as an irrational deviation from the middle as undeserving, often subhuman creatures, because of their and upper class socially constructed norms. Adult television apparent apathy and socioeconomic deviance. Furthermore, portrayals of homelessness are fraught with comical stereo- the homeless characters’ apparent inability to conform to types of the homeless. There are a few notable exceptions neoliberal self-discipline positions them as a waste of atten- in which the homeless character evokes sympathy as the tion and resources. I argue that children’s television pro- protagonist such as in Hancock and The Pursuit of Happyness; motes an understanding of the homeless as dysfunctional nevertheless, these stories are extraordinarily triumphant and delinquent, which leads to a denial of their humanity and not characteristic of the common experience of the and justifies the social death of the homeless. Social death is chronically homeless in particular. Conceptualizations of the negation of the civil rights that provide legal protection homelessness in children’s television, on the other hand, against political, social, and physical violence. have evolved from the romanticized narratives of love and camaraderie depicted in the post-Great Depression-era Negative of the homeless population are Disney movies, Lady and the Tramp (1955) and The Aristocats lethal to the socioeconomic mobility of all impoverished (1970). The homeless cats and dogs of Disney’s classic mov- people. Literally, the homeless exist outside of the home, ies were charmingly humanized as they enjoyed the freedom in a foreign and unprotected world. Not only does their of the open roads, and were the protagonists of narratives attire signify abandonment, but also their dwelling places containing personal growth and success. against garbage cans, police stations, public parks, alley- ways, and beneath bridges signify isolation. The homeless Today, however, the homeless are portrayed stereo- characters become an embodiment of what Philosopher typically as isolated, one-dimensional figures that epitomize Michel Foucault would call biopolitical delinquents, which failure and social deviance. The general disregard for people are individuals who break social norms rather than the experiencing homelessness is reflected in children’s televi- ( 251–3). The so-called “dysfunctional sion as much as any media segment. Children’s television is Discipline and Punish self” is being blamed for homelessness. As a result of their an influential avenue for developing connections with popu- delinquency, the homeless are seen as physically, socially, lations and experiences outside of a child’s respective socio- politically, and economically impotent because they cannot economic class; the homeless and severely impoverished are 3 be fixed or are deemed unworthy of our attention (Cronley The theme of violence and passivity continues in 325). In the children’s programs that I analyze, they are Regular Show, which follows a blue jay named Mordecai and called “beggars,” “slackers,” and, as in Adventure Time, a raccoon named Rigby who work in a public park and find “freaks.” themselves in random, bizarre, and often dangerous situa- tions that are a direct result of their laziness and disobedi- Adventure Time is the story of a boy, Finn, and his ence on the job. In the episode “Benson Be Gone,” Benson, shape-shifting dog, Jake, who embark on random adventures the park manager, is fired. In his unemployment, Benson throughout the fictitious Land of Ooo. The episode entitled discovers a new sense of freedom and meets the homeless “Freak City” is the focus of my study because it is the only character Leon who describes the “ of a slacker.” Leon episode that centralizes the issue of criminalized homeless- has a thick beard, long hair, and is wearing a gray hoodie ness. The episode depicts a colony of abandoned “freaks” with a brown knit skullcap as he eats a plain sandwich. The whose living situation and social isolation are disturbingly conversation between Benson and Leon becomes contro- reflective of the criminalization of the poor and home- versial when Leon mocks the importance of maintaining a less. The offensive treatment of the freaks normalizes the job and receiving an income. Leon even refers to himself as eschewing of those presumed to be delinquent because of “Upe,” which is “short for Utopia” because “[he’s] livin’ the their differences. The episode begins with a self-identified dream . . .,” thus implying that homelessness is a choice of “beggar” asking for food from Jake and Finn. Finn, believ- his own free will because he refuses to work. The neoliberal ing himself a hero, becomes momentarily conflicted about ideology that emphasizes self-reliance and asserts individual offering his assistance to the “beggar” when Jake suggests, failure as the reason for the existence of poverty and unem- “maybe feeding a starving homeless guy is the wrong thing ployment is unabashedly displayed through this interaction to do.” In the off chance that the “starving homeless guy” is between Benson and Leon. an elf rewarding helpful passersby, Finn decides to offer him food from his own backpack. Treacherously, the “beggar” In his book, Down & Out, On the Road: The Homeless reveals himself to be the Magic Man, as he magically trans- in American History, Kenneth Kusmer recounts the disparag- forms Finn into a giant foot. Shortly after, the town’s inhab- ing sentiments towards the homeless throughout American itants, believing Finn to be a freak who must be banished, history; these sentiments are intentionally embodied in force him to live beneath a bridge with the other freaks in the seemingly harmless portrayal of Leon. Kusmer asserts, order to restore the town’s safety. “Attitudes toward work, idleness, inequality, and benevo- lence have all been connected in some way with the home- Rotting in underneath the bridge is a small less, who in different guises have represented alienation and group of animated body parts that were also people prior to failure in a society that has long worshiped upward mobility crossing paths with the Magic Man. The setting, ambiance, and success” (7). Leon is the failure America irresponsibly and the dialogue that takes place amongst the characters seeks to bury by presenting the issue of homelessness as a parallel stereotypes of real homeless situations in America. shameful deviance and a choice inspired by laziness. Specifically, the moment Jake and Finn enter the bleak pov- erty of the colony, Jake immediately begins to romanticize Finally, The Amazing World of Gumball revolves the life of an outcast by asking: “Can we live here in this around the daily lives and adventures of two school-aged pile of trash and rats forever?” Satisfied by the affirmative brothers and their family. The homeless character in this response he receives from the colony members, he plops series is actually a regular character on the show. The char- into the pile and relaxes his body. Meanwhile, Finn is ada- acter is not listed amongst the supporting characters and mantly trying to galvanize the abandoned creatures in a fight remains nameless on television, but the online world has against the Magic Man; however, a creature that announces dubbed the creature “Hobo.” The homeless character is himself as the leader of the colony of freaks asserts: “Oh, he an obviously abnormal creature that receives virtually no [the Magic Man] can’t be caught. He’s got magic. Besides recognition. A further search also reveals that Hobo is an we’re worthless freaks. We can’t ever beat him. So we’ve unknown species that appears in multiple episodes in every gathered here to wallow in our self-pity.” This exchange season of the series to date (Gumball Wiki). Contrastingly, is reflective of the conservative and banal belief that the the protagonists are of a stable and respectable socioeco- homeless have abandoned social norms and no longer value nomic class; as a reward for abiding by the social standards personal productivity. The homeless are often understood that mandate productive contributions to the economy

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 to be a passive population that solely relies on government through labor and education, Gumball and Darwin can welfare, or the labor of productive middle-class citizens. afford to be devious without fear of becoming the crimi- Without agency, the characters are portrayed as victims of nalized deviant. For instance, in the episode, “The DVD,” their own passivity. the two brothers are frantically attempting to return a badly damaged DVD to the store, Laser Video Rental. Gumball 4 drags Darwin through a series of failed schemes to collect of deviance that is deemed threatening to the neoliberal enough money to cover the cost of the DVD. Gumball dominance inflicts physical and psychological punishment decides that panhandling outside a convenience store is the visible to the public and exploitative of the homeless. To best plan of action. Loitering outside the store, in front of take Foucault’s discourse on biopolitical delinquency even an ATM, Darwin begins to complain, but Gumball retorts: further, the homeless characters embody Lisa Marie Cacho’s “Less complaining, more begging . . . . Now pinch me, we analysis of the inescapable violence that is foundational to get more when it looks like I’m crying.” neoliberal ideology: “Certain vulnerable and impoverished populations . . . are deemed deserving of discipline and pun- Supposedly a humorous component of the plot, ishment but not worthy of protection. They are not merely the scene becomes nuanced as the image zooms out and excluded from legal protection but criminalization as always reveals a mysterious character squatting next to Gumball already the object and target of law, never its authors or and Darwin. The character, Hobo, is also panhandling; addressees” (5). The criminalized homeless character is a however, he is represented using media codes for homeless necessary outsider for the neoliberal community and is, people. The character has purple bags beneath his eyes, therefore, ineligible for any form of legal protection from shaggy brown hair that covers the top half of his eyes, a literal and social death. Accordingly, Craig Willse states that long brown beard that covers his entire neck, and a thick, “[homeless] programmes serve the economy twice over: first bushy tail that peeks out from his brown trench coat and by removing an economic obstacle and then by investing in trails on the ground behind him. Hobo engages Gumball a growing non-profit industry of population management” and Darwin by caustically asking: “The reason you guys (174). In other words, the death of the homeless allows for are on the streets is to pay a DVD fine?” Gumball’s priv- an increase in economic competition and an efficient reallo- ileged response reveals a seriously classist perception of cation of resources. hardship that disallows Gumball the ability to identify with the reality of Hobo’s situation; Gumball complains: “Yeah, Emphatically, the social death of the homeless is I know it’s crazy, right? People don’t understand how hard evident in each of these three series. For example, Adventure our life is.” Hobo pauses briefly and quickly swaps his hat Time’s episode “Freak City” illustrates the violent disposal with Gumball and Darwin’s hat, which contains approxi- of the deviant, homeless body. When Finn appears before mately $3. Upset, Darwin exclaims that their money has the town’s creatures, the structural factors behind his abnor- been stolen. Like the “beggar” in Adventure Time, Hobo is mal appearance and behavior is ignored, and immediately represented as a thoughtless criminal. Unsurprisingly, Hobo he is devalued and criminalized. The foul treatment of the is predominately a background character whose obvious deformed Finn and the freaks of Freak City illuminate a purpose appears to be comic relief, yet he is a destructive major component of a neoliberal agenda: Finn’s difference representation of homelessness that ultimately hinders the forces him into the category of freak, which effectively possibility of a critical discussion of the structural violence deems him delinquent and dangerous to the town. The of poverty. manner in which the town’s creatures attempt to dump Finn outside the town “with the others” by throwing him over a Further exacerbating the homeless characters’ social bridge becomes a literal abuse and othering of the freaks, or isolation is the socially constructed lens through which homeless characters. The freaks are living in a space unfit viewers read them. The community clearly does not identify for human habitation not only because they have been iso- with the homeless and as a result, neglects to acknowledge lated from society, but also because they are not viewed as their personhood (Power 68). Hobo shares the experience humans, but instead, as monsters and delinquents. of being denied his identity with thousands of homeless people across the United States. There are a multitude The most disturbing example of social death occurs of factors that contribute to an inability to identify with in Regular Show. Leon functions as a brazen contrast to the Hobo. The first factor being that he is categorized online productive members of the local community. The moment as an “Unidentified Species.” The second factor is that he Leon informs Benson of his current occupation as a “full- never exceeds the debilitating parameters of his stereotyped time slacker,” Leon is deemed socially unacceptable and homelessness. Because Hobo acts as a structural opposite disapproved by normal society. Leon states: to the neoliberal community, the animation and merriment “I used to be park manager and just like you, I gave of Gumball and Darwin’s daily lives within a bustling com- it up for a life of slacking. Now I don’t worry about munity masks the fact that Hobo is isolated and nobody is silly things like where Leon’s gona lay his head to invested in him. sleep tonight. Cushy caress of a garden compost is my pillow. The grease on my face is my shower. Yes Moreover, the stereotypes that plague the homeless sir, can’t beat the life of a slacker. I’m proud to be characters reinforce their status as delinquent. Any form the one to welcome you to your new life.” 5 6 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Willse explains: “ attention onSkidRowcommunitiesacrossthecountry; ing ofhomelessnessconstructedaroundtheheightened any kind . any ism andtheviolenceofhomelessness. homeless rights,webeginthedeconstructionofneoliberal- truth: Whenweopenadiscourseoneconomicequalityand it isclearthatthehomelessbodyanindicationofalarger death. Therefore,whenweconsidertheseshowstogether, upon them in the form of privation, neglect, isolation, and petuates theirstigmatizedcharacters,violenceisexacted exhibit personalagencyandcorrectthediscoursethatper the homeless are not often provided the opportunity to tion physically, socially, legally, andeconomically. Although the homelessaspathologizeddeviantharmspopula- harm canbeunderstoodasviolent;hence,theperception of poor andthebiopoliticaldelinquent.Anyforcethatcauses sentations isjustifiedthroughthemythofundeserving in therestorationofBenson’s socioeconomicvalue. the socialdeathofhomeless.Heisvaluelessuntilheaids It’s good to be back.” Decisively, Leon is a literal example of sneak insidetoplayvideogamesashesighshimself:“Ahh. In thefinalmoment,BensonwatchesMordecaiandRigby even amentionofhisname.NogratitudeisowedtoLeon. there is no acknowledgement of Leon’s self-sacrifice, nor Mordecai andRigbyasemployedslackers.Remarkably, to their normal positions with Benson as park manager, and listless slacker. Theepisodecloseswitheveryone returning he ishappytodiebecausehaslivedalifeinutopiaas basically assertsthathehasnousefulfunctionanymore,so Benson canberestoredtohispositionasparkmanager. Leon society. Ultimately, Leonkillshimselfinthisepisodesothat citizen whochoosestocontributehislaborandcapital to seekemploymentandreturnhisstatusasaproductive on thelifeofaslackeriscatalystnecessaryforBenson socioeconomic positionisalazychoice.Leon’s explication Subsequently, hisdevianceappearsintolerablebecause of thehomelessasabjectandinsignificant. Basically, Leonalignswiththeprevailingconceptualization is everythingthatalltherestofustrynottobe”(161). Leon isamanifestationofconventionalunderstand- Essentially, theviolenceofthesestigmatizedrepre- Leon’s delinquency is described as a lifestyle choice.

The skidrowerdoesnothing,hejustis.He The skid rower does . . .

little work of - as mytimeatSpelman. Mellon MaysUndergraduateFellowshipexperienceaswell torship, constructivecriticism,andguidancethroughoutmy experience. A special thank you to Dr. Ventura for her men- support throughout the duration of my thesis and Spelman Willse, Craig. “Neo-liberalBiopoliticsandtheInventionof Ward, Pendleton,andTom Herpitch.“FreakCity.” Adventure The PursuitofHappyness.Dir. GabrieleMuccino. Prod.Todd “The DVD.”TheAmazingWorld ofGumball.CartoonNetwork. The Aristocats.Dir. Wolfgang Reitherman.Walt Disney Quintel, J.G.“BensonBeGone.”RegularShow.CartoonNetwork. Power, Gerald.“Mediaimageandthecultureofhomelessness: Lady andtheTramp. Dir. ClydeGeronimo,Wilfred Jackson,and Kusmer, KennethL.Down&out,ontheroad:homelessin Hancock. Dir. PeterBerg.Perf.Will Smith.Sony, 2008. “Gumball Wiki.” N.p.,n.d.Web. 6June 2016.. Vintage, 1977. Web. 29July2015. Environment 20.2(2010):319–333.SocINDEXwithFullText. Homelessness.” 2012. Print. Criminalization oftheUnprotected.NewYork: NewYork UP, I wouldliketothankDr. Knadlerforhisguidanceand Journal ofHumanBehaviorintheSocial Journal This Language Still Duh Gwine Down Yuh: TMA Markers and the Creole Origins of AAVE Krystal Briggs, Brooklyn College, CUNY

Krystal Briggs is an aspiring speech-language pathologist and Introduction linguist, double-majoring in speech-language pathology and linguistics at Brooklyn College. She is currently a Mellon Mays The topic of the linguistic variation termed African- Undergraduate Fellow at Brooklyn College’s Honors Academy. American Vernacular English (AAVE) brings heavy contro- Krystal is passionate about her academics and is the recipient of versy in the media and the education system in the United the Dorothy Day Lawson Scholarship for academic excellence States. For instance, in 1996 the Oakland school board in in her speech-language pathology classes. Her research interests California took the initiative to teach lessons in AAVE to are primarily in linguistically diverse speakers and phonological child speakers of AAVE as a way to help them learn how awareness skills in African American English child speakers. As to speak and write Standard American English. However, of fall 2017, she will be applying to both speech-language pathol- they wrongly claimed AAVE as a different language from ogy and linguistic PhD programs. Standard American English which ignited racial storms in the media from both white people and middle-class black people who were not speakers of the dialect (Rickford, Abstract 1998). The media sparked negative comments about AAVE and, by coining it “Ebonics” (Ebony + Phonics), they only There are two long-standing theories concerning the added to the misrepresentation. A study by Winford (2003) origins of African-American Vernacular English (AAVE). on AAVE-speaking boys found that past sociologists in the The Creolist Hypothesis holds that AAVE has its roots in a ’60s and ’70s wrongly believed that AAVE was a language Plantation Creole based on a mix of West African languages distinctive from Standard American English and was an and English which arose during . In contrast, the intellectually inferior genetic trait found only in African- Dialectologist Hypothesis argues that the slaves learned Americans. Unsurprisingly, no such evidence could be the regional varieties of English spoken by their oppressors proven to support their claim. A year later, the district in directly. My research compares varieties from rural South 1997 retracted their statement and said that AAVE does, in Carolina in the 1930s spoken by white farmworkers and fact, have historical value and is traced from West African laborers, African-American farmworkers and laborers, and roots. former slaves. The goal is to determine whether these vari- eties make use of Creole-like grammatical features. The data Nevertheless, regardless of their statement in the are drawn from oral histories, including Slave Narratives, nineties, AAVE is still stereotyped as a “vernacular” form of collected under the Federal Writers Project (1936–1940). Standard American English today in City Public I analyze verb usage in six speech samples with a focus on School curriculums and in videos on social media mislabel- Tense-Mood-Aspect (TMA) pre-verbal markers character- ing AAVE as “ghetto talk.” Therefore, due to the contin- istic of Creole grammars. A preliminary examination of the uous stigmatizing of this language variation that has both transcripts indicated that at least four TMA-like markers are historical and linguistic value, it is imperative to not only present: the zero past tense marker (e.g., the house burn down examine its linguistic features but also trace its origins to five years ago); the anterior tense marker been (e.g., in I been examine how it came to formation. This position is not only walk down in the field); the future modality marker gwine (e.g., being argued to reduce misunderstandings among scholars, I gwine cook some of dem in dat turnip pot); the perfective aspect educators, and even the ordinary public but it is also used to marker done (e.g., Miss Alice done come back to de old place inform these same individuals that this dialect has its own again). I hypothesized, based on the Creolist theory, that unique significance apart from Standard American English. the slave narratives would contain the highest proportion Thus this research can be used to further inform educa- of these markers; that the narratives of the AAVE speakers tors and clinicians about AAVE and enable them to have would contain a significant but lower proportion, and that a broader understanding towards children who speak and the narratives from the life histories of white speakers would write in the dialect (Dillard, 1972). contain no TMA usage. The findings do suggest a “sharp There are two long-standing theories concerning break” between the white and Black varieties with respect to the origins African-American Vernacular English (AAVE). the four markers that were investigated, consistent with the The Creolist Hypothesis holds that AAVE has its roots in Creolist but not the Dialectologist Hypothesis. a Plantation Creole based on a mix of West African lan- guages and English which arose during slavery. The Creolist Hypothesis asserts that AAVE developed from a Creole language, known as Plantation Creole, that resulted from the interactions between Africans and Europeans during the

7 17th century (Dillard, 1972). The development of “Creole” features result from the retention of older British English languages results from the communication between two or features that have not survived in other varieties (Schneider, more groups who are not familiar with each other’s language 1991). In the middle colonies, the number of black slaves (Dillard, 1972). First a “pidgin” emerges. Pidgins have no was small and black slaves interacted with their white mas- native speakers and are not fully functioning languages; ters communicatively, especially the house servants, who however, they become functional through the children of were imported in larger numbers than that field slaves; the pidgin speakers. The children learn the pidgin from such a situation would have resulted in the “direct learn- listening to the adult speakers who communicate in it, and ing” advocated above (Schneider, 1991). The same scenario as they do so, they instinctively enrich it so that it becomes would seem more unlikely regarding the field slaves, whose a fully functioning language, called a Creole. numbers are thought to have been much greater. However, Mufwene (1994) argues that even though this might have Dillard (1972) argues that this Creole spread been so in some locations, such as the coastal areas of South throughout the southern and northern states through the Carolina and Georgia where Gullah, or Sea Island Creole, slaves that worked on plantations during the 18th century. arose, it could have been that elsewhere, for instance on the At the same time, the household slaves (as opposed to the tobacco and cotton plantations, white Americans were the field slaves) had to speak with their owners in much more majority (and the majority of them were farmers and inden- standard English (Dillard, 1972). Historical research shows tured servants), and that the number of slaves per plantation that runaway slaves had in fact typically achieved some mas- was not nearly as high. In fact, Mufwene (2014) suggests that tery of Standard English. Such knowledge was necessary in the divergence between AAVE and AWSE (American White order to reach their desired destinations and to obtain free- Southern English) didn’t occur until was dom. Thus, household slaves were the ones who acquired institutionalized under Jim Crow in the late nineteenth the most Standard English, while the field slaves normally century, and that antebellum slaves and Southern white spoke only Creole. indentured servants and farmers spoke essentially alike in the same regions. Not only were some slaves able to speak in Standard English, they were also able to read and write in it too. As for Gullah, which would be seen as an exception Advertisements regarding runaway slaves in the 1700s often to the above scenario by proponents of the Dialectologist stated that the fugitives could read and write, which clearly Hypothesis, it was first seriously studied by Lorenzo Turner implies they had some knowledge of Standard English (1949) who documented its African morphological, syn- (Dillard, 1972). These runaway slaves, then, must have tactic, and lexical roots. Such an analysis is consistent with been household slaves since there was nothing written for the Creolist Hypothesis whose proponents suggested that mono-dialectical speakers of Plantation Creole (Dillard, Gullah is actually related to the original Plantation Creole 1972). The field slaves were not exposed to Standard spoken by the first generations of slaves born in North English from their masters as much as the household slaves. America (Dillard, 1972). As a result, over the years, several Based on these types of evidence, it is generally thought that researchers have examined AAVE to uncover Creole-like three varieties of English were therefore used by African- features, most notably with a focus on copula absence (e.g., Americans in the thirteen colonies: (1) West African Pidgin Rickford, 1998; Winford, 2003). English (a Creole which originated, as its name indicates, in West Africa in the 1600s and became fully creolized by In an overview of the Creole origins of AAVE, the end of that century), spoken by most of the recently Rickford (1998) suggested that at least seven sources of evi- imported slaves (while many of the others experienced lan- dence are available, the sixth type being “differences from guage-learning difficulties; (2) Plantation Creole (which, other English dialects, especially those spoken by whites” as already mentioned, developed on the plantations of the (6). The underlying assumption here is that dialects are on a American South), spoken by native-born field workers; (3) continuum with other varieties or with earlier stages, while Standard English, spoken by slaves who were typically house Creoles involve a sharp break or discontinuity. Following servants or mechanics that ran errands in the towns. In this approach, this research will compare three vernacular addition, freed slaves spoke similarly to the household slaves varieties from rural South Carolina in the 1930s in order to (Dillard, 1972). determine which of the following speakers, if any, make use of Creole-like grammatical features: white farm workers and In contrast to the Creolist Hypothesis, the

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 laborers, African-American farm workers and laborers, and Dialectologist Hypothesis argues that the slaves learned former slaves. the regional varieties of English spoken by their oppressors directly, that is without passing through any pidgin-Creole phases. Dialectologists further argue that AAVE-specific 8 Methodology walk can mean either he walks (present) or he walked (“bare verb”). In he bin walk, the anterior tense marker bin is fol- The data are drawn from manuscripts from the lowed by the bare verb. In he go walk, the irrealis mood Federal Writers Project (1936–1940) which present, notably, marker go is followed by the bare verb. In he a walk, the narratives of formerly enslaved African-Americans, but also non-punctual aspect marker a is also followed by the bare of ordinary people, including white residents of rural areas verb. For he bin go walk, the tense marker bin precedes the in South Carolina. Six transcripts were chosen as follows: mood marker go. two from the Slave Narratives collection, and four from the Life Histories collection, involving two AAVE speakers A survey of the six transcripts selected for the study and two speakers of WVE (White Vernacular English). All revealed that four TMA features appear to have survived the the speakers are of lower socioeconomic status, laborers transcription process (which was not carried out by trained or tenant farmers, and from rural South Carolina. The linguists but rather by unemployed writers hired under the two speakers from the Slave Narratives, Lizzie and Heddie WPA program): Davis, were sisters who grew up together on a plantation in rural South Carolina. They shared stories about their • The zero past tense marker (Ø): e.g., I watchØ Diana experiences working for their masters on the plantation. holler (referring to an event from 6 years earlier). For the The four speakers from the Life Histories collection were Ø tense marker to be considered present, the verb must males. The two African-American speakers, Jim Kelley and be uninflected and the context must clearly indicate that Gabriel Washington, were tenant farmers who discussed reference is being made to a past action. their family experiences and the challenging labor of work- • The anterior tense marker: e.g., I been walk down in the field. ing on a farm. Lastly, the two speakers of WVE, Willie For the anterior tense pre-verbal marker to be considered Marlowe and George Tanner, were tenant farmers who nar- present, been must be followed by an uninflected verb. rated their interactions with African-Americans, their expe- riences working as farm laborers, and their personal lives • The future modality marker: e.g., I gwine cook some of dem with their spouses. This study analyzed verb usage in the in dat turnip pot. For the future modality marker to be six speech samples with a focus not on the zero copula but considered present, gwine must be followed immediately on Tense-Mood-Aspect (TMA) pre-verbal markers which by an uninflected verb, with no intervening to preposition. characterize the grammar of all Creoles (Bickerton, 2008), including Gullah (Mufwene, 1994). • The perfective aspect marker which emphasizes completion of an event: e.g., Miss Alice done come back to de old place again. Procedure For the perfective aspect marker to be considered present, done must be followed by an uninflected verb. All Creoles are thought to express the following rela- tions through a TMA system of pre-verbal markers rather These features comprise the set of pre-verbal TMA than through verbal inflection: features that were investigated in this study. In keeping with the Creolist Hypothesis, it was hypothesized that the Slave • Tense (+/- anterior), which refers to the anteriority of an Narratives would contain the highest proportion of TMA- event relative either to the speech act or to another event. like features, the other African-American narratives would Tense places events on a time line. contain a significant but lower proportion of TMA-like features, and the WVE narratives would contain little or no • Mood (+/- irrealis), refers the reality or non-reality “irrea- evidence of TMA-like features. lis” of events (Bickerton, 2008). Real events are events that have occurred or are currently occurring. Non-real events Results and Discussion are events that could hypothetically have occurred (in the past) or might occur (in the future, or conditionally). Overall, results show that one of the two African- American speakers from the Slave Narratives displayed the • Aspect (+/- nonpunctual), distinguishes between different most TMA-like Creole features, followed by the other three kinds of events (past, present, or future) that are described African-American speakers who also made substantial use by verbs, for example: progressive (ongoing) events, punc- of TMA-like Creole. In contrast, the two speakers of WVE tual (completed) events, habitual (repeated) events. displayed no TMA-like Creole features whatsoever. These Bickerton (2008) gives examples of the TMA verb results are displayed in Figure 1 on the following page. structure in Guyanese Creole. In he walk, the bare verb

9 10 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Figure 1.PercentageofverbswithTMAmarkers(allfourtypescombined) frequencies for the fourindividualTMAMarkers. white Vernacular Narratives.Table 1presents theactual instances at allofTMA-like pre-verbal markersinthe two American Narrativesdidso;in starkcontrast,therewereno TMA-like Markers and exactly 8% of the two other African- finite verbconstructionsinthe SlaveNarrativescontained Table 1.Percentage ofverbswithTMAmarkers(bycategory) As canbeseenfromthegraph,over14%of younger sister Total: your neck) I (e.g., Gwine dere) dem (e.g., Done in evenin de home (e.g., Been (e.g., ∅ past Speaker 10.00% 10.00% 12.00% 14.00% 16.00% 10.00% 12.00% 14.00% 16.00% 0.00% 0.00% 2.00% 4.00% 6.00% 8.00% 0.00% 2.00% 4.00% 6.00% 8.00%

I done move I been get He marry my my marry He

gwine hug

Speakers 5-6:WhiteNarratives Speakers 3–4:OtherAfricanAmericanNarratives Speakers 1–2:SlaveNarratives Speakers 5– Speakers 3–4: Other African American N arratives Speakers 1– ) ) ) lv artvs fia mrcnSekr WhiteVernacular Speakers AfricanAmericanSpeakers Slave Narratives Slave Narra1ves African American Speakers White Vernacular African American Slave Narra1ves 6: 2: 2:

White Narratives Slave Narratives 12 15 0 0 3 1

43 25 5 5 8 2

13 However, a possibleexplanation could bethe siblingorder transcript contained moreCreole-likefeatures thanLizzie’s. Aspect Markerdone.Itisnotentirelyclearwhy Heddie’s subjects (speakers3and4),especially forzeropastsandthe Davis (speaker 1) and to the two other African-American quency ofTMA Markers inrelation to hersister, Lizzie Narratives, HeddieDavishad an overwhelminglyhighfre- 4 0 3 7 3 As canbeseeninTable 1,speaker2oftheSlave 14 10 2 0 7 4

0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 6 of Heddie and Lizzie. In her transcript, Heddie discusses Speaker Transcripts. In particular, there were possible her relationship with Lizzie and states that she is much instances of serial verbs, a well-documented characteristic older than her younger sister. Therefore, perhaps Heddie of Gullah and other Creoles, such as in the sentence Four had more exposure to Creole features in her parents’ speech years a fightin en hoped shoot dem old Yankee robbers. Another than did Lizzie. Furthermore, Lizzie may have had more interesting finding was the phrase,you did tief (“You stole”). exposure to white speakers than her older sister. Using nouns as verbs is another well documented feature of Creoles. In fact, Bickerton (2008) gave the very same Another finding found in the transcripts was the dif- example of the noun teef (“thief”) transforming into a verb ferent ways in which been and done were used by the White in Guyanese Creole (and then, once tief came to mean “to and African-American speakers. For example, when describ- steal,” Guyanese needed a new noun for “thief” and came ing his life as a tenant farmer Willie Marlowe used phrases up with teefman). In truth, few of these were present in like “I done worked” and “I been coming.” It can be noted the transcripts, but more transcripts could be examined to that in both phrases, Marlowe uses the inflected form of determine if these occur on a reasonably regular basis, even the verbs worked and coming. As noted earlier in the paper, if only in small numbers. the inflected form of a verb is a typical grammatical rule for Standard American English but not Creole. In contrast, The lack of Creole features found in the WVE tran- Jim Kelley, an African-American speaker, used phrases such scripts as compared to the relative frequency with which as “I done come back” and “I been know” without adding these did appear in the African-American transcripts both inflections to the main verbs come and knows. Conversely, his provides general support for the Creolist hypothesis and consistency of using zero inflections is a typical feature of demonstrates the usefulness of comparing Black and White Creole and not Standard American English. transcripts of speakers from similar regions and social back- grounds, as per John Rickford’s listing of this approach Despite zero instances of TMA-like Markers in the as one of seven sources of evidence to show that AAVE WVE transcripts, there were some instances of verb usage has Creole origins and is not a “vernacular” of SAE. This that, at first sight, might be thought to resemble those of the position was not only being argued to reduce misunder- Creole-like TMA zero past marker. Thus, Willie Marlowe standings among scholars, educators, and even the ordinary used bare root forms to express the simple past. For exam- public but it was also used to inform these same individuals ple, when describing an earlier evening out with his wife, that this dialect has its own unique significance apart from he said “we come dressed to the Centenary,” without inflect- Standard American English. According to the statistics on ing the verb come. However, this usage has been noted in special education, there is a disproportionate percentage American Vernacular varieties as part of a levelling process of African-American youth in special education and under- of the preterite (simple past), past participle, and bare forms representation of them in honors courses (Mufwene, 2014). of irregular verbs. Most teachers have little, if any, accurate knowledge about Black Language and are likely to harbor negative attitudes For example, Murry and Simon (2008) discuss about the language and its speakers. The goal of this paper American Vernacular regional varieties including Southern was to address these individuals and provide them with a Vernacular English. In particular, they describe an irregular source about how to use rich and varied linguistic abilities verb usage in the eastern United States where the bare root for African-American children to help them become fluent form of an irregular verb is used as a simple past, as in “He readers and writers. Additionally, the paper can also be used swim in that river just about every day of his life” and “Why, to increase awareness about Black language to educators he give Junior here more for it used than he [Junior] paid for and clinicians about AAVE and enable them to become less it new” (Schneider, 2008, p. 2). Such forms could easily be critical towards children who speak and write in the dialect. mistaken for zero pasts.

However, the main difference between these bare References root forms and the TMA zero past marker is that in WVE, Bickerton, D. (2008). Bastard tongues: A trailblazing linguist finds as already discussed, the bare root, preterite, and past forms clues to our common humanity in the world’s lowliest languages. New of irregular verbs have largely merged and get used more or York: Hill and Wang. less interchangeably. That is WVE continue to use preterite and past forms with irregular verbs, and continue to inflect Dillard, J. L. (1972). Black English: Its history and usage in the United their regular verbs with –ed to indicate past actions. States. New York: Random House.

Other varieties of verbs “with a Creole flavor” were Mufwene, S. S. (1994). On the status of auxiliary verbs in Gullah. also found in the Slave Narratives and African-American American Speech, 69(1), 58–70. 11 12 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Winford, D.(2003).AnotherlookatthecopulainBlackEnglish Turner, L.(1949).AfricanismsintheGullahdialect.Chicago:The Schneider, E.W. (Ed.).(2008).Varieties ofEnglishZ:The Schneider, E.(1983).ThediachronicdevelopmentoftheBlack Rickford, J.R.(1998).TheCreole originsofAfricanAmerican Mufwene, S.(2014).TheEnglishoriginsofAfricanAmerican and CaribbeanCreoles.AmericanSpeech,67,21–60. University ofChicagoPress. Gruyter. Americas andtheCaribbean.BerlinNewYork: Moutonde 16, 55–64. English perfectiveauxiliaryphrase. American English(pp.154–200).London:Routledge. Mufwene, J.R.Rickford,G.Bailey&Baugh(Eds.),African Vernacular English:Evidencefromcopulaabsence.InS. Company. 364). Amsterdam/Philadelphia:JohnBenjaminsPublishing The evolutionofEnglishes:dynamicmodelandbeyond(pp.349– S. Buschfeld,T. Hoffmann,M.HuberandA.Kautzsch(Eds.), Vernacular English:WhatEdgarW. Schneiderhastaughtus.In Journal ofEnglishLinguistics, Journal Mass Effect as a Conduit: The Effect of Simulated Realities on Our Perception of Alien Individuals Sydney Brown, Smith College

Sydney Brown graduated from Smith College in 2016, with A key dynamic of Mass Effect which produces ethical a degree in English and theatre. Her goal is to continue studying effects is what I term “emotional tethering.” This concept the connections between immersive mediums, our societal struc- names a crucial link between the emotion of the player and tures, and representations of marginalized experiences. the action of the game through empathy. By implementing choice in a key series of circumstances, the game generates empathetic relationships in which the line between the avatar Abstract Shepard and the player becomes structurally blurred. Janice Radway describes a similar process of blurring identities in By examining a sequence of narrative readings, visual Reading the Romance: “[Dot’s customers] willingly acknowl- representations, and game procedures of the Bioware video- edge that what they enjoy most about romance reading is the game series Mass Effect, this essay explores the ethical and opportunity to project themselves into the story, to become social realities presented throughout the games. The Mass the heroine, and thus to share her surprise and slowly awak- Effect series includes three popular science fiction video- ening pleasure at being so closely watched by someone who games focusing on the adventures of Commander Shepard, finds her valuable and worthy of love” (67). Radway suggests who aims to save the galaxy from an ancient, alien threat that immersion intensifies the relationship between the text called the Reapers. This essay argues that when game devel- and reader. Mass Effect similarly engages the audience in the opers critically structure videogames and incentivize their immersive process of emotional tethering. However, it does audience, they provide players with the potential to expe- so by implementing choice in the gameplay, such as in the rience and understand cultural issues such as alienness dis- character creation screen, choice wheel, plot and relation- tanced from our own lived experiences. Because aliens often ships with NPCs (Non-Player Characters). By receiving stand in for marginalized people in the science fiction tradi- the agency of the series, practicing, doing and performing, tion, by observing the interaction with aliens we can under- we—as members of the real world—learn lessons that leave stand how Mass Effect helps shape our interactions with the game with us. Thus, by examining choice we can deter- different gender, racial, and sexual identities. Understanding mine how Mass Effect encourages us to interact with aliens. this, we can begin recognizing subversive structures that have devalued marginalized identities in our physical reality. First Contact

The story in videogames is not just about what is Shepard’s initial interaction with aliens begins during happening in the game. Instead, these games, no matter the first part of Mass Effect. The game immediately contrasts how fantastical, are telling us what is happening in our real Nihlus, an alien, with his human surroundings through world. At its best, Bioware’s science fiction, role-playing vid- both his dialogue, physical appearance, and coloring. Joker, eogame series Mass Effect creates an engaging, unique, and the pilot, admits his dislike for Nihlus outright by saying, fun narrative in which the player is invited to traverse space “I hate that guy.” Nihlus unsettles and angers members as the universe’s savior. To allow the player the fullest, most of the crew although none of them know him personally. individualized experience, the game implements choice into Although the players take in different views from multiple the narrative. However, by attempting to allow the player characters, the players build their own inclination on how to to fully “play” via choice procedurals, the developers fall interact with Nihlus. Whether they choose to react politely short of their potential to create empathetic interactions or rudely to Nihlus through the choice wheel that provides with aliens, who often stand in for marginalized groups in the dialogue and choice options of the game, the plot pro- the science fiction tradition. InValues at Play, Nissenbaum gresses by teaching a positive lesson about Nihlus. If the and Flanagan explain the nature of Mass Effect’s play. They player was polite to Nihlus, they are shown the lesson that observe, “Games like Mass Effect equally incentivize “good” they were right to look beyond his physical appearance and and “evil” choice, and they might be considered morally alienness. If the player was rude, they receive the message of relativistic. It could be that players experience them as a not judging someone solely based on their appearance, race, kind of sandbox for moral play, allowing them to explore or someone else’s opinion. This is especially important as ethical issues in a setting where real-world consequences do we consider our individual interactions with . This not apply” (21). Although Nissenbaum and Flanagan praise is when the game shows its ability to meet its progressive Mass Effect for the openness of its moral play, I argue that potential. If the game interacted more with the player on the unwillingness of the series to support positive ethical this level and reinforced this interaction with repercussions, interactions causes the game not to reach its progressive the experience could actually teach the player an important, capabilities in relation to alienness and, consequently, rein- relevant lesson about prejudice. The first contact example forces negative stereotypes, thereby potentially harming real encourages players to look beyond physical appearance into individuals from marginalized groups. the substance of an NPC and, consequentially, builds a rela- tionship between the player and the character. 13 Romancing Jacob: Presenting Racial Stereotypes human equality and chose to create a minimally diverse crew. Because of this, Jacob’s presentation and its negative Introducing friendship and romantic relationship connotations are even more significant. systems to the core gameplay encourages the player to seek out specific characters and engage with them in a way that Objectification or Identification: Romancing the Alien uses emotional tethering to learn lessons. However, just as and Gender this has the potential to create positive interactions, it also can reaffirm negative stereotypes, as evidenced in the case The sole romanceable alien in the first game is an of Jacob, human bionic and Cerberus operative, in Mass NPC named Liara, an Asari scientist.i The treatment of Liara Effect 2. The only straight, black, male love interest in the as more palatable than alien is an indication of Bioware’s series is an NPC named Jacob, whose romantic plot with early interests. In The Art of the Mass Effect Universe, read- a female Shepard depicts negative stereotypes about black ers are invited to view the concept of the Asari before the men because his content is sexual but not intimate. Although race was finalized. Rather than attempting to diminish the there is an entire mission in which Shepard helps him find distance between what is alien and “attractive,” Bioware his estranged father, the romance is built around the idea chose designs for the Asari that are just alien enough to be of “keeping it light,” as Jacob says, and discussing feelings alien and still human enough to be sexy. Bioware states, “To without being explicit. Jacob’s dialogue mentions at the add a familiar element of science-fiction fantasy, we decided beginning and end of his romance in Mass Effect 2 that once one of the main species in Mass Effect would be a race of their ongoing battle against the Collectors is over he will beautiful, blue alien girls. An extensive exploration of the spend time with Shepard. However, that time never comes idea led to the Asari appearing exotic and alien while having because, between the events of Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect some human qualities, which allowed them to be desirably as 3, Jacob develops a relationship with another woman and potential love interests” (The Art of the Mass Effect Universe they have a child together by the time of Mass Effect 3. Both 19). From their face to their clothes,ii the Asari are an exam- the dialogue and the plot lines attributed to Jacob act as an ple of how our reality—specifically our objectifying views of amalgam of stereotypes, specifically black men’s oversexed women—influenced the game construction. Whereas aliens nature and their inability to deal with their emotions. This could have existed proudly in their otherness, Bioware’s simulation, if the players chose to get to know Jacob roman- assumption that they need to gratify a teenage, male, hetero- tically, not only reaffirms negative perceptions that harm normative audience made their alienness erasable. black people in our physical reality, but creates one of the few instances in which a romanceable character can betray All of Liara’s features are what we might expect to the players. In this instance, emotional tethering may have see on any human woman. Her alienness is solely presented the negative effect of enhancing players’ internalization of by the tentacles on the back of her head and her blue skin. racial . However, the tentacles are styled to appeal to humans. In The Art of the Mass Effect Universe, several members of The conceit of Mass Effect is that present-day racial Bioware’s team (executive producer Casey Hudson, art constructions should hold little meaning for humans in the director Derek Watts, and writer Chris Hepler) write, “The future. The problem with this is that when Bioware ignores original inspiration of the scalp tentacles was to evoke the race or forgets that racial stereotypes exist in our lives, image of a woman emerging from the water with her hair it may thoughtlessly reinforce images that matter in our swept back” (19). Although Liara is alien enough not to be reality. Having a human character be visibly ethnic allows identified as human, the invention of that alienness depends people of color to be represented among the elite heroes in on conventional tropes of late 20th-century Hollywood Shepard’s squad. It is just as important for white players to female sexual attractiveness and availability for the viewer’s see people of color existing in a place in which their race is gaze. Using Laura Mulvey’s concept of the male gaze, we not a negative factor or something to overcome. The effects can understand that this view of women is a part of the cin- of representation, positive and negative, have real-world ematic tradition dependent on “straight, socially established consequences for those interacting with the medium. In interpretation of sexual difference which controls images” Ann Marie Baldanodo’s post “Representation,” she explains (1). That Liara’s womanness or female appearance defines the effect of representation: “It cannot be ignored that every aspect of her race and ultimately sexualizes her is only representations affect the ways in which individuals are the first part of a problematic assertion of alienness thatMass

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 perceived. Although many see representations as harm- Effect presents in the romance section. less likenesses, they do have a real effect on the world . . . . Since there are so few images, negative ones can have devas- Mass Effect’s game protocols and storylines function in tating affects [sic] on the real lives of marginalized people.” a similar way when it comes to sexuality in that they reaffirm Bioware introduced a hypothetically perfect world state for present-day heteronormative standards. The nonexplicit sex 14 scene at the end of Liara’s relationship path (the sequence Spectre, a possible zombie, or a person with the world in the of procedures and narrative options that a player navigates) palm of their hand. However, the players will interact with remains a small moment in a massive game. Players cannot our world on their own terms. interact with the scene. Instead, the players have to actively consent and reaffirm interest in Liara to receive the sex Mass Effect, similar to the immersive books of Janice scene, an inset video “cut scene” that interrupts the forward Radway, helps us figure out how we are going to interact narrative. The process of affirmation (renewing interest with our reality. The Mass Effect series has the potential to in Liara and investigating her character) is an example of educate the player about alienness, diversity, racial stereo- Bioware effectively using emotional tethering. Procedurally, types, gender, sexuality, and culture through choices made the players have to make the choice to want Liara and go a in the game. Positive outcomes through the choices made in step further to prove it. This cut scene highlights the dif- these areas can affect how players will later live in the real ference between Shepard and Liara and raises the question world. Bioware had the potential to do interesting, informed of whether emotional tethering in this instance causes the cultural work, through emotional tethering and choice, player to identify with aliens or objectify them through but its commitment to already problematic practices—the gameplay. sexualization of marginalized bodies and the reassertion of stereotypes against black men—and its overwhelming commitment to making as many choices as possible, with- Moving Forward: Mass Effect and Choice out significant repercussions, causes the game to miss its “I don’t think we’re trying to generate controversy progressive potential. as much as just reflect that this is a real world with similar issues to what you face in real life, so it’s In Critical Play, Flanagan asserts, “As design matures familiar and accessible at the same time. It’s chal- . . . there is a growing need for designers to approach the lenging and interesting on a moral level. We’re creative process with increased awareness and responsibility not trying to make a statement per se, and if we do to be inclusive, fair, and cater to a variety of play styles” inadvertently, maybe that’s a reflection as games as (251). Bioware’s relationship to critical play, especially in art as much as anything.” relation to aliens, changed significantly over the initial five Ray Muzyka, Co-Founder of Bioware years since it was released. The course of Bioware’s inter- Muzyka’s words serve as representation for the entire action with alien individuals becomes increasingly relevant problem with Mass Effect. The work that Bioware does— as veteran and new players anticipate Mass Effect 4, which creating its world and employing emotional tethering— is planned to be released in 2017. With the original series creates a game that has enormous potential to do cultural selling over 10 million games, it is not a stretch to antici- work on the player. Further, the game is set up to simulate pate the new game entertaining a similar, sizeable audience moral play. As Muzyka explains, the issues that the players this year. If Bioware and the entire videogame industry face within the Mass Effect world are similar to those that attempt to bridge the gap between the player and margin- we face once we “unhook” ourselves from our computers, alized groups instead of committing themselves to practiced consoles, cellphones, and experience the world. If players routes that cement those same disparities, our implicit social can empathize with aliens who look and act very differently biases have the potential to be discovered, questioned, and than they do, then they should be able to begin learning changed. If they continue designing games that perpetuate how to interact with real-world marginalized groups. When negative social structures, they are not only denying their we play, we set up a Pavlovian condition through choice— potential to teach positive lessons through choice, they are except instead of hearing a bell ring and expecting food, furthering practices that harm real-world people with mar- we see a marginalized individual and react. Mass Effect does ginalized identities. not explicitly make players respond negatively or positively; however, by implementing choice, players may practice Acknowledgements and repeat negative interactions. Choice matters because I would like to thank Professor Cheung for his unwav- it makes us practice interacting with aspects outside of our ering guidance, enthusiasm, support, and patience through- lived experience, such as with aliens. Although the player out the past two years. Without him the thesis which this will never meet Jacob Taylor, players will probably meet article is based on could not have been created. I would like black men who do not fit into the stereotypes Bioware to thank Provost Rowe for her wisdom, fervor and thought- places Jacob in. The player will never meet Liara T’soni, ful engagement, which made the fruition of this project a 100+-year-old Asari scientist, but I believe the players of professional and personal achievement. In addition, I would Mass Effect will meet passionate young women excited to like to thank Professor Miller, Professor Lamothe, and the learn something new and share it with the world. Lastly, the Mellon Mays Foundation for their continued support and players will never be Commander Shepard, Alliance Marine, 15 16 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 The ArtoftheMassEffectUniverse.Milwaukee:DarkHorse,2012. Smee, Andrew. “MassEffect3&Beyond.”IGN.ZiffDavis, Radway, Janice.ReadingtheRomance:Women, Patriarchy, and Nissenbaum, Helen,andMaryFlanagan.Values atPlayinDigital Mulvey, Laura.“Visual PleasureandNarrativeCinema.”The Mass Effect2.Bioware,2010.Videogame. Mass Effect.Bioware,2007.Videogame. Flanagan, Mary. CriticalPlay.Cambridge:MITPress,2009.Print. Baldonado, AnnMarie.“Representation.”(Apr. 1996)Scholar Works Cited Endnotes two years. ing story, whichhasentertainedandinspiredmeforthepast Bioware forcreatingsuchamassive,immersiveandengag- dedication. Lastly, Iwouldliketothankthecreatorsat iii ii i Print. 7 Feb.2010.Web. 1Apr. 2016. Carolina Press,1984.Print. Popular Literature. ChapelHill:TheUniversityofNorth Games. Cambridge:MITPress,2014.Print. London: Routledge,2003.44-53.Pdf. andVisual CultureReader. Ed.Amelia Jones. Spring 2016. Blogs. Online.PostcolonialStudiesatEmoryPages.Internet. Achievements arebadgesforcompletingcertainaspectsofagame.They The ArtoftheMassEffectUniverse.Milwaukee:DarkHorse,2012,17. The ArtoftheMassEffectUniverse.Milwaukie:DarkHorse,2012,19. romance subplotsthroughouttheMassEffectseries. outcomes. TheParamourachievementisreceivedforcompletingcertain as motivationformultipleplaythroughsandexploringdifferentchoice are listedontheplayer’s profile.Forcertainplayers,achievements serve the Asariwhowere,infact,strippers).” more ofaHollywoodred-carpetfeelthanthatstripper(exceptfor clothing wastobealluringandsexybutwithasenseofclassstyle— The ArtofMassEffectexplainsthedesignintentforAsariclothing:“Asari desirable aspotentialloveinterests.” and alienwhilehavingsomehumanqualities,whichallowedthemtobe An extensiveexplorationoftheidealedtoAsariappearingexotic main speciesinMassEffectwouldbearaceofbeautiful,bluealiengirls. add afamiliarelementofscience-fictionfantasy, wedecidedoneofthe sex andanyspecies.With regardtotheirinspirationBiowarestates,“To intelligence, incrediblylonglifespansandtheabilitytomatewithany of aliensintheMassEffectuniverse.Asariattributesincludeextreme Asari areamonogendered,althoughdistinctlyfemale-presenting,race Form, Function, and Structure: Online Dating While Fat Amanda Cabanilla, Whittier College

Amanda Cabanilla is a recent graduate of Whittier College, Literature Review having graduated summa cum laude and earning her Bachelor’s of Arts in sociology with distinction in the major. As a senior, Within established feminist discourse there exists Amanda won the Charles J. Browning Prize in Sociology, tensions between the role of institutionalized structure and which is awarded to outstanding students in the major by the personal agency with regards to the portrayal of the female department faculty. Amanda’s research focuses on the experiences body as an object of sexual consumption by heterosexual and identity formation of fat women, particularly in online men and society at large (LeBesco 2004; Murray 2009; spaces, through a feminist lens. She is currently applying to PhD Saguy 2002; Saguy 2013; Snider 2009). Structuralist schol- programs in sociology and hopes to enter graduate school in the ars like Abigail Saguy (2002) and Samantha Murray (2009) fall of 2017. argue against the deliberate sexualization of fat female bod- ies within a patriarchal society aimed at the exploitation of women’s bodies. However, others, such as Kathleen LeBesco Abstract (2004), critique such structuralist thinking as negating fat women’s agency by focusing so heavily on the role of the As fat female bodies continue to garner the attention “alleged monolith” (50) of structural beauty ideals. LeBesco of scholars, research has primarily focused on the effects of (2004) contends that a post-structuralist recognition and anti-fat biases on the identities and lived experiences of fat celebration of the socially constructed nature of normative women. Additionally, the plethora of social media platforms beauty ideals and its antithesis, fat, “[pulls] beauty down has spurred academic interest into how social prejudices from its pedestal” (50) and creates the possibility for lib- become digitized and how individuals interact with one eration by demystifying sacred beauty ideals and bringing another online. However, scholars have yet to combine them back into the profane world. These ideological ten- the physical and the digital in order to examine how niche sions in the fat studies literature beg the question as to how online dating platforms mediate and limit the online identity much agency (fat) women have over their own bodies and creation of fat women. Through an analysis of four niche sexualities within a patriarchal structure aimed at the sexual and two mainstream online dating platforms, this study finds exploitation of their bodies. that embedded biases and negative depictions of fat women are amplified on niche dating sites through the deliberate Research on online dating websites dealing with the construction of a fat in which fat female bodies interactions of social structure and personal agency is limited are objectified, fetishized, and exploited as soft targets for and inconclusive. For instance, Hitsch et al. (2010) suggest male user sexual satisfaction. I conclude that without the online dating users do not utilize what Toma and Hancock coalescence of an intersectionally focused fat community, (2010) describe as “strategic deception,” in which users fat women, particularly fat women of color, will continue to manipulate their online profiles to seem more appealing, have their bodies debased for market consumption. when choosing which profiles to respond to, but the data overwhelming disproves this assertion (Toma and Hancock 2010; de Vries and Peter 2013; Rudder 2014; Fry 2015). In contemporary American society, fat activists, blog- Furthermore, the rise of the Internet era has also sparked gers, and ordinary women have taken to the Internet in an new research into the ways in which social structures are effort to redefine fat female bodies as legitimate objects reproduced online and how individuals interact with this of desire. Simultaneously, online dating has emerged as new social medium within the structural limitations of digi- an increasingly dominant force in our social and romantic tal technologies (de Vries and Peter 2013; Fry 2015; Hogan lives by providing new spaces for individuals to meet and 2012; Lanier 2011; Nakamura 2006; Rudder 2014; Toma interact. Within this context, niche online dating platforms and Hancock 2010; Turkle 1997; Turkle 2011). Specifically, have emerged that cater to individuals seeking out “Big scholars in digital media studies, like Lisa Nakamura (2006), Beautiful Women” (BBWs). While the presence of these are examining how various racialized and gendered bodies sites may signal an increased acceptance and/or desire for fat exist in cyber space and how individuals interact with one bodies, niche dating sites and apps are further marginalizing another online. However, there does not yet exist an analysis and dehumanizing fat women through an apparent lack of of how these digital spaces themselves impact identity for- resources allocated to the development of welcoming, inclu- mation for fat women. Fat bodies exist online as well, and it sive, respectful, safe, and open spaces for fat women to find is crucial to examine the conditions under which fat women romantic companionship. in particular are negotiating these spaces.

17 18 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 to body, reduction toappearance,and silencing. Firstand of objectification as laid out by Langton (2009): reduction dating platforms. of structuralmechanismsthroughout thesampledniche (229). These characteristics are employed through a variety ing another’s bodyas“silent,lackingthecapacitytospeak” 2009: 229).Finally, Langton(2009)definessilencingastreat - of howitlooks,orappearstothesenses”(Langton reduction toappearanceistreatabody“primarilyinterms other asaperson,butbody”(228–229).Furthermore, implies “thatsexualinterestinanotherisnotthe ance, and silencing tures ofobjectificationasreductiontobody, of theirbodies.RaeLangton(2009)identifiesthreekeyfea- ization offatwomenisthroughthedeliberateobjectification dating sites,theprimarymodeofthisparadoxicalcharacter hyper-sexualized subjects of deviant male desire. On niche ously framefatwomenasbothdisgustingasexualvesselsand capital” (40). (37), precisely because “fatness isa valued form of bodily as obese to produce valuable and new kinds of knowledge” studies, “one would expect those people who are categorized more, Saguy(2013)contendsthatwithinthefieldoffat how thesebiasessubsequentlyinfluencetheirwork.What’s readers withanhonestaccountingoftheirownbiasesand contend withtheirownpositionalityinanefforttoprovide (2013) and Julie Bettie (2003) who directly address and is inkeepingwithfeministscholarssuchasAbigailSaguy of afatfemaleidentityonline.Thissubjectiveengagement itized replications of anti-fat biases impact the construction subjectivity inordertoilluminateandunpackhowthedig- cess werealsotaken. and screenshotsofthewebsitesprofilecreationpro- individual profileswerecreated,asbothamanandwoman, lyzed solelyforwebsitecontent.Oneachdatingplatform, sites, ChubbyBunnie and BBWlocalhookup, were also ana- WooPlus, andBumble.Two additional nichedatingweb- and 15femaleusers’profiledata:BBWCupid,OkCupid, and twomainstream,wasconductedbysampling15male tive analysisoffouronlinedatingwebsites/apps,twoniche ing object of these websites: thefatwoman. Aquantita- their admirersfromtheperspectiveofcentralorganiz- examine onlinedatingstructurescateringtofatwomenand Results/Discussion Methods BBWCupid exemplifiesallthree keycharacteristics Popular depictionsoffatfemalebodiessimultane- As aself-identifyingfatwoman,Iengagedmyown This studyemploysamixedmethodsapproachto . For Langton (2009), reduction to body reduction toappear- -

“Speech isadistinctivecapacityofpersons . . . options tosite-selectedquestions.AsLangton(2009)notes, selves withouthavingtodependonpredeterminedresponse dating sites,thatallowuserstoarticulateandidentifythem- the fewwithinalldatingwebsites,butinparticularniche because thequestionsregardingusers’personalityareamong actively silencestheuser’s voice. through thesequencingofprofileinformation,BBWCupid Finally, bydeemphasizingtheuser’s interestsandpersonality further reducestheindividualtotheirbodyandappearance. to nothingmore thantheamountoffaton theirbodies. such, regardless oftheirbodytype,fatwomen arereduced or couple.Whilemaleusers are permittedtoidentifyas their matches.Usersaregiven threeoptions:male,BBW, for, andthentoinputtheirsexthepreferred of BBWlocalhookup, users are asked “what” they are looking BBWlocalhookup. Wheninitially establishingaprofilewith process offetishizationisnomore acutelyapparentthanon attributes ofthewomenusingsitesand/orapps.This after, whileerasingordiminishing allothernon-physical depict female fatness as something to be adored or sought the overtobjectificationoffatwomen,nichedatingsites cation andsubjugationof(fat)women’s bodies. mate meansofonline silencing andthe continued objectifi- wants, desires,andwhotheyareasindividuals,istheulti- match selection through an autonomous expression of their to activelyparticipateintheironlineidentitycreationand in the physical world. Therefore, (fat) women’s inability are alreadyatastructuraldisadvantage,bothonlineand both menandwomenacrossdatingplatforms,(fat) silencing of users’ voices. Althoughthis silencing affects users’ bodies, but specifically through the sites’ deliberate of nichedatingwebsitesthroughtheovertobjectification (2002) fearsaremanifestingthemselveswithinthestructure romantic and/or sexual relationship. Unfortunately, Saguy’s tially subjectedtoandwillingtolerateinorderhavea of the emotional and physical jeopardy fat women are poten- between fat women and the men who seek them out because cerned abouttheunequalpowerimbalancesembroiled have beensilenced”(229).Saguy(2002)isjustifiablycon- subordination is partly constituted bythefact that women files withoutuploadinganacceptable other sampledsites,youcannotevenaccessusers’pro- What’s more, onboth BBWCupid and WooPlus, unlike neously reducestheusertotheirbodyandappearance. descriptors beforeanyotherpersonalinformationsimulta- the factthatnichesiteslikeBBWCupidaskforphysical as awebsitethatcaterstocertainbodytype.Furthermore, places the central focus on the user’s body simply by existing foremost, BBWCupid, as all sampled niche dating websites, This mannerofsilencingisparticularlycritical By creatingaseparatespaceforfatbodiesandthrough i profilepicture,which

[and] women’s Suddenly, the fat on a woman’s body is the only thing that the mainstream sites than on the niche platforms. Given the matters. This reduction of female users to their fatness associated with men deliberately seeking out reinforces the unequal, heteronormative gendered power fat women (often referred to as “chubby chasers”), it is pos- imbalances Saguy (2002) warns against. Furthermore, by sible that men utilizing online dating platforms to connect asking what users are looking for, rather than whom, and with these women would feel a need to emphasize their mas- then subsequently reducing female users to the singular cat- culinity in order to counteract the emasculation of “going egory of BBW, BBWlocalhookup depicts male users as fully after easy prey.” However, this was not necessarily the case. autonomous subjects, while simultaneously constructing fat women as the objectified Other, thereby removing any While there were definitely images of men hiking or capacity for female users be active agents within the struc- playing soccer, this study finds that men on niche sites often tural confines of the website. only provided standard “selfies.” Any additional photo- graphs were often of the men lying in bed with headphones The advertised content on male users’ homepages on or in an otherwise relaxed and stationary position. These also serves to further fetishize fat women by subordinating sedentary and passive photos ironically exemplify the inher- fat female bodies to their male counterparts. For instance, ent gendered power imbalances at play between men and one advertisement depicts BBW women as “whores” to be fat women that Saguy (2002) highlights. Men on niche “fuck[ed]” or nothing more than a set of “large breasts.” dating sites are permitted to assume a more relaxed role as Another shows BBWlocalhookup’s “friends” offering oppor- a result of the stereotyped assumption that fat women are tunities to “stick a horny fat babe” or the availability of so desperate for attention and affection, they will settle for “BBW sluts for you!” These ads effectively portray fat mediocrity.ii This reified power imbalance is exemplified women as nothing more than physical vessels for men’s plea- when male users on niche sites are contrasted to those on sure and exploitation. The entirety of BBWlocalhookup’s Bumble. As I navigated through the popular dating app, I website unequivocally argues that fat women have to make found that I was much more attracted to an overwhelming themselves hyper-sexual and subordinate to the desires of majority of the male users on Bumble than on any other men in order to “compensate” for their deficiencies. While dating platform. I attribute this phenomenon to the fact BBWlocalhookup is the most explicit and extreme example that women must initiate contact on Bumble, thereby forc- of the fetishization of fat women, it is by no means alone. ing men to project the most appealing image of themselves The same tools used to objectify fat women on other sites because they are suddenly at the opposite end of the gen- are also employed to fetishize their bodies. Niche dating dered power hierarchy. However, because common percep- websites perpetuate fat stereotypes through the overt sex- tions of fat women as undesirable suggest men have to exert ual fetishization of female subscribers, suggesting deliber- significantly less energy in order to gain a fat woman’s favor, ate efforts to maintain popular images of the paradoxically male users on niche dating sites seem to feel comfortable hyper-sexualized undesirable fat woman waiting to fulfill putting in a minimal amount of effort into their dating pro- male fantasies. files, while still apparently expecting to successfully attract a fat woman. The staggering number of male user profiles I Socially constructed power dynamics between men skipped while collecting data because they did not meet my and women are embroiled within the structure of online selection criteria further supports this assertion. It was not dating sites and their users’ profiles. Across sampled dat- uncommon to disregard a dozen male profiles for every one ing platforms, users typically display photographs of their sampled, further illustrating the lack of time and effort spent faces and upper-torso areas, with only minimal background in creating their online profiles. The embedded and reified settings visible. In the sporadic cases in which users pro- constructions of power within niche dating platforms allow vided multiple photographs, additional pictures ranged male users to continue to enjoy the fruits of a patriarchal from users engaging in outdoor activities like hiking or society obsessed with thinness, while simultaneously forcing travel, group photos at social gatherings, or more “selfies.” fat women to comply in their own subjugation by objectify- Interestingly, men were more likely than women to have ing, fetishizing, and otherwise reminding fat women of their photos of themselves engaging in outdoor and/or athletic abject inferiority. activities such as rock climbing or mountain biking. While this trend is consistent across all sampled dating platforms, Conclusion it was most commonly observed on the mainstream sites, namely OkCupid and Bumble. Counterintuitive to Toma So long as websites dictate the terms of one’s online and Hancock’s (2010) findings that online dating users tend existence through the forceful imposition of de-contextu- to enhance certain areas of their profiles in order to com- alized and de-personalized identity markers, the utopian pensate for perceived deficiencies in other areas, men more ideals of an authentic and wholly legitimated self-ascribed consistently highlighted their more masculine attributes on digital identity will continue to be subjugated by the same 19 20 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 I couldnothavedonethiswithoutyou,Becky! support, encouragement,andlovethroughoutthisprocess. “Becky” Overmyer-Velázquez, for her unyielding guidance, Endnotes Acknowledgements and empoweritsmostmarginalizedmembers. effects ofidentitypoliticsthathavefailedtoacknowledge of itspredecessors,withfallvictimtothehomogenizing sectional approach,thefatacceptancemovement,likemany erecting thesenewlyre-imaginedspaces.Without aninter sectional understanding of identity when conjuring and fat women, we also need to take care to include an inter need to create online spaces that give voice and agency to straight, cis-gendered,able-bodiedwomen.Notonlydowe and featurewhite/light-skinned,conventionallyattractive, tance andbody positivity movementsoverwhelminglyfavor bodies andexperiences.Presently, thepopularfataccep- marginalizing or silencing the extraordinary diversity of and everydayindividualsmustcoalesce,withoutfurther to occur, however, acommunityoffatactivists,scholars, demeaning niche online dating market. In order for this exists the potential for a significant pushback against the ing howweunderstandandtalkaboutfatbodies,there to pushforincreasedvisibilityanddiscoursesurround- ing sites/apps,thereisstillhope.Asfatactivistscontinue the softwaredeveloper(s). given enoughsocialcapitalandwillingnessonthepartof based structures can quickly respond to social pressures, ful aboutonlinespacesishowmalleabletheyare;Internet- upon (Lanier2011).Nevertheless,whatisusefulandhope- innovation canonlygosofarasthetechnologyitisbuilt capacities throughsoftwaredesign.However, evenradical reimagine thedigitallandscapeanditsmeaning-making the individualswithskillsandknowledgenecessaryto tive potentialityoftheInternetasaliberatoryspaceto the Internet’s structuralinterfacelimitsthetransforma- bodies move through the physical world. The rigidity of socially constructednormsthatdictatehowourindividual i On BBWCupidandWooPlus, matchesareshownon the user’s home- site’s policies,but itisunclearwhoreviewingthesephotos. profile picturesare“reviewed”toensure theymeettherespectivedating to accessadditionalinformationabouta particularmatch.Furthermore, page, butwithoutaprofilepicture,userscannotclickonotherprofiles I would like to thank my mentor, Professor Rebecca Despite themanyproblematicaspectsofonlinedat- - - Murray, Samantha.2004.“LocatingAesthetics: SexingtheFat LeBesco, Kathleen.RevoltingBodies?TheStruggletoRedefine Fat Lanier, Jaron.2011. YouAreNotaGadget.NewYork: Vintage Hogan, Bernie.2012.“PseudonymsandtheRiseofReal- Hitsch, GunterJ.,AliHortacsu,andDanAriely. 2010.“What Fry, Hannah.2015.TheMathematicsofLove:Patterns,Proofs,and de Vries, DianA.andJochenPeter. 2013.“Women onDisplay: ChubbyBunnie. 2015.RetrievedOct.1,2015(http://www.chubby Bumble. 2015.RetrievedOct.1,2015(https://bumble.com). Bettie, Julie.2003.WomenWithoutClass:Girls,Race,andIdentity. BBWlocalhookup. 2015.RetrievedOct.1,2015(http://www.bbw BBWCupid. 2015.RetrievedOct.1,2015(http://www.bbwcupid References ii Woman.” Identity. 2004.Amherst:UniversityofMassachusetts Press. Books. abstract=2229365). Name Web.” RetrievedApril13,2016(http://ssrn.com/ Quantitative MarketingandEconomics8(4):393–427. Makes You Click?—MatePreferencesinOnlineDating.” Schuster, Inc. the SearchforUltimateEquation.NewYork: Simonand Objectification.” The EffectofPortrayingtheSelfOnlineonWomen’s Self- bunnie.com). Los Angeles:UniversityofCaliforniaPress. localhookup.com). .com). In herresponsetoErichGoode’s (2002)highlyproblematicethicsand (555) competition fromothermenandthereducedself-esteemoffatwomen anti-fat prejudicegivesthemoverfatwomen”becauseoflessperceived concern thatthesemen“mayevenfeeltheybenefitfromthepower equality forthefatwomenthey“loveand/ordesire,”thereisaserious (2002) assertsthatwhilemalefatadmirers(FAs) maytrulywantsocial up withalotofabusetohaveboyfriend”(Saguy2002:551).Saguy more seriousrelationship.Inthispursuit,fatwomen“arewillingtoput purposes offindinganintimatepartner, whetheritbecasualsexora NAAFA events,whereGoode(2002)conductshisresearch,forthesole of FatAcceptance(NAAFA) asstatingthatmanyfatwomenattend cites severalmembersoftheNationalAssociationforAdvancement you areparticularlyvulnerabletosexualpredators”(552).Saguy(2002) your entirelifethatyouarenotworthyoflovebecauseweight, between themandthemenseekingout:“Whenyouhavebeentold that forfatwomen,thereareseriousgenderedpowerimbalancesatplay Research inaFatCivilRightsOrganization,”Saguy(2002)highlights conduct outlinedinhisethnography, “SexualInvolvementandSocial Social Semiotics14(3):237–247. Computers inHumanBehavior29:1483–1489. Nakamura, Lisa. 2006. “Cybertyping and the Work of Race in the Age of Digital Reproduction.” Pp. 317–333 in New Media Old Media: A History and Theory Reader. Edited by W.H.K. Chun and T. Keenan. New York: Routledge.

OkCupid. 2015. Retrieved Oct. 1, 2015 (https://www.okcupid.com).

Rudder, Christian. 2014. Dataclysm: Who We Are* When We Think No One’s Looking. New York: Crown Publishers.

Saguy, Abigail C. 2002. “Sex, Inequality, and Ethnography: Response to Erich Goode.” Qualitative Sociology 24(4):549–556.

Saguy, Abigail C. 2013. What’s Wrong With Fat? New York: Oxford University Press.

Smith, Aaron. 2016. “15% of American Adults Have Used Online Dating Sites or Mobile Dating Apps.” Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech. Retrieved March 6, 2016 (http://www. pewinternet.org/2016/02/11/15-percent-of-american-adults- have-used-online-dating-sites-or-mobile-dating-apps/).

Snider, Stefanie. 2009. “Fat Girls and Size Queens: Alternative Publications and the Visualizing of Fat and Queer Eroto- politics in Contemporary American .” Pp. 223–230 in The Fat Studies Reader. Edited by Esther Rothblum and Sondra Solovay. New York: New York University Press.

Toma, Catalina L. and Jeffrey T. Hancock. 2010. “Looks and Lies: The Role of Physical Attractiveness in Online Dating Self-Presentation and Deception.” Communication Research 37(3):335–351.

Turkle, Sherry. 1997. Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Turkle, Sherry. 2011. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. New York: Basic Books.

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21 A Case Study of the Experiences of Students of Color at a Selective American Prep School Walter G. Chacón, Bowdoin College

Walter Chacón is a sociology and education major at Bowdoin to incorporate more racial minorities, as ten percent of stu- College in Brunswick, Maine. Born to Dominican and Peruvian dents in Cookson and Persell’s (1985) study were not white. immigrants, Walter is a first-generation college student inter- Today, selective private secondary schools throughout the ested in race, class, education, and social stratification. Walter United States demonstrate an increasing commitment to hopes to pursue research in education upon graduation before racial and socioeconomic diversity in their student popu- entering graduate school to earn his PhD in sociology. lations. Devotion to diversity demonstrates a commitment to equity and equality among these schools; it also reflects belief in the many benefits that inclusion of students from Abstract a wide array of backgrounds offers. With this diversity pre- sumably comes diversity of thought and experience in aca- For centuries, prep schools in the United States have demic communities. Diverse communities enhance learning catered primarily to white and affluent students, contrib- and provide spaces for collaboration across lines of race uting to an organizational habitus informed by the white and class, promoting creativity and innovation. Students in and wealthy. Though prep schools today are more racially diverse schools learn to function in multiethnic environ- diverse than they have ever been, access to selective prep ments, a skill that is becoming increasingly important as our schools does not guarantee a smooth road to success in nation becomes increasingly diverse (Page 2008; Denson school and beyond for students of color who gain admission. and Chang 2009; Hyman and Jacobs 2009). Prestigious, Through focus groups comprised of African American and predominantly white independent preparatory high schools Latino students, this study finds that students of color at a have offered increased access to non-white students, making selective prep school in the northeast United States experi- efforts to recruit talented African-American, Latino, and ence feelings of marginalization and alienation on the basis Asian students and today, students of color comprise thirty of race. Further, the data demonstrate that prep schools percent or more of the student population at many of the today continue to be sites in which students of color are per- most selective prep schools in the United States.i ceived to be outsiders. By promoting cultural competency among faculty, staff, and students, prep schools can become However, increased access to selective prep schools places in which all students, regardless of race, can not only does not guarantee a smooth road to success in school survive, but thrive. and beyond for the students of color who gain admission. The historical roots of prep schools as places for the white and affluent echo today in the organizational cultures and Introduction the students they attract. Previous research suggests that minority students in selective, predominantly white prep Selective private secondary schools throughout the schools encounter environments that are not always wel- United States have historically been sites which enable upper coming. Datnow and Cooper (1997) found that African class families to maintain their class status and reproduce it American students in Baltimore independent schools across generations. Cookson and Persell (1985) found that reported feelings of alienation and lack of belonging in the emergence of boarding schools in the northeast United their predominantly white institutions. Borrowing from States created means for the upper class to form a collec- black feminist author Patricia Hill Collins’s (1968) research, tive identity distinctive from other social classes. Boarding students reported feeling like “outsiders within” the white schools were places in which children of the most well-off establishment (Datnow and Cooper 1997: 62). Feeling like families integrated into a homogenous group, legitimizing outsiders in their own schools prompted some minority stu- their own social status and formalizing their credentials at dents to question whether they deserved to be in the school the top of the social pyramid. And so, boarding schools came or if they were admitted as racial tokens. David Addams, to exist as “status seminaries” (Cookson and Persell 1985: Executive Director of the Oliver Scholars Program which 22) that groomed the young elite instead of as educational seeks to place underprivileged students into private sec- institutions. By the 1980s, most families who sent students ondary schools in New York, lamented that some students to boarding prep schools were at the top of the income believe that they were only allowed into privileged schools distribution, while a very small minority earned less than to fill a minority quota (Khalid 2012). For minority students the national median income. Parents of boarding school stu- in elite prep schools, earning admission is not enough to dents tended to be highly educated and were more likely to make them feel as if they belong. The existing research on be doctors, attorneys, and bankers than any other profession The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 students of color in selective prep schools prompts me to (Cookson and Persell 1985). ask, how do the historically white and affluent roots of elite Yet, in the last two decades of the twentieth century, prep schools influence the experiences of students of color the demographics of elite schools were beginning to change today? What challenges and obstacles do students of color 22 face as they seek to gain high-quality educations in prep schools? The answers to these questions will inform our their classes, they were, or felt that they were, expected to thinking about the state of diversity in prestigious secondary speak on behalf of people of color. schools throughout the U.S. At the same time, students of color felt that their opinions were invalidated by white students because their Methodology opinions stem from their own experiences as people of color. To investigate the ways students of color navigate A Mexican American eleventh grader shared his personal the environments of prep schools, I conducted focus groups experience of feeling that his views were discounted by his with African-American and Latino students at a selective, peers. He remembered, predominantly white, boarding preparatory school in the “If they mention Mexicans in history class, every- northeast, which I refer to as Collegiate. The research pro- one looks my way. If I give my opinion that is tocol was created in cooperation with Collegiate’s adminis- informed by my ethnicity and experiences, peo- tration and approved by the Bowdoin College Institutional ple sometimes overtly sometimes not, diminish my Review Board. All names of individuals involved in my opinions because of the fact that they originate study have been replaced with pseudonyms. I recruited from my own experiences through my race. They student participants from an organization on campus that kind of invalidate that and say that I think [what I matches upperclass minority student mentors with under- think] because I’m Mexican.” class minority student mentees to offer academic, social, and cultural support. Sixteen African American and Latino Paradoxically, students of color at Collegiate are students from grades nine through twelve participated in expected to be the arbiters on topics of race in the class- this study. room, but their views are invalidated because their opinions stem from personal experiences. The focus group questions addressed the academic, social, and cultural experiences of African American and When topics in class were not about race, African Latino students at Collegiate. Topics included why students American and Latino students reported feeling excluded chose to leave home to attend Collegiate, whether they from the conversations. A female junior student contended, thought race matters to students and teachers on campus, “In situations when it’s not about race, you don’t exist. and student experiences transitioning to and navigating life That’s how I feel a lot of the time.” One female student at Collegiate. Open-ended questions allowed participants suggested that the reason for this may be that white students to speak about their experiences in their own words. The do not expect her to know as much. She recounted, “When semi-structured style allowed me to guide the focus group someone has a question in class, they will deliberately go topics while allowing for participants to answer questions around me and not ask me and that makes me mad because how they saw fit and also to speak about important experi- they assume I don’t know as much I do.” In the classroom, ences that my questions did not directly address. students of color occupy an unusual space in which they are expected to be very knowledgeable about issues of race (although their views are then discounted), but not expected The Experiences of Students of Color at Collegiate to know about topics not related to race. African American and Latino students reported fac- African American and Latino students at Collegiate ing contradictory expectations in the classroom. Students of felt that they were always working to prove their merit to color felt that they were expected by their white peers to be their white peers. But, regardless of how they performed the educators when it came to topics of race. A ninth grade at Collegiate, they could never truly prove their ability. female lamented, “When you’re in class and there aren’t When students of color at Collegiate do well, white students other people of color, teachers look to you expecting to shed often attribute their accomplishments to racial tokenism light on my experiences in relation to what we’re learning instead of merit. A senior girl spoke to this issue by noting about and using me to educate everyone else, which I don’t that the accomplishments of students of color at Collegiate really like.” Another female ninth grade student reacted, are diminished because the students are non-white. She “It pisses me off because I’m not god, not the profes- reported, sor, and not going to be able to tell you everything you need to know. No one can know everything but “You will do something and there will always be an [white students] expect people of color to be able to excuse for why you got it. Like, you got in because teach them and that’s not why we’re here.” you’re black. There’s always another reason. It couldn’t be because I worked hard. I feel like it’s Students across the sample expressed similar frustra- sometimes impossible to prove yourself.” tions with their classes. When the topic of race came up in 23 24 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 up againstthe historical organizationalhabitus andthis bodies, theyare facedwithstudentswhosepresence bumps Today, asprepschoolshaveincreasinglydiverse student the historicalorganizationalhabitus ofthoseinstitutions. schools andtheirdispositions and perceptionshaveshaped and affluent students have been the dominant group inprep who haveinhabitedtheseinstitutions. Forcenturies,white are informedbyqualitiesofthedominantgrouppeople common organizational culture. The culturesofinstitutions tions andperceptionsthatistransmittedtoindividualsina (1997) definedtheorganizationalhabitusasasetofdisposi- be unwelcomingplacesforstudentsofcolor. McDonough examining theculturesofprepschoolsandhowtheycan do notreceiveindividualcreditfromtheirwhitepeers. gests thatnomatterwhatstudentsofcoloraccomplish,they it comestoraceatCollegiate,theunderlyingdynamicsug- a result,helamented“We arealwaysunderalens.”When community ofstudentscolorinsteadtheindividual.As are expelledfromCollegiate,itreflectsbadlyontheentire more seriouscases,hebelievesthatwhenstudentsofcolor may suggestthatallstudentsofcolorarebadatmath.In students ofcolordonotwellinmathclass,thenthat on theentirestudentofcolorcommunity. Forexample,if students ofcolormakemistakesinschool,itreflectspoorly revealed, the entirecommunityofstudentscolor. Ajuniorgirl that theirdifficultiesareattributedtolackofmeritamong When studentsofcolordopoorly, however, theyperceive got inbecauseofhisraceandnotmerit. there was widespread talk among white students that he American studentearnedadmissiontoanIvyLeagueschool, to fulfilladiversityquota.Inonecase,whenanAfrican card,” statingthatstudentsofcolorgotintoeliteschools certain colleges,whitestudentsresortto“playingtherace dents becameupsetaboutwhodidandnotgetinto student reported that in his experience, when white stu racial tokenismbecomes an evenmoresalienttopic.One tions.” When it comesto the college application process, they’re tryingtogetstudentsofcolorinleadershipposi- position becausehe’s Mexicanandhefillsthatquota else did.” A junior recounted hearing, “He only got that belong allthetimeeventhoughIgotinjustlikeeveryone Discussion The conceptofanorganizationalhabitusisusefulin A juniorAfricanAmericanmalereportedthatwhen Another studentfeltthatshehadto“proveI then you’rerepresentingalotmorethanyourself.” everyone wholookslikeyou.Whenyoumessup, I have to prove myself. And you’re representing “I feellikesomuchmoreisexpectedofmebecause -

youth inAmerica. tution inAmericansociety, denyingequal opportunity to conflict withtheegalitariangoalsofeducationasaninsti- schools asinstitutionsofeducationwillcontinuetostandin be second-classstudentsattheirschools.Moreover, prep this trendcontinues,thenstudentsofcolorwillcontinueto their doors,butarenotreadytoembracethemasequals.If will continuetobesitesthatallowstudentsofcolorthrough beyond powerful notions of , prep schools one thatvaluesthemeritofeachstudentequallyandmoves the organizationalhabitusofselectiveschoolsshiftstowards navigate and achieve success in their prep schools. Until the waysinwhichAfricanAmericanandLatinostudents perceived tobelonginthesamewaythatwhitestudentsdo. to bespacesinwhichstudentsofcolorfeelthattheyarenot to theirwhitepeersdemonstratethatprepschoolscontinue students whoattestedthattheycanneverprovetheirmerit knowledgeable exceptaboutissuesofrace.Moreover, the the classroomaswhitestudentsdonotexpectthemtobe they areoutsiders.Theyfacecontradictingexpectations in face anorganizationalhabitusthatreinforcesthenotion that whenstudentsofcolorenterselectiveprepschoolsthey American andLatinostudentsatCollegiatedemonstrate places forthewhiteandwealthy. TheexperiencesofAfrican perceptions ofmanymajoritystudentsthattheirschoolsare of race to their experiences. The habitus reinforces the dents ofcoloralikeinthesespacesunderstand the centrality white privilegeandmakesclearthatstudentsstu- as spacesfor the whiteand affluent hasreinforced notions of fare intheseinstitutions. tension hasimportantimplicationsforhowstudentsofcolor other withinelite educationalinstitutions. and studentsof colornavigatespacesandinteract witheach race andcultureinfluencethe waysinwhichwhitestudents competent is to recognize the ways in which differences in cross-cultural situations”(13). Inessence,tobeculturally system, agency, or those professionals to work effectively in system, agency, oramong professionalsandenablethat behaviors, attitudes,andpolicies thatcometogetherina definition ofculturalcompetencyas,“asetcongruent culturally competent.Crossetal.(1989)offerawidelyused people involvedwithstudentsonaday-to-daylevelwere services for students were effective is whether or not the most important factor that dictated whether or not support they cannotonlysurvive,butthriveattheirschool.The despite theobstaclesstudentsof color faceatCollegiate, Recommendations These experienceshaveimportantimplicationsfor The historical organizational habitus of prep schools For thesereasons,itisimportanttoensurethat At Collegiate, the Center for Multicultural Life Hyman, Jeremy S., and Lynn F. Jacobs. 2009. “Why Does engages students from diverse backgrounds so that students Diversity Matter at College Anyway?” Professors’ Guide. August may learn from each other across lines of race. To this end, 12. http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/professors- the Center can provide workshops and trainings to the guide/2009/08/12/why-does-diversity-matter-at-college-anyway. faculty and students at Collegiate regarding how race influ- Khalid, Kiran. 2012. “Access to Elite Education, but Feelings of ences the experiences of students of color. These practices Exclusion for Some Students of Color.” In America. December can bring to the forefront topics relevant to the experiences 4. http://inamerica.blogs.cnn.com/2012/12/04/access-to-elite- of students of color at Collegiate so that faculty and student education-but-feelings-of-exclusion-for-some-students-of- leaders can gain an understanding of how race pervades the color/. experiences of African American and Latino students. By promoting cultural competency among students and faculty, McDonough, Patricia M. 1997. Choosing Colleges: How Social Class . New York, NY: SUNY Press. Collegiate can be become an that is vigilant of the and Schools Structure Opportunity ways in which cultural differences influence the experiences Page, Scott E. 2008. The Difference: How the Power of Diversity of students of color. In doing so, Collegiate can become a Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies. Princeton, NJ: model for other predominantly white institutions that are Princeton University Press. dedicated to ensuring that all students, regardless of race, feel comfortable and welcome in their environments.

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor Professor Craig McEwen for his guidance, men- torship, and support throughout this entire study. I could not imagine pushing myself to pursue this project without his unwavering dedication to supporting my undergrad- uate research. In addition, I would like to thank my aca- demic advisor Professor Nancy Riley for her continued encouragement. I thank Professor Matthew Klingle for the opportunity to work as his research assistant which sparked my interest in academic research. Further, I would like to thank the faculty, staff, and administrators at Collegiate for allowing me to pursue this topic. Last, I would like to thank Rosemary Effiom, the Bowdoin College MMUF coordi- nator, as well as the MMUF program for the continued support that has enabled me to commit myself to academic research.

Endnote 1 Information gathered from individual school websites.

References

Collins, Patricia Hill. 1986. “Learning from the Outsider Within: The Sociological Significance of Black Feminist Thought.” Social Problems 33 (6): 14–32.

Cookson, Peter W., and Caroline Hodges Persell. 1985. Preparing for Power: America’s Elite Boarding Schools. New York, NY: Basic Books.

Datnow, Amanda, and Robert Cooper. 1997. “Peer Networks of African American Students in Independent Schools: Affirming Academic Success and Racial Identity.” The Journal of Negro Education 66 (1): 56–72. 25 “Eso Ya No Se Consigue”: The Effects of Economic Shortages on Women’s Everyday Lives in Venezuela Andrea Clark Gómez, University of Texas at Austin

Andrea Clark is a 2016 graduate of the University of Texas Shortages and Women’s Health: An Overview at Austin who double-majored in Latin American studies and history and minored in African and African diaspora studies. This paper explores the effects of the current short- Andrea was born in Venezuela and has lived in various places, ages on women’s reproductive and sexual health. Through including Argentina and Saudi Arabia. These transnational my ethnography, I record women’s experiences as they experiences sparked her interests in gender and race studies, in struggle to find items like sanitary pads to birth control particular women’s rights and transnational feminism. Andrea pills, and I assess the availability of these items. In addition, I will pursue an MA in Latin American Studies at the Teresa analyze some of the short-term and long-term effects of the Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies. After com- shortages in women’s reproductive and sexual lives. As the pleting the MA, Andrea plans to continue her research by com- literature explains, women are political actors that respond pleting a doctorate in anthropology or sociology. to both practical needs (e.g., tampons, etc.) and strategic interests (e.g., organizing to legalize or offer alternatives to abortion) (Fernandes 100). I adopt these concepts not to Abstract separate the private from the public sphere but to under- stand women’s demands and struggles in post-Bolivarian Studies on Venezuela’s Chávez administration and revolution Venezuela. The research question is two-fold: the media have focused on the country’s political polar- As a result of the shortages, how difficult is it for women ization and the visible effects of the economic crisis: long to access basic goods necessary for women’s reproductive lines outside supermarkets and empty shelves. This paper and sexual life? And what are the short-term and long-term identifies and clarifies the effects of the economic crisis in effects of these shortages on women’s ability to a general, and the shortages in particular, on women’s practi- healthy sexual and reproductive life? I argue that the short- cal needs (e.g., tampons, etc.) and strategic gender interests ages have not only affected women’s practical needs but also (e.g., organizing to legalize or offer alternatives to abortion). their strategic interests. It presents ethnographic work, interviews conducted during the summer of 2015, and non-governmental reports on This paper is part of a larger study that assesses the how women access basic goods and servicces, how they are Bolivarian state policies and institutions and whether or not organizing, and how shortages affect women’s health. For they improved the status of women’s reproductive and sexual exampe, as a result of scarcity, issues such as access to contra- health. The overall argument is that the Chávez’s adminis- ceptives, the status of maternal health and teen pregnancy, tration opened spaces for various discussions to take place and the rise of sexually transmitted diseases have become and initiated programs designed to further women’s stra- problems that have remained unaddressed by the media. tegic interests. At the same time, however, the Revolution This paper is part of a larger study, an undergraduate thesis, has not guaranteed women’s practical and material needs to that surveys the debates around women’s reproductive and ensure a healthy reproductive and sexual life. This reality sexual rights during the Bolivarian Revolution. has actually deteriorated women’s efforts to accomplish their strategic interests. In other words, the pro-women ideological rhetoric of the Bolivarian Revolution does not Since the end of 2013, the daily life of most translate and differs substantially from the precarious class- Venezuelans involves standing in line for an average of determined status of women in Venezuela. one hour in order to purchase basic goods like harina pan (flour), rice, and sugar. Economic shortages and inflation Literature Review: On the Economic Crisis and have troubled Venezuela since the government devalued the Women’s Demands currency in 2013 (Corrales). The international media has disseminated images of Venezuelans lining several blocks To understand the shortages, it’s important to while waiting outside of supermarkets (Corrales). However, acknowledge that the literature on Venezuela’s economy neither the media nor any recent study has analyzed the gen- has been politically motivated and polarized. For example, dered composition of these lines and the effects of shortages Javier Corrales, a known political scientist and expert on on women’s livelihood (Weisbrot). Most of the Venezuelans Venezuela, claims that the regime mismanaged the oil boom standing in line are women, because gender roles continue and is the one to blame for the recession (Corrales). Corrales unchallenged. Even after the Bolivarian Revolution, these dismisses external factors like a U.S. conspiracy and internal traditional roles require women to shop for groceries while factors like the Venezuelan elites that, according to the The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 men continued their work uninterrupted. While visiting government, are waging “una guerra económica,” an eco- pharmacies and supermarkets, I witnessed the tension and nomic war (Corrales). Mark Weisbrot, on the other hand, struggle women face as they search for basic goods. argues that the Venezuelan government has the resources to weather the economic crisis and resume economic growth 26 and poverty reduction efforts (Weisbrot). According to Failing to acknowledge the grassroots organization’s depen- Weisbrot, fears of an economic collapse in Venezuela like dency on the state’s monetary support and on a healthy that of Greece or Spain are not an accurate assessment of economy, Valencia could not foreshadow how economic the situation and are disseminated by the opposition who problems could hinder women’s grassroots organizations; seeks to destabilize the government (Weisbrot). Because or how the practical needs affect the strategic interests of the phenomenon of inflation and recession that has led to women’s grassroots. the shortages is recent and constantly changing, this study does not focus on the causes of the economic shortage or Methodology those responsible. Instead, this paper tracks how economic problems in general, and the shortages in particular, have During the summer of 2015, I traveled to Maturín and affected women’s reproductive and sexual health and rights. Caracas in Venezuela and conducted research in different sectors of these cities. In Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, I Few studies have focused on women’s movement visited both predominantly Chavista sectors like Libertador and on the issues of women’s reproductive and sexual lives. district and opposition sectors like El Hatillo. I also inter- Sujatha Fernandes’ work titled “Barrio Women and Popular viewed pro-government and opposition institutions that Politics in Chávez’s Venezuela” is one of these ethnographic provide services to women in the area of reproductive studies that records women’s mobilization in popular poli- and sexual health. In my study, however, I decentralize tics during the Bolivarian Revolution (Fernandes 102). By Venezuelan studies from the capital, where most academic providing an ethnography of “lo cotidiano” or the every- studies take place, and focused most of my ethnography in day, the author differentiates between elite women and Maturín (Fernandez; Valencia; Rakowski & Espina). “barrio women” and how these women resist or contribute to popular politics (Fernandes 113). Fernandes proposes For my methodology, I conducted ethnographic and women’s “practical needs” and “strategic interests” in order archival research. My ethnographic experiences allowed me to gauge the demands of popular women’s movements and to obtain information about the current impact that the how the government has met these demands (Fernandes shortages have on women. More specifically, I chose partici- 99). Practical needs are defined as the “daily struggles over pant observation, such as standing in line outside pharmacies food, shelter and health,” so sanitary pads and birth control, and talking to women. This method made me a witness to which are important to women’s reproductive and sexual the everyday activities of women and helped me understand health, can be added to these needs (Fernandes 99). On the the impact of the economic shortages on women’s everyday other hand, “strategic gender interests” constitute larger lives. As mentioned previously, I conducted interviews with needs that “lead to a growing consciousness and questioning a variety of actors from different sectors, affiliations, and of gender hierarchy” (Fernandes 100). As this study reveals, geographical areas of Venezuela. This allowed me to collect women’s strategic interests have been curtailed, because, different perspectives about controversial issues, such as instead of focusing on work or participating in grassroots government policies, which are often met with polarizing activism, women have to wait in line and confront the bur- perspectives on the streets. In addition, I reviewed several den of the economic crisis on the family. These two concepts published materials and government archives to supple- allow us to better situate the problems Venezuelan women ment the interviews and my ethnographic encounters with face as a result of shortages. women.

Other important studies have foreshadowed several Practical Needs and Strategic Gender Interests: challenges to women’s movement and the Bolivarian social Measuring the Effects programs. The work of Cathy A. Rakowski and Giaconda Espina on women’s movements correctly foreshadowed that In order to understand how women’s practical needs economic problems could affect government services, espe- are affected by the crisis, I decided to immerse myself in cially those catered to women (Rakowski and Espina 267). “lo cotidiano,” or women’s everyday life. While I stood In effect, scarcity has affected not only the availability of in line, behind a woman wearing a shirt with the eyes of basic goods for women’s reproductive and sexual health but Chávez ironically gazing over the situation, I listened to also government services for women. Cristobal Valencia’s women complain about the long wait outside the pharmacy book We are the State! highlights the grassroots mobilization Farmatodo. They protested with “Dios mío, espero que aquí of the “Chavistas” in Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution. encuentre papel toalet” (Oh my god, I hope that I can find However, Valencia erroneously concludes that, because the toilet paper here) or “Ya no me queda ni pañales para mi state has transferred power to organized civil society actors, bebe, ni toallitas sanitarias para cuando me llegue la regla” the Chavistas, they will be able to voice and meet their (I don’t have any diapers left or any sanitary pads for that demands through participatory democracy (Valencia 6–7). time of the month) (Observations 06/29/15). Just like they 27 28 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 were experiencing hardships,andhowtheshortages were how womenorganizers andleadersofwomen’s institutions basic goods.Throughoutmy interviews, Ialsoidentified how theshortageswereaffecting women’s accessibilityto condoms. ignored bythemedia:contraception, sanitarypads,and and tensionswererunninghigh even over products often availability of these items. Scarcity was an undeniable reality, these itemswerevastlydifferent.Thus, gender affects the items wererelevantformenandwomen,theavailabilityof necessarily men’s products(condoms).Eventhoughthe solely women’s products(padsandcontraception)not of Maturín.Infact,theshortagesseemedtobeimpacting and theyweremostlyinthepharmaciesnearcitycenter control andemergencycontraceptionwerehardertofind, macies, andpregnancytestswereavailableinmost.Birth found). However, Iwasable tofindcondomsinallthephar sanitary pads, “eso ya no se consigue” (that is no longer pharmacies downtown,womenlamentedtheabsenceof pharmacies, Ineverfoundsanitarypads.Inmanyofthe To summarize,Table 1showsthat,inmyvisitstotheten Table 1:Availability ofItemsinPharmaciesMaturín life. However, mostofthesewerenotfoundortoocostly. reproductive lifeandcondomstocarryoutahealthysexual women’s practical needs. Women needed tampons for their in ordertogaugetheimpactofcountry’s shortageon would recordtheitem’s pricesandavailability. Ididthis items like tampons,condoms, and birthcontrol. Then, I a researchermyplanwastoenterpharmacyandaskfor products, I visited ten pharmacies throughout Maturín. As health depended. bility tobasicgoodsonwhichtheirsexualandreproductive ized that the shortages were threatening women’s accessi- inside Farmatodo,afterarecord42minutesinline,Ireal- own basicmaterialnecessityaswomen.AsIfinallymadeit not findingitemsfortheirhomestranscendedinto monthly femaleneeds.Thewomen’s burdenandangerover the family, theycouldn’t findsanitarypads toanswertheir couldn’t findtoiletpaperforthehouseholdordiapers Pregnancy Test Emergency Contraception Pads Sanitary Condoms Contraception The visitstothepharmacies inMaturínrevealed In order to further collect data on women’s hygiene Items Pharmacy oN oN oN oN oNo No No No No No No No No No No No No e e e e e e e e e Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 1 Pharmacy No 2 Pharmacy Yes 3 Pharmacy - No No e Yes Yes 4 center wouldhave conducted300to500tubal sterilizations for sterilization increased, and, by the end of 2015, the procedures (Torres). However, starting2014,thedemand ception andconductedno“ligaduras” ortubalsterilization the women’s center provided the free distribution of contra- the scarcityofcontraceptives.Torres explainedthat in2009 women’s increasingdemandforsterilizationisrelatedto of Women fromMiranda(IREMUJERES) explainedthat interview, Deliana Torres Director of the Regional Institute very physicalandvisiblewayswomen’s health.Inanother tegic genderinterests,theeconomiccrisisisthreateningin izing abortion,anddismantlinggenderhierarchies. gender interestssuchasprovidingservicesforwomen,legal- has takenatollonwomen’s organizationsandtheirstrategic responsibility: thefamily. Furthermore,theeconomiccrisis survival oftheirfamily, womenmustassumetheirprimary women toretreatbackfromthepublicsphere,and,for ability toorganize.Theeconomicshortageshaveforcedthe increases themanyburdenswomenfaceandlimitstheir still requirewomentomaintainthehouseandfamily. This Venezuela’s economic, revolution, traditional gender roles energy neededtoundertakeacampaign)(Carosio).Despite (it’s noteasy, asorganizedgroups, tofindthestrengthand las fuerzasylaenergíaparallevaradelante[unacampaña].” fácil quecomogruposorganizadosnosotrosencontremos a campaign to legalize abortion (Carosio). She stated: “no es tive ofsocialist-feministsandthoseinvolvedwithinitiating toll notonlyonF.A.L.D.A.S. butalsoonthelargercollec- Dra. Carosioconfessedthattheeconomiccrisishadtakena most hadtoattendtheirfamilialresponsibilities(Carosio). to increasetheir work hours; some had left the country; and the recenteconomiccrisis,membersofF.A.L.D.A.S. had Abortion hotlineforwomen(Tinta Violeta 190).Becauseof women whogaveoutinformationandanswereda24-hour five years, F.A.L.D.A.S. was composed of a group of young ular womenwhohadunwantedpregnancies.Forfourto main goalwastoprovideservicesandcounselingforpop- aligned withtheChávezadministration(Carosio).Their zation waspartofthelargercollectivesocialistfeminists me the story of F.A.L.D.A.S. en Revolución. This organi- the CentralUniversityofVenezuela (UCV-CEM), shetold with Dra.AlbaCarosiofromtheleadingWomen’s Centerat affecting women’s ability to organize. During my interview Pharmacy Yes Yes Yes Yes Besides affectingwomen’s practicalneedsandstra- 5 Pharmacy / oN No No No N/A N/A 6 Pharmacy e e e Yes Yes Yes Yes 7 Pharmacy No 8 Pharmacy e Yes Yes 9 Pharmacy Yes 10 (Torres). Of course, Torres clarified that women were economic crisis and, specially, how scarcity seems to affect informed about all their options at forums organized by the women in particular ways of their everyday lives. This paper center, but women were increasingly opting for permanent focused specifically on the gendered implications of the solutions as a result of scarcity of contraceptives and the economic situation, especially as it relates to women’s health economic crisis that endangers their ability to afford other and ability to organize for the consolidation of their rights. methods. However other analyses, specially an intersectional analysis, on the implications of class, race, and sexuality could yield The effects of the economic crisis may also worsen to other conclusions on how these affect certain women’s the state of other intersecting issues on women’s health. Dr. reproductive and sexual health in specific ways and their Luz Beltran from the Venezuelan Observatory of Women’s ability to organize in order to further their rights. (OVDHM) revealed the precarious status of maternal health and the rise of Sexually Transmitted Acknowledgements Diseases (STDs). First, Venezuela has one of the high- est maternal mortality rates in Latin America (72.18 per I would like to thank my family in Venezuela who are 100,000) and ranks as the country with the highest levels of the true inspiration for any and all of my work. Se lo debo teen pregnancy in the region (89.10 per 1,000 between the todo a ustedes. Thank you Dr. Juliet Hooker for introduc- ages of 15 to 19 years) (Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas; ing me to the world of community-informed research and Observatorio Venezolano de los Derechos Humanos de las Dr. Nicole Guidotti-Hernandez for giving me the tools Mujeres). These worrisome rates are in addition to the rise to do it. Finally, I am thankful to the women and experts I of STDs; for example, the rise of AIDS with 11,000 new interviewed in Venezuela and stand in solidarity with all the cases of HIV per year and the rise of HPV, making cervical mujeres que se calan las colas. cancer the number one cause of death amongst women, may only worsen in the face of shortages and the larger economic Works Cited crisis (Observatorio Venezolano de los Derechos Humanos de las Mujeres). These numbers show the gravity of the situ- Corrales, Javier. “Don’t on the Oil.” Foreign Policy, 7 ation, and Dr. Beltran foreshadowed an increase in maternal May 2015, http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/05/07/dont-blame- mortality and STDs due to the shortages of and it-on-the-oil-venezuela-caracas-maduro/. Accessed 10 October supplies in hospitals and budget cuts of programs focusing 2016. on STD prevention (Beltran). Fernandes, Sujatha. “Barrio Women and Popular Politics in Chávez’s Venezuela.” Latin American Politics and Society, vol. 49, Discussion no. 3, 2007, pp. 97–127.

The Venezuelan economic crisis is affecting wom- Instituto Nacional de Estadisticas (INE). Compliendo las Metas en’s reproductive and sexual health. The shortages deny del Milenio. ODM 2012, http://www.ve.undp.org/content/ women’s access to basic products necessary to their health venezuela/es/home/mdgoverview/overview/mdg5.html. like sanitary pads and contraceptions. Because women’s Accessed 10 October 2016. priorities are to answer their families’ and their individ- Observatorio Venezolano de los Derechos Humanos de las ual needs, women’s practical needs are being jeopardized. Mujeres. “Women Beyond 2015: Venezuela is not going Furthermore, the scarcity disproportionately impacts the to achieve the Millenium Goals.” 9 Sept. 2013, http:// availability of women’s products. Consequently, shortages observatorioddhhmujeres.org/documentos/women%20 and the overall economic crisis have led to a decrease in beyond%202015%20final%20.pdf. Accessed 10 October 2016. women’s mobilization—from women’s grassroots organizing to institutions focused on women’s issues. Therefore, the sit- Rakowski, Cathy A. and Giaconda Espina. “Advancing Women’s uation has made it more difficult for women to further their Rights Inside and Outside the Bolivarian Revolution: 1998– 2010.” The Revolution in Venezuela. Edited by Thomas Ponniah strategic gender interests. In addition, the consequences on and Jonathan Eastwood, Harvard University Press, 2011. women’s health, such as sterilization and maternal mortality rates, are grave and undermining women’s health. As part of Tinta Violeta. La Araña Feminista Opina. Tinta Violeta, 2014. a more holistic study of women’s health, this study concludes that women’s practical needs and strategic gender interests Valencia, Cristobal. We are the State!: Barrio Activism in Venezuela’s are at risk as the economy of the Bolivarian Revolution Bolivarian Revolution. The University of Arizona Press, 2015. further crumbles.

My ethnographic work and interviews suggests wom- en’s experiences must be further explored in light of the 29 30 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Torres, Deliana.Personalinterview. 6July2015. Carosio, Alba,Dr. PersonalInterview. July72015. Beltrán, Luz,Dr. Personalinterview. 7July2015. Interviews/Ethnography Weisbrot, Mark.“Sorry, Venezuelan Haters:thiseconomyisnot October 2016. venezuela-not-greece-latin-america-oil-poverty. Accessed10 http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/07/ the GreeceofLatinAmerica.”TheGuardian, 7Nov. 2013, “Necessary Failures”: Reproducing Masculinity, Transgression, and Violence in Late-Medieval Male Pregnancy Narratives Benjamin Diego, Stanford University

Benjamin Diego is a recent graduate of Stanford University, masculinity was not: the biological male cannot conceive; where he majored in English and history. His work deals bearing children was not gendered masculine. This may primarily with the art and literature of the early Middle Ages seem obvious, but understanding childbirth in women as with a focus on depictions of the gendered body and architectural natural begs the question: what is childbirth in men? Is it space in early Insular illuminated manuscripts. He is a Beinecke queerness? Is it ? Scholar and recent recipient of the Kennedy Thesis Prize for his “Where the Word Dwells: Architecture and ‘Architexture’ As Robert McRuer has argued in his recent work, the in Insular Gospel-Books, 600–900 CE.” He is back home in “queer” (i.e., sexually othered) and the “disabled” (i.e., phys- Phoenix, working, writing, and applying to doctoral programs ically or mentally othered) interpenetrate throughout dis- in art history and medieval studies. courses of identity. His scholarship extends Butlerian gender theory to postulate the “necessary failure” of performing not only heterosexual masculinity, but also able-bodied- Abstract ness (Wheatley 387). His point is that “ideal able-bodied- ness,” like ideal masculinity, “can never, once and for all, A number of medieval tales feature men, some peas- be achieved,” since they are essentially conflicted identi- ants and knights, others kings and monks, who similarly ties, fraught with contradictions and always at risk of being believe that they are pregnant. Many of these tales have been undermined (McRuer 93). Moreover, these unstable identity critically examined through the lens of gender theory inde- categories often blur into one another, the successful mas- pendent of one another, but have never been analyzed as a culine subject at risk of being “compromised by disability corpus organized around a common theme. This paper takes metaphorized as queerness,” and the successful able-bodied these tales together to reveal the significance of the pregnant subject, “by queerness metaphorized as disability” (94). This man across texts and contexts. It argues that the intratextual consolidation of queerness and disability, McRuer explains, pregnant man embodies the failure of able-bodied, able- minded masculinity at various social levels (lay, chivalric, occurs through complex processes of conflation and monarchic, monastic), the continuities of which rely on the . . . . Once these conflations are available preservation of male hegemony. in the popular imagination, queer/disabled figures can be tolerated and, in fact, utilized in order to maintain the fiction that able-bodied heterosexual- A large corpus of medieval art and literature registers ity is not in crisis. (94) a profound unease with the embodied sexuality of not only “life-giving, lactating, menstruating, polluting” women, In other words, cultural processes of conflation and but also of men (Murray 18). These men are besieged by stereo type—in literature or popular culture, for instance— unwelcome erections and nocturnal emissions, and vulnera- serve to consolidate and contain threats to hegemonic ideals. ble to mutilation and penetration. In other medieval depic- In a society that institutes compulsory het-able-bodiedness, tions, impotent kings are blinded and male “sodomites” disability is queering and queerness is disabling. are violated, skewered through the anus in Hellish torture In this way, medieval male pregnancy narratives scenes. These sources reveal where in the body the cultural treat disability and queerness as what Edward Wheatley construct of gender was located in the later Middle Ages, as calls “paired manifestations of disempowerment” (388). well as raise questions regarding the relationship between Their “pregnant” protagonists are depicted as being short the parts of the sexed body and the gendered whole. They of breath and confined to the childbed, impaired and unable imagine the “compromised,” non-normative male body to to perform the “masculine” tasks expected of them; yet the betoken transgressive masculinity. parturience that marks their “disability” is women’s expres- Perhaps no male body challenges normative mas- sion of able-bodiedness. Medieval male “pregnancy” stories culinity more than that of the “pregnant” man. Men who construct a view of embodied masculinity that runs contrary believe that they are pregnant abound in later medieval to embodied femininity—a man cannot and is not allowed to comic tales—funny, apparently, because they typify what become pregnant “like a woman.” In thinking that he has would have been considered an ironic incongruity between conceived, the “pregnant” man expresses a queer desire to cultural expectations of the sexed body and its perceived transgress the limits of the sexed body, and thereby jeopar- reality. Gender may be a purely cultural designation, but is dizes his male gender identity, his authority, and his mental nevertheless encoded in and “constructed on the material and physical ability. substrate of the biological body” in the popular imagination (Green 357). In this way, medieval femininity was partly constructed on the painful, dangerous, and often incapaci- tating experiences of pregnancy and childbirth. Conversely, 31 32 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 trails behind“the servant[who] always [rides]ahead” (v. 71), servant—his inferior—he assumesasubmissive role.He sexual subordination.Whenthe monkseekshelpfromthe happening tohissexualizedbody, butalsobyhissocialand a feminineroleis not onlyindicated by whathebelievesis zation” throughpregnancy(126). Themonk’s transitionto of theseiswhatTrokhimenko callshis“grotesque femini- concatenate to queer and disable him. The most obvious perhaps devolutions?)overthecourseoftale,which tive privationbeforebeingreadmittedintohiscommunity. monastery. There,heenduresabeatingandweeksofpuni - the “insane”(v. 435)monkiscapturedandreturnedtothe rabbit which he believes to be his aborted child. In the end, about like“arabiddog”(v. 409),searchingforapassing-by from his humanity: bloodied and broken, the cleric lurches the monkonlyretreatsfartherfromhonor, andindeed, ow’s soncausedtomiscarry. Butwhen theservantobliges, (v. 309),andentreatshimtobeatlikethecowwid- summons a servant, called “the widow’s son” by the narrator could jeopardize hisposition inthe monastery, the monk Desperate toconcealandterminatehis“pregnancy,” which his ownbody, thenaïvemonkworriesthatheispregnant. when giventhechance.Misconceivingworkingsof of thestory, yetfailsutterlytoperformsexualintercourse The eponymousmonkfindshimselfinlustatthebeginning ity, andaggressionpunishesthequeer/disabledbody. Olga Trokhimenko hasargued,privilegessexualskill,viril- divergent ,ultimatelyadvocatingonewhich,as ment” followsthispattern,highlightingthetensionsamong facing punishmentforhisqueered,disabledtransgressions. this socialsystem,he(re)producesit,ultimatelyforsakingor the preservation of male hegemony. And rather than subvert ity atvarioussociallevels,thecontinuitiesofwhichrelyon embodies thefailureofable-bodied,able-mindedmasculin- and contexts. I argue that this intratextualpregnant man reveals thesignificanceof“pregnant”manacrosstexts common themesandconcerns.Taking thetalestogether tion theydeserve,especiallyasacorpusorganized around nant. The tales have yet to receive the scholarly atten- kings and monks, who similarly believe that they are preg- all of these feature men, some peasants and knights, others and Nicolette,JacobusdeVoragine’s TheGoldenLegend— Peasant andtheBeetle,”OldFrenchchantefable “The Monk’s Predicament,”MariedeFrance’s fabliau“The dered discourseonlytoreinforcethem.TheGermanmœre ing thatineachinstanceitpushestheboundariesofgen- in fourpopulartalesofdiverseoriginsandgenres,argu- The PregnantManinLate-MedievalLiterature The monkundergoesaseriesoftransformations(or The earlyfourteenthcentury“TheMonk’s Predica- This paperanalyzestheimageofpregnantman Aucassin or stereotype,to nameafew. MariedeFrances’ shortfabliau and theultimate restorationofnormativitythrough violence narratives: theimplicationof sodomy, theanimal“child,” Predicament” carryintoother medievalmalepregnancy ity, butalsoofmaleaggression overmonasticmalepassivity. only reinforces the hegemony of masculinity over feminin- “pregnant” protagonistof“TheMonk’s Predicament”not of conflation and stereotype” (94). So, the failure of the ity, andirrationality)throughMcRuer’s “complexprocesses consolidated threatstomasculinity(e.g.,femininity, animal - conformity the“grotesque”body, intowhichthetale has theory, therecoursetoviolenceissignificant:itbeats into viewed throughthelensofqueer/disabledintersectional ing thatmonasticpacifismonlyworksuptoapoint.And he correctstheyoungprotagonistattale’s end,suggest- laity. Indeed,theabbotinstoryresortstoviolencewhen instead a masculinity of virile aggression associated with the signal thefounderingofmonasticmanhoodandendorse queered byhispassivityanddisabledignorance—to Predicament” usesthefigureof“pregnant”monk— the failingsofprotagonist’s rationalmasculinity. (vv. 145,403)—andevenamadman—hedrawsattentionto or repeatedly labelshim akid(vv. 9,19,534) anda fool inexperience; orcharacterizeshimasawomananimal; when thenarratorinsinuatesmonk’s passivityandsexual course, conception,andabortioneludehimentirely. So, lacks anysuchintellectualmight;theworkingsofinter (125). Theprotagonistof“TheMonk’s Predicament” expression that privileged intellectual over physicalstrength structed for themselves analternative form ofmasculine masculinity in its dominant mode of virile aggression, con- explains howmedievalmonks,whodidnotengagewith how theyliterallyappear. Trokhimenko, citingWheeler, ciency ofhisabilitytoreason—toseehowthingsarebeyond later, thathehasmiscarriedaliverabbit,reflectsthedefi- social position,andhismasculinity. suggests themonk’s readinesstodispensewithhisvows, any man.Nevertheless,theservant’s implicationofsodomy engages inintercoursewithanyofhisbrethren,muchless perhaps the abbot or cellarer. In actuality, the monk never the servant,latter wonders iftheprior is thefather, or with hisbrethren.Whenthemonkrevealspregnancyto whom hesexually disappoints, and also, the author implies, of “theoneonthebottom”(v. 263)—withtheprostitute passivity. Themonkagaintakesonasubordinaterole—that between themonk’s socialpassivityandafeminizedsexual mal. Anumberofinsinuationsbytheauthorsuggestalink and offershisbodytohimbebeatenlikeadomesticani- A numberoftheelementsintroduced in“TheMonk’s Ultimately, Trokhimenko argues that “The Monk’s The monk’s willingnesstobelieveheispregnant,and -

“The Peasant and the Beetle” transposes these motifs from demanding to know why he is in bed when his nation is at the context of the monastery to that of the lay village, but war, the king replies, “I’m a mother [. . . ] / When my month sustains the hegemony of able-bodied masculinity. is gone at length, / And I come to health and strength, / Then I shall hear Mass once more / As my fathers did The fabliau tells the story of an unwitting peasant, before, / Arm me lightly . . . .” Here, the king imagines a whose exposed anus is besieged by a beetle. In pain and slippage between motherhood and fatherhood, femininity desperate for relief, the peasant totters to the doctor, only and masculinity. When he has borne out his time on the to be convinced he is pregnant. The people in his village childbed, then he will simply return to acting as his fathers fear him when they learn of his “condition,” convinced did before him, attending mass and charging into battle. that his purported pregnancy is an ill omen. Half-repulsed, half-fascinated by his affliction, the villagers monitor the The King’s gender fluidity, which has not only upset “pregnant” peasant “to see [from] where the baby [might] the foundations of his own nation, but also challenged emerge” (125). When a mere beetle exits the peasant’s bow- the rigidity of Aucassin’s own chivalric masculinity, causes els, he and the townsfolk recognize their folly, leaving the Aucassin great alarm. Disgusted by the monarch, the knight author to point out the credulity of those who believe “that grabs a nearby staff and beats him mercilessly, threatening which cannot be” (125). to do worse should he ever “lie in childbed” again. Aucassin’s sadism comes somewhat by surprise in the story, but mostly Like “The Monk’s Predicament,” the fable stresses falls in line with the corrective violence that permeates male the importance of behaving rationally. The masculinity of pregnancy narratives. A unique addition to this motif is the the peasant does not come into question until he abandons staff—suggestive in its phallicism as the object with which reason and “really believes” that he is pregnant. Doing so Aucassin asserts the dominance of his own able-bodied mas- sexualizes his penetration by the beetle, reconstructing it culinity over that of the queer, bed-ridden king, which has as a sort of parodic intercourse or insemination that carries weakened an entire nation. with it connotations of bestiality and sodomy. The peasant’s apparent conception by the bowel-beetle is surely intended The story of Nero’s pregnancy in Jacobus de as a scathing burlesque of his inability to masculinely defend Voragine’s widely read thirteenth-century Golden Legend his body and mind from violating forces, be they perverted similarly reflects how the non-normative male body signals a insects or irrational superstitions. But the peasant’s confi- failure of power and masculinity. In the legend, Nero, called dence in his pregnancy does not only disrupt his own body, to task for killing, dissecting, and inspecting the womb of his but also that of his community. On one hand, the townsfolk mother “who gave birth to him with such pain,” exhorts his are repulsed by what they see as a violation of nature—as a physicians to impregnate him, so that he might understand consolidation of the queer and disabled into an abject body. just “how much pain it cost [his] mother.” Following orders, But on another level, they are just as culpable as the peasant the doctors concoct a potion that deposits a frog into the in accepting the pregnancy, demonstrating for instance an emperor’s stomach. As the frog grows larger, so does Nero’s abiding interest in where the baby will emerge. They differ belly, such that he thinks he is with child. Swollen, short from the monastic community in “The Monk’s Trouble,” of breath, and desperate for relief, Nero orders the doc- which did not accept, but rather violently deny the young tors to “hasten [his] delivery,” leading to what may be best monk’s irrational, impossible pregnancy. It seems, then, that described as a parodic birth scene: Nero vomits up “a frog the “The Peasant and the Beetle” does not just reflect on an horrible to see, full of vile humors and covered with blood” individual’s failure to perform able-bodied and able-minded and shrinks away, horrified to think that he might have masculinity, but also on the failure of an entire community produced something so awful. The doctors explain that the to correct that individual. That responsibility is left to the fetus is just “deformed” because the emperor did not allow author, who adds an austere admonition against foolishness it to gestate for a full term. Finally, Nero asks if that was and subversion at the end of her fable. what he looked like when he was born; the doctors respond affirmatively, and Nero orders that his fetal “likeness” be A male pregnancy episode in the French romance cared for and housed in a stone chamber. Later, when Nero Aucassin and Nicolette elevates this theme of community dis- is deposed, the citizens of Rome cast the frog from its nest : it focuses on the jeopardization of an entire and burn it, presumably to rid the city of any trace of the kingdom under the rule of a “foolish” and feminized king, emperor’s legacy, as well to posthumously correct the trans- and its salvation through the punitive actions of the overtly gressions of his pregnancy. The tale appears between other virile knight, Aucassin. The bungling monarch, convinced accounts of Nero’s frivolity and wickedness as a ruler. Here, he is pregnant, has traded places with his wife—has sent Nero’s inability to rule Rome is linked to his incapacity to her into battle as he himself writhes with pain in the throes rule—or even fathom—his own body. of “labor” on a childbed. When Aucassin confronts him, 33 34 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 question that may becomemoreviablein bio-futurity: (Davidson 207). But for all its farcicality, Junior joke involvesseeing Mr. AmericabecomeMrs.America” ened hissharperedges.AsMichael Davidsonputsit,“The Moreover, helikesthewaythatcarryingachildhas soft- to thetrialsofmorningsickness andhormoneimbalance. cannot; he has become attached to his future baby, if not invented. Butwhenthetimecomes forHessetoabort,he growth hormone he and his partner Larry Arbogast have the fetus just long enough to demonstrate the success of the to terminatethepregnancyinfirsttrimester, keeping ization experimentandendsuppregnant.Heinitiallyplans genetic scientist who volunteers for his own in vitro fertil- body-builder ArnoldSchwarzeneggerasAlexHesse,adour case is the 1994 movie Junior, which stars the uber-male der identity, gender performance, and ability. An interesting ing acontinuityof preoccupations withanatomical sex, gen- borne itselfintothepopulartalesofpresentday, signal - unnatural, theinhuman,beastly. steps not into the realm of the feminine, but into that of the mob. Bytransgressingthelimitsofhisgenderedbody, Nero and latermeettheirdemiseatthehandsofanangryRoman frog whenitaddsthatbothliveinpalatialdomedchambers, reinforces this connection between the emperor and the when I came out from my mother’s womb?” The story only of youngerversionhimself:“IsthiswhatIlookedlike of—an animal that he later comes to recognize as a sort nancy” involvesnurturinginhisbelly—andeatingthediet Trouble” and “The Peasant and the Beetle.” His “preg- bestialized, similar to theprotagonistsof“The Monk’s social fabricthatprescribeswhatitshouldbe. order: thenon-normativemalebodyphysicallydisrupts not onlyafailureofindividualleadership,butalsosocial has shownthecompromisedbodyofkingtorepresent subjects hate him and his advisorslive in fear. Tania Colwell disabled. Moreover, itdisempowershiscommunity—his disempowers him,conflatingoncemorethequeerand jeopardizes hiskinglyauthority. Nero’s feminizedbody his demandsincreasingly“contrarytonature”—andthus “pregnant”—his breathinggrowslabored,hisbodyweak, leader Nerolosesthesemalequalitieswhenhebecomes nality, temperance—were alsothe qualities ofan effective normatively masculinequalities—physicalstrength,ratio- gender andkingshipinmedievaldiscourse,arguingthat tive tolead.Tania Colwellhaswrittenonthelinkbetween embody femininity—adesireatoddswithNero’s impera- ruler foranumberofreasons.First,theyreflectdesireto Biofuturity andthePregnantMan The imageofthe“unnatural”pregnantmanhas But Neroisnot only feminized in the tale, but also Nero’s maternalimpulsesthreatenhisauthorityasa poses a afflicted bytheviolenceofcategorical assumptions. man representsthepromiseof universality—ofaworldless articulation” (32).The“necessary failure”ofthepregnant status asalimitlessandunconditional featureofallpolitical place [. ] is precisely the futural promise of universality, its sivity (Butler32).Assheexplains:“Thisfailuretofillthe calls a“necessaryfailure”ofthatnormpromisesinclu- context ofviolence,embodiesnotthenorm,butwhatButler The intratextualpregnantman,loosedfromanyparticular rather than violence, of inclusion rather than exclusion. now therealworld,asasymbolofnewera—ofgeneration pregnant manneverthelessenduresintheimagination,and creation ofnewbodies. relies on such violence—on the destruction, rather than and physical violence. The success of the masculine subject irrational, pregnant—atwhichitcanthendirectverbal culinity into a transgressive male corpus—queer, disabled, solidating threatstothehegemonyofhet-able-bodiedmas- can be embodied. Their means of doing so involves con ways normative intersectional masculinity and femininity reaffirms a seriesofcategorical assumptionsthatlimitthe of male reproduction. Each of the stories discussed above an interestinanddiscomfortwiththeculturalimplications actual malepregnancies—theyneverthelesssharewiththem hormone treatments,sex-reassignmenttechnologies,and the bio-futuristspinofthesemodernstories—withtheir Arbogast fearsHessemaybeinJunior. many seeingtheactualpregnantmanas“freak”that views, hispregnancyneverthelessgeneratedcontroversy, give birthasamaninarticlesandhighlypublicizedinter despite Beatie’s repeatedattemptstonormalizehisdesire though mygenderidentityasmaleisconstant”(Beatie).Yet, am. InatechnicalsenseIseemyselfasmyownsurrogate, inside me,Iamstableandconfidentbeingthemanthat “Despite thefactthatmybellyisgrowingwithanewlife article he wrote for the Advocate 2016. Beatieoffersananswertotheabovequestionin given birth—ThomasBeatiein2008andEvanHempel Hesse is,inArbogast’s words,“afreak!” identity, suggestsanother, lesscompassionateanswer:that Hesse’s pseudo-feminizedbodyandhismasculinegender draws comediccontentfromtheironicdisjuncturebetween “a more sensitive male” (208). Still, the way the movie The movie’s answerislargelyambivalent—Hessebecomes What woulditmean for a “masculine” man togive birth? In spiteofitsperennialsuppression,theimage Though themedieval tales discussedinthisessaylack To be sure, at least two men have already actually while pregnant, stating: - - Acknowledgements Wheatley, Edward. “A River Runs Through It: Disability, Homosexuality, Queered/Disabled Discourse, and the Isle of I would like to thank Professor Fiona Griffith for her Blandie in Bérinus.” Exemplaria: A Journal of Theory in Medieval advice and guidance through the preparation of this paper, and Renaissance Studies 19:3 (2007). as well as Professors Elaine Treharne and Beatrice Kitzinger for their continued support and mentorship.

Works Cited

Aucassin and Nicolette. “Excerpt.” Translated by Eugene Mason. Cambridge, Ontario: In Parentheses Publications, 2001.

Beatie, Thomas. “Labor of Love: Is Society Ready for This Pregnant Husband?” The Advocate. N.p., 23 Apr. 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

Butler, Judith. “Restaging the Universal: Hegemony and the Limits of Formalism” in Contingency, Hegemony, Universality: Contemporary Dialogues on the Left, eds. Judith Butler, E. Laclau, S. Žižek (London: Verso, 2000).

Colwell, Tania. “Medieval Masculinities: Transgressions and Transformations.” Our Medieval Heritage: Essays in Honour of John Tillotson for his 60th Birthday. Eds. Linda Rasmussen, Valerie Spear, and Diane Tillotson. Cardiff: Merton Priory Press, 2002.

Davidson, Michael. “Pregnant Men: Modernism, Disability, and Biofuturity in Djuna Barnes.” Novel: A Forum on Fiction 43.2 (2010): 207–26. Web.

De France, Marie. “The Peasant and the Beetle.” In The Fables. Edited and translated by Mary Lou Martin. Birmingham, AL: Summa Publications, 1984.

De Voragine, Jacobus. The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints. Translated by William Granger Ryan. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2012: 347.

Green, Monica H. “Caring for Gendered Bodies.” The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe. Eds. Judith M. Bennett and Ruth Mazo Karras. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Print.

McRuer, Robert. “Compulsory Able-Bodiedness and Queer/ Disabled Existence.” Disability Studies: Enabling the Humanities. Eds. Sharon L. Snyder, Brenda Jo Brueggeman, and Rosemarie Garland Thompson. New York: Modern Language Association, 2002.

Murray, Jacqueline. “The Law of Sin That Is in My Members: The Problem of Male Embodiment.” Gender and Holiness: Men, Women, and Saints in Late Medieval Europe. Eds. Samantha J. E. Riches and Sarah Salih. New York: Routledge, 2002.

Trokhimenko, Olga V. “‘Believing That Which Cannot Be’: (De) Constructing Medieval Clerical Masculinity in ‘Des münches not.’” German Quarterly 85:2 (2012): 121–136. Web.

35 What Good Is It, Anyway? Moral Lessons from Literature in Cortázar’s Rayuela Daniel Dominguez, Stanford University

Daniel Dominguez holds a Bachelor of Arts with honors in acting as a training ground for the mental capacities neces- comparative literature from Stanford University. His honors sary for moral introspection (Landy 12). Literature may not thesis, “Oh, What Fun! The Ludic and Ergodic in Cortázar and make us better, but it does give us the tools to examine our Perec,” focused on ergodic and ludic conceptualizations of litera- own actions. The examples cited to support this view are ture as a game in order to explore the highly complex and often typically morally ambiguous moments in literature where adversarial relationships between authors and readers in La vie readers are forced to see how a character reacts and, conse- mode d’emploi (1978) by Georges Perec and Rayuela (1963) quently, reflect on how they themselves would react in the by Julio Cortázar. He was awarded the 2016 Top Honors Thesis same situation. While these examples are certainly the most Award in the Division of Languages, Cultures, and Literature. accessible to readers, given that most books contain such His current research interests include the 20th- to 21st-century deliberative moments, the focus on them has meant that Latin-American novel, experimental literature, and reader- lessons lying at the structural level have been overlooked. response theory. He is currently examining the novels of Chilean writer Alejandro Zambra and how they deal with the memory One of the works that best highlights how literature of the Pinochet dictatorship. He is currently applying to doctoral can develop critical faculties on the structural level is Julio programs in Romance languages and comparative literature. Cortázar’s 1963 novel Rayuela (Hopscotch), which recounts He resides in Las Vegas. the adventures of Horacio Oliveira as he lives out his vie bohème phase in Paris, and his subsequent return to Buenos Aires. While the book’s whimsical episodes and deep medi- Abstract tations on life provide plenty of examples of morally ambig- uous situations, its usefulness rests doubly on its plot as it In this article I investigate how Rayuela (1963) by does on its highly complex narrative structure, which will be Julio Cortázar presents a complex, reader-centered nar- the focus of this discussion. The book opens with a “Table of rative that allows readers to develop a set of critical skills Instructions” that tells readers that the book can be read sev- they can use to critique both fiction and society. In doing eral ways, but principally two. The “normal” path through so, I engage with Espen J. Aarseth’s theory of “ergodic” the book involves reading chapters 1–6 linearly, after which literature and theories of the ludic aspect of society. After “reader[s] may ignore what follows with a clean conscience” describing how the book’s reading instructions are para- (Hopscotch v). However, what follows is an additional 99 doxical and purposively misleading, I offer an explanation chapters. If readers wish to engage with these chapters then for why Cortázar may have chosen to deliberately mislead they must follow the second prescribed path which begins his readers. Drawing on Joshua Landy’s theory of formative with chapter 73 and ends with chapter 131, with readers fictions, I argue that these texts draw the reader into a para- “hopscotching” from chapter to chapter non-linearly in a dox that readers themselves must resolve. In doing so, they pre-arranged sequence. In short, the text undermines the force the reader to develop critical reading skills that can be very action of reading itself and the idea that the author used to critique not only literature, but society and societal has full authority over the text. I argue that it is precisely constructs as well. this introspection that provides a series of moments in the novel that forces readers to reflect on and begin to question the many rules and customs surrounding reading they take What good does literature do? The simple answer, as given. Through repeated readings these critiques extend the one that authors themselves seem to be most fond of, beyond the book itself and allows readers to develop analyt- is enjoyment. While literature is certainly enjoyable and, ical skills that can be transferred to the world at large. in this sense, positive, it also contains a long list of other qualities nowhere near as laudable. If literature is sheer Because of its unique structure, Rayuela has garnered entertainment, then why did Socrates ban it in the Republic? a great deal of critical attention, with many calling it a Don Quixote’s brain was famously withered by chivalric “hypertext” (Sánchez 1–2), a classification that reflects the romances just as Emma Bovary’s tragedy was begotten by book’s ability to create various branching narratives à la her infatuation with romances of the sentimental variety. Borges, similar to the ways websites’ hyperlinks allow for Schools have lists of banned books and even Walmart metic- highly idiosyncratic paths through the internet. At the cen- ulously chooses which books occupy its shelves. Yet, despite ter of the book is a requirement that readers “navigate” all this, people read. This must mean that large swaths of their way through the text. To use a term coined by Espen J. society consistently find something good enough about lit-

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Aarseth, they are examples of “ergodic” literature, in which erature to continue consuming it. “nontrivial effort is required to . . . traverse the text” (1–2). What then is this good we should be seeking? Joshua In ergodic texts, readers must make a choice in order to pro- Landy, who wrote an entire book on the uses of literature, pel the plot forward. What, however, constitutes a decision to keep going? At any moment while reading a book, readers 36 concluded that literature serves the important function of could decide to slam it shut to keep the plot from moving The cheat is still inside the universe of play. If he forward, pausing its plot until they return to it. However, in violates the rules of the game, he at least pretends ergodic texts the plot itself exists only as a result of a decision to respect them. He tries to influence them. He is made by readers. At the end of every chapter in Rayuela, dishonest, but hypocritical. He thus, by his atti- tude, safeguards and proclaims the validity of the readers are forced to decide as to which chapter to read next, conventions he violates, because he is dependent lest the narrative end there. In a non-ergodic text, readers upon others obeying the rules. If he is caught, he know instinctively to move on to the next chapter in a linear is thrown out. The universe of play remains intact. sequence: the decision is a trivial one precisely because it is (Caillois 45) too familiar for readers to notice and because the unfolding of the plot will not change as a result of this action. By forc- Phrased differently, if I, while playing basketball, ing this choice upon his readers, Cortázar forces them to be grab the ball and start sprinting away with it towards the aware of the very act of narrative navigation itself. hoop, I’ve entered into one of two scenarios. In the first, I am breaking the rules and will be castigated appropriately, To illustrate this latter point, and highlight exactly i.e., I’ll be given a foul and be allowed to return to the game. how ergodic texts require a higher level of engagement from However, this scenario works only if my lapse from the readers, I’ll use a brief hypothetical. Imagine reading The rules is temporary. All involved players entered the game Great Gatsby as a continuous scroll of text on a screen instead by agreeing to the rules. I exited the game by traveling with of from a book. If the scroll was synchronized to the number the ball, and then reentered the game when I accepted a of words that readers could read per minute then readers foul that allowed me to continue playing. However, if I run would need no physical engagement with the text other than off with the ball, refusing to give it back, then I have left moving their eyes along the screen. This ocular scrolling the game. It cannot be said that I have broken a rule, since certainly qualifies as purelytrivial effort on the reader’s part such a statement can only be made retroactively once I have since their main focus would be comprehending the twists reentered the game. By simply ignoring the rules, however, I and turns of the plot, not the navigation or traversal of have instead done something even more dangerous: the text itself. Contrast this with a scroll setup for Rayuela. Readers would immediately need to pause the scrolling to The spoil-sport shatters the play-world itself. By decide whether or not to take the first linear path through withdrawing from the game he reveals the relativity the novel or the second nonlinear, or “hopscotch,” path. and fragility of the play-world [and] robs play of Having chosen, readers would then either have to stop the its illusion . . . . Therefore he must be cast out for scroll at the end of chapter 56 (when the linear sequence he threatens the existence of the play community. (Huizinga 11) ends) or, more interestingly, watch the scroll eternally in accordance with the endless loop that Cortázar tacked onto Games can deal well with cheaters and indeed often the end of the sequence. The antepenultimate chapter in have complex mechanisms by which to handle them. What the sequence is chapter 131, which then directs the reader they cannot handle are anarchists who prove that the rules to chapter 58, which in turn sends the reader back to 131. are arbitrary and, perhaps most threateningly, meaningless. Readers, if they follow the rules of navigation laid out for them, are stuck in an unceasing circular paradox. They will Cortázar is aware of this anarchic necessity and pro- endlessly oscillate between the two chapters, not knowing grams an error into his initial rules that forces his readers when or how to escape the instructions they’ve been given. to question the very game in which they are involved. He Therefore, readers will never finish the text if they only designs the instructions of his novel so that readers must passively read the book or even if they passively follow necessarily destroy them in order to fully comprehend the Cortázar’s instructions. Similar to the original choice of how text. “Sus tesis anarquizantes plantean como primer paso de to begin the text, they are also forced to choose how, and if, la creación artística la destrucción de todo aquello que llegue they want to end the text. In order to break out of the cycle hasta nosotros prefabricado” i (Juan-Navarro 243). In other they are tricked into by the “Table of Instructions,” they words, the formal structure is only important in serving must break the rules of the game they initially, and perhaps as the norm from which readers must deviate in order to unknowingly, agreed to follow. They must cheat. truly engage with the book (Heise 100). As we have noted earlier, the second reading sequence ends in an infinite loop Cheating, however, is a rather interesting phenome- that forces readers to alternate between chapters 131 and non, since games only technically exist for as long as every- 58. A strict adherence to these rules then is only possible if one involved is following the rules. Games therefore end they spend the rest of their lives switching back and forth when even just one player ceases to obey the rules. As Roger between the two chapters. They are trapped within the con- Caillois notes however, the game is only temporarily over: fines of the book and its rules. Ironically, some critics argue that the only way to truly “win” Rayuela is to follow the first 37 38 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 who denounce the rules asabsurd . . . them nooption,thereadersareforcedintobeing“nihilist[s] with thefactthattheyaretrappedandrulesleave rules and primes the reader to rebel against them. Faced his readers,heimplicitlycondonesthesidesteppingof postulate that,sinceCortázarinstallsnoreprimandsfor what such cheating would even resemble. One might then of punishmentfordeviantreaders,readersareunclearasto escape. Furthermore,sinceCortázarneveroutlinesasystem that therulesareexactly that fromwhich they aretryingto within therealmofrules,whichisanimpossibilitygiven a cheat,sincedoingsowouldrequirethemtohavestayed who createdthoserules.Theycannotnecessarilybelabeled the rules,butareforcedoutofthembyveryauthor readers, since they may very well want to stay well within to carryonwiththeirlivesoutsideofthetext. forces themtostepbeyondtheconfinesofrulesinorder must escapeinordertoreadthetext.Consequently, thetext do. Insteadtheyareforcedintoacornerfromwhich out andfinish,i.e.,thatthebookwouldendasmostbooks rules withtheassumptionthatgamewouldplayitself this finaltrickisabetrayal.Readersagreedtofollowthe one has chosen the second path and dutifully followed it, a certainmomentitisover. Itplaysitselftoanend”(9).If the rules.“Playbegins”JohanHuizinganotes“andthenat instead thetypicalarcofgamesinwhichplayerfollows cheater’s exitnorananarchist’s destructionofthegame,but lets thereaderexitgame(Hardin).However, thisisnota linear sequencesincethatistheonlyprescribedpath out ontothereal world. able maze,onlysothatthereader thenfindsanexitleading (Fuentes 3).Hetrapshisreaders inaseeminglyinsurmount- itself intoagrandexerciseinreading inallitsvariousforms act ofreadingitself.Cortázar’s goal,henotes,istoturnlife third readingleadingtoafourth, butopenedupthevery the secondreadingopenedupnotonlypossibilitiesfora second sequence.CarlosFuentesnotedthis,writingthat in thefirstsequenceorbyarbitraryrulesofCortázar’s by eitherthesocietalconstructoflinearreadingembodied their fullrangeoffreedominthetext,nolongerconstrained read atwhim?Itisthismomentthatreaderscanexercise sequence? Ordotheysimplypickachapteratrandomand cial plotpointsbutisintentionallyskippedinthehopscotch Do theygoimmediatelytochapter55,whichprovidescru- reader returnfirsttothosechapterstheyfoundconfusing? the text,thentheymustfigureoutwheretobegin.Does Cortázar hasnosayin.Iftheywanttonowre-engagewith however, readersareleftwithanotherchoice,onethat denounced the rules and exited the pre-existing structure, play becausethegameismeaningless”(Caillois7).Having This, however, causesaconflictofintentionsinthe

[and] who refuse to but it does develop a set of critical skills in readers that apply crucial. large degreeoncomplacency, thequestionofcomplicityis twentieth centurycraftmultiple genocidesthatreliedtoa crafted byanauthorwhosawthe totalitarianregimesofthe lectoral complicityintheconstruction ofthetext.Inabook authority. Cortázarforces readerstoreflectontheirown of authors themselves—an almost universally unquestioned lessons oftheirfirstreadingsfreshinmind. the twoprescribedreadingmethods,theywilldosowith the instructionsofauthor. Eveniftheyreattemptoneof not fallintoasimilarmethodofunquestioninglyfollowing be conscious of these two ideas and actively make sure to ing orders.Therefore,duringthesecondreadingtheywill author, but also their own proclivity towards blindly follow- that theyautomaticallyconferontocertainfigures,likethe case, thereaderisforcedtoquestionnotonlylegitimacy blindly followingorderswithoutquestioningthem.Inthis dead end.Authoritariansystemsoftenrelyontheirsubjects followed atraditionalnarrativeanddoingsoledthemto second hopscotchsequencejustaseasilytheywouldhave rules ofengagementfromtheauthor. Theyfollowedthe habit offollowingrulesimmediatelyafteracceptingnew It alsodrawsattentiontohowquicklyreadersfellintoa trust theygavetheauthorwhotrickedthematend. hopscotch sequence leaves readers questioning the initial sequent rereadingofthenovel.Thefirstreading cal andanalyticalskilldevelopmentoccurswitheachsub- literature can do for us, we can see how the readers’ criti- the mazeoftext. Only cooperativelycanbothreaderandauthorescapefrom within theplay-spacehehascreated:needsonebeyondit. the wayheclaimstowantone.Hedoesn’t needaco-author said that Cortázar wants a co-author for his text, but not in uno ledélagana. . . . ocan, alamejorquedaperfecto” mí me gustaría releerlo. Y en el peor de los casos, si se equiv- “Ninguna importancia . importancia “Ninguna wrong order. Brushinghisworriesaside,Morelliresponds, who isworriedthatthechaptersmightendupin the manuscriptofhisownRayuela–esqueworktoOliveira, an authorandmise-en-abymeofCortázarhimself,handsoff perfect bybeingreadinarandomway. InRayuela,Morelli, its rules. The selfish reason is that his book might become the freedomthatplay-spaceofreadingusuallylimitsvia is two-fold.Theselflessreasontohavethereaderexercise His motivationforforcinghisreadersoutoftheplay-space that the book might verywellbecomeperfectas a result. the path that he has prepared for them, but also postulates Rayuela Returning finallytotheinitialquestionofwhatgood Cortázar not onlywants his readerstodeviate from Rayuela maynotuniformly makeitsaudiencebetter, trains readerstobecriticaloftheauthority

Lo másquehagoesponerlocomoa

Mi librosepuedeleercomoa ii (Rayuela590).Itcouldbe not only to literature, but also to the self and society. The Cortázar, Julio. Hopscotch. Trans. Gregory Rabassa. New York: work begins by undermining the very act of reading lin- Pantheon, 1966. Print. early, a societally conditioned action derived from human- Cortázar, Julio. Rayuela. Buenos Aires: Alfaguara, 2013. Print. ist reading habits that arose after the decline of scholastic habits (Grafton 184). After this, the novel diminishes the Fuentes, Carlos. “Rayuela, La Novela Como Caja De Pandora.” importance of the author by forcing the readers to act as co- Rayuela. By Julio Cortázar. Ed. Julio Ortega and Saúl creators and by leading the readers to question the author Yurkiévich. Nanterre, France: ALLCA XX, 1996. 703–05. Print. who led them to a dead end. Readers leave the text critical of the many assumptions with which they entered the book and Grafton, Anthony. “The Humanist as Reader.” A History of Reading . By Guglielmo Cavallo and Roger Chartier. Trans. those they developed along the way. In this way, it develops in the West Lydia G. Cochrane. Amherst: U of Massachusetts, 1999. the capacity of the reader to critique not only literature, 179–212. Print. but society as it exists all around them. As they continue to reengage with both the text and the world outside of it, this Hardin, Micheal. “Seducing the Male-Reader: Julio Cortázar’s skill continues to develop, allowing readers to be more crit- Hopscotch and the Pleasure of Losing.” International Fiction ical of authority in both spheres. Literature may not make Review 25.1–2 (1998): n. pag. International Fiction Review. Web. us uniformly better, but it can certainly allow us to perceive 24 Mar. 2016. our imperfections. It allows us to see ourselves as the flawed Heise, Ursula K. Chronoschisms: Time, Narrative, and primates that we are. Critiques of society, that global con- Postmodernism. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1997. Print. glomeration of flawed primates, follow not too far behind. Huizinga, Johan. Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Acknowledgements Culture. London: Routledge, 2008. Print.

This article is excerpted from my senior honors the- Juan-Navarro, Santiago. “Un Tal Morelli: Teoría Y Práctica De La sis. I would like to thank Professor Joan Ramon Resina and Lectura En Rayuela, De Julio Cortázar.” Revista Canadiense De Professor Vincent Barletta for advising me through the Estudios Hispánicos 16.2 (1992): 235–52. Print. process and for their continued support of my academic Landy, Joshua. How to Do Things with Fictions. New York: Oxford pursuits. I would also like to thank Stanford Mellon coor- UP, 2012. Print. dinators Laura Selznick and Dayo Mitchell for making sure my time in the program ran smoothly and allotting me the Sánchez, Pablo Martin. “Hypertextualité et Pseudo-hypertextualité best the fellowship had to offer. Furthermore, I’d like to Dans L’œuvre De Georges Perec.” Le Cabinet D’amateur. Revue thank Patricia Valderrama for advising our Mellon cohort so D’études Perecquiennes (2011): 1–12. Le Cabinet D’amateur. well about the graduate school application process and mak- Association Georges Perec. Web. 14 Feb. 2016. ing the process infinitely more bearable. Additionally, I’d like to thank Alyssa Vann for meticulously reading various drafts of both this article and the thesis it came from. Finally, I’d like to thank my friends and family who supported me throughout my undergraduate studies and who continue to help me now.

Endnotes i “The first step to artistic creation in his anarchist worldview is the destruction of everything that arrived prefabricated.” My translation. ii “Who cares . . . . You can read my book any way you want to . . . . The most I do is set it up the way I would like to reread it. And in the worst of cases, if they do make a mistake, it might just turn out perfect.” (Hopscotch, 556).

Works Cited

Aarseth, Espen J. Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins UP, 1997. Print.

Caillois, Roger. Man, Play, and Games. Trans. Meyer Barash. Urbana: U of Illinois, 2001. Print. 39 Mujeres en la Lucha: Health Activism and the Devaluation of Women’s Labor in the Brown Berets’ Free Clinic Cassandra Flores-Montaño, Wellesley College

Cassandra is a recent graduate from Wellesley College. She Berets could be identified as guardians of community health, majored in women’s and gender studies with a concentration the women themselves were undervalued as members of the in Chicanx/Latinx studies. Her research interests include social organization. movements, gender, and sexuality. She’s interested in archi- val research and conducting oral histories. She is currently at Establishing the Free Clinic in East L.A. Wellesley working in the Office of Intercultural Education. She assists in the programming for students of Latinx, African, and The opening of the clinic involved several parties, Asian descent and LGBTQ students. many of which were medical professionals in the area. They included individuals from such organizations as the L.A. chapters of Physicians for Social Responsibility, L.A. Abstract Psychologists for Social Action, the Medical Committee for Human Rights, University of Southern California County The Brown Berets are a para-military organization Hospital, the County Health Department, and members which serves Chicano community interests. They have of the Brown Berets and the greater Chicano community.v chapters nationwide in the United States, and the first chap- The involvement of these professionals gave the clinic access ter was established in East Los Angeles in 1967. For the pur- to funds that would have otherwise been nearly impossible poses of this paper, I focus exclusively on the health activism for the clinic to receive. Establishing a board of directors, of the Brown Beret chapter in East L.A. from the late 1960s comprised almost exclusively of these professionals, added until the early 1970s. In 1969 the organization opened a greater weight to grant proposals that may have not been free clinic in collaboration with politically left medical pro- considered had they been signed off by the Brown Berets.vi fessionals in L.A. The clinic was immensely successful in its Additionally, the willingness of these professionals to share goal of providing adequate medical services to the Chicano their knowledge and make resources accessible, further community. I argue that this positive stride for the Chicano legitimized that Brown Berets’ claim that services were lack- people came at both a great cost and benefit to the women ing in their community.vii of the Brown Berets. Together, they were able to provide a great wealth of services to an underserved and marginalized community. Introduction At the time, the existing medical services were inadequate; Gloria Arellanes, the former Minister of Correspondence The Brown Berets are a para-military organization and Finance and co-director of the clinic, remembers going which serves Chicano community interests.i They have to public hospitals and seeing patients go unattended for chapters nationwide in the United States, and the first chap- hours. These facilities were often overcrowded and lacked ter was established in East Los Angeles in 1967. During that resources.viii Service also remained mostly inaccessible to time, the Brown Berets identified , education, those who spoke Spanish, because bilingual services were housing, the war in Vietnam, and a lack of adequate medical often not provided. Undocumented people were afraid of services as the most pressing issues affecting the Chicano using existing facilities and their services for fear of depor- community. Their motto, “‘to serve, observe, and protect’ tation.ix Overall, there were major gaps between the services stressed that [their] role was to serve [their] community, to provided and the services that were needed by Chicano observe conditions in the community such as police abuse communities in East L.A. and lack of social services, and, finally, to protect [their] community against the police and, in a larger sense, against As co-directors of the clinic and members of the .”ii After experiencing and observing the social condi- Brown Berets, Gloria Arellanes and Andrea Sanchez made a tions in which Chicanos in East L.A. lived, they mobilized steadfast commitment to protect their community’s privacy. a militant group of Chicanos to address these concerns.iii They rejected federal funds that would require them to For the purposes of this paper, I will focus exclusively on release information about their patients.x Taking and releas- the health activism of the Brown Beret chapter in East L.A. ing information in order to receive medical care would have from the late 1960s until the early 1970s. compromised their ability to reach and serve undocumented people. Despite the board of directors’ constant urging for In 1969 the organization opened a free clinic in col- the acceptance of federal funds, Arellanes and Sanchez nav- laboration with politically left medical professionals in L.A.iv igated and found a path within the U.S. health system in The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 The clinic was immensely successful in its goal of providing order to best serve the needs of their community. Because the adequate medical services to the Chicano community. I U.S. health system is financed by various institutions which argue that this positive stride for the Chicano people came include government, private businesses, and non-profits, the at both a great cost and benefit to the women of the Brown clinic had multiple pools of funds to draw from.xi 40 Berets. Although women’s labor ensured that the Brown The Importance of the Free Clinic services were fulfilling the Brown Beret motto to “observe, serve, and protect” their community. The clinic and its The clinic and its volunteers also aided in filling an services were part of the battle they fought against the sys- xii educational gap regarding sexual and reproductive health. tematic of Chicano people. Brown Berets and other clinic volunteers distributed flyers to high school students as they exited their campuses. The The Brown Beret fight for community health was as academic curriculum and culture of silence within fami- militant as their structure. In an attempt to increase knowl- lies regarding sexual health kept young people ignorant edge about the clinic, they entered a “float,” for a Mexican about safe sex practices, what to do in case of an unwanted Independence Day parade in L.A., as an advertisement for pregnancy, and how to handle emotional and physical the clinic. Arellanes went to an army base and sweet-talked abuse.xiii The clinic provided counseling for people of all ages her way into borrowing an army tank.xxii The people at the regarding these topics.xiv One of the most important services base not only gave her a tank, they also provided her with a that the clinic offered reveals a commitment to protecting driver, and a flat-bed truck to carry the tank. Arellanes and women’s reproductive health. Their comprehensive family the other women of the Brown Berets began the parade by planning services included access to various methods of riding the tank wearing rebozos. The rebozo functioned as birth control, adoption, abortion, etc. The Chicana women the quintessential marker of Mexican femininity and a dis- running the clinic were mostly from a Catholic background, guise for their militancy. Some of them tore off the rebozo but had no qualms providing these services.xv Even when the and put on their bush jackets and berets, while carrying signs Catholic Church rescinded their funding upon finding out like “War on Disease.” xxiii about the counseling services, the women did not change the xvi way that they operated the clinic. This once again revealed Tensions Based on Gender Manifest in the Clinic the fierceness with which they were committed to guarding Chicano community needs. An aspect of the clinic which requires critical exam- ination is the way that it served as a site of contestation The clinic worked to maximize the accessibility of its between Chicano men and Chicana women. There was a services. They would organize immunization drives and go clear divide based on gender in the Brown Berets and this into communities rather than requiring that people come divide manifested itself in the day-to-day operation of the xvii to them. They maximized convenience in terms of travel, clinic. From the beginning, David Sanchez, the Prime min- cost, and time by remaining open as late as 10PM, in addi- ister of the Brown Berets, assigned the task of running of the tion to making appointments for those who could not make clinic to a reluctant Gloria Arellanes. She was not interested it to regular clinic hours. Most importantly, these and the in working with upper-middle class professionals, but took other services were accessible to Spanish-speakers. The it on after Sanchez’s insistence.xxiv This serves as an example success with which the clinic was able to serve a community of the ways in which the male leadership would make deci- that remained largely inaccessible or poorly served by estab- sions about the future of the organization and have women lished medical instructions, enabled the securing of material carry out the ideas.xx v As the only female minister, Arellanes support from the County Health Department. Arellanes was expected to lead the women in the Berets; thus as she recalls that she was guaranteed resources with one phone became co-director of the clinic, the rank-and-file women xviii call. For example, county personnel would pick up blood in the organization took on the task of running the clinic. samples from the clinic, process the results, and promptly return information to the clinic.xix Gloria Arellanes emphasizes the lack of male partici- pation in this important endeavor as one of the most disap- The existence of the clinic and the provision of ser- pointing realities of working as a Brown Beret. She discusses vices was rather remarkable considering that the Vietnam that while the Brown Berets emphasized self-discipline, the War served as the political backdrop to the time. Cynthia ministers and rank-and-file men did not have the discipline Enloe discusses the ways in which war colors social realities to regularly contribute to the clinic.xxvi Despite their lack of on the home front, “there are those people, largely women, contribution and effort, men would readily accept credit who are most hurt when social programs (health, transpor- for the clinic as a Brown Beret project. Tension escalated tation, education, social security) are cut back in order to further as the men began to use the clinic as a recreational satisfy the alleged needs of the military and its industrial space. Over a period of several months the Brown Beret men xx suppliers.” Jenna Loyd argues that Chicana women, spe- would make a mess of the space and the women would clean cifically “welfare mothers,” were linking military spending up after them. Arellanes shared that they could not afford xxi to a lack of social services. The fact that multiple institu- janitorial services, so the women who ran the clinic carried tions were investing into this project is quite striking. These the burden of upkeep. The continual use of the space for

41 42 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 and patriarchalcontrol.” Laura Pulido argues, “enforced rigid notions of the family The organizationwasfueledbyculturalnationalism,which how toruntheclinic. shut down,asnoneoftheremainingmembers(men)knew Adelitas deAztlan.Oncetheyleft,theclinicimmediately ate anownautonomouswomen’s organizationcalledLas Arellanes andthewomenofBrownBeretswentontocre- work ledtoacollectivedecisionleavetheorganization. feminized space. ment intheclinicwasthatitcametobeunderstoodasa the men,”and she confidentlyconcludedthat theywere, supported oneanother, especiallyagainstthemachismo of deep friendshipsandsolidarity betweenthewomen.We ant aspectsofmyroleinthe Beretshadtodowiththe the women in the Brown Berets, “One of the most import- interview, Arellanes reflected on the relationships between led tothewomenidentifying their collectivepower. In an Espinoza argues that the divisionof labor based on gender development of Chicana women’s empowerment. Dionne on genderwouldmanifest,italsofunctionedaspaceforthe The CollectivePowerofChicanaWomen their mess,nothankyou!” go home and clean my house and then come here and clean meetings orpartieswasinfuriatingasArellanesdescribed, “I indispensable.” made, shewastoldbyoneofthedirectorsthatwas,“not when shethreatenedtoleavetheclinicifchangeswerenot they understoodtobeinternalBeretconflict.Although, was notmet.Theboardrefusedtogetinvolvedinwhat board ofdirectors.Herdesireforkeepingtheclinicclean leadership oftheBerets,shealsosoughtsupportfrom the organization. of respectforthewomen’s efforts,ledtoaturningpointfor line militantaestheticexpectedoftheBrownBeretmen. down uponbecausetheydidnotfulfillthehypermascu- with theBerets.The“long-haired”Chicanoswerelooked college-age “long-haired” Chicanos who were not affiliated clinic were either very young rank-and-file male berets or of genderroles.Themenwhowoulddevotetimetothe were notabletoseebeyondtheirprescribedunderstandings labor intheorganization. influenced theirdecisionto uphold unequal distributions of acceptable femininityandmasculinity. Thiswouldalsohave the organization’s men would transgressthe linebetween shaped expectationsfortheirmembersmadeitunlikelythat Part of the reason for the lack of the men’s involve- While the clinic was a space in which conflict based Not only did Arellanes take her concerns up with xxviii xxx Thedevaluationofherandthewomen’s The ministers and rank-and-file members xxix

xxxii xxvii Arguably, thepoliticswhich Thedivisionoflaborandlack xxxi

“women warriors.” Rainbow forfacilitatingmyintellectualgrowth. access to the archives necessary for this project and Professor I trulyappreciateProfessorSaldañaforhelpingmegain Research Program at the NYU Center for the Humanities. a warmthankyoutostaffattheUndergraduateSummer research throughouttheyears!Iwouldalsoliketoextend Dr. Tracey Cameronfortheircontinuoussupportmy call ElBarrioFreeClinic . . . East L.A.BrownBeretswastheestablishmentofwhatwe “without question,themostsignificantcontributionof effect onthesurroundingcommunity, Arellanesarguesthat, The servicesthattheywereabletoprovidehadatangible in additiontothepotentialforwomen’s empowerment. the tensions based on gender within the Brown Berets, community. Theday-to-dayoperationsoftheclinicreveal torically importantsiteforhealthactivismintheChicano tion intothecommunitywithrealandpracticalresults.” Endnotes Acknowledgements Conclusion commitment towomen’s reproductivehealth. growth ofChicanafeministpoliticscanbeseenthroughthis argue thatitwouldnothavebeenapriority. based onthetensionswhichIpreviouslydescribed,would of women intheir community? This remains unclear, but ership oftheclinichaveprotectedreproductivehealth health. Would amixed-genderorpredominantlymalelead- the clinic offered in regards to sexual and reproductive strongly influencedtheirdecisionsabouttheservicesthat guardians ofChicanocommunityhealth. exclusively rantheclinic,Iarguethattheyservedastrue Considering thatthewomenoforganizationalmost other. had asay, hadtheirvoiceheard,andlearnedfromeach munal decisionmakingprocess,throughwhicheveryone men, theyforgedstrongpoliticalbondswithoneanother. organization. As the women worked independently from the supported, theycarvedouttheirspaceforactivismwithinthe ii i Mario T. García,TheChicanoGeneration:Testimonios oftheMovement Chicano isatermreferringtopolitically activeMexican-Americans. 26 (1),Spring2001: 18. among ChicanaBrown BeretsinEastLosAngeles,1967–1970,” Aztlan “Revolutionary Sisters: Women’s SolidarityandCollective Identification (Berkeley: UniversityofCaliforniaPress, 2015),196;DionneEspinoza, xxxiv I wouldliketothankProfessorIreneMataand In conclusion, the free clinic functioned as a his- The operationsoftheclinicweremarkedbyacom- Iarguethatthefactwomenranclinic xxxiii Althoughthewomenwerenotalways

the clinicwasadirectinterven- xxxv Thebudding xxxvi iii Laura Pulido, Black, Brown, Yellow, and Left: Radical Activism in Los xxxv Chávez, “¡Mi Raza Primero!,” 58. Angeles (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 116. They Male leadership of the Berets was more focused on recruiting the “vatos identified themselves as a community-defense unit; one aspect of the locos” or “crazy dudes” in their community to the organization. They protection they provided was taking the brunt of police brutality during saw the Berets as a way to clean up the acts of people who used drugs or events such as the East L.A. high school walkouts and the Chicano consumed alcohol. Had the men been in charge of the clinic, we might Moratorium marches, all of which were heavily policed. These events have seen an emphasis for drug abuse counseling or more aggressive anti- had some extremely brutal instances of police brutality. The violence drug programming. that took place in the Chicano Moratorium of August 1970, broke the xxxvi spirit of many committed organizers and supporters of the Chicano García, The Chicano Generation, 255. movement. iv Gloria Arellanes, interview from Chicana por mi Raza: Uncovering Works Cited the Hidden History of Chicana Feminism (1965–1985), part 1, video recording. Arellanes, Gloria. Interview from Chicana por mi Raza: v García, The Chicano Generation, 258. Uncovering the Hidden History of Chicana Feminism vi Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. I will detail the challenges that (1965–1985). followed by having only one non-professional representative on the board of directors later. Chávez, Ernesto. ¡Mi Raza Primero!”: Nationalism, Identity, and vii Insurgency in the Chicano Movement in Los Angeles (Berkeley: Levitsky, Social Movements and the Transformation of American Health Care, 8. University of California Press, 2002). viii Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 4. Enloe, Cynthia. Does Khaki Become You? The Militarization of ix Ibid. Women’s Lives. (London: Pluto Press, 1983). x García, The Chicano Generation, 267; Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. Espinoza, Dionne. “Revolutionary Sisters: Women’s Solidarity and Collective Identification among Chicana Brown Berets in East xi Ibid., 8. Los Angeles, 1967–1970,” Aztlan 26 (1), Spring 2001: 18. xii García, The Chicano Generation, 262; Espinoza, “Revolutionary Sisters,” 35. García, Mario T. The Chicano Generation: Testimonios of the xiii Espinoza, “Revolutionary Sisters,” 35. Movement (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2015). xiv Ibid. Gloria Arellanes also made appearances on local radio stations in order to discuss these issues and raise awareness of the clinic and the Levitsky, Sandra and Jane Banaszak-Holl, Introduction to Social services provided. Movements and the Transformation of American Health Care, ed. xv Jane Banaszak-Holl, Sandra R. Levitsky, and Mayer N. Zald Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 2. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). xvi Ibid. xvii García, The Chicano Generation, 269. Loyd, Jenna M. Health Rights Are Civil Rights: Peace and Justice xviii (Minneapolis: University of Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. Activism in Los Angeles, 1963–1978 Minnesota Press, 2014). xix García, The Chicano Generation, 269. xx Cynthia Enloe, Does Khaki Become You? The Militarization of Women’s Pulido, Laura. Black, Brown, Yellow, and Left: Radical Activism in Los Lives. (London: Pluto Press, 1983), 207. Angeles (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006). xxi Loyd, Health Rights Are Civil Rights, 10. xxii Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. xxiii García, The Chicano Generation, 215; Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 5. xxiv Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. xxv Espinoza, “Revolutionary Sisters,” 33. xxvi Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3; García, The Chicano Generation, 273. xxvii Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 3. xxviiiGarcía, The Chicano Generation, 190; Espinoza, “Revolutionary Sisters,” 37. xxix Arellanes, Chicana por mi Raza, part 5. xxx García, The Chicano Generation, 273. xxxi Ibid., 143. xxxii Pulido, Black, Brown, Yellow, and Left, 117. xxxiiiGarcía, The Chicano Generation, 231. xxxivIbid., 263. 43 Introduction to “The Speculative Fiction of Jack London” Thomas Ray Garcia, Princeton University

Thomas Ray Garcia graduated with an English degree from Speculative fiction encompasses the fantasy, science Princeton University in 2016. His current research involves fiction, and horror genres. Essentially, the term refers to constructing a counter-history to the American literary tradition fictional works that are “speculative” in nature which usually which involves writers spanning from the Beat Generation to rely on plots probing into the fantastical, improbable, and Chicano/a Literature. He is currently teaching college access and unknown. Speculative fiction thus differs radically from the leading K–12 education initiatives in his hometown of Pharr, naturalism and realism that marked London’s early works Texas, writing novels and poems, and applying to English PhD by insisting on freeing both the writer and the reader from programs. most of the restrictions and limitations that mark other lit- erary forms and the conventional human experience of time and space. To be clear, London never considered himself a Abstract writer of speculative fiction. In fact, by the time London became an internationally acclaimed author, speculative Jack London, an early 20th-century American fiction was just beginning to emerge. Until 1926, the fan- writer renowned for his survival and adventure stories, has tasy and science fiction genres had not yet been defined received insufficient attention for his speculative fiction. or given a generic name, which underscores the fact that This introduction to a 90-page senior thesis argues that earlier speculative fiction functioned as an emerging mode studying London’s speculative fiction expands our under- still striving for development and realization (Stableford standing of self-preservation, or living beyond a textual legacy. 31). Before the publication of magazines such as Weird Tales, Speculative fiction’s unconventional form and subject matter Amazing Stories, Astounding Stories, and The Magazine of enabled London to transcend traditional methods of story- Fantasy and Science Fiction, the forerunners of what we now telling which resulted in a highly literary yet deeply personal call speculative fiction were often distinguished by an affin- journey for the solution to his own mortality. ity for supernatural and fantastical events. In London’s time, the success of his contemporaries, such as H.G. Wells and Jules Verne who popularized speculative fiction with their Introduction to “The Speculative Fiction of Jack London” stories of aliens, time travel, and adventure, proved that sto- Before Jack London came into prominence as an ries set apart from conventional reality could function as lit- American writer at the turn of the 20th century, he seemed erary works as well as attract wide readership. Furthermore, to have already lived multiple lives, including, but not lim- speculative fiction enabled writers to move beyond the lim- ited to: An oyster pirate, a fish patrolman, a Pacific Ocean its of realistic modes of writing and revel in flights of the sailor, a cross-country tramp, a socialist advocate, and a imagination, and the pioneers of this new mode, including Klondike adventurer (Labor xi). After the success of The London, embraced these opportunities all while working in Call of the Wild in 1903, London added the distinction of genres that had not yet been clearly defined. “most popular and highest-paid author in America” to that My research explores London’s speculative fic- list (Kingman 12). His output as a writer proved prodigious, tion as literary works that provide crucial insights into his resulting in the production of fifty volumes before his death wide-ranging imagination. Doing so draws attention away in 1916. However, one century later, his contributions to lit- from the biographical mythos, which asserts that London’s erature have not yet been fully appreciated. Instead, London adventures produced his best writing, and shifts our focus has been victimized as the literary equivalent of a one-hit toward the workings of his mind and his literary artistry. wonder. Most scholars still confine London’s significance to Whether it depicts prehistoric, dystopian, or historical his “adventure and animal stories” while dismissing much of worlds, his speculative fiction transcends conventional his other output as hackwork (Hodson and Reesman 4). In modes of storytelling, allowing London to flex his creative addition, recent scholarship has been preoccupied with his muscles and find meaning in the extraordinary rather than non-literary work. For instance, Cecelia Tichi, in her book, the ordinary. If we consider London a pioneer in the estab- Jack London: Klondike A Writer’s Fight for a Better America lishment of modern speculative fiction, then we can see why (2014), argues that we should not simply define London he chose this burgeoning literary form to investigate new as a writer of adventure stories, but also value his role as methods of what I call self-preservation. The necessity for this a public intellectual (13). In 2010, Sue Hodson, Jeanne umbrella term stems from the constantly evolving motifs, Campbell Reesman, and Philip Adam produced Jack London: from racial memories to storytelling to the human spirit, Photographer, highlighting another unexplored aspect of The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 contained in London’s speculative fiction. Through these London’s life. But despite these books, few frameworks have motifs, London’s speculative fiction attempts to represent been established for academic inquiry into London’s creative the undying and resilient nature of the self, which provided capabilities, which are exemplified most prominently in his London a new, perhaps more complex way to extract per- unjustly neglected speculative fiction. 44 sonal significance from his life experiences and express it in literature. In other words, through speculative fiction, him to explore methods of preserving himself in ways he London attempted to accomplish the seemingly impossible: knew his body could not. investigate the nature of immortality. As a writer who knew the meaning of living multiple Although London’s longer works of speculative fic- lives, London ultimately resisted the finality of death not tion differ widely in their subject matter, analyzing them in by his grandiose adventures or triumphs of the body, but conjunction with one another reveals a decade-long effort through his words. The fact that he wrote his first major to discover new methods of self-preservation. Beginning with work of speculative fiction in 1906, ten years away from his Before Adam (1907), London attempted to create a story untimely death, coincides with this view. Through writing, fundamentally different from The Call of the Wild by writing he wanted to cement his place in time as his body broke down, about a primordial ancestor living in the Mid-Pleistocene, a his health declined, and his youth waned. Undoubtedly, he time period accessed through the narrator’s racial memories, could not foresee his premature death, but his speculative his first method ofself-preservation. These racial memories fiction written in “the last decade of his life,” during which serve as the link between the narrator and his ancestor and Lawrence Berkove claims he “rethought many of his ideas, explore the implications of reliving a primordial existence modified some of them, and even reversed others,” none- disconnected from the present. In his next two works, The theless suggests a move toward preserving an aging and Iron Heel (1908) and The Scarlet Plague (1912), he investigates increasingly fragile self (15). In Before Adam, for example, his the feasibility of living after death through storytelling. The recreation of a “Younger World” in which characters survive Iron Heel’s vision of a dystopian future ravaged by capitalism by virtue of their physical strength reveals London’s inter- is presented in the form of a recovered manuscript which est in exalting youth over old age. This concept is further affirms the possibility of metaphorically surviving through developed in The Star Rover, in which London rejects the the written word. However, by describing the demise of body and affirms the human spirit, the essence of life itself, humanity in The Scarlet Plague, London offers an alternate as the tool to achieving an immortal existence. Although vision of the future reverted to primitivism after a deadly London wrote several shorter works of speculative fiction plague. The failure of the generation born after the plague before 1906, the year nonetheless marks a greater interest in to learn from the mistakes of the past demonstrates the and commitment to writing stories that are speculative and shortcomings of storytelling as a means of preserving mem- fantastical in nature to gain a greater understanding of how ories, history, and ultimately one’s own life. Furthermore, to live beyond death (Hodson and Reesman 61). The Star Rover (1915) directly addresses the issue of mor- tality by using its narrator, Darrell Standing, as a case study Unfortunately for London’s textual legacy, relatively of how torture can enable the spirit to leave the body and little academic attention has been given to his speculative experience past lives. More explicitly, analyzing London’s fiction. Although it would be unjust to disregard the lit- evolving methods of self-preservation provides a framework erary merit of London’s “animal and adventure stories,” that illuminates his taking advantage of speculative fiction’s focusing solely on a small number of these acclaimed and experimental narrative form and unconventional subject anthologized texts paints an incomplete and false portrait matter. Doing so allowed him to explore a variety of lit- of London as a man who could write only about his adven- erary modes while also escaping conventional methods of turous life. As a result, London has been branded with the storytelling, commenting on political and social issues, and adventure man-turned-writer persona that has prevented speculating on the possibility of living after death. further exploration of his worth as an imaginative writer who worked successfully in a variety of literary modes. London’s concern with death was not limited merely Interestingly, Jack London scholars are the primary perpet- to motifs in his fiction, but extended to his personal con- uators of this limiting perspective. Scholars such as Franklin victions as a man concerned with living forever. As he grew Walker frequently claim that London wrote best when he older, he often endured physical sicknesses, which esca- wrote about “what he had seen or done” (15). This notion lated in severity during his voyage in the South Seas on is also reflected in Alfred Kazin’s renowned quote, “[t]he the Snark (Labor 211). Near the age of forty, he suffered best story Jack London ever wrote was the one he lived,” from “cramping of [the] muscles and rheumatism” (Joan which suggests that London’s real-life travails trump his London 371). Less than a year before his death, he exhibited creative talents (111). Unfortunately, statements like these numerous ailments, including “agonies of kidney stones . . . both simplify London’s complex literary scope and under- [h]is body filling with poison from pyorrhea . . .” The days mine his imaginative prowess. While his naturalist stories of cross-country tramping, sea excursions, and Klondike often involve characters attempting to survive in the face expeditions were now in the past, and “[h]e had grown old of death, his speculative fiction explores a variety of ways of and tired” (Kingman 267). During this period of decline, the surviving beyond death. Before Adam and The Scarlet Plague reality of aging and his weakening state may have motivated preserve worlds and lives lost to time, whereas The Iron Heel 45 46 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 forgrantingmeaccesstotheJack LondonCollection. trip to the Huntington Library; and the Huntington Library, Undergraduate Research (ODOC), for funding my research the spirit of Jack London; the Princeton University Office of Jack LondonStateHistoricPark, forallowingmetodiscover uplifting mentorship throughout my Princetoncareer;the Fellowship mentor, foroffering sincere,compassionate,and my academicadviserandMellonMaysUndergraduate igniting mypassionforAmericanliterature;SarahAnderson, Acknowledgements highly literary endeavors, Before Adam, ularly hisabilitytoextractdeeplypersonalmeaningfrom In order to trulyunderstand his creative capabilities, partic- cessfully engageswithboththerealisticandfantastical. telling aswellhisabilitytoproduceliteraturethatsuc- should beknownforhismulti-facetedapproachtostory- prolong them.Ishallusemytime”(Labor373). sentences ofhiscredo:“Ishallnotwastemydaystryingto nature oftime,hisattitudetowardlifeisreflectedinthefinal confines of his aching body and hindered by the limiting question: howcanwritingchangelives?Trapped withinthe appreciate and learnfromhisrelentlessquesttoanswerthe self-preservation. Readersandwritersofallbackgroundscan but alsohiscapacitytouseimaginationasamethodof through experimentation with form and subject matter, ability to expand the boundariesof his fictional landscape American Literature studies is founded not only on his ity. London’s significancewithinspeculativefictionand his lifetime,Londonsoughtthesolutiontomortal- the immortalityofhumanspirit. death through memory and London’s unique affirmation of and ensure thespiritofJackLondonneverdies. to scholars,students,andreadersfromallbackgrounds With 2016 marking the centennial of his death, it is up forever canberealizedintheannalsofAmericanLiterature. his memorywillnotbeforgotten,andgoalofliving scholarly attentiontohisspeculativefictionwillensurethat preserve his own self, physically and otherwise. vors, orprisoners,Londonstrovetounderstandhowbest prehistoric ancestors,socialistrevolutionaries,plaguesurvi- as it transforms from story to story. Whether writing about so, wecantrackLondon’s representationofself-preservation tion tohowforminfluencestheirsubjectmatter. Indoing Scarlet Plague, andThe Star Rover must be read with atten- The StarRoverconfirmthepossibilitiesoflivingafter I thank:AlfredBendixen,myseniorthesisadviser, for Often ignoredasamajorAmericanwriter, London More thansimplywantingtobereadbeyond The Iron Heel Granting , The Walker, FranklinW. JackLondon&theKlondike.California:The Tichi, Cecelia.JackLondon:AWriter’s FightforaBetterAmerica. Stableford, Brian.“Sciencefictionbeforethegenre,”inThe London, Joan.JackLondonandHisTimes: AnUnconventional Labor, Earle.JackLondon:AnAmericanLife.NewYork: Farrar, Kingman, Russ.APictorialBiographyofJackLondon.Czech Kazin, Alfred.OnNativeGrounds.NewYork: Harcourt,Brace,and Hodson, SaraS.andJeanneCampbellReesman,JackLondon:One Berkove, Lawrence.JackLondon:OneHundred Years aWriter. Beauchamp, Gormon.JackLondon.Washington: Starmount Works Cited Huntington Library, 1972.Print. Print. North Carolina:UniversityofCarolinaPress,2015. 2003. Print. Farah Mendlesohn.Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, Cambridge CompaniontoScienceFiction,ed.EdwardJamesand Biography. Seattle:UniversityofWashington Press,1974.Print. Straus andGiroux,2014.Print. Republic: Triality, 1979.Print. Company, 1942.Print. 2002. Print. Hundred Years aWriter. California:HuntingtonLibraryPress, California: HuntingtonLibraryPress,2002.Print. House, 1984.Print. Black Women’s Legacies and Activisms: Filmic, Visual, and Vocal Anti-Rape Technologies Ahmad Greene-Hayes, Williams College

Ahmad Greene-Hayes is a PhD student in the Department embodied what Black feminist scholar Tamura Lomax calls, of Religion at Princeton University, where he is also pursuing “the technologies of Black women’s lives,” or the strategies graduate certificates in African American studies and gender and that Black women and girls deploy to “loose” themselves sexuality studies. In June 2016, he graduated from Williams from “vapid feminine technology and bigotry, which stifle College with a degree in history and departmental honors in radical imagination.”ii The Black feminist/womanist tech- Africana studies. His work examines Black Pentecostalism, nologies that were both proffered and utilized duri ng the 19th- to 20th-century African American religious history, and Truth and Reconciliation Commission are not only befitting gender, sexuality, and sexual violence in Black churches. of critical scholarly engagement, but they are also indicative of the various healing and liberatory technologies that anti- rape activists use as they culturally and strategically disman- Abstract tle anti-black and anti-woman systems of domination.

Black feminist/womanist technologies of resistance sit Black Women’s Anti-Rape Technologies of Resistance at the crux of the anti-rape movement in Black communities, and they were instrumental in the planning and execution This paper situates the Truth and Reconciliation of the Black Women’s Blueprint: Black Women’s Truth and Commission into historical context, and analyzes three tech- Reconciliation Commission. The usage of traditional film nologies that were used during the TRC: (1) The Womanhood alongside and in conversation with contemporary iterations or Woman-Hurt Project, (2) the Black Women’s Oral History of filmic texts, albeit through social media, oral histories, or Project, and (3) the filmic recording of a conversation with the literal/figurative recording of anti-rape conversation, led Black men, co-facilitated by myself and Quentin Walcott to what was a successful and groundbreaking event in the (CONNECT NYC), at Twins Barbershop in Brooklyn, history of Black America. This paper examines filmic, visual New York, in which we discussed patriarchy, toxic mascu- and vocal anti-rape technologies that Black women anti-rape linity, rape, and . To be clear, all of activists use to forge resistance, healing, and accountability these interventions against sexual violence are not “filmic,” in the fight for justice, and argues that anti-rape activists but in the age of social media they function as filmic texts, re-imagine “filmic texts.” changing the way Black women and girl survivors are seen and regarded in a society that valorizes rapists, rape culture, and rape itself. Indeed, Black feminist anti-rape activists who Introduction: The Black Women’s Truth and Reconciliation use contemporary technologies of resistance do so in the Commission spirit of African foremothers—enslaved and free—even as From Thursday, April 28 to May 1, 2016, Black those women did not have access to film, high-tech record- women and their allies joined together in to ing devices, text messages and chats, or even social media. witness to the narratives of Black women and girl survi- My understanding of the power of film and/or other vors of sexual violence, as part of the Black Women’s Truth technologies of resistance builds on Jacqueline Bobo’s words and Reconciliation Commission (BWTRC). “The BWTRC in Black Women’s Films: Genesis of a Tradition, where she is an independent body led by and comprised of civil society, states: which examines the history, context, causes, chronology, and consequence of rape/sexual assault on women of African Mainstream cultural forms are replete with devas- descent.”i The opening plenaries were held at the Riverside tating representations of Black women as victims, Church in Harlem, New York, and other sessions were held as pawns of systemic oppressive forces, lacking the at the Auburn Theological Seminary, the Ford Foundation, will or agency to resist. [F]ilms are instrumental and most notably, at the United Nations. Never before in in the effort by Black women filmmakers to erase destructive ideologies affecting Black women. With the history of the United States, have Black communities— their body of socially conscious work, the film- led by Black women—openly discussed the pervasive reality makers form an integral component of a cultural of rape. This tribunal, as it was also called, was historic and movement, a configuration of activists that seeks cutting edge. Black Women’s Blueprint (BWB) designed, to transform the status of Black women in popu- cultivated, and carved intentional space for Black women lar imagination and in the minds of Black women and girl survivors of rape to find some semblance of justice. themselves. Through meticulous concentration on Black women’s history, faithfully representing their Much of what took place the entire weekend at the lives, Black women’s films magnify female viewers’ UN and at other TRC locations was shaped and informed perception of their material circumstances, moti- by technology. Everything from videos displayed, tweets vating them toward activism, thereby strengthening and social media posts curated, and the photographic and their viability as a potent social force.iii filmic recordings by attendees, volunteers, and hired staff 47 48 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 workers haveused actual“films”todocument andpushback and awardwinning Blackwomenfilmmakers andcultural the boundsofHollywood,similar tothewaysself-identified the resultofnew-age“filmic” technologies thattranscended ing nearthesiteofherson’s deadbodyignitedrevolution. seeing recordingsofMike’s mom,LesleyMcSpadden,cry- Black LivesMatterFreedomRidestoFerguson.Formany, that leadtotheMikeBrownRebellionandsubsequent initial videopostingsofFergusonactivistsonAugust9,2014 erwise wouldnotbeabletorecord.Take forinstance, the new mediashasmadefilmaccessibletoindividualswhooth- Instagram, Vine, , and Facebook amongmanyother out theways“filmic”activismhasevolved.Theonsetof the BlackLivesMattermovement,itisimportanttotease contemporary politicalmoment,bothfueledandshapedby (2009) andKelleeTerrell’s Blame(2014).However, ina communities, suchasTina Mabry’s MississippiDamned films anddocumentariesthathavehighlightedrapeinBlack that piercedheartsandminds. was film—movingimagesandwordsfromBlackwomen— impact ofrapeandsexualviolenceinBlackwomen’s lives.It and everyoneelsegainedagreaterunderstandingofthe Black womenhadbeensayingforcenturies,thatmen Shahidah Simmonsturnedonhercameraandrecordedwhat of theBlackLiberationMovement.ItwasnotuntilAishah sexual assaultthatwasalltoocommoninpreviousiterations petuate the violences, erasures, and silences around rape and be successful,if African Americanleaderscontinuedto per Rights racialjusticemovementcouldnotexist,norit the Stateandbykin. timization that Black women and girls are subject to by both body ofworkwasthefirsttounapologeticallydetailvic- violence thattheyhadexperienced.Suchagroundbreaking vivors tofeelcomfortablespeakingofthehorrorssexual the TRCfostered,anditalsoopeneddoorsformanysur its director. were involvedwiththeTRCpaidhomagetofilmand prise, then,thatmanyofthesurvivorswhotestifiedand/or rape andallformsofviolenceagainstwomen.Itisnosur college campuses,andacrosstheglobeinfightagainst inist filmicandtechnologicaltoolutilizedinchurches,on Festival inLosAngeles,California,itremainsablackfem- Ten yearsafteritsworldpremiereatthePanAfricanFilm Black communitiesfromtheplantationtopresentday. ing to the pervasive reality of rape and sexual violence in Documentary, whichincludedamyriadofBlackvoicesspeak- her groundbreakingfeature-lengthfilmNO!TheRape Without question, thesepoliticalmobilizationswere Fast-forward tenyears,andtherehavebeenother NO! In 2006,AishahShahidahSimmonsreleased ’s filmic interventionwas pivotal.A post-Civil NO! paved the way for the raw truth-telling that - - -

and rightsofthehighestcourt,”saidonereaders. “This tribunalisnotvestedwiththepowers,privileges, to healing,justice,andreconciliationontheirownterms. centuries ofracial-sexualterrorismandrecodedpathways both asgirlsandwomen.Thewordstheyspokedecoded stage andspokeoftheviolationsthattheyhadexperienced story of Celia, a slave, killing Robert Newsom with a tualize thesetechnologies historically. The widelyknown in theusageof socialmediaplatforms,we must contex- Black feminist/womanisttechnologies ofresistance,evident ers. of AfricanDescent,”declaredonetheBlackwomenread- tribunal squarelywithintheInternationalDecadeforPeople Anti-Rape Activisms Ancestresses andForemothers: Historicizing Contemporary assault. determine the legitimacy of Black women’s cries of rape and highest court”—withitsanti-Blacksentiments—couldnot all storiesbare,andenvisioningaBlackfuturewhere“the were builtonarchivesofracial-sexualviolence,rendering Indeed, theBlackfeminist/womanisttechnologiesinplace women’s experiencewithviolence. Facebook andothersocialmedia sitestopublicize Black conversations and movements utilized Twitter, Instagram, light oncampusrapeandsexualassault.Alloftheseonline with Wagatwe Wanjuki’s #SurvivorPrivilege, whichshed discussed intimatepartneranddomesticviolence,along street harassment,BeverlyGooden’s #WhyIStayed,which ple, FeministaJones’#YouOkSis, whichdetailedrapeand racial-sexual andgender-based violence.Take, forexam social mediatopublicize,educate,andinterveneagainst legacy andBlackwomen’s contemporaryengagementswith rape activismisasymbiosisoftheBlackwomen’s filmmaker Much of what currently exists in therealm of pro-Black anti- against racistandsexistdepictionsofBlackwomanhood. of thosewhowouldotherwisenothear. and spreadacrosstheinternetintohomesoffices space orwalkingbythepark,buthavealsobeendigitized speak candidlyaboutrape—notonlyaffectedthoseinthe Nations—because theUNdidnotwantBlackwomento of the rape testimonies that were read outside of the United rape technologiesofresistance.Forexample,therecording were affectedorpushedtoactionbyBlackwomen’s anti- who participatedinand/orwatchedtheTRCvialivestream Commission, #BWTRC,alsobearswitnesstohowthose Black communities. cultural imagesconcerningBlackwomen’s lackofsafetyin are “filmic,”inthattheygraphicallyandintentionallyshift posts, andothermaterialsthatemergedfromthesehashtags vi Thecrowd grew and grew asBlack women took the Even asthiscontemporarymoment presentsnew The hashtagfortheTruth andReconciliation iv The videos,tweets,blog v “We convenethis vii - club—materially—represents anti-rape technology.viii Ida B. women discusses how Frances’ experience was much like Wells-Barnett’s anti- campaign and revolutionary their own experiences with sex and sexual violence more pen was also an anti-rape technology.ix Rosa Parks, Recy specifically. “What is womanhood?” asks Frances, “Because Taylor, JoAnn Little, and other Black women from the long so many of the women that I have spoken to have had the Civil Rights Movement who protested the brutal rapes of same experience.”xv Black women at the hands of police officers and other state entities embodied anti-rape technology.x Assata Shakur, The visual images, the music, and the poetry inter- xvi too, told of the gendered/sexual violence present in the woven in the trailer “give name to the nameless.” Rape is Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army and all too often thrown under the rug, but as one of the women presented a Black Nationalist anti-rape technology of resis- featured in the trailer states, “the more you keep putting tance that prioritized Black women’s safety in the midst of stuff under the rug, in a minute the rug is gonna be like this xvii a pro-Black, anti-woman movement.xi Among these famed (lifts hand to show a mountain).” Bradley’s filmic, visual, and activists are also the lesser known Sojourners for Truth and artistic intervention against sexual violence names the evil Justice, a Black left feminist human rights organization of that altered her life and the lives of so many other women. the early 1950s that fought during the Cold War and the In many ways, it builds on films likeNO! and merges a mul- global struggle for civil rights in the spirit of Sojourner tiplicity of art forms to represent pain and healing. Truth, and called for “the immediate freedom of Mrs. Rosa Lee Ingram, sentenced to life imprisonment for defending The BWTRC and Black Women’s Oral Histories of Rape the honor of all womanhood,” by killing her neighbor who Filmic power is present in the melodic ways that Black sexually assaulted her and attacked her sons who came to her women claim survivorship even when the world around defense.xii Black Women’s Blueprint builds on these legacies them demands their individual and collective silence. The and activisms. Farah Tanis, the executive director, stated at Truth and Reconciliation Commission gave Black women the United Nations, “This event for us is at the center of a and girls the space to tell their own stories. Imagine walking Black Women’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The down the stairs of the historic Riverside Church of New creation of this space for us means the creation of critical York City, into the basement where there is a gym, a large spaces of engagement and healing for Black women in the kitchen, tons of storage closets, and a large dining hall with global movement for recognition, justice, and development a stage. At the base of the stage there are stations with media for people of African descent. That cannot be overstated.”xiii devices and headphones. Inside of those headphones are the oral histories of Black women who have survived everything Womanhood or Woman’s-Hurt? from molestation and incest to domestic violence and gang On Friday, April 29, at the Riverside Church of rape. Their stories permeate your ears as you listen and New York, Black Women’s Blueprint screened the trailer listen. You may begin to cry, feel triggered, or the psychic for a forthcoming documentary entitled Womanhood or remembering of your own violations and traumas may arise Woman’s-Hurt?, which depicts the survivor story of Frances in ways that you did not plan for or could even imagine. Bradley, a visual and performing artist, who was raped at the These oral histories are being spoken over and over into age of 18. In the opening montage, Bradley’s words fill the your ear and in the ears of so many others sitting next to screen: “It’s so hard for me to grasp the whole idea that I you. You are intimately communing with a Black woman’s was raped on Friday morning at 3:30. The devil slipped into story of rape, and you are being called to action to fight with my body and snatched my soul away (stated on August 18, dedication and fervor against sexual violence in all its forms. 2003).”xiv Right after finishing a successful year of college, This is what the Black Women’s Oral History station was Bradley was raped by someone she knew and trusted. Her like at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and there harm-doer was an older, married man, a mentor and some- were activists who expressed righteous indignation after lis- one who she looked up to, and deeply admired. Feelings of tening to such horrific crimes against humanity. betrayal, deep hurt, and the dread of violation sent Frances Seeing these artistic and visual representations of into a spiral of fear and depression. Her first experience with Black women’s survivorship—absent of the white gaze and sex was nonconsensual, and in an effort to reclaim sex for the colonized media industry—provided an unparalleled and herself, she used daily journaling and visual reflections, all of uncensored display of the pervasive reality of rape. Moreover, which culminate in her forthcoming documentary project. the oral histories showed how “Black women across the Within the film, Bradley visualizes her own healing, diaspora [. . . ] can continue to hone, in their own localities, in conversation with other women in her family. One of her specific techniques and technologies which promote safety, xviii sisters confesses that she, too, is a survivor. The intergener- healing, narrative sharing and preservation, and justice.” If we take cultural worker and filmmaker Toni Cade Bambara’s ational impact of sexual violence is palpable as each of the 49 50 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 most mendon’t getit.” If thetruthbetold,onsomelevel ofawarenessoranother, fully takewithafemaleisnothing lessthanmind-boggling. who harborblurrynotionsaboutthelibertiestheycanright- men’s-room talk,andI’dsaythenumberofboysmen McCall haspreviouslywritten,“I’veheardallthemacho ing, challenging, and in some moments, baffling. As Nathan Walcott andmyself.Thethree-hoursessionwaseyeopen - participated inaconversationco-facilitatedbyQuentin 5–10 Black women, gathered inside ofthebarbershop and twenty ormoreBlack(andLatino)men,alongwithabout at theTwins BarbershopinBrooklyn,NewYork. About cally engageissuesoftoxicmasculinity, rape,andpatriarchy space createdforBlackmale-identifiedindividualstocriti- Emerging SonsonFilm:Wrestling withRapeCulture justice, healingandreconciliationtheydesire. hell’s doorandcomebackoutwithnewvisionsforthetruth, the imaginativecapacityforsurvivorstostepfootbackinto the powerinoralhistoriesandtestimoniesthatcelebrate the creativeimaginationhasbeencolonized,”wewillsee words seriously, “thetoolsofmytradearecolonized[and] church basement. out—even if only through a recording in a listener’s ear in a righteousness andjusticebysurvivorswhodaredtospeak so many other Black institutions, was pushed towards true leanings has harmed more thanit has helped, and it, like church with its heterosexist, patriarchal, and rape apologist raped, Idecideditwastimetoleavethechurch.”Indeed, made me apologize for becoming pregnant after having been during her testimonyat Riverside, stated, “when the church accountability andhealingforharm-doers.LorettaRoss, giving graceandhopetothoseharmedtheoptionfor rape culture led to the recoding of survivor theologies, of theologicalhermeneuticsthathavetraditionallyupheld rapes ofBlackwomenandgirlsonitswatch.Thedecoding church also “technically”held the churchresponsible for the oppression. for communalaccountabilitytoexistdespiteunrelenting beyond “themaster’s tools”andcreatespacesplaces resistance—in filmandoffscreen,too—inthattheypush is the power of Black feminist/womanist technologies of anti-black andanti-womanworldrefusestoconfront.This whole stories,eveniftheirstorieswouldtelltruthsthatan constraints allowedBlackwomenthespacetotelltheir others, arecommon inBlackbarbershopsas theyarein , and rapeculture.Theseideologies, amongmany of relationship, parenting,andkinship;also insexism, mission tomalecounterparts; in heteropatriarchalnotions believed ingender roles; inthenecessity of female sub- As partoftheTRC,therewasalsoanintentional The absenceofcensorshipand/orcolonizedmedia xx Havingtheseoralhistoriespresentinahistoric xxi

xxii Thereweremenpresentwho xix

new eyes.” colonizer’s faceandare able tolookatgenderandrace with from blackmaleswhohaveturned theirgazeawayfromthe barbershop talk.Asbellhooks hassaid,“We needtohear conversation withtheirown statements duringtheBlack nies ofBlackwomensurvivors ofrape,alongsideandin their lives as anti-rape activists after hearing the testimo- hope thatBlackmenandboys willfeelcompelledtolead on thelivelihoodofBlackwomenandgirls.Itisalso their masculinityinlightofpatriarchy’s debilitatingeffect footage willbeabletowrestlewithhowtheyconceptualize watch itscontent.Thehopeisthatthosewhothe gaze andshiftingthefocus of theBlackmenand boys who future work.Thefootagewilldotheworkofdiverting Women’s Blueprint,andperhaps,aspartofthatfilmmaker’s will belaterusedinEmergingSonsprogrammingatBlack by anup-and-comingBlackwomanfilmmaker. Thefootage barbershop conversationwas that it was entirely recorded flaws and/ortheirlackofunderstanding. hypermasculine spaceasaBlackbarbershop—toadmittheir tremendous step.ItisnottypicalforBlackmen—insucha that theywerewrongordidnotunderstandwasa McCall says,“theyjustdidn’t getit.” some oftheBlackmeninroomhadtoadmitwhen,as things Blackmenweresaying,andonseveralincidences, women openlyconfessedwhentheyweretriggeredbythe our communities,andeveninmovements.TheseBlack women inthehome,ourchurches,schools, dialogue aboutthewaysBlackmendonotshowupfor care aboutBlackwomen?”A question that generatedintense survivors intheroomwhoaskedquestion,“doBlackmen Recy Taylor, RobertCorbitt.TherewerealsoBlackwomen with rapeand/oranti-rapeactivism,suchasthebrotherof in the room who talked about their personal experiences The discussion was also intergenerational. There were elders rape, and patriarchy dehumanize andoppress Black women. and comprehensiveconversationabouthowtoxicmasculinity, rape andconsent.Alltwentyormoreindividualshaddetailed there ornot—eachpersonleftthatdayhavingtalkedabout ears ofthoseintheshop—whethertheyknewwhywewere barbers andothermen.Byutilizingthatspace,takingthe get adviceonhowtodealwithday-to-dayissuesfromtheir together, talkanddecompressabsentof“women,”also poraneously functionedasthespacewhere“men”cancome Certainly, theBlackbarbershophashistoricallyandcontem- two Blackmen(myselfandQuentin)leadtheconversation. fact, Blackwomensuggestedthatthisbetheplacewhere was aBlackfeminist/womanisttechnologyofresistance.In churches, etc.). a hostofotherBlackculturalinstitutions(i.e.,HBCUs, Nonetheless whatwasmostnoteworthyaboutthe Having thisconversationinthebarbershop,however, xxiv xxiii Their ability to admit Theirabilitytoadmit Conclusion v Please see hashtag #BWTRC, then click “videos” on Twitter. vi Black Women’s Blueprint, Twitter post, April 29, 2016, 3:17pm, Black feminist/womanist technologies of resistance https://twitter.com/BlackWomensBP/status/726128363660840960. sit at the crux of the anti-rape movement in Black commu- vii Ibid. nities and they were also instrumental in the planning and viii execution of the Black Women’s Truth and Reconciliation See Chapter Three, “Seduction and the Ruses of Power,” in Saidiya V. Hartman, Scenes of Subjection: Terror, Slavery, and Self-making in Commission. The usage of traditional film alongside and Nineteenth-Century America (Oxford University Press, 1997), 79–114. in conversation with contemporary iterations of “filmic” ix See Crystal Nicole Feimster, Southern Horrors: Women and the Politics of texts—albeit through social media, oral histories, or the Rape and Lynching (Harvard University Press, 2009). literal/figurative recording of anti-rape conversation, led x See Danielle L. McGuire, At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, to what was a successful and groundbreaking event in the Rape, and Resistance—A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from history of Black America. As Toni Cade Bambara has writ- Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power (Vintage, 2011). ten, “There is no American cinema; there are American xi See Assata Shakur, Assata: An Autobiography (Zed Books, 1987). xxv cinemas.” Black women’s utilization of technology in the xii See Eric McDuffie,Sojourning for Freedom: Black Women, American literal sense, and “the technologies of their lives,” that being, Communism, and the Making of Black Left Feminism (Duke University Press, 2011), 160–192; and for primary source materials on the the underpinnings, secrets, and details of their inner selves— Sojourners: “Proclamation of the Sojourners for Truth and Justice.” in public and digital spaces—challenges what Darlene Clark Louise Thompson Patterson Papers, Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Hine called “the culture of dissemblance” and what Evelyn Book Library, Emory University. Brooks Higginbotham defined as “the politics of respect- xiii “Recognition, justice and development: Women of African descent— ability.” xxvi Contemporary (and past) anti-rape activists bring at the intersection of race and gender” on the occasion of the International Decade for People of African Descent,” United Nations to light the issues that have been sequestered in the closets Webcast, April 29, 2016. http://webtv.un.org/meetings-events/ of Black life—that being, racial-sexual violence—and they conferencessummits/high-level-signature-ceremony-for-the-paris- are conjuring transformative and restorative justice for all agreement-22-april-2016-new-york/watch/women-of-african-descent- at-the-intersection-of-race-and-gender/870747324001#full-text. those committed to black women and girls’ livelihoods. The xiv commitment “to the folk,” to borrow Alice Walker’s words, Womanhood or Woman’s-Hurt? http://womanhoodorwomanshurt.com/ short-documentary/. deepens the reach and effect of the technologies deployed xv Ibid. and engaged.xxvii There is no truth or reconciliation if Black xvi women and girls are not affirmed as the coders, designers, Audre Lorde, “Poetry Is Not a Luxury,” Sister Outsider (The Crossing Press, 1984), 37. and techies of the Black liberation movement and the Black xvii future collectively hoped for, dreamed about, and imagined. Womanhood or Woman’s-Hurt? xviii BWTRC program, page 2 (in author’s possession).

xix Acknowledgements Toni Cade Bambara, “Language and the Writer,” in Toni Cade Bambara, Deep Sightings & Rescue Missions: Fiction, Essays, and Conversations I am deeply inspired by and called to action by the (Vintage, 2009), 139–140. xx freedom fighters, sages, and healerwomen at Black Women’s Audre Lorde, “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House.” In Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches, (Berkeley, CA: Crossing Blueprint who make known the realities of racial-sexual vio- Press, 1984), 110–114. lence and are creating pathways to justice, healing, account- xxi See Monica A. Coleman, The Dinah Project: A Handbook for ability and liberation in black communities. Congregational Response to Sexual Violence. Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2010. Endnotes xxii Nathan McCall, “Men: We Just Don’t Get It.” In Rudolph P. Byrd and Beverly Guy-Sheftall, eds. Traps: African American Men on Gender and i BWTRC program, “About the BWTRC” (in author’s possession). Sexuality (Indiana University Press, 2001), 195. xxiii ii Tamura A. Lomax, “‘Technology of Living’ Toward a Black Feminist Ibid. Religious Thought.” The Black Scholar. xxiv bell hooks, Killing Rage: Ending Racism (Macmillan, 1996), 96. iii Jacqueline Bobo, “Black Women’s Films: Genesis of a Tradition.” In xxv Toni Cade Bambara, “Language and the Writer,” 140. Bobo, Jacqueline, ed. Black Women Film and Video Artists (New York: xxvi Routledge, 1998), 19. See Hine, Darlene Clark. “Rape and the inner lives of Black women in the Middle West.” SignsRighteous Discontent: The Women’s Movement in iv For more on #YouOkSis, please see Demetria Irwin, “#YouOkSis: the Black Baptist Church, 1880–1920. Cambridge: Harvard University Online Movement Launches to Stop Street Harrassment,” TheGrio.com, Press, 1993. August 2, 2014; for more on #WhyIStayed, please see Nina Bahadur, xxvii “#WhyIStayed Stories Reveal Why Domestic Violence Survivors Can’t See Alice Walker, “Womanist,” in Layli Phillips, ed. The Womanist Reader ‘Just Leave,’” Huffington Post, September 9, 2014; and for more on (Routledge, 2006), 19. #SurvivorPrivilege, please see: Tyler Kingkade, “The Woman Who Started #SurvivorPrivilege Was Kicked Out Of School After Being Raped,” Huffington Post, June 12, 2014.

51 Bibliography

Bambara, Toni Cade. Deep Sightings & Rescue Missions: Fiction, Essays, and Conversations, Vintage, 2009.

Black Women’s Blueprint. www.blackwomensblueprint.org.

Bobo, Jacqueline, ed. Black Women Film and Video Artists, New York: Routledge, 1998.

Byrd, Rudolph P. and Beverly Guy-Sheftall, eds. Traps: African American Men on Gender and Sexuality, Indiana University Press, 2001.

Feimster, Crystal N. Southern Horrors: Women and the Politics of Rape and Lynching, Harvard University Press, 2009.

Hartman, Saidiya V. Scenes of Subjection: Terror, Slavery, and Self- making in Nineteenth-Century America, Oxford University Press, 1997.

hooks, bell. Killing Rage: Ending Racism, Macmillan, 1996.

Lomax, Tamura A. “‘Technology of Living’ Toward a Black Feminist Religious Thought.” The Black Scholar.

Lorde, Audre. Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches, Berkeley, CA: Crossing Press, 1984.

McDuffie, Erik S.Sojourning for Freedom: Black Women, American Communism, and the Making of Black Left Feminism, Duke University Press, 2011.

McGuire, Danielle L. At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance—A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power, Vintage, 2011.

Phillips, Layli, ed. The Womanist Reader, Routledge, 2006.

“Recognition, justice and development: Women of African descent—at the intersection of race and gender” on the occasion of the International Decade for People of African Descent,” United Nations Webcast, April 29, 2016. http://webtv.un.org/ meetings-events/conferencessummits/high-level-signature- ceremony-for-the-paris-agreement-22-april-2016-new-york/ watch/women-of-african-descent-at-the-intersection-of-race- and-gender/4870747324001#full-text.

Shakur, Assata. Assata: An Autobiography, Zed Books, 1987.

Simmons, Aishah Shahidah. NO! The Rape Documentary. DVD. U.S.A: AFROLEZ Productions, 2006.

Sojourners for Truth and Justice. Louise Thompson Patterson Papers, Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Emory University. http://womanhoodorwomanshurt.com/

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 short-documentary/.

52 A Survey of Automatic Annotation Methods Gualberto (Wally) Guzman, University of Texas at Austin

Gualberto Guzman is a senior, double-majoring in computer the slow and expensive nature of hand annotation, scholars science and electrical engineering at the University of Texas at have turned to other approaches. These include joining Austin. His research interests focus on the applications of machine inexpert annotations (Diab & Kamboj, 2011; Snow et al., learning and artificial intelligence to corpus linguistics. He is 2008), combining expert annotations (Raykar et al., 2009), currently working with Dr. Barbara Bullock and Dr. Almeida and creating machine learning models to annotate for us. In Toribio as part of the Bilingual Annotation TaskS Force (BATS) all of the aforementioned cases, automatic methods outper- to develop and improve automatic annotation tools for dealing form the results of hand annotation in terms of time, effort, with mixed-language data. He plans to pursue a PhD in com- and cost. puter science to expand his research of computational linguistics and artificial intelligence. This paper claims that relying on automatic anno- tation through machine learning poses no threat and frees researchers to perform actual linguistic analysis rather than Abstract devoting a significant portion of their time to hand anno- tation. I will begin with a short definition of annotation in Linguistic scholars are increasingly interested corpus linguistics. Then, I move on to discuss the benefits, in studying the linguistic features of multi-lingual texts drawbacks, and successes of previous methods and argue through Part-Of-Speech (POS) tagging, code-switch iden- that the best approach to annotation is through machine tification, or other levels of classification. However, aside learning. I demonstrate that relying on hand annotation is from hand annotation, the current tools for annotation and inferior to employing the current machine learning tools, textual analysis are highly limited. In the past, hand anno- drawing examples from current work carried out with tation by experts was the only way to tag a mixed language my research team, the Bilingual Annotation TaskS Force text, but it is slow, inefficient, and tedious to verify. Today, (BATS) at the University of Texas at Austin. In addition, I there are other approaches to annotation including crowd discuss the results of my research with BATS in automatic sourcing, combining inexpert annotations, and an array annotation and compare it to related work. of machine learning approaches that teach computers to annotate for us. In this work, I will discuss the benefits, Defining Annotation drawbacks, and success of each of these methods and argue that the best approach is automatic annotation through Before moving forward, it is necessary to describe machine learning. I claim that relying on hand annotation what annotation means in corpus linguistics. It is simply is inferior to using current machine learning tools. As an the labeling or tagging of every token in a text based on the example, I briefly discuss the results of my team’s work in object of study, where a token is usually a space-separated automatic annotation and compare with previous work, word. Take, for example, the sentence “The big dog ran which approach 100% accuracy. In summary, I submit that quickly,” which has five tokens. In this case, it is not useful machine learning presents the best alternative to hand anno- to tag for language, but it might be worthwhile to tag for tation due to its speed, low cost, and ease of use. POS. We would then see “the” tagged as a determiner, “big” tagged as an adjective, “dog” tagged as a noun, and so on until we have consumed all of the tokens. Verifying the Introduction validity of a tagged text, or corpus, is carried out with a gold standard, which is an expert annotation of a small fraction of In recent years, the number of non-English and mul- the original text. Comparing the tags in the corpus against tilingual documents available in digital formats has spiked the gold standard allows researchers to determine the accu- dramatically. However, linguists studying features of these racy rating over that fraction and extrapolate to the rest of documents, such as Part-of-Speech (POS) or degree of the text. While our small, one-sentence example is relatively language mixing, have few tools for doing so. As a result, useless, a corpus composed of thousands of sentences with the annotation of linguistic features such as code-switching, tens of thousands of tokens or more serves multiple ends. where speakers change languages in a single utterance, has With that much data or more, linguists can break down previously been done by hand. This method is costly, requir- how natural languages work much faster by examining more ing extensive training, time, and attention depending on the instances of usage in speakers across regions, cultures, or level of detail desired. Furthermore, existing automatic tools dialects. for multiple languages are restricted to a small subset of language pairings such as Hindi and English and demand a In the case of multilingual texts, annotation is essen- high level of maintenance (LIPPS Group, 2000). As a result, tial to discovering the interactions between languages, as there are few options for researchers wishing to work with they can reveal detail about the underlying structure of all large-scale multilingual documents. In an effort to overcome languages (Léglise & Alby, 2013). However, it becomes 53 54 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 agree onspecific tags. verified isthedegreetowhich speakers ofHindiandEnglish the tagsonceentirecorpus iscomplete.Allthatcanbe accurately verifythevalidityor guaranteethecorrectnessof text withwhichtocompareperformance, thereisnowayto there isagoldstandardoranexpertly taggedsectionofthe sourcing withotherformsofannotation.Inaddition,unless tagging forPOS.Thus,itmaybehardertousecrowd- demands alowerlevelofgrammaticalsophisticationthan participants totagaccordinglanguage,whicharguably level ofknowledgeforaccuratetagging.Thestudyrequired not requiretrainedexperts,itdoesdemandaminimum there areseveraldrawbacks.Althoughtheirapproach does implement andcanbeappliedtoanytext.Nonetheless, is relatively inexpensive and quick. Second, it is simple to Therefore, anyonecancontributeandtheentireprocess this approach.First,itdoesnotrequiretrainedexperts. different levelsofclassification,therearetwobenefits to lower stillat66%. agreement was 79.63% and for the Proper Noun tags, it was the samewasnottrueforothertags.ForEnglishtags, the majorityofrespondentsagreedonHinditags(98.1%), human error, whichisanissueinhandannotation.While ber ofvotesandavoidedtheissuedialecticalvariation tokens. The authors chose the tag set with the highest num- English), propernouns(foreignornative),andforunknown with abilingualcorpus,theytaggedforlanguage(Hindior practice knownascrowdsourcing.Sincetheywereworking sentence-level tagsbyenlistingthehelpofInternetusers,a Mechanical Turk (AMT) to gather answers for small sets of authors usedanInternetmarketplaceknownastheAmazon to spare linguists the difficulty of manual annotation, the in Hinglish,amixtureofHindiandEnglish.Inaneffort an entiredocument.Theirtextconsistedof10,500words individually, andcombinetheresults,thanitistoannotate to divideatextintooverlapping chunks,annotatethem Diab andKamboj(2011),reliesonthefactthatitiseasier Crowdsourced Annotations necessitating newmethodsofannotation. even fewerworkwithlanguagesthatarenotwidelyspoken, with languagesotherthanEnglish,suchasTreeTagger, and able to annotate for us, but only a handful of them work corpus ratherthanproducingone.Therearetoolsavail- er’s timeismuchbetterspentanalyzing an alreadyannotated per secondtakesalmostfourteenhours.Clearly, aresearch- annotating afifty-thousand-wordtextatrateofoneword unfeasible toannotatebyhandatthatscale.Forexample, Despite differences in the accuracy of tagging across One approach to the annotation process, used by at theletterand wordlevel.Usingthesemodels, theauthors on existingcollections oftagsinthetrainingexamples both probabilistic language modelsthatpredictthe next tagbased English. Theauthorsusedtwo N-Grammodels,whichare stylistic differences among second-language speakers of features such asspelling mistakes, grammatical errors, or and learnermodelsofEnglish inordertocapturespecific machine learningmodelswere trained onexamplesofnative the workofGwayalietal.(2013),word-levelandletter-level in thatitdoesnotrequire significant humanintervention.In ment ofmultipleexperts. as crowdsourcing as well as the additional cost and invest- work of Sheng etal. (2008), suffers from the same drawbacks and weightingexpertannotations,whichissharedwiththe compared tothemajoritychoice.Thismethodofcombining the mostprobablechoicewasmoreoftencorrect,by3–5%, itarian andindependentofpastperformance.Inallcases, the previous studies where theoutcomewas strictly major of thetimehadgreaterinfluenceonfinalresult,unlike disagreement. In thisway, theexpertsthatwererightmore likely correct one based on previous success in the case of to weightheannotationofeachexpertandreturnmost cancer nodule.Theauthorsusedaprobabilisticframework a cancer, ortheirassessmentofthelocationaspecific had cancer, theiropinionofthedegreemalignancy images to determine whether experts thought a patient Raykar etal.(2009)studiedtheannotationofmedical (2008). Incontrasttothepreviouslymentionedstudies, than usingnon-experts,inlinewithworkbyShengetal. various expert-levelannotatorstoincreaseaccuracyrather Combining ExpertAnnotations Annotation UsingMachineLearning and effort. task, which represents an additional significant cost of time trained beforehandtoannotateaccordingthelanguage (2011) study, however, theparticipantsinthisstudywere and cannotbeeasilyverified.UnliketheDiabKamboj This methodispronetodisagreementacrossrespondents crowdsourcing method,thepreviousdrawbacksstillapply. Although the authors demonstrate the versatility of the simple toimplementanddoesnotrequiretrainedexperts. before, thebenefitsofthisapproachremainsame;itis non-experts to equal the performance of one expert. As in annotation. They found that, on average, it takes four to determinehownon-expertsfaredcomparedexperts agreement onfivelanguagetasks.However, theiraimwas the AMTtogathernon-experttagsanddeterminelevelof Machine learningdiffersfromthepreviousapproaches Raykar etal.(2009)electedtocombinetheresultsof Snow etal.(2008)followedthesameapproach,using - were able to correctly predict the source language of the Of course, compared to the work of a human expert, author of a text with a 74.8% accuracy rating. In the task of machine learning lags slightly behind. It is hard to develop, language identification, King and Abney (2013) compared requires a trained programmer, and is only as good as the the performance of several machine learning models and available training data, which is sparse in languages other found that a more complex type of N-Gram model, known than English. However, it is much faster, more adaptable, as a Conditional Random Field Model, was 80% accu- and more accurate than relying on non-experts. Training rate across several languages. Solorio and Liu (2008) com- and running the algorithms takes a few hours at most, which pared several algorithms on the task of POS-tagging mixed is much faster than what one would expect for the hand English-Spanish texts and found they could combine the annotation. Additionally, machine learning methods per- results of independent English and Spanish taggers to reach form equally well across multiple languages, requiring no an accuracy of 93%. Finally, Solorio et al. (2014) determined more than different training corpora to achieve similar levels that it was much easier to identify languages that are written of accuracy. They clearly surpass the accuracy of non-ma- in different scripts automatically as is case with Nepali and chine learning methods without experts. English, reaching an accuracy of 90%. Conclusion Through the Bilingual Annotations TaskS Force (BATS), I have been developing a new, open-source method In summary, machine learning presents the best alter- based on machine learning to automatically annotate mul- native to hand annotation due to its speed, low cost, and tilingual datasets, which we have applied to two corpora. ease of use. It is much faster and much easier to retrain Our model is composed of two parts: an N-Gram model an algorithm on a new language and run it on a different and a Markov Chain. The first determines the probability dataset than it would be to enlist the help of expert annota- of a language tag for a given word based on the spelling of tors to perform slow hand annotation. It is also much more words in the same language. The second uses the languages cost-effective to develop a single algorithm than to enlist tags of previous words as context for ambiguous cases. For help, combine answers, and account for discrepancy. In all examples, given the two training words “dog” and “perro” of the studies mentioned, the machine learning approach (dog) in English and Spanish, the N-gram model will posit outperformed the results of non-experts by at least 10%, that the new word “carro” (car) is more likely to be Spanish representing a significant gain in time, effort, and accuracy. than English based on the “-o” ending and the “rr” it shares Unlike hand annotation, automatic annotation machine with “perro.” However, the N-gram model alone does not learning is highly adaptable to changes in language task, handle ambiguities. If we consider the sentence, “I realized level of detail, and language variation. I submit that hand que nunca me llamaron” (I realized that they never called annotation cannot compete with new machine learning me) we see that the word “me” could be in either language models, which approach an accuracy of 100%. While these based on spelling alone. However, given that the previous methods directly compete with expert labor, advancement word is in Spanish, the Markov model assigns a high proba- in automatic annotation frees researchers to perform more bility that “me” should also be tagged as Spanish. valuable work resulting from its results without restrict- ing them to carrying out the annotation themselves. As an The first corpus on which we applied our algorithm example, the BATS team plans to apply our algorithm to was the book , an English- Killer Crónicas: Bilingual Memories a broader range of documents involving more languages Spanish work of fiction by Susana Chávez Silverman. The and casual speech in order to test linguistic hypotheses second was the movie script for the film , a Bon Cop, Bad Cop about language interaction among multilinguals. We expect bilingual French-English film directed by Eric Canuel. We to facilitate access and improve the documentation of our fed our model millions of words in the form of large col- current method so that other researchers with interests in lections of monolingual text, or training corpora, so that it multilingualism can employ it. could learn to recognize what each language looks like at the level of spelling and context using the N-Gram and Markov Acknowledgements models. Using small gold standards from each corpus, we evaluated the total performance by looking at the total I would like to thank Prof. Barbara E. Bullock and number of times the model correctly identified the language Prof. Almeida J. Toribio for supporting and guiding me in the test corpus as well as what the model predicted for during this project. I would also like to thank Dr. Nicole the ambiguous cases. For the first corpus, we achieved an Guidotti-Hernández and Chinwe Oriji for their assistance. accuracy of 96% for language identification. For the second, This research was made possible by the Mellon Mays we achieved 97%. Not only are our results higher than those Undergraduate Fellowship. reported in previous related work, they are also very close to the accuracy of hand annotation. 55 56 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Solorio, T., E.Blair, S.Maharjan,Bethard,M.Diab, Snow, R.,B.O’Conner, D.Jurafsky, A.Y. Ng.2008.Cheapand Sheng, V. S.,F. Provost,P. G.Ipeirotis.2008.GetAnotherLabel? Raykar, V. C.,S.Yu, L.H. Zhao,A.Jerebko,C.Florin,G.H. LIPPS Group.2000.TheLIDEScodingmanual:Adocumentfor Léglise, I.&S.Alby, 2013.Lescorpusplurilingües,entrelingüis- King, B.&S.Abney. 2013.Labelingthelanguagesofwordsin Gyawali, B.,G.Ramirez&T. Solorio.2013.Nativelanguage Diab, M.&A.Kamboj.2011.Feasibilityofleveragingcrowd Works Cited Linguistics. 2014, 62–72.Doha,Qatar. AssociationforComputational Workshop on Computational Approaches to Code Switching, identification incode-switcheddata. InProceedingsofthe1st & P. 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Language Technologies, 1110–1119.Atlanta,Georgia.Association Chapter oftheAssociationforComputationalLinguistics:Human In mixed-language documentsusingweaklysupervisedmethods. for ComputationalLinguistics. Educational Applications,224–231.Atlanta,Georgia.Association of the8thWorkshop onInnovativeUseofNLPforBuilding identification: asimplen-grambasedapproach.InProceedings Computational Linguistics. IJCNLP 2011,36–40.ChiangMai,Thailand.Associationfor Proceedings ofthe9thWorkshop onAsianLanguageResources, for HindiEnglishcodeswitcheddata:apilotannotation.In sourcing forthecreationofalargescaleannotatedresource Proceedings of the 26th International ConferenceProceedings ofthe26thInternational onMachine Proceedings ofthe2013Conference oftheNorthAmerican EMNLP Solorio, T. &Y. Liu.2008.Part-of-speechtaggingforEnglish- Linguistics. 2008, 1051–1060.Honolulu,HI.AssociationforComputational Empirical MethodsinNaturalLanguageProcessing,EMNLP Spanish code-switchedtext.InProceedingsoftheConference on The Black Cosmopolitan: A Critical Examination of Cosmopolitanism and Exile in Teju Cole’s Open City Lovia Gyarkye, Princeton University

Lovia Gyarkye recently graduated from Princeton University, middle ground—an alternate mode of being to counter the where she completed a degree in English with certificates in strict categorization of “cosmopolitan” and “exile.” Cole’s African and African-American studies. She is currently a comments, coupled with these tensions, foreground the reporter-researcher at the New Republic magazine. Her questions raised about Open City’s role as an interrogation current research interests focus on how black women complicate of contemporary cosmopolitanism. The tension between the contemporary cosmopolitan identity. Julius’s attempts to be cosmopolitan and his constant feel- ings of displacement signals the need for a more nuanced discussion of the black cosmopolitan identity. Abstract I will argue that, unlike the racially modified “black The recent popularity of the term cosmopolitan and cosmopolitan,” Afropolitanism (and the Afropolitan iden- its frequent application to postcolonial diaspora literature tity) acknowledges the fluid nature of being black in an demands critical consideration. A seemingly 21st reincarna- increasingly globalized world. It abandons the exclusionary tion of Charles Baudelaire’s flâneur figure, the cosmopolitan European aesthetic of traditional cosmopolitanism in favor moves between various spaces with an ease that reflects their of understanding the complexity of global associations, thus simultaneous detachment and belonging to multiple states. making it a more useful framework for understanding our Cosmopolitanism not only becomes a physical state of being main character and Coles’ text. but an existential one. In this paper, I read Teju Cole’s Open City as an interrogation of our contemporary notions of II a cosmopolitan. By analyzing the tension between Julius’ attempts to be cosmopolitan and his constant feelings of dis- While the idea of cosmopolitanism itself extends fur- placement, I explore how the Afropolitan identity provides a ther back in history, I begin with the definition introduced more useful framework for understanding our main charac- by 19th-century French poet Charles Baudelaire in “The ter and Coles’ text. Unlike the racially modified “black cos- Painter of Modern Life.” In this essay, Baudelaire intro- mopolitan,” Afropolitanism acknowledges the fluid nature duces Monsieur G., a man he believes perfectly embodies of being black in an increasingly globalized world. the characteristics of a cosmopolitan. While Baudelaire does not explicitly use the word, his definition of the flâneur bears similarity to contemporary definitions of a cosmopolitan. I Monsieur G. is a man of the world—a flâneur—which in Baudelairian terms is to Teju Cole’s debut novel Open City is best described as a complicated piece of modernist writing. Set in post 9/11 Be away from home and yet to feel oneself every- New York, Cole’s novel follows the physical and mental where at home; to see the world, to be at the centre wanderings of Julius, a Nigerian-German man who moved of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the iii from Lagos to America to attend Maxwell College on a full world. scholarship. With the sentence: “And so when I began to The flâneur finds joy in the everyday object, task, and go on evening walks last fall,” we embark on a journey with person because they believe they are surrounded by “eternal Julius, taking us through the streets of Manhattan, Brussels, beauty and the amazing harmony of life.”iv and a past Lagos.i Julius’s musings and Cole’s Sebaldian- esque writing style have led critics and scholars alike to Taking Baudelaire’s image of the flâneur as a founda- hail both our hero and the author as exemplar cosmopol- tion, we can now turn to philosopher and cultural theorist itans. However, throughout the narrative we realize that Kwame Anthony Appiah’s definition of a cosmopolitan for a Julius’s identity in relation to cosmopolitanism is much more more comprehensive image of the figure that Julius attempts complicated than that of 19th-century flâneur figure. In an to embody. In Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers, interview with Post45, Cole comments on how Open City “is Appiah grounds his exploration of the term in its original a narrative troubled from beginning to end by Julius’s origin meaning. He writes, “Talk of cosmopolitanism originally ii in Africa.” Julius spends a majority of the novel embodying signaled a rejection of the conventional view that every the qualities that would make one a traditional flâneur. He civilized person belonged to a community among commu- wanders through the streets of different cities connecting nities.”v While contemporary notions of cosmopolitanism his quotidian observations to his extensive cultural cache. are rooted in the idea of the flâneur, the original concept However, each interaction feels unnatural and tense. is less about the aesthetics of walking through the crowd and more about rejecting national belonging. Appiah’s defi- While at times our hero falls into the category of an nition builds on the 19th-century figure by attributing the exile, there are instances when he attempts to search for a 57 58 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 choosing amongsttheoptionsyoufindinyoursearch.” as Appiahwrites,“isperfectlyconsistentwithpickingand languages, and beopen to the world in a manner, which ism. Burtoncantraveltodifferentcountries,speakseveral due totheirprivilegedposition,canembodycosmopolitan- Burton serves as a solid caricature for the individual who, Victorian adventurer, toaptly illustrate suchacharacter. can be taken for granted. Appiah usesRichard Burton, a requires onetobeinapositionwheretheir nationhood leans heavilyupon.However, torejectnationalbelonging rejection ofnationalbelonging—thatAppiah’s definition lay claimsonme.” wasn’t sorry at all. I was in nomood for people who tried to thoughts whereheexpresseshisfrustration.Hethinks,“I Julius offersaweakapology before retreatinghisintoown through thecity. Forhim: the novel,Juliusrevealshismotivationfortakinglongwalks like an uncomfortably oversized coat. Atthe beginning of ics ofAppiah,wecanseewhyJulius’s cosmopolitanismfits of community-specificallegiance. cosmopolitan interestinmannersoftheeverydaytoalack bad. Hey, IamAfricanjustlikeyou,whydoyouthis?” “The wayyoucameintomycarwithoutsayinghello,thisis irritated, retortsthatheisnotgood.“You know,” hesaid. “So, howareyoudoingmybrother?”Thedriver, clearly words totheAfricandriverbeyondhisaddressandabelated, struggles tohailacab.Whenhefinallyfindsone,saysfew cannot seem to escape. After a day at the museum, Julius his race troubles hisinteractions and attempts so that he While hewantstoabandontheideaofnationalaffiliation, as stripthemofanimportantaspectcosmopolitanism? Surely, thatwouldlimittheindividualinmanywaysaswell what happensifyouarerejectedbycertainpartsofsociety? function ofrace incompromisinghisability toembrace the unspokenrulesofblackness thatlinkhimtothisman. freedom asatraditionalcosmopolitan. Instead,hefollows gins, Juliusdoesnothavethe abilitytoactwiththesame Because oftheexpectationssurrounding hisNigerianori- on Julius’s identitycutshiscosmopolitanperformanceshort. Julius seeksoutthepartofcosmopolitanism—the Combining theaestheticsofBaudelairewitheth- Julius faces this predicament throughout the novel. There areinstances whenJuliusunderstands the and forthatreasonareminderoffreedom. looking acrosstoQueens—wasinconsequential, Jersey, or to lopein the shadows oftheEast side building, whether towatch thesunsetover New to remain lost in thought in front of an abandoned tine]. Everydecision—wheretoturnleft,howlong The streetsservedasawelcomeopposite[torou- ix Thiscabdriver’s attemptto“layclaims” vi vii But x viii

. . .. result oftheiroutsider status“exilesfeel. anurgentneed many romanticideasattachedtoblindness.” plated thesilentworld”beforehimand“thoughtof Standing infrontofBrewster’s portraits,Julius“contem- John Brewster Jr., an 18th-century deaf itinerant painter. the AmericanFolkArtMuseumobservingpaintingsby cab withtheAfricanman,Juliusspendsafternoonat particular objectsorsituations.Justbeforegettingintothe tanism byaccessingvariousculturalandaestheticfactsabout Julius overcompensateshishalfembodimentofcosmopoli- wanderings. In an attempt to work around these factors, to edithisroutesandconsiderexternalreceptionsof through thecrowd,claiminginvisibility. Instead,heisforced To bean “other” meansthat he cannotseamlessly weave his skincolorbrandshimasan“other”inmostsituations. is awarethathecannotreallybe“withoutastate”because and anativeplace,betweenthe selfanditstruehome.” of exileasan “unsealable rift forced between a human being “Refection onExile.”Inthisessay, Saiddefinesthecondition pertains toJulius’s behavior—beginswithEdwardSaid’s as neitherexilenorcosmopolitan. disqualifies himfromthisdefinition,affirminghisposition coupled withhismelancholicsolitudeinBrusselsultimately lectual exiles.However, his eventualexodusfromLagos characteristics associated with both traditional and intel politan. Heclumsilyshiftshisbehavior, oftendisplaying comfortably nor effortlessly inhabit the role of a cosmo- at not being with others in the communal habitation.” solitude experience outsidethegroup:deprivations felt He writesthatwhile nationalism is about groups, “exile is a definition ofexileinopposition totheideaofnationalism. lost. Like Appiah with cosmopolitanism, Said situates his The conditionofexileishaunted bytheideaofsomething III tradition. reminding himofhishalfinvolvementinthisEuropean these momentsarenotwithouttheghostofhisblackness experiences alignswiththecosmopolitanism of MonsieurG, Julius’s abilitytodrawassociationsbetweenhismanyglobal wandering bardintheLagosmarketofhischildhood.While from the prophetic blindness of Homer to the spiritual blind he proceeds to weave an impressive number of references family restaurants in the quieter neighborhoods.” late nightwalks”and“tonolongervisitall-white barsor in Brussels.Heresolvesto“cutdownonthelengthof[his] conversation, Julius mediates on his position as a black man man whoworksatthelocalInternetcafé.Aftertheirfirst ipates inaseriesofconversationswithFarouq,Moroccan cosmopolitanism. DuringhisvisittoBrussels,Juliuspartic- The mostappropriatedefinitionofexile—asit Haunted bythespecterofrace,Juliusisunableto xii Fromthere xi Julius xiv As a xiii - to reconstitute their broken lives, usually by choosing to see toward the role of intellectual exile, he consistently refuses themselves as part of a triumphant ideology or a restored this category and therefore does not qualify do be defined people.”xv In Nigeria, Julius fulfills the first part of this under its terms. definition. As a light-skinned half-Nigerian, half-German boy with the name Julius, there remains a stark difference IV between himself and those around him. Julius is neither fully a cosmopolitan nor an exile. However, he is never forced out the city; instead, he His voluntary and involuntary adoption of these labels fit chooses to leave. After being accepted to Maxwell, Julius awkwardly, and the resulting inbetweenness creates an unre- buys “a ticket to New York to begin life in the new country, solved tension. The question becomes, does an alternate fully on [his] own terms.”xvi This voluntary exodus from mode of being exist for those who, like Julius, want to be a Lagos precludes Julius from being a traditional exile. “Black cosmopolitan?” While no definitive conclusions can be drawn or an enthusiastic “yes” exclaimed, the concept of However, incompatibility with one category does “Afropolitanism” offers itself up as an alternative. not mean complete exclusion from the exilic label. In fact, Julius’s restlessness qualifies him to be considered an intel- In 2005, Taiye Selasi, author of Ghana Must Go, wrote lectual exile—an individual who merely chooses to remain an essay entitled “Bye-Bye Babar” which redefined Achille an outsider. In his lecture turned essay, “Intellectual Exile,” Mbembe’s concept of the Afropolitan identity. The most Said expands the definition of exile beyond the physical and referenced part of the essay paints a picture of a group of into the existential. He writes, “Exile for the intellectual in young, hip Africans dancing in a bar in London. Selasi writes: this metaphysical sense is restlessness, movement, constantly being unsettled, and unsettling others.”xvii A three-week “Home” for this lot is many things: where their vacation in Brussels nudges Julius into this metaphysical parents are from; where they go for vacation; where they went to school; where they see old friends; exilic state. In this city, “the days went by slowly, and [his] where they live (or live this year). Like so many sense of being entirely alone in the city intensified. Most of African young people working and living in cities the days [he] stayed indoors, reading, but [he] read without around the globe, they belong to no single geogra- xviii pleasure.” Julius’s solitude in Brussels carries with it a phy, but feel at home in many.xxii sharp sense of isolation. He begins to wander aimlessly, embodying the restless attitude of an exile. However, by Afropolitanism emerges as an alternative to traditional not taking pleasure in being alone—both physically and cosmopolitanism and alleviates the nervous conditions asso- mentally—Julius opposes Said’s complete definition of an ciated with attempting to be both African and cosmopolitan. intellectual exile. In the same essay, Said argues what makes These individuals embody the intersection of their global an intellectual exile unique is that they tend “to be happy associations. As Selasi writes, “they belong to no single with the idea of unhappiness.”xix geography, but feel at home in many.”xxiii In the Foreword to Negotiating Afropolitanism, Simon Gikandi writes that For Said, the intellectual exile differs from both the Afropolitanism has “been prompted by the desire to think traditional exile and a cosmopolitan because they do not of African identities as both rooted in specific local geog- rescind their nationhood. They exist in “the median state, raphies but also transcendental of them.”xxiv Afropolitanism neither completely at one with the new setting nor fully gives these young people a way to acknowledge their African disencumbered of the old, beset with half-involvements and past—frequently rooted in journeys—as well as recreate and half-detachments, nostalgic and sentimental on one level, reimagine their present-day wanderings. As Gikandi puts xx an adept mici or a secret outcast on another.” By inter- it in the same essay, “To be Afropolitan is to be connected lacing his diary like present-day prose with memories from to knowable African communities, nations, and traditions; Nigeria, Cole makes it clear that Julius is not fully separate but it is also to live a life divided across cultures, languages, from his Nigerian past. However, Julius does not see his and states. It is to embrace and celebrate a state of cultural half-involvement as advantageous; in fact, when thoughts hybridity—to be of Africa and of other worlds at the same of his grandmother float to him, he actively rejects the time.”xxv With this understanding of Afropolitanism, we can potential double vision. Calling these memories “nostalgic turn to the text to consider if Julius’s attempts to be cosmo- xxi wish-fulfillment fantasy at work.” Julius wants to dismiss politan are representative of an Afropolitan in the making these feelings of connection and fully embody a cosmopol- or if they merely reflect the impossibility of being both itan attitude toward Brussels—disassociated from his past. cosmopolitan and black. However, because of his “other” status, Nigeria still haunts him and his attempts to be a cosmopolitan. While Julius’s We begin with Julius in Brussels and consider if the origins coupled with his position as an “other” pulls him city contributes to his engagement with the concept of 59 60 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 still keeptheirownvaluesintact.” test caseofwhat[hebelieves];peoplecanlivetogetherbut admits thatheenjoysworkingattheshopbecause“itisa vis-à-vis language.InaconversationwithJulius,Farouq that allowspeople,includinghimself,toswitchidentities acterizes migrantsofthediaspora.Heworksinaspace Farouq’s occupationillustratestheinbetweenessthatchar is aMoroccan-BelgianmanwhoworksinanInternetcafé. to reimaginethetensionhefeels.Asnotedearlier, Farouq where Afropolitanismcanbeperformed. than eitherLagosorNewYork andappearstobeacity connection, Brussels becomes a more comfortable space not exclusively relegated totheperipheral to hispersonal hand, andadded:Howareyoudoing,mybrother?” for Farouq’s name.He“introduced[himself],shakinghis ple, asJuliusleavestheshop,hesurpriseshimselfbyasking presence alsoinducesuncharacteristicbehavior. Forexam- access memoriesofhisgrandmotherandNigeria,Farouq’s types ofpeople.JustasthecityBrusselsallowsJuliusto joy inthinkingaboutandbeingthepresenceofdifferent are cosmopolitan in their own right. Both characters find both blackand cosmopolitan, forthecontemporary flâneur and exile. Cole’s text illustrates the incompatibility of being categorizations presentedbylabelssuchas cosmopolitan conveniently servesasamiddle groundbetweenthestrict However, itemergesasanattractivealternativebecause it concept ofanAfropolitanidentity remainsfarfromperfect. figure the black identity into the molds of modernity, the V of havingjustarrivedfromasun-suffusedelsewhere.” Julius observesallofthepeople“whogaveimpression Afropolitanism. Atthebeginning ofhisthree-weekstay, language), intriguesand,dareIsay, comfortsourhero. ease withslippinginandoutofseveralidentities(through combination ofthecityBrussels,Farouq’s knowledge,and New York, Juliuswouldmostlikelyavoidthem.However, a this Afropolitancategory. Iftheseinteractionsoccurred in connection withanotherAfricanmancatapultsJuliusinto immediately andwithoutobligation.Willing tomakethis cab driver, it differs in that Julius initiates this interaction moment seemssimilartotheearlierscenewithAfrican in whichborderswereflexible.” France orBritain,itstillreflectsthesame“Europeanreality, Though Brussels does not have as strong a colonial past as were atinyminority.” Africa andthatonthetramshequicklydiscovered“whites large numbersofpeopleseemedtobefromsomepart iarity” struck Farouq andwhyhehadsaidit. in thestreet,Juliuswondershowthis“aggressivefamil- Farouq also plays a significant role in Julius’s ability Stemming fromalonghistory ofattemptstorecon- xxviii Fromthefactthatminoritiesare xxvii Juliusalsoobservesthat xxix Farouq’s sentiments xxxi Whilethis xxx Out xxvi -

of communityinscholarship. Princeton forconstantlyremindingmeaboutthenecessity kind words.Andfinally, thankyoutomyfellowMellonsat continued support,encouragement,terrificleadership,and you to Khristina Gonzalez and Judith Weisenfeld for their porting mycontinuedinterestinthisfieldofstudy. Thank early iterationsofthispaper, inspiringthistopic,andsup- Endnotes Acknowledgements and reimaginewhatitmeanstobeblackglobal. nity toshifttheimageofacosmopolitanawayfromtradition within thecontextofAfropolitanismprovidesanopportu- does not acknowledge racial realities. To read Open City xxiii xxii xxi xx xix xviii xvii xvi xv xiv xiii xii xi x ix viii vii vi v iv iii ii i Ibid. Taiye Selasi,“Bye-ByeBabar,” TheLIPMagazine,March2005,http:// Cole, Ibid.,1. Said, “IntellectualExile:Expatriatesand Marginals,3.” Cole, Edward Said,“IntellectualExile:ExpatriatesandMarginals,”Grand Cole, Said, “ReflectionsonExile,140-141.” Ibid., 140. Edward W. Said,“ReflectionsonExile,”inReflectionsExile:AndOther Ibid., 37. Ibid. While beyondthescopeofthispaper, itisnecessarytoconsiderJulius’s Ibid. Cole, Appiah, Cole, Kwame AnthonyAppiah,Cosmopolitanism:EthicsinaWorld ofStrangers Ibid., 11. Charles Baudelaire,“ThePainterofModernLife.pdf,”inThe Aaron Bady, “Interview:Teju Cole,”Post45:AfricanWriters inaNew Teju Cole,OpenCity(NewYork: RandomHouseTrade Paperbacks, thelip.robertsharp.co.uk/?p=76. Street 47,no.47(1993):2. andCulturalEssays(London:GrantaBooks,2001),137. Literary female cosmopolitan. cosmopolitan lifestyle.Futureresearchcouldexplorethelimitsofablack he isstillmoremobilethanablackfemalewhoattemptstoembrace gender inthisconversation.Whilehisblacknesslimitsmobility, (New York: W.W. Norton&Company, 2006),xiv. LifeandOtherEssays,ed.JohnMayne,1964,9. Modern World, 2015. 2011), 1. Thank you to Professor Simon Gikandi for advising Open City,115. Open City, 108. Open City, 85. Open City, 40. Open City,7. Cosmopolitanism: EthicsinaWorld ofStrangers,5. xxiv Simon Gikandi, “Foreword: On Afropolitanism,” in Negotiating Afropolitanism: Essays on Borders and Spaces in Contemporary African Literature and Folklore (Amsterdam: Rodopi B.V., 2005), 9. xxv Ibid. xxvi Cole, Open City, 97. xxvii Ibid. xxviiiIbid. xxix Ibid., 112. xxx Ibid., 102. xxi Ibid.

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61 62 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 contact, andhybridity.” modernization create“newformsofcultural exchange, how patternsof migrationorderedbyglobalization and transnational and transcultural exchange,” by focusing on work as “assert[ing] a genealogically based paradigm for will prepare him for the “biggest adventure of [his] life.” Tu, believesthathisdecision toenlistintheMaoriBattalion complicit inheteropatriarchy. fighting inwarandalsoseehowtheyareaffectedby acknowledge thetraumathatPitaandTu faceasMaorimen Ultimately, I argue that it is simultaneously possible to intersections of masculinity, nationalisms, and indigeneity. chy withinsettlercolonialcontextsbyacknowledgingthe ates discursivespacetocritiquetheroleofheteropatriar feminist theoryframeworkallowsareadingofTuthatcre- Maori familiesasdepictedinTu.IdiscusshowtheNative minates themanifestationandimpactofheteropatriarchyin A Nativefeministtheoryapproachisusefulbecauseitillu- read the novel Tufrom a Nativefeminist theory approach. at differenttimesandforreasons.Inthispaper, I ers, Pita,RangiandTu, whoalljointheMaoriBattalion, to fightinbattle.Thenovelfollowsthestoryofthreebroth- Tu, joinstheMaoriBattalionwithexcitementandeagerness trauma. ramifications and political consequences of violence and ters havebeenpersonallyshaped bythewar, butitssocietal of thethreebrothersreflectnotonlyhowcharac- traumatized soldiersinTu and fordifferentreasons.DonnaCoates,writingabout and Tu, whoalljoin the MaoriBattalion, at differenttimes The novelfollowsthestoryofthreebrothers,Pita,Rangi Abstract Riverside. Studies attheUniversityofCalifornia, attends thedoctoralprograminDepartmentofEthnic , settlercolonialstudiesandaffectstudies.Tomoyo currently politics ofknowledgeproduction,feministandqueerstudies, Asian andAmericanstudies,criticalethnicthe Undergraduate Fellow, herresearch interests haveincluded inclusion thattheadministrationembodied.AsaMellonMays and howBlack student activismchallengedtherhetoricof online diversityinitiativepage“ManyVoices, OneFuture,” University,” examinedthediscourseofdiversityinPrinceton’s and ItsChallengetothePromiseofDiversityatPrinceton Racist Pasts:theBlackJusticeLeague’s DemandforInclusion inist studies.AtOberlinCollege,herhonorsthesis,“Managing College inMay2016withaBAgender, sexuality, andfem- Japan, andraisedintheBayArea. ShegraduatedfromOberlin Tomoyo inKyoto, isa1.5-generationJapaneseAmericanborn Tomoyo Joshi,OberlinCollege Militarized Violence Heteropatriarchy, Nationhood,andtheTrauma of A NativeFeministTheoryApproachtoPatriciaGrace’s Tu In the novel Tu In thenovelTubyPatriciaGrace,protagonist, ii Somescholars,likeErinSuzuki, interpretGrace’s by Patricia Grace, the protagonist, iii

, demonstratesthatthenarratives - i

gender, sexuality, race,indigeneity, andnation.” heteropaternalism [by]focus[ing] on compound issues of between settlercolonialismandbothheteropatriarchy substantial advancesinunderstandingsoftheconnections Tuck and Angie Morrill, consists of theories that “make theory framework, which, according to Maile Arvin, Eve in the novel. Therefore, Iread Tu to thesettlercolonialpowerstructuresthatarepervasive and possible readingsofTu of God.” and wenttositinasidepewundertheeyesofMother with Jess,Pita“crossedhimselfholywater, genuflected basis thatsheisnotMaorinorCatholic.Afterthisencounter a beautifulPakehawomanwhomheisinlovewith,onthe born” or“traditional”inthemomentwhenherejectsJess, narrative. novel thatrefusestobecontainedinasingularormonolithic in additiontothevarietyofnarrativevoicecontributea Tu. ThedifferentsourcesGraceutilizedforherresearch sent home,andtoPita’s thirdpersonperspectiveastoldby styles, rangingfromTu’s firstpersonvoice,toRangi’s letters time diary. Thereafter, Grace employs a variety of narrative nephew, RiminiandBenedict,towhomhegiveshiswar research. ThenovelbeginswithTu’s “letter”tohisnieceand graphs, state archives, military reports and interviews for her Grace’s father, thoughshealsousedmemoirs,letters,photo- masculinity, nationalisms,andindigeneity. colonial contexts by acknowledging the intersections of space tocritiquetheroleofheteropatriarchywithinsettler framework allowsareadingofTu ilies asdepictedinTu manifestation andimpactofheteropatriarchyinMaorifam- feminist theory approach is useful because it illuminates the as a“paintedface.” ends upmarrying,Jessusesmakeup, whichPitarefersto In contrast to Ani Rose, the Catholic Maori woman Pita a desirewhichhemustnothave,theembodimentofsin. perceived asabnormal,aberrant, and abhorrent.” normal andnatural,inwhichotherconfigurationsare in whichheterosexualityandpatriarchyareperceivedas of heteropatriarchy, whichisdefinedasthe“socialsystems text ofthispaper, IuseArvin,Tuck andMorill’s definition his brotherscasting herintheroleoffemme fataleinthe represents, self-referentially, herawareness ofPitaand/or painted claws,intotheglossy skin?” that Imightgetmypianohands ontheMaoriboy, the ever think that I might do wrong to the good Catholic boy, of her, questionshimexplicitly, “Did[yourbrother, Rangi] intentional examinationofheteropatriarchyinrelation While CoatesandSuzukicontributetothedifferent For instance,itiseasytocharacterizePitaas“stub- Most oftheinspirationforTu vi Pita feels a need to pray because Jess epitomizes vii Jess,understandingPita’s perceptions . IarguethataNativefeministtheory , neitherofthemhaveanexplicit from a Native feminist camefromthediaryof that createsdiscursive viii ThisquotebyJess iv Inthecon- v ANative : - novel. The femme fatale is an archetype in which a female made him fearful of putting himself somewhere where he character, usually mysterious and alluring, brings tragedy could be watched by a thousand eyes.”xiii Pita’s observations and disaster upon a male protagonist.ix Considering the set- reveal that his emotional turmoil follows him as he migrates tler colonial relationship in this situation, Pita becomes the to a different place, and his repression of trauma, from wit- oppressed, the Maori man on the verge of being tainted by nessing abusive episodes of his father, is exacerbated by the the evil of whiteness, as represented by Jess. “thousand eyes.” The “thousand eyes” that Pita writes about represent the feeling of surveillance and Pita’s heightened A Native feminist theory can add to this simplified awareness as a colonial subject. It was a “thousand eyes that dichotomous interpretation of their relationship (indigenous made the colour of his skin shame,” Pita writes.xiv Pita’s expe- and therefore oppressed, or white and therefore privileged) riences of racism and feelings of racial inferiority highlight by asserting the need to locate heteropatriarchy within more broadly the context of settler colonialism that neces- the situation. Renya K. Ramirez argues that Native women sitates Maori populations to feel displaced and unwelcome are often encouraged to “defend tribal nationalism that in their own land. ignores as part of [their] very survival as women as well as [their] liberation from colonization.”x In response, a Consequently, Pita attempts to quell his feelings of Native feminist approach understands that aims for decol- displacement by enforcing gendered expectations in his onization cannot separate or dismiss gender injustice. A domestic life, expectations that are established by heteropa- Native feminist reading therefore allows a recognition of triarchy. Because his brother Rangi had enlisted in the army, Pita’s emotions as not simply being a reflection of his “tra- Pita’s sisters, Sophie and Moana, express their desire to find ditional” views—this idea being hinged upon our read- a job to supplement their family’s income. Despite this fact, ing of Pita as “authentic” based on his romantic partner Pita “believed [Sophie and Moana] were needed at home, choices—but a recognition that his actions are informed even though Ma had pointed out that it wasn’t like back- by heteropatriarchy. The construction of Jess as a femme home where there are always so much to do, growing food, fatale, construed both by Pita and Jess, is a function of het- getting wood, carrying water, and where there was no paid eropatriarchy because Jess as a character does not have space work anyway. Here in the city it was money they needed. for nuance other than what she is labeled to be: a character Still he didn’t approve. It wasn’t right.”xv Pita’s emphasis on deemed malevolent in relation to Pita, who can thus be “money” indicates that the spatial relocation from “back- constructed as the innocent hero unaware of women’s evil. home” to the city shifts the Maori’s relationship to society, to It is important to name Pita’s sexism towards Jess because one that is ordered by a dependency on capitalist structures the acknowledgement of gender injustice within indigenous to sustain a living. Moreover, Pita believes that he, as the communities is one step towards a collective “liberation “Little Father” of the family, has the responsibility to be the from colonization.” sole breadwinner. The expansion of women’s waged labor through the increase of jobs in wartime industries recon- Pita and Jess’s relationship is implicated within the figures gender roles that disrupt Pita’s views of family and relocation of the Maori population from largely agricul- work. Writing about the intersections of settler colonialism tural areas to urban centers. It is this urban migration that and heteropatriarchy, Arvin, Tuck and Morill assert that the unsettles racial tensions. According to Michael King, in “management of Indigenous peoples’ gender roles and sexu- 1939, only eleven percent of the Maori population resided ality was . . . key in remaking Indigenous peoples into settler in urban areas; by 1943, this number had increased to nine- state citizens.”xvi While I am not arguing that Pita is the xi teen percent. The movement from rural to urban cities embodiment of the settler state in his attempt to “manage” during this time is spurred by the surge in demand for jobs his sisters’ gender roles, Pita is one example of how settler xii in wartime industries. This migration reflects a larger shift ideologies of gender roles can be enacted by indigenous of modernization in New Zealand culture that places Maori peoples. In other words, the fact that he is Maori does not and Pakeha in more contact. For instance, Pita repeatedly absolve Pita’s participation—willing or not—in perpetuating struggles with ideas of belonging and identity at Wellington, heteropatriarchal thought that naturalizes what women’s the city his family moves to. Though his abusive father, (and in heteropatriarchal logic, “female”) gender roles are. also a traumatized soldier of the war, is no longer a physical Arvin, Tuck and Morrill’s comments therefore challenge the threat to Pita’s family, Pita continues to feel displaced in limits of identity politics by creating the space to identify Wellington and becomes increasingly sensitive to feelings of multiple intersecting . Pita’s attitudes towards racial inferiority. Referring to the spatial-temporal location his sister and his “difficult[y] know[ing] what was in his of his family’s past lifestyle as “backhome,” Pita notes that sisters’ minds” are informed by the emotional and mental “[i]t was backhome that kept his eyes switching from side to effects of childhood trauma instilled in him by his father side on city streets because he didn’t want not to give recog- that are further aggravated by the physical displacement his nition to those coming towards him. It was backhome that xvii family experiences. 63 64 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 because hehas“dishonestwounds.” ship in the Battalion. In contrast, Tu feels like an “imposter” is what constitutes, authenticates andlegitimizesmember belief thatphysicalinjuryobtainedinbattlefromtheenemy Maori Battalion. “biggest adventure”ofhislifebybeingamemberthe introduction, Tu begins believing that he will be off to the actions withtheMaoriBattalion.Aspreviouslystatedin in thenation-state’s visionofmasculinitythroughhisinter war: Tu, the protagonist of the novel, desires to participate ideas ofmasculinityandindigeneityagainstthebackdrop is nottheonlycharacterinTu into thenation-state, thenitisalsopossible to seeRangi’s who hadmadethemselvesmykeepers,”Tu wonders. the consequencesofwhereIhadplacedmyself—brothers by brotherswhodecidedIwas wounds wereinflicted,notinbattleagainstanenemy, but ever facethepeopleathomeiftheycometoknowthese ticipate in a militarized form of masculinity. “How can I and courageous warrior—is also tied to his desire to par sion intowhattheMaoriBattalionsymbolizes,valiant mined bystate-sanctionedcodesofbehavior. the definitionsofvalorandcourageousness,whicharedeter then Tu’s conceptualizationofbelongingispremisedupon implies asenseofnon-belonging,fakenessorfraud, own,” Tu writes. men aroundme,mostofwhicharemuchworsethanmy pride andegoiswounded: “I envythetrue wounds ofthe when hisbrotherRangiinjureshimintentionallythatTu’s that theBattalionenduresaredeeplyunnerving. “made therightdecision”evenasnumberofcasualties national body. as theguarantee ofwhoisseenasalegitimatemember ofthe such actsofrecognitionbecause itreinstatesthenation-state membership fromnation-states. AndreaSmithquestions in apoliticsofrepresentation thatrequiresrecognitionof “equal citizen.” However, Tu’s desires for inclusionengage be included,asaMaoriman, within thesettlerstateasan as afull-member, notasan “imposter”revealshisdesireto state. Tu’s aspirationstoparticipateintheMaoriBattalion this case, the “state”mustalsoberecognizedasasettler by andofteninaccordancetotheinterestsofstate.In groups necessitates acts of violence, acts which are required during WWII),itisafactthatbeingmemberofsuch Regiment CombatTeam composedofJapaneseAmericans by statepowerintimesofneed(forinstance,the442nd Maori Battalion may be, or other minority groups mobilized violence. Regardless of how courageous and admirable the tutes definitionsofmasculinitytomeanparticipationin of) hismasculinityemphasizeshowthemilitaryreconsti- Tu interpretsRangi’s attackasanon(orinvalidation Though myanalysishasmainlyfocusedonPita,he This ideaofbelongingthatTu aspiresto—theinclu- xxiii Ifweconsider the dangersofinclusion xviii xx Thephrase “true wounds”indicatesTu’s Heremainssteadfastinhisbeliefthathe not manenoughtowithstand to strugglewithcompeting xxi Iftheword“imposter” xix Itisonly xxii That - - - - feedback intheearlystagesof my paper. Professor Keldermanforprovidingmewithguidanceand throughout mytimeatOberlinCollege.Thankyouto Ofori-Mensa forherencouragement,wisdom,andinsight throughout thispaper. Iam alsogratefultoProfessorAfia Professor JanCooper, who hasgenerouslysupportedme Endnotes Acknowledgements the impact of heteropatriarchy in are affectedbyheteropatriarchy. Thoughmydiscussionof the trauma thatPitaandTu faceandalsoseehowthey father andPita.Itissimultaneouslypossibletoacknowledge are acycleTu himselfisimplicatedin,namelythroughhis wounds arehealed.Theintergenerationalimpactsoftrauma and substanceabusethatpervadedecadesafterthephysical unquantifiable: itisdeathandcyclesoftrauma,depression ing membershipintothenation.The“price,”ofcourse,is the violence that must be enacted as the “price” of receiv- the illusionofinclusionwhichworktojustifyandnaturalize eficial tothesettlerstateofNewZealandbecauseitgives with thediscoursesofheroicpatriotismandloyaltyareben- mobilization ofMaorimenintheBattalion,coupled with bothwhitesupremacyandsettlercolonialism.The eropatriarchy aspervasiveandworkinginconjunction perspective toreadingPatriciaGrace’s Tu tion ofviolencefortherighttocontrolland. militaristic definitions that arepredicated upon the justifica- definitions ofmasculinitywhichadheretothenationaland to include and exclude.” to landascommoditythatmustthenrelyonboundaries sumption behindaheteronormativenationisrelationship national belongingbecauseitdemonstratesthatthepre- the needtochallenge“presumedheteronormativityof utilize Maorimenmerelyfortheirmanpower. Smithasserts away aspartofanationaldiscourseheroismthatseeksto it atthistime,thathislifeismore valuablethangivingit nation-state byremindinghim,thoughTu doesnotrealize Rangi interruptsTu’s visionofimaginaryinclusionintothe act ofinjuringTu asanactofinterruption.Inthisnarrative, ii i manifestations. without aseriousconsiderationofheteropatriarchyandits that collectiveaimsfordecolonizationcannotbeachieved text-based withinafictionalaccount,itiscriticaltorealize Donna Coates, “‘When theWorldDonna Coates,“‘When isFree’:Traumatized Soldiersin Patricia Grace,Tu and SoniaBaelo-Allué (Amsterdam:Rodopi,2011)29–55. Facets ofTrauma inthePost-Colonyand Beyonded.byDoloresHerrero Patricia Grace’s SecondWorld War NovelTu I wishtoexpressmysincerethanksmentor, A Native feminist theory approach creates anew , (Honolulu:UniversityofHawai’iPress, 2004)34. xxiv In that way, Rangi disturbs Tu’s Tu Tu ” inTheSplintered Glass: is specific and con- that locateshet- iii Erin Suzuki, “Genealogy and Geography in Patricia Grace’s Tu,” MFS King, Michael. “Between Two Worlds” in Oxford History of Modern Fiction Studies 58 (2012): 112–127. Accessed May 10, 2016, New Zealand, ed by W. H. Oliver & B. R. Williams (Oxford: https://muse.jhu.edu/ Clarendon, 1981), 289. Quoted in Donna Coates, “‘When the iv Maile Arvin, Eve Tuck, and Angie Morrill, “Decolonizing Feminism: World is Free’: Traumatized Soldiers in Patricia Grace’s Second Challenging Connections between Settler Colonialism and World War Novel Tu” in The Splintered Glass: Facets of Trauma Heteropatriarchy,” Feminist Formations 25 (2013): 11. in the Post-Colony and Beyond ed. by Dolores Herrero and Sonia v Arvin, Tuck and Morrill, “Decolonizing Feminism,” 13. Baelo-Allué. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011, 37. vi Grace, Tu, 172. Kuhn, Annette, and Guy Westwell. “femme fatale.” In vii Grace, Tu, 171. A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press, viii Grace, Tu, 172. 2012. http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/ ix Annette Kuhn and Guy Westwell, “femme fatale,” in Dictionary acref/9780199587261.001.0001/acref-9780199587261-e-0266 of Film Studies. Oxford University Press, 2012, http://www.oxford reference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199587261.001.0001/ Ramirez, Renya K. “Race, Tribal Nation, and Gender: A Native acref-9780199587261-e-0266 Feminist Approach to Belonging.” Meridians: feminism, race, x Renya K. Ramirez, “Race, Tribal Nation, and Gender: A Native transnationalism 7 (2007): 22–40. Feminist Approach to Belonging,” Meridians: feminism, race, transnation- alism 7 (2007): 22. Smith, Andrea. “Queer Theory and Native Studies: The xi Michael King, “Between Two Worlds” in Oxford History of New Zealand, of Settler Colonialism.” GLQ: A Journal of ed by W. H. Oliver & B. R. Williams (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981), 289, Lesbian and Gay Studies 16 (2010): 42–68. quoted in Donna Coates, “‘When the World is Free’: Traumatized Soldiers in Patricia Grace’s Second World War Novel Tu” in The Suzuki, Erin. “Genealogy and Geography in Patricia Grace’s Tu.” Splintered Glass: Facets of Trauma in the Post-Colony and Beyond ed by MFS Modern Fiction Studies 58, no. 1 (2012): 112–127. Accessed Dolores Herrero and Sonia Baelo-Allué (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011), 37. May 10, 2016. https://muse.jhu.edu/ xii Suzuki, “Geneology and Geography,” 114. xiii Grace, Tu, 139. xiv Grace, Tu, 140. xv Grace, Tu, 99. xvi Arvin, Tuck, and Morrill, “Decolonizing Feminism,” 15. xvii Grace, Tu, 100. xviii Grace, Tu, 34. xix Grace, Tu, 35. xx Grace, Tu, 237. xxi Grace, Tu, 237. xxii Grace, Tu, 237, emphasis mine. xxiii Andrea Smith, “Queer Theory and Native Studies: The Heteronormativity of Settler Colonialism,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 16 (2010): 63. xxiv Smith, “Queer Theory and Native Studies,” 63.

Works Cited

Arvin, Maile, Eve Tuck, and Angie Morrill. “Decolonizing Feminism: Challenging Connections between Settler Colonialism and Heteropatriarchy.” Feminist Formations 25 (2013): 8–34.

Coates, Donna. “‘When the World is Free’: Traumatized Soldiers in Patricia Grace’s Second World War Novel Tu.” In The Splintered Glass: Facets of Trauma in the Post-Colony and Beyond. Edited by Dolores Herrero and Sonia Baelo-Allué. Amsterdam: Rodopi. 2011. 29–55.

Grace, Patricia. Tu. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2004.

65 66 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 domestic violence towardsindigenouswomen, therehasnot at themultiple oppressionsindigenouswomen faceand indigenous leadershipinEcuador, andothershavelooked focused onthehistoryofindigenous movementsandfemale roles havereceivedlittleattention. Whilesomescholarshave the routes they have taken tooccupy important leadership politics, butthechallengesthey faceasagentsofchangeand played acrucialroleinindigenousmovementsandnational be understoodinalltheircomplexity. they have, which encourage and undermine their leadership, these womenhavetakentobecomeleadersandthenetworks of environmental destruction. It is crucial that the routes women, farmers, and the lower class, while addressing issues a way to have justiceand equality for indigenous people, and acrossLatinAmericaareleadingthestruggletofind obstacles they faced. Indigenous women in ECUARUNARI economic hardship present in their lives were additional in ECUARUNARI. The government’s repression and the supported andunderminedindigenouswomen’s leadership Ecuador. Family, community, andformalorganizationsboth two monthsinsevendifferentprovincesthehighlandsof views of female Kichwa leaders conducted over a period of cles theyfaceindoing so. It’s basedontenin-depth inter ECUARUNARI attainleadershippositionsandtheobsta- how femaleindigenousleadersinthehighlandorganization roles haveoftengoneunnoticed.Thispaperfocuseson the routes they have taken tooccupy important leadership politics, butthechallengestheyfaceasagentsofchangeand played acrucialroleinindigenousmovementsandnational Introduction Abstract Missouri. at Victim intheSt.LouisCircuitAttorney’s Services Office, working asadomesticandfamilyviolenceadvocatecaseworker through theDavisProjectsforPeace.Currently Martinezis workshops withtheCouncilofWomen ofECUARUNARI from BowdoinCollege,Martínezdevelopedaseriesofleadership ferent communitiesusetogaingreater rights.Aftergraduating are forsocialchangetotakeplaceandonthetoolsdif- necessary they face.Martínezisinterested inexploringtheconditionsthat are abletobecomeagentsofchangedespitethemarginalization of PeoplestheKichwaNationalityEcuador, andhowthey indigenous femaleleadersinECUARUNARI,theConfederation minored inLatinAmericanstudies.Herresearch focuseson she majored insociologyandgenderwomen’s studiesand Caroline Martínezisarecent alumnaatBowdoinCollegewhere Caroline Martínez,BowdoinCollege in theHighlandsofEcuador Formation ofFemaleIndigenousLeaders Indigenous womeninthehighlandsofEcuadorhave Indigenous womeninthehighlandsofEcuadorhave - in doingso. ECUARUNARI, and the opposition and support they had women recognizedandaddressedwithintheirorganization, in thisstudywereabletogettheiroppressionasindigenous be usedinordertobetterunderstandhowtherespondents attain greaterrights?CrenshawandStockdill’s theorywill that aremarginalizedwithinanalreadygroup that bothCrenshawandStockdilldealwith:howdogroups indigenous leadersinECUARUNARIhadasimilarstruggle getting rid of different forms of oppression. The female and othergroupsinthismovementagainstAIDShad UP) andtheinternalstrugglepeopleofcolor, prisoners, writes abouttheAIDSCoalitiontoUnleashPower(ACT ism, sexism,andhomophobiawithinmovements.Stockdill activism intheU.S.andactivistswhofightagainstrac- intersections oftheseoppressions.HisworklooksatAIDS rience multiple forms of oppression and is centered on the lives. Stockdill’s (2001) theory focuseson people who expe- gory andignoringtheinfluencethattheirracehasin question theideaoflabelingwomenintosimplyonecate- ignored. LikeJulietaParedes(2008),Crenshawcallsinto they experience as both black people and women often gets are seenasneitherwomennorblackpeople,theoppression and female.Crenshawarguedthatbecauseblackwomen sion indigenouswomenface:asindigenous,lowerclass, which CarmenBlancoValer (2009)callsthetripleoppres- ways inwhichraceandgenderoppressionareexperienced, their leadership.Crenshaw’s theoryhighlightsthemultiple of this study navigate, which both strengthen and hinder order tounderstandthecomplexnetworksrespondents oppositional consciousnesswillbeusedinthispaper ity and Brett Stockdill’s (2001) theory of multidimensional seven different provinces in the highlands of Ecuador: interviews over aperiodoftwomonthswith womenfrom Theoretical Framework Methodology Ecuador. women fromsevendifferentprovincesinthehighlandsof period oftwomonthsinthesummer2015withKichwa paper isbasedontenin-depthinterviewsconductedovera repression andeconomichardshipplayanegativerole.This organization, community, andfamily, andthatgovernment their leadershipisbothunderminedandsupportedby of Ecuador’s largestindigenousorganization.Itarguesthat female leadersfaceinECUARUNARI,thehighlandbranch on boththesourcesofsupportandobstaclesindigenous affect indigenouswomen’s leadership.Thispaperfocuses been anoverarchingstudythatshowshowtheseoppressions Kimberlé Crenshaw’s (1989)theoryofintersectional- During thesummer of2015,Iconductedtenin-depth Imbabura, Pichincha, Chimborazo, Bolívar, Cañar, Azuay, Family, however, could also be a source of violence and Loja. The interviews ranged in length from forty-five and verbal abuse, constraining the respondents to tradition- minutes to two hours, and the respondents were recruited ally female spaces and limiting their leadership. Violence through snowball sampling. All of the respondents were against the respondents discouraged them from becoming current or past members of ECUARUNARI. The women leaders, threatening their physical integrity, creating fear, whom I interviewed were Saraguro, Puruha, Kayambi, and perpetuating a role of submission to their husbands Cañar, and Otavalo people, and all were part of the Kichwa and male family members. Five out of the ten women inter- nationality. Each interview was conducted according to a viewed reported experiencing physical abuse from their semi-structured protocol, including questions about the husbands or male family members. None said they had area the respondents were raised in, their initial involve- been attacked by a woman in their family, but some did talk ment with indigenous organizations, and the functions about women, like mothers, condoning the violence that was they performed in their leadership roles. The respondents’ perpetrated against them. The following saying recounted age ranged between forty-three to sixty-six years old. This by a respondent describes the situation of disempowerment research project went through the International Review many women felt: “Aunque mate, aunque pegue, marido es,” Board process at Bowdoin College and all the respondents meaning, “Even if he kills, even if he hits, he is the husband” gave permission to have their real names used. (Guacho, 2015).

Community Results

Family, community, formal organizations, govern- The community the respondents were a part of ment repression, and economic hardship emerged as signifi- offered them resources, a connection to their indigenous cant themes that affected the respondents’ leadership. culture and identity, and important mentors. By commu- nity I mean a physical location with a set of structures that Family enforced rules, regulated the behaviors of individuals, cre- ated activities and provided resources for people living in Family members were a source of inspiration and the same geographical area. For the women in this study this support for the respondents and were often their first point meant the indigenous commune where they grew up and all of contact with indigenous struggles. Five out of the ten the people who belonged to it. Receiving assistance from the respondents had family members who were community community was particularly important for the respondents leaders. These family members were fathers, uncles, and who did not receive it from family members or other people aunts who occupied various leadership positions from presi- and institutions. Carmen Lozano, the current Leader of dents of their communes to ECUARUNARI’s regional lead Women in ECUARUNARI, claimed an elder man in her ers. Family members verbally encouraged women to become community was the most influential person in her life. She involved in organizing, to speak up, and to further their edu- described one of her interactions with him as follows: cation. Baleriana Anaguarqui, a Puruha Kichwa leader from Chimborazo who cofounded the Organization of Women “You have to guide this community, the people of Lorenza Abimañay and ECUARUNARI, credits her father San Lucas, with the values that are ours. We are already old and you that are young must follow for her dedication to indigenous struggles in Ecuador. In this path.” So he’say, “The word has worth and is the following passage she describes a conversation with her sacred.” So that was instilled in me. That is why mother who wanted her to leave indigenous organizations I always remember them. They helped us start a because of the danger she faced: path. (Lozano, 2015)

“I am fighting because I have children. That’s why This elder man encouraged Lozano to be a leader and I’m fighting so my children don’t have to live under had faith in her capacity to guide her community. Having the conditions that I lived in. And that’s what my someone who wanted her to be a leader and trusted her dad said and I am doing it, fulfilling what my dad said. I can’t let my children live how I lived, herding allowed Lozano to have more confidence and to continue pigs, herding calves of the hacendados and without doing community organizing. having a shoe to wear.” I [Anaguarqui] told her, “No, mom. I’m not going to do that [leave the Community, however, also provided barriers for the struggle] . . . . I am going to be in the organization.” respondents because it could be a source of sexism, mis- So my mom gave me her blessing and said, “When treatment, and humiliation. Some women were discrimi- are you coming back?” I told her, “When the strug- nated against, silenced, disrespected and forced to conform gle ends.” to certain norms of oppression. Guacho, who cofounded several indigenous organizations in the country including 67 68 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 This councilwould increasewomen’s participation,address proposal to create a Council of Women in ECUARUNARI. been involvedincommunityorganizing fordecadeswrotea 2015, CarmenLozanoanda groupofwomenwhohad zation and its internal structure. During the summer of move. Women wereexpectednottoquestion theorgani- Focusing onwomen’s issueswasoftenregardedasadivisive sexist menwhodisrespectedoroutrightabusedwomen. vided obstaclesfortherespondents.Leadersoftenwere nous andwomen’s rights. became leaders in ECUARUNARI, advocating for indige- ten respondentswenttotheEscuelaDolores Cacuangoand ing howtodialogue.BeforeIfeltembarrassed.”Fiveofthe Cacuango Istartedlearning,gainingknowledgeandknow- I’d lowermyhead,butwhenIenteredtheEscuelaDolores anything, nothing. When there’d be questions [at meetings] a memberoftheEscuelaDolores Cacuango: “Iusedtonotsay of Women inECUARUNARI,recountsherexperienceas own autonomy. MaríaTenesaka (2015),theformerLeader further improve indigenous and women’s rights and their they wereinandthetoolsgainedfromorganizingto is anexampleofhowtherespondentsusedorganization political formationoffemaleindigenousleadersinEcuador, of oppression.TheEscuelaDolores Cacuango, aschoolforthe other womenwhowerestrugglingwithsimilarexperiences greater authorityintheirorganizationsandbeconnectedto created spacesforthemselvesthatallowedthemtohave rights asindigenouspeopleandwomen.Therespondents ferences andworkshopswherewomenadvocatedfortheir Ecuadorian society. Organizationscreatedactivities,con- a higherdegreeofagencythantheycouldintherest tions womenhadmore negotiating power and could gain to their survival, which meant that within the organiza- sexism existsintheseorganizations,womenwerecrucial nity organizingandgainnewleadershipskills.Eventhough respondents anopportunitytobecomeinvolvedincommu- Organizations greatly limittherespondents’leadershipandsafety. community wasnotalwaysasourceofsupportandcould forced marriageandtheabusesheendured—showsthat condemnation ofherdivorce—anditsfailuretooppose port of priest Monseñor Leonidas Proaño, her community’s Guacho’s marriagewaseventuallyannulledwiththesup- and accusedofbeingabadwife(Guacho,2015).Although In acommunitymeetingGuachowaspubliclyshamed she wasforcedtomarrywhensixteenyearsold). prohibited herfromdivorcingabusivehusband(whom has notreturnedtohercommunityindecadesbecauseit the ConfederationofIndigenousNationalitiesEcuador, Formal indigenous organizations, however, also pro- Formal organizations, like ECUARUNARI, gave the yet anotherobstacletherespondentshadtoconfront. type ofphysicalrepressionsshowsEcuador’s governmentis or any other right winggovernment”(Martínez, 2015). This of FebresCordero[presidentEcuadorfrom1984-1988] are repressingusmorethantheydidunderthegovernment have beentreatedsoterribly. They[themilitaryandpolice] participated sincethe1990sandthisisfirsttimethatwe concern abouttheviolenceshewaswitnessing,“We have women and old men”(Martínez, 2015). Lema,also expressed clubs, andtheydidn’t carethatthey were dragging pregnant dragged peopleoutoftheirhomeshittingthemwithbilly soldiers] carriedoutamassacre.InSaragurotheysavagely in thenationalstrike.AccordingtoLozano,“They[the by the targeted violence indigenous women had to endure Women ofECUARUNARI,wereparticularlyconcerned to “shutup”(EcuadorNews,2008). with makeupandnottheeconomy(ElUniverso,2016), prominent femalepoliticalfigurestoconcernthemselves Saturday, andTwitter account.Ecuador’s Presidenthas told Sabatinas, PresidentCorrea’s addresstothecountryevery slurs andsexistlanguagePresidentRafaelCorreausesinhis country’s nationalstrikeinAugust2015andbytheracial the police’s physical attacks of indigenous women in the repression ofEcuador’s governmentwasalsoevidentin become educatedandtohavesteadyjobsaseducators.The maintain theircultureandpassitontochildren, system ofeducation,whichhelpedindigenouspeopleto tically eliminatedtheinterculturalbilingualindigenous them inmultipleways.Ecuador’s governmenthasprac- they facedwithEcuador’s governmentwhichoppresses meet theirneeds. Eightoutofthetenrespondents worked not includeasalary, andtheyneededasource ofincometo of timebecause theirfulltimepositionsasorganizers did respondents hadtoleavetheir organizationforaperiod tional optionsandinvolvement inorganizingefforts.Some leadership opportunitiesbecause itrestrictedtheireduca- Government Economic Hardship not focusingonmoreimportantissues. wanting todivideECUARUNARI,ofwastingtimeand women opposedits creation. Someaccusedthewomenof president of ECUARUNARI, but most men and even some who supportedthisinitiativelikeCarlosPerez,thecurrent conference ofthisorganization.Therewereafewmen bers ofECUARUNARIwhospokeagainstitattheannual power inECUARUNARI.Itwaspoorlyreceivedbymem- their particularconcerns,andgivethemmorenegotiating Lozano andJosefinaLema,theformerLeaderof The respondents spoke at length about the challenges Economic hardshipgreatlylimited therespondents’ in agriculture; and the constant travelling they had to do as oppressions they were simultaneously experiencing. They community leaders conflicted with their work that bound were very aware of the of oppression they them to the land. faced, but their challenge was to have their organization and Ecuadorian society see it and work to eliminate it as well. Baleriana Anaguarqui’s story shows that poverty was a real obstacle for respondents who wanted to be involved Crenshaw and Stockdill’s theories, however, do not in community organizing. Despite the fact that she was an address the particular problems indigenous women in this extremely successful leader who cofounded ECUARUNARI, study experienced. They do not deal with the battle indig- she was forced to decrease her involvement with organiza- enous women in this study faced in trying to maintain their tions of indigenous resistance because she had to meet her culture and ethnic identity, which was constantly threat- family’s basic needs. According to Anaguarqui (2015): ened by Ecuador’s government and private sectors, while challenging the movement that supported their ethnic and We [Anaguarqui and her husband] had to start and class struggle but undermined their quest for equality and work for the family because really there were days leadership as women. The respondents were constantly when we didn’t have anything to eat because we were always involved in the organization, in the pushing their organization to meet their rights and working struggles, so we had left our children unattended. with this same organization to engage in continuous forms We were so poor and that was what forced us . . . of resistance at a national level. ECUARUNARI gave the to leave a social activity that I loved so much, that I respondents a unique opportunity to gain greater agency had done so much for. and address their concerns as indigenous women, but it also provided barriers and further marginalized them from Anaguarqui’s comments show that there was pain within. and regret in leaving the struggles in which she had been so heavily invested in for years and illustrates the great eco- Acknowledgements nomic challenges the respondents faced. I would like to thank my mom, brothers, and host Conclusion parents, Doug Bates and Lynn Kay, for their support and interest in my education and research. I would also like This research describes how family, community, to thank Professor Ingrid Nelson, who was my advisor and organizations encouraged and discouraged indigenous and helped me improve my research and present it in the women in ECUARUNARI to become leaders and to be National Association of Hispanic and Latino Studies’ annual active political agents and the constant obstacles they faced conference, 2016. This research project would not have from government repression and economic hardship. The been possible without the support of Professor Susan Faludi, results of this study show that the respondents do have a Nadia Celis, and Kristen Ghodsee. Professor Susan Faludi multidimensional oppositional consciousness that allows helped me edit my research countless times and challenged them to support ECUARUNARI while challenging it from me to think of ways to reach out to a non-scholarly audience. within to make it be more just for women. Crenshaw (1989) While conducting an independent study with Professor and Stockdill’s (2001) theories were useful for this study Nadia Celis, I realized that I was in awe of indigenous because they tackled the complexity of the multiple oppres- women’s resilience in Latin America and their ability to con- sion the respondents faced. The respondents were con- nect various struggles, and thus decided to embark on this scious of the multiple levels of oppression they faced, which research project. Professor Kristen Ghodsee’s office hours Carmen Blanco Valer (2009) points out as the triple oppres- are one of the main reasons I decided to graduate from col- sion indigenous women face due to gender, race, and eco- lege, go to graduate school, and learn how to be a researcher nomic disparity, and worked to eliminate them within their and change maker at the same time. Miguel Áviles, my best organization and country. They did this by creating forms of friend, helped me stay focused on the goal of my project and resistance within that would allow their voices as indigenous gave me hope and motivation when they ran dry. women to be heard. Two examples of this are the Escuela Dolores Cacuango, which trained indigenous women to be References active political agents of change, and the eventual creation of the Committee of Women of ECUARUNARI, which Ana María Guacho, personal interview, July 14, 2015, Riobamba, allowed women in ECUARUNARI to be more involved Ecuador. in decision making processes and organize around issues Baleriana Anaguarqui, personal interview, June 26, 2015, that affected indigenous women. The respondents con- Riobamba, Ecuador. stantly tried to address the particular concerns they had as indigenous women, which encompassed all the types of 69 70 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Tenesaka, María,personalinterview, June25,2015,Cañar, Stockdill, BrettC.2001.“ForgingaMultidimensional Paredes, Julieta.2008.Hilandodesdeelfeminismocomunitario. Martínez, Caroline.2015.“Correa’s RegimeChallenged.”Change El Universo.2016.RafaelCorrea dicequeCynthiaViteri debería Ecuador News.2008.“Noseasmajadera,cállate.”Ecuador: Crenshaw, Kimberle.1989.“DemarginalizingtheIntersectionof Carmen Lozano,personalinterview, June10,2015, Blanco Valer, Carmen.2009.LasHijasdelaPachamama.Lima, Ecuador. Chicago, IL:UniversityofChicago. Oppositional Consciousness:TheSubjectiveRootsofSocialProtest. AIDS Activism,”inJ.J.MansbridgeandA.D.Morris,eds., Oppositional Consciousness:LessonsfromCommunity-Based : Lesbianasindependientesfeministassocialistas. Magazine. Retrieved2015. “hablar demaquillaje,”noeconomía.Ecuador:ElUniverso. News. : Vol.Chicago LegalForum 1989,Iss.1,Article8,139–167. Doctrine, FeministTheoryandAntiracistPolitics,”Universityof Race andSex:ABlackFeministCritiqueofAntidiscrimination ECUARUNARI office,,Ecuador. Perú: EdicionesLuchaindígena. The Secular Speaks to the Sacred: The Challenges of Western-Islamic Communicative Action in Politics of Piety Iman Masmoudi, Harvard University

Iman Masmoudi studies social studies at Harvard College. serious—challenge can be found in the actual lifeworld that Her focus field is on theories of Islamic authority in modernity, Habermas is so concerned with preserving. It is the ques- and she is interested in the effect of changes in religious pedagogy tion: how can secular and religious people communicate? on modern forms of religious practice. She is highly involved On what foundation can they reach Habermas’s standard of in the Harvard Islamic Society and the Phillips Brooks House mutual understanding? Habermas attempts to outline the Association for Public Service. She hopes to study legal theory necessary theoretical foundations of such a conversation, yet both within and without the field of Islamic thought in post- questions remain as to its practical applications. graduate programs. Saba Mahmood’s Politics of Piety, an ethnography on women’s religious practice in Egypt, is a particularly useful Abstract text for this discussion given that conversation between secular-liberal Western individuals and Muslims is among Some have challenged the German sociologist Jurgen the most significant challenges of the modern era. An Habermas’s theory of communicative action on the basis of examination of this text, which exemplifies such secular- its infeasibility, while others have challenged it with post- religious communicative action, shows that Habermas’s modernist accounts of power relations, such as Foucault’s. theoretical conditions for such a discourse ultimately con- This paper, however, argues that a serious—perhaps more tribute to its practical shortcomings. To make this argument serious—challenge can be found in the actual lifeworld that using Politics of Piety, this paper will do three things. First, Habermas is so concerned with preserving. It is the ques- it will outline Habermas’s theory of communicative action tion: how can secular and religious people communicate? and specify his vision for religious-secular dialogue. Then, On what foundation can they reach Habermas’s standard of it will illustrate how Mahmood’s exploration and methodol- mutual understanding? Habermas attempts to outline the ogy constitute a Habermasian discourse between religious necessary theoretical foundations of such a conversation, and secular people. Finally, by using Mahmood’s study of yet questions remain as to its practical applications. Saba Egyptian Muslim women as a case study of Habermasian Mahmood’s Politics of Piety, an ethnography on women’s discourse, this paper will illustrate precisely how certain religious practice in Egypt, is a particularly useful text for conditions of Habermas’s theory of theocentric-anthropo- this discussion given that conversation between secular- centric communicative action ultimately lead to its failure liberal Western individuals and Muslims is among the most to achieve his standard of mutual understanding. Overall, significant challenges of the modern era. An examination this paper hopes, through identifying these challenges, to of this text, which exemplifies such secular-religious com- provoke further consideration and propose possible prem- municative action, shows that Habermas’s theoretical con- ises for secular-religious dialogue and understanding in the ditions for such a discourse ultimately contribute to its future. practical shortcomings. To make this argument using Politics of Piety, this paper will do three things. First, it will outline The Theory of Communicative Action on Religion Habermas’s theory of communicative action and specify his in Modernity vision for religious-secular dialogue. Then, it will illustrate how Mahmood’s exploration and methodology constitute Habermas frames his theory of communicative a Habermasian discourse between religious and secular action as a redeeming project for modernity, rationalism, people. Finally, by using Mahmood’s study of Egyptian and Enlightenment ideals. He recommends a “redirection” Muslim women as a case study of Habermasian discourse, rather than an abandonment of these ideals and outlines this paper will illustrate precisely how certain conditions the means by which to assess the benefits and shortcom- of Habermas’s theory of theocentric-anthropocentric com- ings of rationality and, subsequently, pivot towards a new municative action ultimately lead to its failure to achieve understanding of modernity and progress. The foundational his standard of mutual understanding. Overall, this paper assumption of Habermas’s new rationality is that the ulti- hopes, through identifying these challenges, to provoke mate aim of language is mutual understanding, and that further consideration and propose possible premises for communicative action, unlike purposive rational action or secular-religious dialogue and understanding in the future. strategic action, aims towards achieving this understanding between subjects. As such, speech acts have three possible valid outcomes: moral truths, subjective truths, and truths Some have challenged the German sociologist Jurgen about the objective world.i Habermas’s theory of communicative action on the basis of its infeasibility, while others have challenged it with post- Habermas’s emphasis on dialogue is different from modernist accounts of power relations, such as Foucault’s. past thinkers in two important ways. First, he places lit- This paper, however, argues that a serious—perhaps more tle weight on the importance of communicative action for 71 72 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Habermas’s ideal. Mahmood constitutes the secular side of movement’s participants, which alignsveryclosely with centered onachievinggreater understandingofthepiety ethnographic methodologyisobservation andconversation or manipulatethewomen’s thoughts.Atthe core ofher did notintend,byherconversations, topersuade,barter, clearly falloutsidetherange of “strategicaction,”asshe secular-religious communication. analyzing thepracticalapplicationsofHabermas’s theoryof core oflanguage.Becausethis,itisausefulexamplefor action theory:thetelosofmutualunderstandingat the fundamentalassumptionofHabermas’s communicative alike. Her conversations with religious subjects centered on viewing participants of the mosque movement and outsiders ings, learningaboutwomen’s Islamiceducation,andinter Mahmood, spenttwoyearsinCairoattendingmosquemeet- modern “pietymovement”inEgypt.Theauthor, Saba another ormerelyaboutoneanother.” However, itmakesadifferencewhetherwespeakwithone the viewfromafaroftheocentricorcosmocentricthinking. the alternativebetweenananthropocentricorientationand of WhatIsMissing,hewrites, “We should not trytododge religious-secular communication. In his work of hisrationalizationtheorycommunicative action to tions oftherolereligioninmodernityandapplication Habermas hasrecentlybegunengagingindeeperexplora- Politics ofPietyasHabermasianDiscourse edge. power to upend dogma and create self-corrective knowl- arguments for free speech largely rest on a belief in its arriving atgreater truths, unlike Mill and others, whose of Western reason,sciences,anduniversalistmorality. subjects, these conditions are to “accept the authority” centric-theocentric conversations to occur. For religious to outlineasetofnecessaryconditionsfortrueanthropo- is “inprincipleuniversallyaccessible.” thing thatcannotbetranslatedintosecularlanguage,which judge “truthsoffaith,”butatthesametimetorejectany- Meanwhile, forsecularsubjects,theconditionsaretonot situation thatcanaccountforallvoices. post-structuralists, ashestilladvocatesforanidealspeech who discountpowerrelationsinspeech,butalsofromthe communicative action,settinghimselfapartfromthose of the inclusion and recognition of marginalized voices in of progress.Second,Habermasstressestheimportance essarily sustainedchallengestoacceptedbeliefsforthesake leads toagreementormutualunderstanding,andnotnec- ii Incontrast,Habermasseeksrationaldiscoursethat Mahmood’s conversationswithEgyptianwomen Politics ofPietyisanethnographicexplorationthe Stemming fromthistheory of communicativeaction, vi iii iv Thus,hegoeson An Awareness - v

As heoutlines: questions thatarisefromtheroleofreligioninmodernity. can alsoseethatHabermasisequallyconcernedwithglobal of Habermasiandiscourse.However, ifwelookcloser, we Egyptian women,doesnotexemplifytheintra-statescope being a discourse between the American Mahmood and thought wouldbenefit fromdialoguewithreligion, heisalso while Habermas recognizesthatthesecularstate andliberal in thoseregionscenturiesago, thisexcerptindicatesthat Africa andSoutheastAsia,asopposed toitshavingarrived ing thatIslamiscurrently“extending” intosub-Saharan discourse.” izens, aswelltheroleofreligiouscitizensinnational determine howthesecularstateshouldtreatitsreligiouscit- He mentions that thiscommunicative action may help to between religiousandsecularcitizenswithinthesamestate. Awareness of What Is Missing, to be communicative action Habermas’s intendedscope,whichappearsatfirst,inAn a Habermasian secular-religious dialogue may point to understand herpointaboutcultureandreligion. as amutuallyrecognizedexternalsymboltohelpMahmood nicating withMahmooddirectlyandpointingtothehijab the mosquemovementparticipants,HajjaFatma,commu- that alsoentailsotherresponsibilities.” lot of them wear it as a custom, rather than a religious duty these womenwearingthehijab,youmustrememberthata directly] asaforeignerlookatsocietyrightnowandseeall tance inEgyptsaid:“Whenyou[heresheaddressedme whom sheinterviewedonissuesofsecularizationandresis- standing. For example, Mahmood recounts how one woman symbols, asHabermassuggests,inordertoachieveunder relating toherpersonalexperiencesormutuallyrecognized stand them.Theyaddressherdirectlyinsomecases,even in adialoguewithMahmoodandattempttohelpherunder part, theMuslimwomensheinterviewsalsoengagedirectly eral tradition,despiteherMuslimheritage.Andfortheir sion, shecomesfromandwritesintheWestern secular-lib- this religious-secular dialogue because, by her own admis- Setting asidethehistorical inaccuracy ofclaim- as An objectiontounderstandingPoliticsofPietyas of Islam.” main issuehasbeenthepoliticalinstrumentalization denominations . . . . SinceSeptember11,2001,the of conflictsbetweendifferentreligiousgroupsand hand-in-hand withan increase inthefrequency into SoutheastAsia . . . . Thisresurgence isgoing the MiddleEastbothintosub-SaharanAfricaand munities . . . the[Muslims]areextendingfrom by the the worldbyunexpectedspiritualrenewaland conflicts whicharecurrentlybeingtriggeredaround “[Liberal/Secular-Religious dialogue]toucheson viii Thus,itmaybearguedthatPoliticsofPiety, unsettling political role of religious com - ix vii Hereweseeoneof - - concerned with the trajectory of global religious revival and gleaned from discourse, engagement with sources, and “politicization.” He argues that the importance of anthro- learning from their female teachers. pocentric-theocentric discourse, because of the pressing global questions to which he alludes, is useful outside of the The book is, in many ways, a paradigm-shifting public sphere of any one particular state. A secular-religious moment in postcolonial and feminist studies. Mahmood’s discourse that is inter-state and centers on Islam is directly uplifting of Muslim women’s voices and her transcrip- relevant to his purpose in setting up conditions for reli- tion of their objectives and challenges is too often absent gious-secular dialogue. Thus, while Politics of Piety does not from Western feminist discourse. Her deep knowledge directly fit the mold of secular-religious dialogue—it is not of the potentially problematic politics of such a West-to- a direct transcription of such a dialogue—the author’s meth- East examination are commendable. All of this, however, odology encompasses all of Habermas’s requisite conditions, makes the ultimate inability of the text to bridge the gap and the book is a collection of those secular-religious con- in secular and religious mutual understanding all the more versations interspersed with their subsequent “translation” disappointing. to secular Western audiences in the form of Mahmood’s Ultimately, Mahmood’s exploration, while it success- analysis and commentary. fully challenges some fundamental assumptions of Western liberalism, is limited precisely by its fidelity to the require- Mahmood, Muslim Women, and Habermas’s Secular ments that Habermas sets out for secular-religious dis- Universality course: namely, the need to translate the experiences of the Egyptian women in the piety movement into a “univer- Mahmood appears aware of the political and poten- sally accessible” secular language. While this process allows tially Eurocentric undertones of a Western academic study Mahmood to open up new definitions of agency and sub- of Islamism, particularly of Muslim women. She rightly jectivity in the Western tradition, it also strips the original highlights that “current scholarly concern surrounding acts of their essential meaning. The women’s behaviors are Islam centers on this tradition’s (potentially dangerous) secularized, and therefore not just translated, but reconsti- divergence from the perceived norms of a secular-liberal tuted with a new and alien meaning. Consider how not one polity.” x Indeed, her exploration is powerfully aimed at of the Egyptian women involved with the piety movement prompting reexamination of not only external projections ever makes reference to agency, resistance, or other Western of Western norms and standards, but also internal meanings feminist concerns, and yet despite this, Mahmood’s central and assumptions. She introduces the text by saying: framework is a reexamination of forms of agency and an “If academic knowledge production aims to be expansion of the feminist project. This concept of agency something more than an exercise in denunciation runs counter to a theocentric worldview—it centers the and judgement, it must surely think beyond its human being as the agent and sets up their agency as the own naturalized conceptions in order to grasp what ultimate goal, rather than the theocentric ideal of complete other notions of criticism, evaluation, and reasoned surrender in obedience to God. deliberation operate in the world. This in turn requires opening up a comparative (and dare I say Thus, Mahmood first removes what was at the very critical?) study of different forms of subjectivity and heart of the women’s mosque movement, self-improvement xi concomitant disciplines of ethical self-formation.” and obedience to the interpreted will of God, and then seeks to make these actions intelligible to the secular-liberal Mahmood’s central question seeks not to evaluate narrative of “human flourishing.” One central concern that why “patriarchal” structures surrounding the Egyptian this process overlooks is that secular-religious dialogue will women in the piety movement exist, but rather how the necessarily fail if the search for secular justifications for reli- women navigate and uphold that space and cultivate them- giously motivated behaviors and ideas is unsuccessful. What selves while maintaining fidelity to its standards. In this happens when a secularized meaning can’t be derived for a exploration, she examines the trends in thought, argumen- particular religious truth, act, or ideal? Then that action, tation, resistance, and submission pertaining to a variety no matter how central to the religious person’s worldview of issues that these women face, including questions about or self-constitution, falls outside of the realm of potential leading other women in prayer, veiling, interacting in public mutual understanding since, according to Habermas, the with male non-family members, marriage, the obligations of secular subject must reject any religious truth that cannot be prayer, conflicting scholarly interpretations, resisting a sec- translated into “universally accessible” secular terms. ular outlook—in a phrase, cultivating piety amidst modern challenges. The women are constantly seeking their own Here, the matter of “universal accessibility” becomes self-improvement and cultivation through the knowledge the fundamentally flawed assumption of Habermas’s 73 74 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 egalitarian lawandmorality” in principlethoughnotalwayspractice,to“universalist and risingsecurityconcerns,oroutofitsowncommitment, such aspost- colonial immigration,foreignpolicyobjectives, out ofconversationwithIslam,whetherforpracticalreasons for suchadialogue.Meanwhile,theWest isunabletostep versalist secularlanguagethatHabermassetsasacondition make itdifficulttotranslateIslamintothepresumeduni- ultimate goal.Thisimpermeabilityandindigenousreliance course andcoretextsofIslamasboththeirmethod would alwaysbemotivatedbyafidelitytothejuristicdis- appear liberating to womenby Western standards, they debate oradoptdifferentopinionsthatineffectwould of thememberspietymovementwouldfrequently Mahmood’s repeatedobservationthatevenwhilesome must be rejected which cannot be “translated” opens Islam its tradition,forlanguageandnormativity. fundamental core,orsetofreferencepointsattheheart tions and ideals, and on the other, particularly reliant on a appears particularlyaversetoinfluenceby Western assump- versations ofourtime.Ontheonehand,Islamsometimes West isoneofthemostsoughtafter, butdifficult,con- selves andthelanguageusedtoexpressthem. contingent assumptionsthatunderlieboththeideasthem- accessible istocontradicthimselfandignorethehistorically merely naturalimpulses.To claimthattheyareuniversally ular andmodernideascanbetracedarethereforenot morality, implyingthatthehistoricaldevelopmentofsec- Habermas’s ownworkhasdelineatedagenealogyofsecular no such“baggage,”ensuringitsuniversalaccessibility. Yet to secularpeople,butthatdiscoursecomeswith “baggage” thatmakesitincomprehensibleinitsownterms conclusion that only religious discourse comes with extra innate predisposition.Habermas’s assumptionleadstothe particularly Islam, which see belief in the Divine as man’s a reversalofthebeliefwithinmanymonotheisticfaiths, tionally gain access to religiousdiscourse. This is itself to acceptseculardiscourse,andthatsomeindividualsaddi- sible istoimplyitsinnateness—thatallofusarebornable conditions. To say that secular discourse is universally acces- critique.” and withthesecular-liberal assumptionsthatanimatethis porary critiqueofIslamicethical andpoliticalbehavior, the Western academycanavoidengaging withthecontem- when shesays,“NostudyofIslamist politicssituatedwithin and Islam.Mahmoodrecognizes thisimbalanceherself characterizes theacademicrelationship betweentheWest ideas andtermsisindicativeofthepowerimbalancethat with others. salizing missionthatrequiresinterventionandinteraction Secular-religious dialoguebetweenIslamandthe This tendencytoassumetheuniversalityofWestern xiv However, the Habermasianconditionthat all xiii accompanied bya univer xii Consider - moral principles.” dation formodernhumanrightsphilosophyanduniversal lishing hiscategoricalimperative,whichremainsthefoun- German philosopherImmanuelKant’s purposeinestab- of whatismissing.” violations ofsolidaritythroughout theworld,anawareness awake, inthemindsofsecular subjects, anawarenessofthe these images,rationalmoralityfailsto“awaken,andkeep “court of international public opinion. ideas aretheultimatedeterminantsofIslam’s placeinthe skills intranslationandsecularjustificationofreligious which Islammustbemadetoconfess”—whoseparticular secular translators—“asecular-liberal inquisitionbefore municative action, Islam is still at the mercy of its Western end oftheattemptstowards mutual understandingand com- jects’ trueconcerns,upholdsthisverysystem.Thus,atthe emphasis onagencyandhumanfreedomdespitehersub- lation andprojectionofnewmeaning,exemplifiedbyher thinkers exemplified preciselythedifficulty that Habermas Genevan political theoristJean-JacquesRousseau. These be drawn from a balance between Kant and the French- in actionbasedonsolidarity.” order toprovidemoreinsightinto“thedecisionengage losophy needed to be developed after the Enlightenment in of collectivemoralresponsibility. Hearguesthatmoralphi- religious discoursetothemindsofsecularsubjectsisasense dialogue. and thepossibilitiesthatremainopenfor religious-secular West, Habermas’s viewontheusefulnessofsuchdiscourse, the broadchallengesfacingdialoguebetweenIslamand primarily directedagainst,itmaybeusefultobrieflyexamine to avoidthepessimismof thought thatHabermas’s workis dard againstwhichreligioustraditionsarejudged.However, secular subjectsandupholdstheWest astheuniversalstan- atic, asitdependsentirelyonthe“translation”skillsof secular-religious dialogueisbothimpracticalandproblem- Mahmood’s Conclusion criticizes. lar-liberal norms, the very practice which Mahmood herself up once again to “judgement” and “denunciation” by secu- understanding. own wordsdescribeaptlytheresultofthisprojectinmutual as collectivelybindingideals.” of themoralwhole—ofKingdomGodonearth— is foundinreligions:“theimages,preservedbyreligion, rationalized moralityleavesoutoneimportantfeaturethat This paper suggests that such moral philosophy could Habermas believesthatthepotentialcontributionof This paper argues, through an exploration of Saba xv Despiteherbestefforts,Mahmood’s actoftrans- Politics ofPiety,thattheHabermasianaccount xviii xx However, Habermasbelieves thatthis xvii xix This,hebelieves,wasthe Whilereligionpreserves xvi Here, Mahmood’s is identifying. While Kant’s moral philosophy was fully xii This is not to suggest that Islam has not, over its long history, learned rationalized, it lacked Rousseau’s powerfully binding from and engaged with other traditions, nor to imply that the tradition itself is unchanging or unadaptable. Rather, it is merely to point out General Will, which compelled every individual member of that the change has thus far largely been justified through the language, the collective to defer to its common good and moral judge- systems, and symbols of Islam itself. For further exploration of these ment.”xxi Famously, Rousseau declared that the General Will concepts, see Talal Asad’s Formations of the Secular and Intisar Rabb’s Doubt in Islamic Law. can never be in error, but rather compliance with it was both xiii required and constituted a moral good. There are striking Habermas, An Awareness of What Is Missing, 16. similarities between Rousseau’s General Will and the will of xiv Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 189. a sovereign Divine being. Both are binding, indivisible, and xv Ibid. infallible. Both require obedience even over the subjective xvi Ibid. disagreements of individuals in the collective. Importantly, xvii Habermas, An Awareness of What Is Missing, 18. both maintain the sense of moral responsibility and duty xviii Habermas, Jurgen. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. to the collective that Habermas believes lies at the heart of Cambridge, MA: MIT, 1990. Print, 89. “what is missing.” xix Habermas, An Awareness of What Is Missing, 19. Thus, this exploration suggests an alternative course xx Ibid. to the conditions that Habermas previously laid out for xxi Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. The Social Contract. London: W. Owen, 1751. religious-secular communicative action. Perhaps a return to “Chapter 3: Whether the General Will Is Fallible.” Rousseau’s social contract, with its emphasis on collective moral responsibility, and its similarities to a theocentric Works Cited view of the polity, can establish a new foundation upon which religious-secular discourse can be based—a founda- Habermas, Jürgen, Ciaran Cronin, and Pablo De Greiff. “A Genealogical Analysis of the Cognitive Content of Morality.” tion that does not privilege or falsely universalize one tra- The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theory. Cambridge, dition over another, but rather makes possible Habermas’s MA: MIT, 1998. N. pag. Print. aim of mutual understanding and, ultimately, agreement. This requires more work, of course, but has the potential to Habermas, Jürgen, Michael Reder, Josef Schmidt, and Ciaran create a foundation for the structure of society that is under- Cronin. An Awareness of What Is Missing: Faith and Reason in standable in both secular and religious discourse, namely a Post-secular Age. Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 2010. Print. collective fealty to a higher will outside of the individual. Habermas, Jürgen.Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 1990. Endnotes ———. The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. I. Boston: i Habermas, Jürgen.The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. I. Boston: Beacon, 1984. Print. Beacon, 1984. Print. ii Mill, John Stuart. On Liberty. London: Longmans, Green, 1867. Print. Mahmood, Saba. Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the iii Feminist Subject. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2005. Print. Habermas, Jürgen, Ciaran Cronin, and Pablo De Greiff. “A Genealogical Analysis of the Cognitive Content of Morality.” The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theory. Cambridge, MA: MIT, Mill, John Stuart. On Liberty. London: Longmans, Green, 1867. 1998. N. 42. Print. Print. iv Habermas, Jürgen, Michael Reder, Josef Schmidt, and Ciaran Cronin. An Awareness of What Is Missing: Faith and Reason in a Post-secular Age. Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. The Social Contract. London: W. Owen, Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 2010. Print. 16. 1751. v Ibid. vi Ibid. vii Mahmood, Saba. Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2005. Print, 50. viii Habermas, An Awareness of What Is Missing, 21. ix Ibid., 19–20, emphasis added. x Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 189. xi Ibid., preface to 2012, xii.

75 “Denied Their Gender”: The Impact of Medical Tourism on Access to Gender Reassignment Surgery by Kathoey Communities in Thailand Gissell Alexis Montoya, Bryn Mawr College

Originally from a loving Mexican migrant community in of MTF GRS from a medicalized, Thai-exclusive procedure, Houston, Texas, Gissell is a Mellon Mays Fellow and a Posse to one that is globalized and fueled by foreign exchange, Scholar. She is currently a senior at Bryn Mawr College pur- has rebranded MTF GRS as a costly procedure accessible suing a major in international studies with a minor in health mainly by international elite trans women—making MTF studies and is interested in researching how globalization impacts GRS inaccessible by Thailand’s own low- and middle-in- health care delivery. After she graduates, she plans to complete come kathoey communities. a fellowship program before going on to pursue a PhD in med- ical sociology to continue researching globalization, health, and Background inequality. She is currently a research intern at a public health corporation in Philadelphia. Considering how relatively understudied and poten- tiallyii large the trans community is in Thailand, it is vital to understand the importance of the kathoey community to the Abstract success of the GRS medical tourism industry that exists in Thailand today. GRS resulted from the heavy medicalization This research aims to problematize the gender reas- of communities in Thailand and was devised as signment medical tourism industry in Thailand. Using a “corrective” surgery to accompany “gender identity dis- descriptive statistics and previous literature, this prelim- orders” (Aizura, 2010, p. 430; Zucker and Lawrence, 2009, inary study explores the ways in which the gender reas- p. 9). GRS is regarded as one of the earliest forms of medi- signment medical tourism industry has reduced access to cal tourism in Thailand predating the boom of the medical male-to- female (MTF) gender reassignment surgery (GRS) tourism industry in 2000 (Aizura, 2010). Two decades after for kathoey communities in Bangkok, Thailand. I argue the first MTF GRS was performed in 1975, Thailand saw that the transformation of MTF GRS from a medicalized, a sizeable increase in foreign clientele seeking MTF GRS Thai-exclusive procedure, to one that is globalized and (Aizura, 2010; Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). This demand fueled by foreign exchange, has rebranded MTF GRS as was largely fueled by the lack of availability of MTF GRS in a costly procedure accessible mainly by international elite other countries (as in the case of Japan and Korea) as well trans women — making MTF GRS nearly inaccessible by as the rumored skill and innovation believed to be possessed Thailand’s own low- and middle-income kathoey communi- by Thai surgeons (Bookman, 2007). As a result, Thailand ties. This paper hopes to shed light on this important issue garnered an international reputation amongst transgender in Thailand today as well as highlight the need for further communities worldwide as a destination country for MTF research on the negative effects medical tourism can pose for gender reassignment surgery, but this success has been met destination country nationals. with great disparity. Thailand’s success is speculated to be having an effect on its most marginalized population kathoey communities. Introduction

Thailand has been dubbed the “mecca of transsexual The Kathoey of Thailand body modification” and has gained international acclaim for The transgender community in Thailand has had a its gender reassignment surgeries (GRS), specifically male- significant impact on Thailand’s culture, tourism and GRS to-female (MTF) (vaginoplasty) GRS (Aizura, 2010, p. 425). industry, especially the MTF kathoey community. Although Not surprisingly, transgender communities worldwide there are currently no formal, peer-reviewed studies that flock to major cities in Thailand like Bangkok to receive report statistics of Thailand’s transgender community, state-of-the-art gender reassignment surgeries (Wilson, unpublished studies report an estimated prevalence of 2011). This growing phenomenon resulted from Thailand’s 10,000 to 300,000 MTF individuals in Thailand as of 2002 desire to medicalize “transsexuality” within its local kathoey i (Ehrlich, 1996; Winter, 2002a; Winter, 2002b). As of 2002, communities (Aizura, 2010, p. 430; Aizura, 2011, p. 149; the population in Thailand was about 64 million (“The “Male-to-Female Sex Reassignment Surgery”). FTM GRS World Bank”), which, in ratio terms, puts the range of esti- is relatively uncommon and therefore the market for it is mated MTF prevalence in Thailand from 1:6,700 to 1:223. small in Thailand. It is for this reason that I will aim to focus One study by Matzner (1999) reports a “sorority” of over exclusively on MTF populations and MTF gender reassign- 100 MTF students at a Thai university with a population of ment surgery. The popularity of MTF GRS amongst kathoey The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 15,000 students. That’s about 1 in every 150 students. Even communities in Thailand quickly bred a demand for GRS the lowest prevalence estimate puts Thailand at a much overseas, especially among Westerners. Thus, GRS found higher rate than is found in other parts of the world. For its way into the market of medical tourism in Thailand and example in the Netherlands in 1990, the estimated prev- now caters to a largely foreign clientele. The transformation 76 alence of MTF was calculated to range from 1:45,000 to 1:11,900 (Bakker et al., 1993). In the United States, Harris outside Asia, with Japan providing the largest customer base (2015, p. 16) reported a figure of 19,019 to 32,027 for MTF from Asia (Aizura, 2010). It also comes as no surprise that in 2010 indicating a prevalence of 1:16,263 to 1:9657. And foreign patients tend to have higher levels of education and a 2011 study by Winter cited a reported figure of 1:13,000 work as doctors, engineers, lawyers, and police officers in MTF for Iran in 2010. These comparisons demonstrate a their respective countries; implying that they are better able significant difference in prevalence, although it is important to afford such procedures abroad (Chokrungvaranont et al., to note that these figures are estimates and cannot be guar- 2014). anteed with accuracy. In an effort to help demystify preva- lence figures ofkathoey in Thailand, one of Thailand’s major Currently, there are about 20 Thai surgeons that are research universities, Chulalongkorn University, is currently licensed to perform GRS in Thailand with the bulk of the gathering prevalence data on “transsexualism” throughout procedures being conducted by 6 major urban hospitals: PAI Thailand (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). (Preecha’s Aesthetic Institute) (Bangkok), Suporn Hospital (Pataya, Cholburee), Chettawut Hospital (Bangkok), Kamol Most of the kathoey who have undergone or are Hospital (Bangkok), Sanguan Hospital (Phuket), and Yanhee undergoing GRS are trans women who have received International Hospital (Bangkok) (Winter, 2014). MTF GRS. Kathoey usually undergo GRS in their 20s, with the mean age being 27 years old (17–50) in one study The medical tourism industry poses a big problem (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014), and 24.1 years in another for the kathoey community in Thailand. The recent boom (Winter, 2006). According to a study by Winter (2006), of the industry and increase in foreign clientele for GRS in over half of trans women reported growing up in cities,iii Thailand has transformed MTF GRS from a highly medi- most reported being of ethnic Thai or mixed Thai/Chinese calized procedure created exclusively for Thailand’s kathoey, heritage, 89.6% reported being of average income, 46.1% to one that is now largely exclusive to elite international reported having completed secondary school, and 23.3% trans women. Thailand’s thirst for foreign exchange has put reported having completed college (Winter, 2006). Because its most marginalized community, the kathoey, at risk for most kathoey start hormonal treatment at a very young age, reduced access to GRS. One study by Winter (2006) that (it is common to start as young as 10 years old) by the time surveyed a sample kathoey population in Thailand revealed they reach the age of consent in Thailand (18 years old), it that 48.2% of those surveyed have not undergone MTF is relatively easy to obtain approval by medical professionals GRS, but would like to. The issue at hand presents itself (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). as a problem of access to care, specificallykathoey access to MTF GRS in Thailand. Realizing that foreigners are willing to pay higher prices for GRS in Thailand, surgeons The Foreigner Undergoing GRS have amplified prices — with one clinic in particular raising Despite this, most of the individuals receiving MTF its prices from U.S. $2,000 in 2001 to U.S. $15,000 in 2006 GRS in Thailand are not in fact Thai, but rather for- (Aizura, 2009, Aizura, 2010). That’s nearly an 8-fold increase eign nationals from other countries. In the years between in only 4 years. If MTF GRS surgery was barely affordable 1985–1990, 95% of the patients receiving MTF GRS were for many Thais in 2000, then it unquestionably has become Thai with only 5% being foreigners. Two decades later, inaccessible for many Thai kathoey from low and average in 2010–2012, there is a complete reversal with foreigners income brackets. In addition, because nearly all of the MTF outnumbering Thai patients 10:1, meaning only 10% of GRS surgical procedures are performed in the private sec- patients undergoing MTF GRS are Thai with the latter tor, access to these procedures is made even more difficult. 90% of MTF GRS surgeries being performed on foreigners Reduced access to MTF GRS to kathoey populations is (see Table 1) (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). Currently, expressed in their desire to undergo GRS and therefore bar- the only hospital in Thailand that exclusively services Thais riers to going through with the procedure most likely relate is Chulalongkorn University Hospital. This is mostly due to issues of access and cost of MTF GRS. to the fact that the majority of the operations tend to be Furthermore, there is additional speculation that for educational purposes (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). substantial price increases in MTF GRS could be leading The large majority of foreign nationals that undergo GRS communities to seek MTF GRS elsewhere, more in Thailand receive MTF GRS with the mean age being 46 kathoey specifically, in “underground” clinics where most surgeons years old, ranging from 16–72 years old (Chokrungvaranont are unlicensed and not fully trained to perform MTF GRS. et al., 2014). The average age is significantly higher than There have been several reported instances of “castrations” that of Thai patients undergoing MTF GRS in Thailand (27 performed by non-urologists and non-plastic surgeons years old) (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). The majority in Thailand (Chokrungvaranont et al., 2014). There are of foreigners coming to Thailand for MTF GRS are non- currently no known statistics reporting unlicensed GRS Thais from Europe, North America and other countries 77 procedures, and this is likely due to the “underground” peers and devote their attention to friendships, partnership, nature of these performed procedures; there is no way to and career,” whereas those who are well into adulthood accurately quantify procedures obtained through a black are more likely to possess roles in society to which they market. Some of the health risks of receiving GRS from an have stronger gendered ties (i.e., father, partner, colleague) untrained professional can include inflammation, discolor- (Cohen-Kettenis and Goozen, 1997, p. 270). Moreover, ation of genital skin, silicone-induced pulmonary embolism, a study by Brummelhuis (1999) adds that this “fulfilled” as well as decreased sexual functioning (Hage et al., 2001; feeling is strongly tied to Thai daily life and society. In this Zucker, 2009). study, Naa, a self- identifiedkathoey , explains, “I will ask my friend whether he intends me to undergo a sex operation. Risk Factors If he wants it, I am prepared to do it” (Brummelhuis, 1999, p. 135). If kathoey feel the pressure to undergo GRS whether Predictors of decreased access to MTF GRS in that pressure be by family, friends, or colleagues, they will Thailand identified in this paper include: being Thai, iden- feel less fulfilled in life if they could not undergo GRS. tifying as kathoey, and coming from any income bracket that Overall, it is evident that receiving MTF GRS is vital to isn’t high income. Thai individuals that identify as kathoey living a “fulfilled” life for manykathoey individuals. Patients and come from a lower-income bracket are significantly that were allowed treatment reported GRS as being “ther- more likely to experience reduced access to MTF GRS. apeutic and beneficial” to their general wellbeing, whereas Access to MTF GRS would have been likely higher in the those who were denied treatment evidently would continue late ’90s to early 2000s, before the boom of the medical to live unfulfilled lives (Brummelhuis, 1999; Smith et al., tourism industry and when MTF GRS was more exclusive 2001; Cohen-Kettenis and Goozen, 1997, p. 269). to the people of Thailand. The risk differential between Thais and foreigners is significant. Ones chances of receiv- Limitations ing MTF GRS are much higher if one is a foreign trans woman with a high-earning profession. Because MTF GRS Currently the bulk of the research on transgender is largely restricted to the private sector, I speculate that communities and GRS in Thailand come in the form of living in a rural area of Thailand would further restrict narratives and qualitative studies. Few studies lean towards access. In rural areas, access to healthcare is dependent on more quantitative work, although it is apparent that the field the public sector but because GRS is generally performed is growing. Because formal epidemiological studies on the in private hospitals (usually in cities), living in a rural area prevalence of MTF individuals in Thailand are lacking, no would greatly decrease access to MTF GRS. strong conclusion can be drawn. The large majority of the quantitative evidence used throughout this paper came from Psychosocial Impacts of Being Denied GRS non peer-reviewed, unpublished articles, although several articles indicated that large-scale studies were currently Kathoey individuals remain a largely understudied under way by Thai universities to help gain better insight population in Thailand so the effects of being denied GRS into the MTF transsexual prevalence throughout Thailand are not well understood. With this being said, there are a (Ocha, 2013; Winter, 2002a; Winter, 2002b; Winter, 2002c; select number of Western studies that have researched the Winter, 2006). The majority of the research articles used psychosocial impact on MTF transgender individuals that for this paper contained internal validity, that is, they only have been allowed or denied GRS. In a 2001 study that possessed validity within their own study claims, and could measured psychosocial functioning (postoperative gender not be generalized to the rest of the kathoey community in dysphoria, feelings of regret, behavior, psy- Thailand because most studies were urban-biased. Most of chological, social and sexual functioning) in transgender the studies took place in large cities, such as Bangkok, and individuals who received or were denied GRS, it was dis- are not fully representative of the other regions of Thailand. covered that transgender adolescents who were denied GRS experienced a worse level of functioning than those that Preventative Interventions were allowed treatment (Smith et al., 2001). An earlier study from 1997 even found that receiving GRS before There currently are no large trials looking at how to adulthood resulted in more “favorable postoperative func- improve access to MTF GRS in Thailand because medical tioning” compared to individuals who received GRS later tourism is at a very early stage in not only Thailand but also

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 into adulthood (Cohen-Kettenis and Goozen, 1997, p. 263). across major medical tourism hubs around the world. Due This could be due to the fact that adolescents, getting to its early stage, the effects of medical tourism have not treated so young, can go on to live more fulfilling lives in been fully realized (Pocock and Phua, 2011). Research in their newly acquired gender role within society — free from this area of study remains largely anecdotal as opposed to 78 gender dysphoria anxieties. “They can catch up with their statistical in nature and therefore at this point, only educated speculations can be made, although, a good amount of liter- Aizura, A. Z. (2011). The Romance of the Amazing Scalpel ature recognizing medical tourism’s effect on the destination “Race,” Labour, and Affect in Thai Gender Reassignment country have begun to surface. These studies contemplate Clinics. In P. A. Jackson (Ed.), Queer Bangkok: 21st Century potential implications for the health care systems of des- Markets, Media, and Rights (pp. 143–162). Hong Kong University Press. tination countries and draw links between institutions of medical tourism and their current state of health. Just a few Bakker, A., Kesteren, P. J. M., Gooren, L. J. G., Bezemer, P. D. of the proposed solutions to these negative spillovers include (1993). The Prevalence of transsexualism in the Netherlands. incorporating governmental regulation into the medical Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 87(4), 237–238. tourism industry and establishing international collabora- tion between the destination and home countries (Chen & Bookman, M. Z., & Bookman, K. R. (2007). Medical tourism in Flood, 2013). One intervention that I propose to increase developing countries. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. kathoey access to MTF GRS in Thailand is to impose a Chen, Y. B., & Flood, C. M. (2013). Medical Tourism’s Impact on tax on GRS procedures undergone by international health Health Care Equity and Access in Low- and Middle-Income tourists and ensuring these fiscal benefits are reinvested to Countries: Making the Case for Regulation. The Journal of Law, partially subsidize GRS as a means to make the procedure & Ethics, 41(1), 286–300. more affordable to local kathoey. It is important to put poli- cies in effect to ensure that there are no negative spillovers Chokrungvaranont, P., Selvaggi, G., Jindarak, S., Angspatt, A., inflicted on already marginalized communities in Thailand. Pungrasmi, P., Suwajo, P. and Tiewtranon, P. (2014). The Development of Sex Reassignment Surgery in Thailand: A Social Perspective. The Scientific World Journal, 182981, 1–5. Acknowledgements Web. March 2016.

I would like to thank Professor Sands-Lincoln for Cohen-Kettenis, P. T., & Goozen, S. H. (1997). Sex Reassignment her fantastic class on Epidemiology and Global Health that of Adolescent Transsexuals: A Follow-up Study. Journal of inspired the creation of this paper; Dr. Carol Schilling, for the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 36(2), being a wonderful Mellon Mays mentor; Vanessa Christman, 263–271. my Mellon Mays Coordinator, for her encouragement to submit this paper for publication; Victoria Cubillos-Canon. Connell, J. (2011). A new inequality? Privatisation, urban , migration and medical tourism. Asia Pacific Viewpoint, 52(3), for her invaluable comments during the drafting process; 260–271. and, finally, my family, for their love and support. Ehrlich, R. (1996). Thailand’s Secret Sex. Elle Magazine UK, June: Endnotes 42–48.

i Kathoey, meaning “ladyboy,” is a term commonly used in Thai that Finch, S. (2013). Medical Tourism Driving Health Care Disparity most recently has been used to refer to male-to-female transgender in Thailand. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 186(1): E11. individuals. ii I say potentially because studies have not been able to accurately quantify Hage, J. J., Kanhai, R. C., Oen, A. L., van Diest, P. J., Karim, the size of the transgender community in Thailand, but considering how R. B. (2001) The devastating outcome of massive subcutaneous big of a role kathoey communities play in Thai culture, it is projected that injection of highly vicious fluids in male-to-female transsexuals. the population is potentially large. Plastic Reconstruction Surgery 107: 734–41. iii Bias may be present, as the study was conducted in the central provinces of Thailand, where the largest cities reside. Harris, B. C. (2015). Likely Transgender Individuals in U.S. Federal Administrative Records and the 2010 Census. Center Works Cited for Administrative Records Research and Applications U.S. Census Bureau, 1–37. Retrieved December 5, 2016, from https://www. Aizura, A. Z. (2009). Where Health and Beauty Meet: Femininity census.gov/srd/carra/15_03_Likely_Transgender_Individuals_ and Racialisation in Thai Cosmetic Surgery Clinics. Medical in_ARs_and_ 2010Census.pdf Anthropology. (33), 303–317. Male-to-Female Sex Reassignment Surgery. Retrieved May 7, Aizura, A. Z. (2010). Feminine Transformations: Gender 2016, from http://www.yanhee.net/treatment-procedure/srt-mtf Reassignment Surgical Tourism in Thailand. Medical Anthropology, 29(4), 424–443. Matzner, A. (1999). Roses of the North: The Katoey of Chiang Mai University. Retrieved May 2016, from www.transgender asia.org/TGinThailandRosepaper.htm

Ocha, W., and Earth, B. (2013). Identity Diversification among Transgender Sex Workers in Thailand’s Sex Tourism Industry. Sexualities 16(1–2), 195–216. 79 80 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Zucker, K.J,Lawrence, A.(2009).EpidemiologyofGender The World Bank.“UnitedStates/Population.”Data|TheWorld The World Bank.“Thailand/Population.”Data|TheWorld Bank . Winter, S.(2011)“Howmanytrans*peoplearethere?A2011 Winter, S.(2006)“ThaiTransgenders inFocus:Demographics, Winter, S.(2002c).“Whyare there” somanykathoeyinThailand?. Winter,.” http://www.trans Report:Thailand S.(2002b)“Country Winter, S.(2002a).“CountingKathoey.” http://web.hky.hk/ van Kesteren,P. J.,Gooren,L.andMegens,J.A.(1996).An ten Brummelhuis,H.(1999).Transformations ofTransgender: Smith, Y. L.,Goozen,S.H.,&Cohen-Kettenis,P. T. (2001). Pocock, N.S.,&Phua,K.H.(2011).Medicaltourismandpolicy International Journal ofTransgenderism Journal International , 11,8–18. of theWorld ProfessionalAssociationforTransgender Health. Identity Disorder:RecommendationsfortheStandardsofCare Bank. Web. Dec.2016 Web. May2016. asia.org/paper-how-many-trans-people-are-there.htm update incorporatingnewdata.”http://www.transgender Transgenderism 9.1,15–27.Web. May2016. Transitions of Journal andIdentities.”International many_kathoey.htm http://www.transgenderasia.org/paper_why_are_there_so_ genderasia.org/country_report_thailand.htm ~sjwinter/TransgenderASIA/paper_counting.htm 121–137. Scales: MedicalTourism inThailand.Body&Society, May 2016.Wilson, A.(2011).ForeignBodiesandNational Netherlands. Epidemiological andDemographicStudyofTranssexuals inthe , 9(2–3),121–139. Services The CaseoftheThaiKathoey. ofGay&LesbianSocial Journal Child &AdolescentPsychiatry, Prospective Follow-upStudy. oftheAmericanAcademy Journal Accepted orRejectedforSexReassignmentSurgery:A Adolescents withGenderIdentityDisorderWhoWere Globalization andHealthGlobalHealth, a comparativestudyofThailand,SingaporeandMalaysia. implications forhealthsystems:Aconceptualframeworkfrom Archives ofSexualBehavior25(6),589–600.Web. 40(4), 472–481. 7(1), 12. 17(2–3), University, Bangkok10330,Thailand. Surgery, Department ofSurgery, FacultyofMedicine,Chulalongkorn Source: Chokrungvaranontetal.2014.DivisionofPlastic&Reconstructive Table 1. Ratio oftheThai/foreignMTFtranssexualpatients operated on in Thailand operated oninThailand 2010–2012 2006–2010 2006–2010 2001–2005 1996–2000 1991–1995 1985–1990 Periods Thai/foreigners 10%/90% 30%/70% 30%/70% 50%/50% 75%/25% 90%/10% 95%/5%

The Most Costly Gift: An Exploration of the Potential Risks and Rewards of Double Consciousness and Second Sight in The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du Bois Briana Payton, Princeton University

Briana Payton is a senior at Princeton pursuing a major in is a metaphor for African Americans’ experience of existing sociology and minors in African American studies, American in a society where they are excluded on many fronts due to studies, and Spanish language and culture. She is interested in anti-Black racism. This veil, according to Du Bois, endows critical examinations of race, class, and gender inequalities, espe- African Americans with a “double consciousness” and a cially as they pertain to education, criminal justice, and identity. “gift” of “second sight,”ii both of which I will argue pres- Her inaugural independent research project focused on racial ent potential risks and rewards to the souls of Black folks. identity formation in second-generation Black migrants, and Du Bois defines “double consciousness” as “looking at one- her senior thesis will explore racial idenity and talented tenth self through the eyes of others.”iii Double-consciousness ideologies among Black students at elite universities. After causes Black people to be acutely aware of the “contempt graduation, she plans to work at a nonprofit before applying to and pity”iv with which their fellow white citizens see graduate school. them. This constant awareness affords them “no true self- consciousness.” v Double consciousness is awakened and progressively sharpened by of the presence of “the Veil.” Abstract The Veil (when capitalized in Du Bois’ book) refers to the manifestation of anti-Black . Du Bois gives In his 1903 book, , W.E.B. Du The Souls of Black Folk the Veil a quasi-physical characterization throughout the Bois makes a famous assertion that Black people in America book, as he often describes the way that it casts a shadow navigate society behind a “Veil” that gives them both “dou- over African Americans’ existence. While life behind this ble consciousness” and “second sight.” The Veil represents Veil in the state of double consciousness might appear the racism that excludes Black Americans from full partic- grim, Du Bois ventures to say that African Americans have ipation in society, double consciousness represents Black access to a special gift. He calls the gift “second sight,”vi and Americans’ awareness of racist views that white onlookers it represents the ability that Black people have to clearly hold toward them, and second sight represents their ability see America’s deepest flaw. From their uniquely disadvan- to see the flawed nature of racism and America’s need for taged position, they can see that they are the exception to change. Through textual analysis of these concepts and America’s creed of liberty and equality. They are privy to related characters and claims in The Souls of Black Folk, this America’s hypocrisy and her need for change. It is through essay explores the myriad of ways that individuals might second sight that African Americans can gain the awareness respond to these phenomena (the veil, double conscious- necessary to become agents of change in their society, and ness, and second sight) in their lives. The author posits this, I argue, is the most costly yet worthy gift. that certain responses constitute risks and others embody possible rewards for African Americans in their fight to However, this gift is only valuable when it is fully live freely in America. Some risks include that of adopting unwrapped. While the rewards of recognizing the need for the anti-Black worldview of white Americans, deciding not change and becoming an agent of change can be substan- to resist discrimination even if they do reject racist beliefs, tial, I argue that those are potential rather than guaranteed and becoming discouraged to the point of giving up if their outcomes. Risks of adverse consequences accompany these attempts at taking action do not lead to progress. Potential possible rewards of second sight, and through analysis of rewards include rejecting anti-Black views and embrac- characters and claims put forth in The Souls of Black Folk, ing self-love, taking action in pursuit of justice, succesfully I will explore how each African American’s life follows a achieving social change, and maintaining hope and joy even unique trajectory based on whether they incur risks or reap when progress is slow. Rather than apply Du Bois’ concepts rewards in their responses to double consciousness and sec- broadly to all Black people, this exploration highlights the ond sight. Among potential responses, there is a risk of hav- diversity of decisions and outcomes represented among ing double consciousness without unwrapping second sight. African Americans in their individual and collective quest A person’s double consciousness may make them aware of to thrive in a society built on their oppression. It highlights racism, but only second sight can show them that racism is the mysterious co-existence of hope and unhopefulness, the problem, rather than the Black community on which it repression and resilience, and strength and struggle in the casts contempt. By gaining second sight, one becomes not souls of Black folks. only aware of racism but also aware of its falsehood. Once unwrapped, the gift of second sight may still incur signif- icant costs. These include the risk of knowledge without Introduction action, action without results, and the loss of hope because of little progress in the struggle for social change. On the In his 1903 sociological work, The Souls of Black Folk, other side of the risks are the potential rewards of knowing W.E.B. Du Bois introduces the idea that African Americans the truth about racism, acting on that knowledge, and suc- are “born with a veil . . . in this American World.”i The veil cessfully producing change through individual and collective 81 82 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 To whichtheNegrocries‘Amen’!” This prominent AfricanAmericanleaderbecame nationally the ideologyof the otherworldwasBookerT. Washington. ble consciousnessandtherisk of adopting(atleastinpart) lives ofmanyAfricanAmericans. instead allowsdoubleconsciousness toreignasacurseinthe the potentialforsecondsight tofunctionasagift,and this reactiondoeslittletohelpthefactthatitundermines ning tobelievethem.Nonetheless,thereasonablenessof and explicitsuggestionsthatoneisinferiorwithoutbegin- that itisdifficulttobebombardedwithsomanysubliminal world,” or that of white prejudiced Americans. allowed toseeoneself“throughtherevelationofother Revelation oftheOtherWorld illustrations fromDuBois’TheSoulsofBlackFolk. and rewards of doubleconsciousness and second sight, using explore indetailtheaforementionedpotentialtypesofrisks go beyondthescopeofthispaper. Thispaperwillsimply ing whyapersontakesonetrajectoryoveranotherwould to each individual and their circumstances that identify- double consciousnessandsecondsightisaprocesssounique encounter withracism.Navigatingtherisksandrewardsof they representthegroup’s unilateralresponsetoasingular second sightsimplisticallytotheBlackcommunityasthough risk ofapplyingtheconceptsdoubleconsciousnessand ality, andagency. Thistype of analysis protects against the appreciation ofthecomplexityBlackhumanity, individu- their particularencounterswiththeVeil allowsforgreater rewards, andthediversityofBlackpeople’s responsesto a personcanunlockitspotentialrewards. second sight, and second sight is only a gift to the extent that action. Therefore,doubleconsciousnessisacursewithout natural defense of . “call theshadowprejudice,andlearnedlyexplainitas the riskofaffirmingtheirbigotrywhenhesaysthey(whites) losing confidenceinone’s ownworth.DuBoisdescribes of this “other world” as though it were true, and thereby greatest riskofdoubleconsciousness:acceptingtheideology according tosucha“revelation”introducesthefirstand different andlessvaluablethanthemselves.Viewing oneself It meansknowingthatwhiteonlookersseeBlackpeopleas mately awareofanideologyfoundedonBlackinferiority. African American,double consciousness entailsbeinginti- and loweringofideals.” bring theinevitableself-questioning,self-disparagement, ogy, ashereasons,“facingsovastaprejudicecouldnotbut to someBlackAmericans’tragicacquiescenceracistideol- According toDuBois,oneman whoembodieddou- Du Boisdescribesdoubleconsciousnessasonlybeing Foregrounding thisdiscussionofthevariousrisks,

the ‘higher’ against the ‘lower races.’ ix Inthis,DuBoisacknowledges viii DuBoisissympathetic vii For an reconcile those two“un-reconciledstrivings.” “Negro.” However, DuBois’secondsight allowedhimto ideology madeitincompatible tobeboth“American”and For example,DuBoiswrote about howAmerica’s racial ment ofAmericanhypocrisyand thevirtueofracialjustice. can beusedtostrengthenone’s secondsight,ordiscern- the waythatdoubleconsciousness, orawarenessofracism a lie.DuBois’messagesinTheSoulsofBlackFolksreflect other worldisfallibleandAfricanAmericaninferiority revelation, orsecondsight,whichletsoneknowthatthe the truthofracialequality. Thiscomesfromthehigher reward ofrejectingthosefalsehoodsandholdingfastto ing falseracistbeliefs,italsoopensthedoortopotential Second Sight:AHigherRevelation point thatDuBoiscalledhima“compromiser” of theotherworld”withtruth;hemixedthemto he seemed unable to rightly divide the (racist) “revelation His doubleconsciousnessdistortedhisviewsomuchthat forego thedignityofequaltreatment(atleasttemporarily). he thoughttheyshouldacceptthelowest-rankedjobsand Black peopleoughtnotadvanceinsociety, butontheother, responses. Ononehand,Washington resistedtheideathat trum orevenadoptacombinationofriskandrewardbased and doubleconsciousnessinvaryinggradientsalongaspec- ant truth that African Americans can respond to “the Veil” despite environingopinion.” greater group,” and “a determined effort at self-realization attempt toadjustallthoughtandactionthewillof speech reflectedacombinationofwhatDuBoiscalled“an rum earnwhitepeople’s approval.IarguethatWashington’s diligently inordertoaccumulatewealthandbytheirdeco- respect. Instead,hepositedthatBlackpeopleoughttolabor ently worthyofsocialequality, orintegrationandmutual ity. HeaccededtotheideathatBlackpeoplewerenotinher progress withintheotherworld’s ideologyofBlackinferior need forracialprogress,butappearedtoconceptualize directed atawhiteaudience,Washington recognized the for hisfamousAtlantaExpositionaddress.Inthisspeech yet DuBoiscriticizedhimheavilyinTheSoulsofBlackFolk for industrialandagriculturaltrainingofAfricanAmericans, recognized forhisworkinfoundingtheTuskegee Institute Du Boisrefers to theconceptofanAmerican andaNegro beliefs oftheotherworld. sciousness risk varying degrees of concession to the racist to fightagainstWhiteSupremacy. Thosewithdoublecon- sciousness, or“revelationoftheotherworld,”isnotenough simply beingbornasaBlackAmericanwithdoublecon- Washington andmanyotherslikehimserveasproofthat some aspectofwhatsocietyrightfullyowesitsBlackcitizens. for racialjustice,tocompromiseoftenmeanssacrifice the tworaces.Unfortunately, intheAfricanAmericanfight While doubleconsciousnessopenstheriskofaccept- x Hisideasexposetheimport- xii Although xi between - - as “warring ideals,”xiii he shows that in actuality that they are promising response in certain cases. Therefore, second sight perfectly compatible. He does this by claiming, “The Negro does not guarantee that a person will always act on what problem is a concrete test of underlying principles of the they see (individually or in collaboration with others), nor great republic.”xiv Du Bois’ second sight showed him that does it guarantee that they will always be able to act without Black people are true Americans and as long as America does it proving injurious to their own welfare. Therefore, Black not recognize this, she is not true to herself or her own prin- people must decide each day and in every case of discrimi- ciples. In expressing this belief, Du Bois serves as an example nation how they will respond: with resistance or compliance, of how second sight can yield a deeper conviction of one’s action or inaction, or some combination of the two. American identity and right to be included in society. While “revelation of the other world” calls the Negro an exception Just as second sight opens the risk of inaction, it also to American ideals and ties whiteness to American-ness, Du clears the way for the potential reward of taking action in Bois attains second sight, sees through that lie, and boldly pursuit of the equal society one envisions. Second sight asserts otherwise. In a sense, the African American’s plight can be a powerful springboard for working toward change, of being made a “stranger in his own house”xv (or country) which is why Du Bois calls it a gift. The gift may not be causes him to look more closely at the house for evidence fully unwrapped if one never fights the racism they face, that it indeed belongs to him. In contrast, white Americans but when it is utilized in full, second sight can produce the have no double consciousness, assume they belong in the vision that drives Black people to radical resistance. At the house, and blissfully live there with no valid title deed. A same time, every action has a reaction, and on the other presumptuous claim to identity is a weak one, but Du Bois side of the potential reward of activism is the potential risk shows that having two warring ideals in one body causes of retaliation, defeat and subsequent despair because of the the Black American citizen to develop a “dogged strength” prevalence of the Veil (racism) in American society. Under in his identity that “kept him from being “torn asunder.”xvi conditions of persistent inequality, seeing Black people’s While double consciousness can cause a Black person to ini- right to justice through second sight could be compared to tially question their rightful place in America, the potential rooting for the underdog in a game, but constantly watching reward is that this questioning can lead to discovery of true them get cheated. Second sight may allow a person to see belonging through second sight. that African Americans are not truly inferior, but in the face of the Veil, under the shadow of which they are treated as such, there festers a bitter indignation. Second sight may Higher Revelation against Reality even allow one to see one’s own anger as righteous, but Du Although second sight offers the reward of coming Bois poignantly notes, “knowing the bitterness is justifiable xviii into knowledge of truth, this knowledge does not eliminate only makes it more maddening.” Therefore a potential the subsequent risk of inaction. This is because to have sec- risk of spirited action is inner turmoil that comes from try- ond sight and see that racism is wrong does not protect one ing and failing to dismantle the Veil of racism. from the power of the Veil (manifest racism) in American One character in The Souls of Black Folk who embod- society. For example, Du Bois writes in The Souls of Black Folk ies this risk is John Jones. A young southern boy who was that he secured a teaching job in Tennessee and went to eat generally jovial and satisfied with life went north for school at the local commissioner’s house. He describes the way that and encountered the Veil there. After being refused seating racism intruded on the celebratory occasion: “‘Oh,’ thought near his white childhood friend in a theater and riding in I, ‘this is lucky’”; but even then fell the awful shadow of the Jim Crow cars, he gained double consciousness, suddenly Veil, for they ate first, then I—alone.”xvii Although Du Bois realizing how those of “the other world” saw him. However, is college educated by this juncture in his career, he is rele- he had also received the second sight, and knew that the gated to eating alone after his equal eats first. That he knows inequality was wrong, so he returned to his hometown as a this white man is his equal does not in this situation move teacher with a determination to empower his fellow African him to action or protest, but rather to somber recognition Americans with knowledge. He taught children about equal- of the Veil under which he lives. This example represents ity in his local school and thereby embodied the reward the risk of knowledge without action. It is worth noting that of becoming an agent for change, but as soon as word got the response to the Veil in one instance does not necessarily around to the local judge, that judge shut down John’s characterize a person’s response throughout their entire life, school.xix His second sight allowed him to see his school as a although it can. Du Bois surely led a life of fighting racism site of resistance to injustice, but the Veil quickly came down on many fronts, but in this particular instance, he chose to and transformed it into a site of defeat. It was at that point respond with inaction. This may also point to the impracti- he gave up on fighting for change in his community through cality of fighting racism in situations in which one is isolated education and decided to just defend his survival by going as its target, and that perhaps collective action offers a more north to find work and sending money home.xx His double 83 84 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Veil—for nothingcandimthelightthatshinesfromwithin. full ofvitalityandvivacityevenundertheshadow Americans throughsecondsightisthattheycanhavelives spite ofitall.Therefore,thefinalrewardavailabletoAfrican holds thatthesoulsofthoseveryBlackfolkcanflourishin may face suffering that seems worsethandeath, and yet he sayings, DuBoisadmitsthatthosebornBlackinAmerica hand toa“hope not hopeless but unhopeful.” Bois wrotethatevenininfantcyhissonclungwithtiny that unleashes radical light in their dark circumstances. Du by their faceoff with , and to have hope in their hearts by theirexperienceofsorrow, toknowlovethatisdeepened beautiful possibilityforthemtotastejoythatissweetened Black people to fall into hate, despair, and doubt, there is a the giftofsecond sight,orexperiencesome combination den ofdoubleconsciousness, awakenedtoactivism through Members ofthegroupcaneither becrushedunderthebur the risksofpainareworthpossible rewardsofprosperity. the livesofAfricanAmericans begthequestionofwhether Conclusion dub his “ideas insolence” and his “ambitions unattainable.” the Veil waswaitingtothrowitsshadowoverhisface—to this AfricanAmerican’s eyeswereopenedtosecondsight, righteous idealstriedtofightinjustice.Inthemomentthat retaliation thatoftenensueswhenanAfricanAmericanwith consciousness andsecondsightdidnotshieldhimfromthe brighter.” perfect lifewashis,alljoyandlove,withtearstomakeit on whathisson’s lifecouldhavebeen,DuBoissaid“A available to Black people in the face of this risk. Reflecting of hisfirst-bornisreferencetoafinalrewardthatremains tice prevail.However, hiddeninhismusingonthepassing than thoseAfricanAmericanswholivedtoseeracialinjus- that hissonwhodiedjustafterbirthwasbetteroffindeath decide tofightforvirtueinthefaceofsurroundingvice. pain any African American risks encountering when they he imaginedCrummelmusthavefelt,anditrepresentsthe temptations. Hedescribesinvividtermsthedepthofpain he wantedinministry(oftenduetoracism),facedthese African Americans,didnotseethesuccessnorresultsthat how Alexander Crummel, a clergyman who aimed to serve face tosuccumbhate,despairanddoubt. his bookashediscussesthetemptationsBlackAmericans folk. DuBoiscommunicatesthisfinalriskneartheendof ing forprogresscancausesevereinjurytothesoulsofBlack one willeverseevictory. Thisperpetuallyunfulfilledlong- even to the active pursuit of it, but it does not guarantee that The coexistingpossibilitiesof defeat andtriumphin So deepisthispainthatDuBoisventurestoimply Second sightdrawsonetothehopeforchange,and xxiii DuBoishereimpliesthatwhilelifemaytempt xxii Heexplores xxiv In these xxi -

that therewardswereworthrisks. that wouldhaveneverbeenpossiblehadtheynotresolved tions onthedraftalongway. colleague, KhallidLove,whoprovidedthoughtfulsugges- contribution forthisjournalsubmission.Thankyoutomy and updatethepapertoclarifymyargumentscholarly Thank youtoProfessorWeisenfeld, whohelpedmerevise paper. Thanksalsoforhisvaluablefeedbackonmyrewrites. to write this piece as my first African American studies his owncompellinganalysis,andgavemetheopportunity duced metoDuBois’incrediblework,presentedwith Endnotes Acknowledgements ful,” who clingdesperatelytoa“hopenothopelessbutunhope- in amuralofsorts—onethatportraystheimagepeople many. Theseindividualnarrativescometogetherpowerfully has birthedapowerfulstruggleforfreedomintheheartsof Black Folktothepresentday, AfricanAmericansecondsight consciousness, itisclearthatfromthetimeofTheSouls the variedresponsesthatBlackpeoplemayhavetodouble responses. Thoughmoreworkcanbedonetounderstand experiences ofprivilegeand/ormarginalizationshapethese not limitedto)aperson’s class,education,gender, andother research couldexplorehowvariousfactorsincluding(but sciousness and second sight, for better or for worse. Further may exhibitdivergentandlayeredresponsestodoublecon- reward inBlackpeople’s journeysrevealsthateachperson of theseandotherresponses.Thisexplorationrisk xvi xv xiv xiii xii xi x ix viii vii vi v iv iii ii i Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 30. Ibid., 28. Ibid., 6. Ibid., 6. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 2. W.E.B. DuBois,TheSoulsofBlackFolk(NewYork: DoverPublications, 1994), 2. xxv andbytheirclingingforgechangesinnation Thank youtoProfessorEddieGlaude,whointro- xvii Ibid., 39. xviii Ibid., 124. xix Ibid., 147. xx Ibid., 152. xxi Ibid., 152. xx Ibid., 134. xxiii Ibid., 152 xxiv Ibid., 128 xxv Ibid., 128.

Bibliography

Du Bois, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk (New York: Dover Publications, 1903).

85 86 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 black women’s experience attheendof20thcentury. a windowinto the uniquedispossessionthat characterized work. Theseepigraphs, andtheirhistorical context, offer Association onherexcavation ofZoraNealeHurston’s of Alice Walker’s 1975 speech to the Modern Language An AmericanGrammar.” Theotherisanessayadaption Hortense Spillers’seminaltext “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: tural historyhappeningalmost adecadeapart.Oneopens boundaries oflatecapitalistmodernity. creating worldsthatextendfarbeyondthestructuresand have consciouslyimaginednewformsofbeingandselfhood, the 1980s/’90s,mytheoryconcludesblackwomenartists Through a close examination of black women’s art during practice forstudyingblackwomen’s culturalproduction. of aBlackWomen’s RomanticIdeologyasaninterpretive uate honorsthesis.Myprojectputsforththeoriginaltheory essay isanexcerptfromtheintroductiontomyundergrad- Introduction Abstract looks forwardtoapplyingPhDprogramsinAmericanstudies. as aMassachusettsPromiseFellowinBoston.Nextyear, Jocelyn Although sheisoriginallyfromtheBronx,currently serves en’s culturalproductioninthe1980sand1990sAmerica. Mellon Maysundergraduateresearch focusesonblackwom- in AfricanastudiesandEnglishlanguageliterature. Her Jocelyn ProiettigraduatedSmithCollegein2016withadegree Jocelyn Proietti,SmithCollege Black Women’s CulturalProductioninthe1980s/’90s Towards aBlackWomen’s RomanticIdeology:Theorizing I beginwithtwoconversationsinAmericancul- A culminationoftwoyearsMMUFresearch,this existence.” even ifrejected—enrichandenlargeone’s view of in behavior, in growth of spirit and intellect— ard for the artist, simply because models in art, say nothing of painting, is an occupational haz- “The absenceofmodels,inliteratureaslife,to were nothere,Iwouldhavetobeinvented.” rhetorical wealth. My country needs me, and if I ments andprivationsinthenationaltreasuryof founded identities,ameetinggroundofinvest- Woman atthePodium’:Idescribealocusofcon- ‘God’s Holy Fool,’ a ‘Miss Ebony First,’ or ‘Black ‘Sapphire’ and‘EarthMother,’ ‘Aunty,’ ‘Granny,’ body knowsmyname.‘Peaches’and‘BrownSugar,’ “Let’s faceit.Iamamarkedwoman,butnotevery- “Saving theLifeThatIsYour Own,”1975 An AmericanGrammar,” 1987 Modern LanguageAssociation “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: —Hortense Spillers —Alice Walker Enlightenment as: Media, and Cultural Studies “democracy.” InThePoliticsofEnchantment:Romanticism, ment, allthewhileclaimingsupremacyonbasisof the diametricallyopposed concepts of liberty andenslave- born discoursesenabledanemergingnationtoreconcile opportunity, progress,andproperty. TheseEnlightenment- project. That istosay, it wasfounded upon notions of acknowledge thatAmericawasalwaysanEnlightenment violent throughEnlightenmentmodernity. of that existence (life, self, and humanity) have been made humanity inanotheredexistence,evenasthecomponents women’s desiretorecoverand(re)makeselfallowsfor modes ofexistencethatareelsewhereimpossible.Black ungendered, and therefore equal)and creates instead new eliminates the idea of self as a unitary site (de-racialized, being. I contend that black women’s artistic imagination importance of self-making in creating alternate forms of Romantic Ideologyisamethodofreadingthatcentersthe truths suchquestionsreveal. My theoryof a BlackWomen’s why ofblackwomen’s creativepraxisandtheontological on, self.Putdifferently, Iamcurioustoknowthehowand in black women’s art-making as a form of, and reflection privileging ofartliesattheheartmywork.Iaminterested and 1990sinAmerica? women’s art and literature during the period of the 1980s does one account for the noticeable outpouring of black woman. Howthen,didblackwomencreateart?Andhow Everywhere therewasaclamororsilenceabouttheblack women’s recordedhistory(beitintellectualorartistic). pathologized blackwomanhoodandtheabsenceof light aparadoxicaltensionbetweenthehypervisibilityof remains incomplete.Together Walker andSpillershigh- is a record of humanity, and for black women the archive art inthe1970s.Sheremindsreaderthatahistoryof the hazardouspositionofblackwomenartistscreating Equally misnamed and unaccounted for, Walker speaks to women must eternally serve as the ultimate abject other. She conciselyrendersthenationalexpectationthatblack race and gender as it manifested in the American 1980s/’90s. feminized subjectsetsuptheviolentpublicinscriptionof Spillers’ seriesofever-evolving termsfortheblackand In ordertospeakthisconfiguration,Imustfirst Though Spiller’s criticalnoticeisimportant,Walker’s of individualsand theruleoflaw, bothindebtedto impressive: reason,aboveall;the formalequality were founded. (. . .) Their heavy equipment was edged philosophicaltenetsofthe socialsciences revolutionary yearof1789,when theacknowl- The period dating roughly from the 1710s to the i ,

J. David Black defines the

an emergent liberalism (. . .); the intellectual and from Walker’s statement that black women made art for political priority of order, consensus, and progress; themselves, and this centering of self created a place to a utopian belief in human betterment against the contest and create culture. What emerges forth is a critique pessimistic anti-humanism of the medieval Church; not merely of 20th-century American society, but of the and lastly, among other features, the power of intractable concepts that inform it. both natural and social science to support social reform. (21) Although I have identified the Enlightenment as an enemy of black women’s art-making, I would now These ideologies constituted the fabric of American like to propose Romanticism as an oppositional frame for culture. Privileged knowledge-systems (law, social and natu- reading black women’s cultural production. I understand ral science, humanism) created a convoluted logic whereby Romanticism as one of the first schools of thought to argue the idea of “reason” obliterated all other ways of knowing. for the importance of art as a social enterprise in modernity. Indeed, the social construction of blackness in America was In fact, Romanticism’s most pervasive feature and great- only made possible, as Robin D.G. Kelley explicates in his est strength is its belief in the totalizing power of art. As work on the Enlightenment’s relationship to race, through J. David Black argues, “The romantic revolution in culture “the racialism of the West, slavery, imperialism, the destruc- was not about artistic self-indulgence. Art was life because tion of indigenous cultures in the name of ‘progress’” (106). culture was the means to directly fashion a conscious world In other words, the Enlightenment put forth a necessary within which one lived. The romantic subject was often rep- logic in so far as it supposed “reasonableness” in the arbi- resented as a poet-magician conjuring new realities through trary degradation of racialized black individuals. Likewise, it discourse” (27). This idea of a romantic subject points to fostered the emergence of capital and the arrangement of a questions of ontology in modernity that I see operating in gender binary as cooperative processes in defining person- black women’s work. This is not to say that black women of hood, and used the linearity of time to make the atrocities by the 1980s/90s consciously engage with the Romantics, nor which an individual was categorized as non-human (slavery, suggest that Romanticism should be read into the works of trauma, etc.) untouchable to them. Nowhere is this more black women. Rather, I wish to showcase how the philosophy evident than in the incontestable category of human itself, of Romanticism elucidates my own theoretical claims about which even now may only be defined by those imbued with the function of selfhood within black women’s art-making. humanity.ii These constructions compounded to obscure Namely, how black women artists emphasize the concept black women’s access to humanness, forcing them to explore of self in their work and, by doing so, effectively re-fashion and create new ways of being in the modern world. My the- their material conditions. Ultimately, my analysis has little ory argues that this is primarily done through the praxis, and to do with Romanticism and its traditional 18th-century product, of black women’s art. antecedent, and more to do with a fluid version of the con- In their reflections on black women’s subjecthood, cept. My concept of a Black Women’s Romantic Ideology Walker and Spillers interrogate the ways in which a suppos- takes Romanticism and repurposes its core contributions to edly rational and working society comfortably and forcibly the history of ideas in order to theoretically engage the phil- sustains black women’s subjugation. As Walker’s epigraph osophical dimensions of black women’s desire to make art. demonstrates, the absence of models, myths, language, and I consider how black women make clear their unapologetic stories of, and for, black women was a haunting reminder rejection of Western co-authorizing ideologies (capitalism, that equality was elusive as ever. Spillers affirms this notion racism, sexism, and to name a few) especially, in her phrase, “national treasury of Rhetorical Wealth” (65), on the basis of their Enlightenment claims to “reason” which enforces the constitutive relationship between racial- and “rationalism” respectively. Moreover, I demonstrate ized, gendered, and sexual oppression and its persistence as how such a paradigm operates in the 1980s/1990s, an era an uncomfortable yet salient feature of American society. in which black women were seemingly being invented by Walker and Spillers outline how contemporary conversa- everyone but themselves. Facing a society which perpetually tions of, and about, black women always begin—strained devalues their efforts and achievements, black women have beneath the weight of an embattled public present and grap- largely been barred access to normative trajectories of prog- pling with an effaced national past. However, I foreground ress as well as excluded from art as a traditional practice of Walker’s lone notice of the “occupational hazard,” which resistance. poses the inability to ignore, confer, resist, or subscribe to This is the culture that the artists treated by my study an ongoing publicly held discussion of art, as both site of (, Audre Lorde, Toni Morrison, and Lorna absence and a place of ingenuity. As scholar Caroline A. Simpson) are creating within and responding to. Looking Brown notes: “In the era of post-1960s U.S. culture, polit- at the 1980s/’90s as an important period in black wom- ical and socioeconomic power and conflict are increasingly en’s cultural history, I offer my theory of a Black Women’s waged within the culture-language zone” (29). It is clear 87 88 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 however, is compellingfornearlyopposite reasons.Indeed, crafts a superlative alterity. The subject position of the artist or free,havealwaysbeenthematerial bywhichoursociety than intheAmericancontext,where blackwomen,enslaved womanhood. Nowhereisthis morevehementlythecase promises ofmodernitywithout theconstructionofblack modernity. Itisclearthat you cannotdiscusstheadventand sible positiontheyareasked tooccupyinlatecapitalist the 1980sand’90s,startswitharecognitionofimpos- I*s Your Own.”Indeed,myfocusonblackwomenartistsin the titleofWalker’s MLAspeech,“SavingtheLifeThat decades ofthe20thcenturymightbestbesummedupin nized behindtheideaofa“self.” (re)structuring ofartisticandbodilyboundaries,asorga- rejection ofnormativepracticescategorization,andtheir able to see their focuson alternate histories and myths, their through aBlackWomen’s RomanticIdeology, I amuniquely make spacefortheirownexistence.Byreadingtheseworks and showcasehowblackwomenconsciouslycreate subjectivity throughthegazeofblackwomanartist, of selfandsubject.Alldealexplicitlywithblackfemale their bodies, resisting racist, sexist, and heterosexist notions discursive processesthatpathologizeboththeirlaborand texts demonstratehowblackwomenusearttoreorientthe pose scholarswhoreinforcemytheoreticalwork.These (1986) and (1987) aswellLornaSimpson’s photographsWaterbearer New SpellingofMyName(1982),Toni Morrison’s Beloved Erykah Badu’s “Certainly”(1997),AudreLorde’s Zami:A while Part2shiftsfocustomyprimarytexts.Iexamine 21st century. and fluctuating natureof black women’s subjecthood inthe discursivity ofRomanticismasaplacetostudythetenuous advocates for, andevidenceof,theirexistence,utilizingthe project. Finally, itpositionsblackwomenastheultimate modern world, and the “reasonableness” of an American self asreflexivelyrefusingtherelationshipbetweenrace, my theory reveals the concept of a racialized and gendered from America’s Enlightenmentladendiscourse.Moreover, against thefalsecorrelationsandviolentimagescreated and demonstrateshowblackwomenposetheself’s interior mastery in mobilizing the idea of “self” as multiplicitous, cify theexistenceofaself.Itnoticesblackwomen’s artistic and aphilosophythatthoughtfullycentersbutdoesnotcal- stringent categorizationofbodiesbutalsohumanness, supremacy toart’s transformativeability, apoliticthatresists Black Women’s Romantic Ideology as an ethic that gives namely, selfhood,interiority, andmultiplicity. Idefine a understudied dimensionsofblackwomen’s art-making— Romantic Ideologyasamethodbywhichwemayexamine Black women’s experienceduringthetwofinal Part 1 of my project works to establish my analysis, She (1992). Moving across various media, I inter -

of self,asithas beenappearedinblackwomen’s own Ideology proposes araced,gendered,andsexualized notion and thinking aboutthe world. A Black Women’s Romantic gender asdeviantandundesirable categoriesforarranging cepts ofraceandgender. Resultantly, itenforcesrace and under the assumption that selfhood is untouched by con mative identitiesintointeriorand publicspaces.Itoperates offering ofselfbecomesanother meansofinscribingnor undoable, because everyone possesses a self. However, this is: equalityisachievable,humannessaccessible,andracism self relyonthelanguageofuniversality. Thegoverningidea of self.Oftentimesphilosophicalandculturaldefinitions black women’s impulsetodocumentandcreatefromaspace and intowhatmightcome. I treat them as visionaries able to see past what is pervasive this shiftstheworldbackinto Enlightenment terms.Instead work blackpeoplearenotjustanti-Enlightenment;stating give artandmyowndiscussionsofblackwomanhood.In invested in, it takes second place to the primacy I wish to (truth, self,art).However, asmuchit’s aconceptIam ways itactsasaplaceholderforotherwisedisorientingideals these standards,andinpartforitscapaciousnature.Inmany land onRomanticisminpartforitshistoryofunveiling compounding ofoppressivebutoftenunnoticedforces.I linear time,trauma,trajectoriesofprogress,Iidentifya of thelate-capitaliststateaswellfundamentalideas Enlightenment extends forthto encompass both the logic and sexistideologies against them. By scaffolding how the construction ofknowledge that acutely perpetuatedracist ists oftheperiodcametograpplewitha“commonsense” emerging inthe1980s/’90sclarifieshowblackwomenart- ing oftheEnlightenmenttohyperactiveneoliberalism of ideas,andtheotherworldlyqualitiesart.Mylink- results frommyowninterestinblackwomen,thehistory which attempts to piece together a few critical thematics. It practices inthe1980s/’90s.Itconsistsofasmallexperiment to nameismyowntheoryofBlackwomen’s artmaking modern world. play withboundariesofwhatitmeanstobehumaninthe important, essential,perhapstheonlyactworthdoing,isto ity? For black women to consider the act of saving their life public figureswhentheynoticeandrevelintheirinterior the question:Whathappenstoblackwomenascontested subjectivity tothelocationofblackwomeninAmericabegs fact mandatestheexistenceofselfhood.Linkinganartist art centersbeingpresent—ahereness—and byvirtueofthis or subjugation (this is clearly untrue); I merely mean making that artcannotconsidernotionsofoutsiderness,alienation, through, aself.From this statementIdonotwishtoimply art isbydefinitionneveralterity, itisthebelongingto,and In a“BlackWomen’s RomanticIdeology,” Itracked What aBlackWomen’s RomanticIdeologyattempts - - - artistic renderings. In order to read using a Black Women’s Works Cited Romantic Ideology one must first think: Badu, Erykah. . Kedar, Universal, 1997. CD. • Self is claimable, collective, and multiplicitous. Black, J. David. The Politics of Enchantment: Romanticism, Media, • Self can be futurity, retrograde, timeless, and present. and Cultural Studies. Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfrid Laurier UP, 2002. • It is deeply touched by trauma but not incapacitated by it. Print. • Self creates. Kelley, Robin D.G. Yo’ Mama’s Disfunktional!: Fighting the Culture These are dynamic conversations which black women Wars in Urban America. Boston: Beacon, 1997. Print. creators have centered in their work. Though my project employs methods of close reading, socio-historical analysis, Lorde, Audre. Zami: A New Spelling of My Name. Berkeley, CA: and cultural studies theory to draw connections to outside Crossing, 1982. Print. thinkers, I also read these authors as theorists in their own Morrison, Toni. Beloved: A Novel. New York: Vintage International, right. Ultimately, their theorizing allows me to read the 2004. Print. period of the 1980s/’90s as a revolutionary moment for black women and weave together a Black Women’s Romantic Simpson, Lorna, Okwui Enwezor, Helaine Posner, and Hilton Ideology that transformative, radically self- reflexive, libera- Als. Lorna Simpson. New York: Abrams, in Association with the tory, and highly concerned with new modes of being. Black American Federation of Arts, 2006. Print. women are knowledge creators, world makers, and prophets ------. She. 1992. 4 Polaroid prints, 1 engraved plastic plaque 29 who are able to imagine a world in which they are possible. x 85¼ inches. 37. Print.

Acknowledgements ------. Waterbearer. 1986. Gelatin silver print, vinyl lettering, photograph 45 x 77 inches overall. 14–15. Print. Though this work is the product of many people, I would like to give special thanks to Professor Lamothe, Spillers, Hortense J. “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe: An American Professor Quashie, and Professor Miller for their fantastic Grammar Book.” Diacritics: A Review of Contemporary Criticism feedback and encouragement. Of course, nothing I do would 17.2 (1987): 65–81. MLA International Bibliography. Web. 15 be possible without my mother, Marian Proietti; her kind- Apr. 2016. ness and patience has taught me a great deal. Walker, Alice. In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1983. Print. Endnotes

i What I mean by outpouring here is the proliferation of published and publicly available works by black women and women of color. Some examples include Pulitzer Prize-winning novels such as The Color Purple (1982), Jazz (1992), scholarly anthologies such as This Bridge Called My Back (1981), All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave: Black Women’s Studies (1982), the popularization of visual artists such as Lorna Simpson and Carrie Mae Weems, as well as the emerging work of Gloria Naylor, Ntozake Shange, and the later works of Toni Cade Bambara, amongst others. ii In his chapter “Looking Extremely Backward: Why the Enlightenment Will Only Lead Us into the Dark,” Robin D.G. Kelley states: “Enlightenment thought not only opened the door for future argu- ments about the inherent inferiority of different ‘races,’ but also sharply limited the definition of humanity. Thus, at the very moment when a discourse of universal humanism was finding voice (. . .) colored people and Europeans rendered marginal to civilization (such as Jews and Irish) were being written out of the family of ‘Man’” (108). Kelley demarcates the American culture wars of the 1980s/’90s as a time when people of color were pushing back against Enlightenment discourses that sought to silence the movement toward identity politics. I note that this pushback was a part of a larger fight for black people to be recognized as human.

89 90 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 solution: thatwe shouldensurethat“ought” implies “can” In thispaper, Iwillfirstexploreafairly intuitivepotential statement isinsensitivetochanges inanagent’s abilities. Maria’s predicament, becausethetruth-valueofan“ought” Kratzer analysisdoesnotappear toadequatelyaccountfor Quentin forcoffee,butshecannot do both. Astandard seems thatMariaoughttomeet Pattiforlunchandmeet that “ought”implies“can,” ought to keep one’s promises and the classic Kantian dictum moral dilemmas.Imaginethefollowingscenario: proves trickyincircumstancesthatpresentagentswith courses ofaction. consist inchoosingbetweentwo incomparably sub-ideal of carryingitout.Thus,onthisanalysis,moraldilemmas can stillholdeveniftheagenthasbeenrenderedincapable obligation isfirstimposed,andthatattimet’the “ought” and“can”mustonlyholdatthe time twhenthe offer a novel solution: namely, that the relation between “can,” Kratzer’s semanticsseemsunsatisfying.Finally, itwill some form of the Kantian dictum that “ought” implies seem problematic: for anyone who would like to uphold Second, itwillexplorewhy, atfacevalue,thistreatmentmay whether an agent is actually show thatKratzer’s analysisof“ought”isnotsensitiveto an agentfacesconflictingobligations.Thispaperwillfirst troubles whenamoraldilemmaisintroduced:thatis, for astatement“oughtφ.”However, Kratzer’s accountfaces “ought” givesusaplausibleaccountofthetruthconditions grandmother.” Inparticular, Kratzer’s analysisofthedeontic like “It might rain tomorrow” or “You ought to visit your a uniquesetoftoolsforevaluatingeverydayexpressions modals such as “ought,” “must,” “might,” “can,” etc. offers Abstract to returnChicagoandapplygraduateschool. Trinity College,UniversityofCambridge,afterwhichshehopes foundations ofethics.Lauren iscurrently studyingabroadat completed aresearch projectthispastsummeronthelogical interests lieinphilosophyoflanguage,mind,andlogic,she where sheispursuingadegree in philosophy. Hermostrecent Lauren Richardson isajuniorat theUniversityofChicago, Lauren Richardson,UniversityofChicago Must “Ought”Imply“Can”? Moral DilemmasandModalityinKratzer’s Semantics: Assuming thatweacceptthemoralprincipleone Kratzer’s semantic analysis of the deontic “ought” Angelika Kratzer’s possible worlds semantics for no wayforhertoreachthemandcancel. for lunchandmeetQuentincoffee,plusthereis down thismorning,andnowshecannotmeetPatti Quentin forcoffee.Unexpectedlyhercarbroke Maria haspromisedtomeetPattiforlunchand i weareleftwithaproblem:it able to fulfill her obligation(s). ordering sourceg that thebestpossibleworldswithrespecttoability meets bothPattiandQuentin.And,from(2),weknow the mostdeonticallyidealworldsareinwhichMaria a simple fix entails the conclusion that neither “ought” statement. Second, I will show that this attempt at meet bothPattiandQuentinattimet worlds underconsiderationareonesinwhichMariacan by restrictingthemodalbasef(w)suchthatonlypossible source g the bestpossibleworldswithrespecttodeonticordering g the obligation at hand,thenwewillnolonger beleftin scenarios inwhich theagentcanbehaveinaccordance with somehow ensure that“ought”statementsare onlytruein implies “can” into Kratzer’s analysis of “ought.” If we can dilemma istoincorporateKant’s dictumthat“ought” impossible standardofbehavior onMaria. Kratzer analysisisinsensitive tothisfact, andimposesan no way and Quentin,butalsothatshesimplycannot.Thereisjust her abilities.Sheknowsthatsheought incompatible with the best possible worlds with respect to the bestpossibleworldswithrespecttodeonticidealsare can meetbothPattiandQuentin.Mariaisinaquandary: that mostaccuratelyreflectMaria’s abilities it otherwise,therearenoworldsamongthepossible us Quentin forcoffee.(“cannot(p&q)”) Quentin forcoffee.(“oughtp”and“oughtq”) view, letusbreakdownthescenarioasfollows: courses ofaction. of choosing between two incomparably sub-ideal possible moral dilemmaMariaisfacingsimplytheunfortunatetask semantic analysis of “ought,” and, accordingly, that the a preferablewaytointegrateKant’s dictumintoKratzer’s and Quentin attimetwhenthe obligation isfirst imposed consider worldsinwhichMariaisabletomeetbothPatti will proceed to argue that restricting f(w) because itrelievesMariaofboth to meetQuentin)istrue,whichanunacceptableresult (Maria ought to meet Patti) the bestworldsjustincase which is amongthebestworldsjustincasew 1

follows, and(2)leavesuswith [[ (□ D One waywemightshowmore sympathyforMaria’s Following anorthodoxKratzeranalysis,(1)gives (2) MariacannotmeetbothPattiforlunchand (1) MariaoughttomeetPattiforlunchand In ordertobringMaria’s problemmorepreciselyinto [[ □

that Mariacanfulfillherobligations,butastandard 1 p) &(□ (w) A ~(p &q) iii

are suchthatforallw D 2

(w) q)) ]]

w, f w, ]] iv

aresuchthatforallw w, f w, 2 , g 2 1

, g follows. 1 , w nor from which ∈ her obligations.Assuch,I [[ [[ □ (p &q).Inotherwords, ~◊ ii Thus,(1)requiresthat D A

∈

q (p &q) ]] ∈ of evaluationthe ∩

to meetbothPatti w, f, g such that we only f [[ ~(p &q). 1 □ (w), D (Maria ought

in whichshe ]] (p &q) ∈

[[ w isamong w, f w, □ ∩ D 2 , g v

f To put 2 p 2 , from (w), ]]

]] w, f, g

w, f w, w is is 1 , the undesirable position of holding agents accountable for meet either. The next natural step would be to assert that the actions that they are incapable of taking (or of not taking). best possible worlds in our restricted modal base are worlds Take the statement “ought φ,” some obligation φ imposed such that either w ∈ p or w ∈ q. Naturally, we do not want on a random agent in the actual world (or world of utter- to say that just because Maria cannot meet both Patti and ance), wa. In order to guarantee that “ought” implies “can,” Quentin that she is relieved of her duty to keep her promise w, f, g we must evaluate [[□D φ]] (“ought φ”) with a restricted to either of them. On the contrary, it is still true that Maria modal base f’(w) such that for all w ∈ W, w ∈ ∩f’(w) just in ought to keep one of her promises. And, importantly, it does case one’s abilities at w are the same as one’s abilities at wa not seem to matter which of the promises she keeps; neither at the time t of evaluation of “ought φ.” Thus, everything Patti nor Quentin is given priority in this scenario. that one can do at w can also be done at wa, and everything On this account, some world w is among the best that one can do atw m wa can also be done at w. Importantly, this restriction means that the only possible worlds under worlds if and only if either w ∈ p or w ∈ q (i.e., if and only consideration are worlds that accurately reflect one’s abili- if it is a world in which Maria meets either Patti or Quentin). ties, which will affect the truth-value of “ought” statements However, we already know that for any world w ∈ ∩f’(w), if w ∈ p, then w q, and if w ∈ q, then w p. Thus, worlds uttered in the actual world. In Maria’s case, [[□D (p & q)]] ∉ ∉ vii w, f’, g in which Maria meets Patti are incomparable with worlds is true if and only if “□D” quantifies over the best in which she meets Quentin, which proves problematic for possible worlds such that {w: Best (f’(w), g(w)) ⊆ [[(p & q)]] c, f’, g}. In other words, the statement “Maria ought to meet our “ought” statements. Since the worlds are incomparable, Patti and Quentin” is true here just in case the most ideal it is not the case that a world in which Maria meets Patti possible worlds in our new, restricted modal base are ones is deontically preferable to a world in which she meets in which Maria meets both Patti and Quentin. However, we Quentin, or vice versa. As such, we do not want the state- w, f’, g already know that Maria is incapable of visiting both Patti ment “Maria ought to meet Patti” ([[□D p]] ) to overrule w, f’, and Quentin, and so there are no possible worlds in our new the statement “Maria ought to meet Quentin” ([[□D q]] g w, f’, g modal base in which Maria meets both Patti and Quentin ), or vice versa. But in order for [[□D p]] to hold, all best possible worlds in f’(w) must be worlds in which Maria ({w: [[(p & q)]] c, f’, g} = □). Accordingly, since we are dealing viii with a non-empty modal base — because, by definition, f’(w) meets Patti for lunch. Thus, if “Maria ought to meet Patti” is true, then it could not be the case that Maria ought includes at least the world of utterance wa — [[□D (p & q)]] to meet Quentin, because if Maria ought to meet Quentin, w, f’, g = 0, and the “ought” statement is false. The best pos- sible worlds with respect to our newly restricted modal base then all deontically ideal possible worlds are worlds in which f’(w) and our original deontic ordering source g(w) are not Maria does not meet Patti. A parallel result arises when we (p & q)-worlds, and so it is not the case the Maria ought to consider the statement “Maria ought to meet Quentin”: if visit both Patti and Quentin. Maria ought to meet Quentin, then it follows that it is not the case that she ought to meet Patti. Unfortunately, given This solution may seem appealing at first glance, (i) that the worlds in which Maria meets Patti (p-worlds) are because it allows us to capture the intuition that Maria incomparable with the worlds in which she meets Quentin should not be held responsible for events that are outside (q-worlds), and thus cannot be ordered in relation to each of her control. This interpretation also explains the fact other, and (ii) that the truth of either “ought” statement that it was true at some point that Maria ought to have met would require that we impose a deontic ordering on the p- both Patti and Quentin. Presumably, when Maria scheduled and q-worlds together, we are left in a position in which we her lunch and coffee meetings at time t, she was capable of can assert neither “Maria ought to meet Patti” nor “Maria keeping both promises, in some metaphysical sense.vi Thus, ought to meet Quentin.” But this result is entirely unten- the best possible worlds at time t were (p & q)-worlds, and able — Maria is not relieved of all of her duties just because w, f’, g the “ought” statement [[□D (p & q)]] evaluated at time t her car broke down. After all, it is still within her abilities to was true. Now, though, at the time of evaluation t’, Maria’s keep one of her promises. If we were to use this simple solu- w, f’, g abilities have changed, and [[□D (p & q)]] is rendered tion, Maria would not be facing any moral dilemma at all, false. Unfortunately, though, this simple solution is not because it would not be true that she ought to keep either without its own problems, because it forces us to concede of her promises. Maria could guiltlessly relax for the rest of w, f’, g w, f’, g that neither [[□D p]] nor [[□D q]] is true — we must the day, resting assured that she no longer has any lunch or admit that it is not the case that Maria ought to meet Patti coffee meeting obligations to fulfill. and that it is not the case that Maria ought to meet Quentin. w, f’, g Clearly, this conclusion is not what we were after We already know that [[□D (p & q)]] = 0, and for any when we originally restricted our modal base. We were world w ∈ ∩f’(w), it must be the case that either w ∉ p, w ∉ q, or both. Thus, for any world under consideration, Maria aiming for an analysis of “ought φ” that would enable us to incorporate Kant’s dictum that “ought” implies “can” into will either fail to meet Patti, fail to meet Quentin, or fail to 91 92 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 earlier, but include one adjustment. In order to guarantee us mirrorouranalysis of“oughtφ”withwhatIproposed true, despite Maria’s car troubles. To accomplish this, let to meetPatti”or“Mariaought tomeetQuentin”remains enable ustoupholdtheintuition thateither“Mariaought find anewwayofintegrating“ought”with “can”thatwill into murkywaterswhenitcomestopracticalreasoning. the dissolutionofadisjunctive“ought”statementgetsus but Ihopethatthespiritofthisdilemmaisclear:blocking reasoning extend far beyond what I can address in this paper, The myriadissuessurrounding theoreticalandpractical the “ought”operatortakeswidescopeoverdisjunction. “ought” operatorseachhavenarrowscope,whereasin(ii) Patti orQuentin( we couldmaintainthefact that Maria ought to meet either restrict themodalbaseinwaythatwedid.Ofcourse, around thisresultifweworkwithinKratzer’s semanticsand concluding thatsheoughttointervene and insteadstandsby, paralyzedbyindecision. φ difference between the theoretical conclusions (i) “‘ought tical reasoning.Iamcountingontherebeingagreatpractical hand; itassumesadirectlinkbetweentheoreticalandprac- course, thisexamplemayseemtoinvolveabitofsleight of either“oughtφ”orψ absurd, butitis ought todoeither. neither the perfectlyrationalcreaturethatKitis,sheoptedtotake hopelessly confusedastowhichactiontake.And,being ⊨ not thecasethatsheoughttomeetPatti(~ it isnotthecasethatsheoughttomeetQuentinand ought tomeetbothPattiandQuentin,thenitfollowsthat analysis thatwouldshowifitisnotthecaseMaria Kratzer’s semanticsfor“ought,”butwedidnotwantan intervene herself( concludes thatsheoughttoeitherrunalertthepoliceor only afewhundredmetersfromthepolicestation,soKit the sceneofamurderinprogress.Theis Say, forexample,thatasuper-rational agent,Kit,walksby rationally justifiedinevadingobligationsthatreallydo which wemustblockthisinference:anagentmightthenbe or “oughtψ”from(φv).”Imagineascenarioin reasoning we are After all,itseemsfairlyintuitivethatinoureverydaydeontic ought toruninformthem( Kit informsthemshewasnotjustifiedinconcludingthat being questionedbythepoliceasanaccessorytocrime, fact ( Patti” nor“MariaoughttomeetQuentin”followsfromthis be forced to conclude that neither “Maria ought to meet ” v“oughtψ ~ [[ □ [[ □ D Back to our original problem: it seems that we must action sinceshewasnotabletoconcludethat D

φ (φ v ψ) ]] & ~ ’” and (ii)“ought(φ ’” a conceivableresultifweblocktheinference [[ ]] □ ⊭ [[ justified inconcluding either “oughtφ D [[ □ This courseofreasoningseemspatently □

[[ ψ D □ D ]]

). Unfortunately, thereisnogetting (φ vψ) D (r vi)

φ ]] v [[ [[ ]] ]] □ □ ). However, shedoesneither

w, f’, g w, f’, D D

r ψ from “ought(φvψ).”Of ]] ]] ), norwasshejustifiedin =1),butwewouldstill ), which is unappealing. vψ [[ ),” sincein(i)the □ D

i ]] [[ ix ), leavingher □ Later, while D

( φ &ψ hold. it is ) ” ]] ]] adjusted interpretation to deny current obligations at the time of utterance. “ought” statements that impose metaphysically impossible use thisadjustedinterpretationtodenyoutrightthetruthof analysis tovarious“ought”statements.Asdesired,wecan previous attemptatasimplefix. out itsowncomplications,butitisstillfarpreferabletoour the agent’s abilities at t. time ofutterancet,anditstruth-conditionsaresensitiveto true justincase“ought that makethisresultseemscounterintuitive: so atsomepointinthefuture.Ofcourse,therearescenarios ness theorem,eventhoughImightpossesstheabilitytodo deny acurrentobligationtoproveGödel’s firstincomplete- on abilitiesthatwedonotyetpossess:Ican,forexample, “ “can it guaranteesthat“ought not guaranteethat“ought”implies“can”simpliciter. ( that “ought”implies“can,”wemustevaluate“oughtφ ie “now”—impose like “ought” statements — especially those containing indexicals due toanerrorinourinterpretation of“ought”statements. sor andherstudentisduetoa miscommunication,andnot just that. metaphysically possible world homework whenitiscompleted.Andtherecertainlysome just in casew is aworld in which the student turns in his every worldw “ought justified; “oughth”istrue( Thus, fromtheprofessor’s pointofview, “oughth”isclearly but thatheshouldturninhishomeworkonceitiscompleted. not meanthatthestudentshouldturninhishomeworknow, sidering what,exactly, theprofessorisstipulating:shedoes sition. To makesenseofthis,wemustbeprecisewhencon- it isnotwithinthestudent’s abilitiesatthetimet the sameasone’s abilitiesatw all [[ can □ w D

φ” at time φ φ ∈ ” attime Let uslookatsomeimplications of applyingournew We also must be careful not to assume that true , eventhough In thiscase,“oughth”seemsplainlytrue ]] φ” isfirstimposed refuse, youwilllosehomeworkpoints. the obligation I’m imposing now still holds. If you Professor: Well, youcancompleteitlatertoday, so completed thehomeworkyet. Student: Thatcan’t betrue,becauseIhaven’t even homework. (“oughth”) Professor: You ought to turn in your completed

W, W, w, f,g Accordingly, thedisagreement betweentheprofes- w ) with a restricted modal base f’(w) suchthatfor ) witharestrictedmodalbasef’(w) ∈ ∈ t. t, f’(w), ∩f’(w), ∩ Each “ought” statement is indexed to some and that“oughtφ” f’(w) ifandonlyone’sf’(w) abilitiesatware eternal eternal φ” initiallyimposedattimet . Obviously, thisnewanalysisdoes w isamongthebestpossibleworlds This analysis does not come with- φ [[ □ ” firstutteredattimet D obligations just becausethe w in which the student can do a

h

at timetwhentheobligation ]]

w, f’, g w, f’, We can also use this =1)ifandonlyfor evaluated attimet’ obligations that rely of impo- implied Rather, implies is ” statements remain true eternally. Consider the following, w, f’, g Because [[□D (p & q)]] is still true, Maria knows that uttered at time t: the best worlds are worlds in which she meets both Patti and Quentin. But Maria cannot fulfill both her obligations, Hannah ought to go water the flowers right now. and thus is left with the options of meeting Patti but not (“ought f”) Quentin ((p & ~q)-worlds), meeting Quentin but not Patti Supposing that this statement is true, the best worlds ((~p & q)-worlds), or meeting neither ((~p & ~q)-worlds). in our adjusted modal base f’(w) are worlds in which Hannah Maria knows that the (p & ~q)-worlds and (~p & goes and waters the flowers at timet , or at some time shortly q)-worlds are preferable to the (~p & ~q)-worlds, and now after time t. If we were to unpack the sentence in scrupulous must choose whether to meet Patti or meet Quentin. But detail, it would really say something like this: “Hannah ought as we already know, p-worlds and q-worlds are incompara- to go water the flowers immediately after I finish making ble, and thus Maria has no metric by which she can decide this statement — say, sometime between t and t — and she +1 which course of action to take. She cannot reach Patti or ought to water them once.” Even at a subsequent time of Quentin to undo one of her promises, and she is now stuck evaluation, say at time t , “ought f” remains true, because at +2 in a situation where she is forced to choose between two time t the best possible worlds were worlds in which Hannah equally (but distinctively) unattractive possibilities. This watered the flowers between timet and time t . But the +1 conundrum is the heart of Maria’s moral dilemma — it is not truth of “ought f” does not require that Hannah ought to that Maria ought to keep only one of her promises but she water the flowers at timet . In cases like these, when the +2 does not know which, or, as the simple fix would entail, that time for completion of the obligation has passed, we might Maria feels herself puzzlingly relieved of the duty to keep adjust the tense and say “ought to have φ” rather than either promise. Really, Maria knows that she ought to keep “ought φ.” Nevertheless, “ought φ,” when indexed to time t both promises, and to keep only one will invariably result in when the obligation is first imposed, is still true. a sub-ideal situation. Even if Maria now tells herself that she Finally, we can use this adjusted interpretation to ought to visit either Patti or Quentin, Maria is not actually explain the intuition that “ought” statements remain true negating “ought (p & q)” and replacing it with “ought (p when an agent renders herself incapable of fulfilling her v q).” Rather, she is accepting the fact that she now only obligation. Consider a scenario in which I promise at time t has metaphysical access to sub-ideal possible worlds, and is to drive my brother to work (from which we derive “ought attempting to make the best of her situation by turning to d”), but then, at time t’, I slash the car’s tires in a passionate the possibilities available to her. burst of sibling rivalry so that my brother will have to take This result may seem problematic when considering the bus. At time t I was fully capable of driving my brother the assignment of blame or responsibility; it seems counter- to work; the best because I have sabotaged my own efforts intuitive to blame Maria for her inevitable failure to meet to fulfill my obligation. both Patti and Quentin. After all, it is not Maria’s fault that The question remains as to what consequences this her car broke down, and it seems a bit unfair to hold Maria new analysis brings to our understanding of Maria’s original responsible when she inevitably fails to show up at either moral dilemma. When Maria promised to meet Patti and her lunch or coffee meeting. And this might seem to be promised to meet Quentin (say for simplicity’s sake that she the unavoidable conclusion if we maintain the truth of our made both of her promises at time t), she committed herself deontic “ought” statement without adjusting the interpre- to the truth of the statement “Maria ought to meet Patti for tation to account for Maria’s abilities. However, this is too lunch and meet Quentin for coffee” ( w, f’, g simplistic a view. In actuality, we take many factors into [[□D (p & q)]] ). Since our restricted modal base f’(w) includes all the possible account when assigning blame — our learning of “ought φ” worlds that accurately reflect Maria’s abilities at timet , and and “~φ” is not always immediate grounds for condemna- at time t Maria was capable of keeping her promises to Patti tion or punishment. Instead, we might seek an explanation for “~φ” is true. It is in seeking this explanation that and Quentin, it is true that for any world w ∈ ∩f’(w), w is why among the best worlds if and only if w ∈ (p & q). At time we would likely take an agent’s ability (or lack thereof) into t’, Maria realizes that her car has broken down and she is account, and there is no prima facie reason that the statement no longer capable of keeping both of her promises. So, at “ought φ” should have every intricacy of our reasoning about t’, there is no longer a possible world w in which Maria can guilt, blameworthiness, moral responsibility, etc. built into meet Patti and Quentin. But Maria’s abilities at t’ are imma- its truth conditions. Of course, we do want the truth-value of “ought φ” to reflect at leastsome reasonable assumptions terial for the truth of the original “ought” statement [[□D (p & q)]] w, f’, g. In fact, “Maria ought to meet Patti for lunch about the relationship between “ought” and “can,” which and meet Quentin for coffee” remains true at time t’, which our adjusted interpretation ensures. Thus, the best way to incorporate Kant’s dictum that “ought” implies “can” into is precisely why Maria feels herself to be in a moral dilemma. 93 94 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Endnotes continued support. and totheMellonMaysUndergraduateFellowshipforits Thank youtoMalteWiller forhishelpwiththispaper, Acknowledgements g w, f’, Patti forlunchandmeetQuentincoffee”( should thereforemaintainthetruthof“Mariaoughttomeet our intuitionthatMariaisfacingamoraldilemma,andwe fulfill herduties isexactlywhatwe need inorder to explain pretation of“ought”isinsensitivetoMaria’s inabilityto subsequent evaluationof“oughtφ.”Thefactthatthisinter abilities attheinitialimpositionof“oughtφ,” Kratzer’s semantics is to properly account for an agent’s 0iii ii i vii vi v iv Presumably, twopossibleworldscouldbeidenticalwithrespectto Iamsettingasidethepossibilityofdeterminism.alsothinkthatthere Kratzer, A. (1991).Modality. Handbookof Semantics:AnInternational Kratzer, A.(1981).TheNotionalCategoryofModality. Words, Worlds, Kratzer, A.(1981).TheNotionalCategoryofModality. Words, Worlds, Kratzer, A.(1991).Modality. Handbookof Semantics:AnInternational Stern,R.(2004).Does“ought”imply“can”?AnddidKantthinkit world isdeontically preferabletotheother. no betterorworsethan meetingQuentin,wecannotdetermine which differentiating factorandwehavealready decidedthatmeetingPattiis in theotherworldMariameetsQuentin. Sincethisactionistheonly agents’ ethicalbehaviorexcept purposes Iwillconsider“was(is)capable” tobepurelymetaphysical. preting “ought”(i.e.,“wascapableforall Xknows”),butforpresent consider implicitepistemicinterpretationsofabilitymodalswheninter may besomeinterestingquestionstoaskedaboutwhetherweshould Research,639–650. Contemporary (unlike thedeonticorderingsource).SeeKratzerforfurtherdiscussion. world betheclosestwithrespecttoabilityorderingsource agents’ abilitiesmatchtheirintheactualworld.Thus, worlds accordingtowhichthebestorclosest,worldsarethosein Thus, theabilityorderingsourcedeterminesanofpossible bilities availabletoagentsinworldw(again,istheactualhere). The abilityorderingsourceisderivedfromthesetofmetaphysicalpossi- ---- and Contexts:NewApproachestoWord Semantics,38–74. discussion. actual worldisthemostdeonticallyidealworld.SeeKratzerforfurther always behaveinaccordancewitheverymoralrule.Presumably, the to whichthebest,ormostideal,worldsarethoseinagents ordering sourcedeterminesanofpossibleworldsaccording governs behaviorinworld(inthiscase,istheactualworld).Thedeontic The deonticorderingsourceisderivedfromthesetofethicalnormsthat ---- and Contexts:NewApproachestoWord Semantics,38–74. Research,,639–650. Contemporary Stern forfurtherdiscussion. ascribed toKant,butthereisdebateastheexactattribution.See relieve usofobligationsthatareimpossibletofulfill)istraditionally The principlethat“ought”implies“can”(traditionallyunderstoodto ---- does? (1),42–61. )

in Maria’s scenario. that inoneworldMariameetsPattiand [[ □ not D

(p &q) at some - - ]]

Stern, R.(2004).Does“ought”imply“can”?AnddidKantthinkit Kratzer, A.(1991).Modality. Handbook Semantics:AnInternational Kratzer, A.(1981).TheNotionalCategoryofModality. Words, Works Cited ix viii does? Research,639–650. of Contemporary Worlds, andContexts:NewApproachestoWord Semantics,38–74. We couldunderstandthisexampleasparallelingtheparadoxof Kratzer, A.(1991).Modality. Handbookof Semantics:AnInternational initial disjunctiveoughtstatement). derive either“oughteat”ordrink”fromhisknowledgeofthe ever iscloser, hefailstogoeitherandsubsequentlydies(he knows “ought(eatvdrink).”Sincethedonkeywillalwaysgotowhich- equidistant fromabaleofhayandbucketwater(saythatthedonkey Buridan’s ass:apoordonkeyisequallyhungryandthirsty, andheis Research,639–650. Contemporary Utilitas, 16(1),42–61. John Paul II and Political Catholicism in Chile Melissa Sarmiento, Cornell University

Melissa graduated from Cornell University in May 2016 with On the Cessation of Violence a major in history and minors in German and Latin American studies. Her research interests include modern and colonial Latin The Pope’s visit to Chile marked the first time since America, and analyzing how film redefines our understanding of General Augusto Pinochet assumed power in 1973 that mass ii historical events. She currently lives in Tokyo, Japan. gatherings were permitted in the country. By 1987, Brazil and Argentina had, for the most part, completed the tran- sition from right-wing military dictatorships to democrati- Abstract cally elected governments, ending the Dirty Wars that were responsible for the deaths and disappearances of thousands. In this excerpt of my Mellon Mays essay, Political These transitions meant that Chile was politically isolated in Catholicism and Chile’s Path Toward Human Rights during the the region, as it was the only country in the Southern Cone Pinochet Regime, I explore how John Paul II influenced that was still ruled by an oppressive regime whose anti- Chilean politics by advocating for conservative human rights communist excuse was becoming increasingly irrelevant as ideology and rejecting liberation theology. General Augusto Cold War tensions and fears waned.iii Thus, although John Pinochet held power in Chile from 1973–1990. Among Paul II visited Argentina and Uruguay on the same trip to other things, the Pinochet administration was responsible Latin America, his presence in Chile had much more politi- for egregious human rights violations and a rise in poverty cal significance because his pro-human rights message—and levels. John Paul II visited the country in 1987. During his its implications—directly targeted Pinochet and other mili- visit he delivered a series of addresses that both defended tary dictatorships that still ruled in Central America. human rights and attacked the government for violating them. In this excerpt, I analyze these speeches closely and For Pinochet, the Pope’s visit was all about the possi- demonstrate that though the Pope claimed that the Catholic bility of gaining political leverage in the eyes of the Vatican. Church was a politically neutral institution, his visit to Chile In preparation for the Pontiff’s visit, the Regime conducted proved that in reality it functioned as a powerful, conserva- several random searches and increased police presence tive political entity. throughout Chilean cities. The government actively tried to create a façade that depicted an idyllic Chile with happy, working people.iv Yet, despite the efforts to fabricate a pos- i In this excerpt of my Mellon Mays essay, I use Chile itive image of Chile, the reality soon surfaced during the as a case study to analyze the political involvement of the Pope’s visit. As he spoke with individuals from various social Catholic Church during the papacy of John Paul II (1978– strata, John Paul II began to receive complaints about the 2005). John Paul II rejected liberation theology—the idea atrocities of the regime and the poor working conditions that the Catholic Church had an obligation to help those that people faced.v Matters became worse during the address living in poverty overcome socioeconomic inequality—in at O’Higgins Park on April 3, 1987: more than 600,000 support of human rights. During the late twentieth century, people had gathered to hear the Pope speak, but violence human rights were still a nascent, undefined political ide- erupted among the masses, giving the Pope’s call for the ology. The Pope used this to his advantage to cement the cessation of violence immediate importance.vi position of the Catholic Church by linking conservatism to human rights discourse, a sharp turn from the socialism that At O’Higgins Park, the Pope condemned political was associated with liberation theology. violence and showed solidarity toward political subversives by alluding to the Vicariate of Solidarity (known as the During the Pinochet administration (1973–1990), Vicaría de la Solidaridad in Spanish, from here on referred high poverty levels and egregious human rights violations to as Vicariate)—an organization founded by Cardinal Raúl plagued Chile. John Paul II visited the country on April Silva Henríquez in 1976 that functioned as a safe haven for 1987. The visitation, masked as a religious undertaking to intellectuals to discuss political instability in Chile.vii John bring the word of God to the country, was a testament to Paul II’s recognition of the work of the Vicariate in front the conservatism of the Church and human rights ideology, of hundreds of thousands of people, including government and the Church’s rejection of liberation theology. While in figures, was significant because it was a public acknowledge- Chile, the Pope delivered a series of addresses that focused ment that as Pope, he was aware of the dangerous mission on the importance of human rights, the cessation of vio- that the organization had undertaken to defend human lence, and helping the poor improve their socioeconomic rights and combat economic and political oppression in status through work. Despite the Pope’s claims of political Chile. The address at O’Higgins Park was essentially a papal neutrality, his addresses in Chile were an example of the endorsement that not only helped establish the Vicariate as Catholic Church pursuing its own political agenda. a champion of human rights; it also legitimized its political

95 and religious advocacy in the eyes of the Vatican, and there- Paul II discussed Chile’s slow economic progress and called fore the world. By endorsing the Vicariate, a religious orga- for public and private economic institutions, as well as the nization with a firm stance against the government, the Pope developed nations, to fund programs that would aid the confirmed that the human rights violations in the country socioeconomic liberation of Chileans who were living in were, indeed, concerning, and that the dictatorship was to “an intolerable economic, social, and political oppression.”xiv blame for most, if not all, of Chile’s problems.viii The Pope cautioned, however, that

In addition to defending the Vicariate, John Paul “. . . the state must not replace the initiative and II said that it was in everyone’s best interest to build an responsibility that individuals and social minori- environment where dialogue between political parties was ties are capable of assuming in their respective fields. On the contrary, it [the state] must actively possible, adding that dialogue amongst dissenting opinions favor these areas of liberty, but, at the same time, “was not foreign to the recognized democratic tradition of it should organize its performance and guard its the Chilean people.”ix With these words, the Pope alluded to adequate incorporation in the common good.”xv Chile’s democratic past, which was thwarted by the coup.x At O’Higgins Park, the Pope further argued for the reconcilia- By outlining the role of the state in helping people tion of the government and political subversives, saying that achieve economic freedom, the Pope was making a refer- “reconciliation is expressed in the convergence of people’s ence to the high unemployment rates in the country, and will to achieve the common good, this high objective that claiming that although the government was not responsible bestows its purpose to the functions of the political com- for whether or not an individual was willing to work, it was munity.”xi Through these words, John Paul II emphasized responsible for creating jobs and other activities that allowed that politics were a result of the will of the people and that people to earn a living, something that was not happening in a government should always respond to this will because a Chile; in 1987, even though the economy was showing signs ruling party only existed as long as the people allowed it to of recovery after its crash five years earlier, over two fifths do so. Since the Regime was no longer defending the inter- of Chilean families remained poor.xvi Even if the Regime ests of the majority of the population—and it arguably never wanted the Pope to believe that the economy was recovering did—the Pope’s words were a direct attack on the Pinochet and that working conditions were great, the high poverty administration. rates proved otherwise.xvii

In criticizing the regime, the Pope emphasized that In order to emphasize how the state should not Chile must say no to violence because “reconciliation, as attempt to keep the poor from engaging in their own eco- it is seen by the Church, is the genuine path to Christian nomic salvation, John Paul II warned the CEPAL against liberation . . . . Chile cannot progress by heightening divi- welfare, saying that while subsidizing housing, nutrition, sions. It is time for forgiveness and for reconciliation.”xii and health was necessary for the poor to survive, these Although the Pope suggested that reconciliation was needed actions were not laudable because they were not as useful for divine purposes, this statement was clearly political. In to the poor as offering them work. “Work,” the Pope said, this case, reconciliation meant the end of the military dic- is the way that “. . . a worker takes control of his destiny, tatorship and the democratization of the country, two goals integrates himself into society as a whole, and even obtains that the Church supported in order to bring political and help [welfare] not as charity, but, in a way, as the personal economic stability to Chile and to advance its pro-human and material fruit of his efforts.”xviii In this context, of course, rights agenda. This strong emphasis on reconciliation what was useful to the poor was highly subjective, and these also showed that the Pope was against radical change— words revealed how economically conservative the Pope a political tactic to which some leftist liberation theologians was: he condemned welfare because it was preventing the subscribed—and that, instead, he favored peace under an poor from attaining divine salvation. As the Pope saw it, sal- established system of government.xiii Thus, the call to end vation was reserved for those who actively tried to partake in violence was applicable not just to the government, but to the global order by earning a living. Seemingly, he ignored political opponents as well. how difficult it could be for the poor to partake in an eco- nomic system that had ignored them for decades. On Chile’s Economy and the Right to Work John Paul II’s speech to the CEPAL assembly was One of the focuses of the Pope’s visit to Chile was a clear rejection of liberation theology: although the Pope the country’s economy and its egregious poverty levels. In agreed that certain economic practices of developed nations an address to the Comisión Económica para América Latina were largely responsible for underdevelopment in Latin y el Caribe (Economic Commission for Latin America and America, he also stressed that the poor were, to a certain the Caribbean, from here on referred to as CEPAL) John extent, to blame for their own situation because they were 96 not trying to contribute to the economy and were instead to protect his human rights are increasingly more hoping for the state to grant them socioeconomic relief. This prominent in society . . . . The political community was a significant break from liberation theologians that saw is a function of the human being and must serve xxiii the poor as victims of the developed world and its economic him.” ambitions. They did not really believe that working would In this speech, John Paul II underscored the Church’s help improve the living conditions of the poor because it political neutrality, but he also stressed that should any would not change the fact that their oppression was an insult political activity contradict the mission that God has given to human dignity.xix Through the CEPAL address, John the Church to advocate for the common good and salvation Paul II expressed disagreement with this socialist stance, from sin, it must interfere in order to steer nations in the suggesting instead that the poor could actually change their correct path. Since the audience of this particular address socioeconomic status and contribute to their own prog- consisted exclusively of politicians, the Pope’s words in this ress—and that of their country—if they worked.xx The Pope case could be interpreted as a justification for Catholic concluded the CEPAL address by saying that “we [Chile] involvement in Chile. John Paul II was operating under the should not rest until we have not made it possible, for every technicality that the Church was not a political entity, but inhabitant of the region, to access that unique right . . . when innocent individuals were being harmed, as was the the right to work.”xxi He approached his stance toward the case in Chile, it was the Church’s duty to ameliorate political poor from a human rights perspective, yet he claimed that differences, attenuate violence, and instill peace. The pope’s everyone, and not just the poor, deserved access to work. reference to ethics, morals and inalienable rights had a dual Once again, this was a clear division from many liberation meaning: not only did it reiterate John Paul II’s support theologians that believed that only the poor needed help, for human rights in a country that very obviously did not as they were the ones that, historically, had been at an eco- respect them, but it also showed that as pontiff, it was his nomic disadvantage. By suggesting that the country help responsibility to try to appeal to the governments that were the poor through work and not by granting them welfare perpetuating their violation. The CEPAL address revealed benefits, John Paul II offered an alternative to the socialism how as Pope, John Paul II was able to discredit liberationist that characterized liberationist thought.xxii Additionally, the thought and its emphasis on the poor, and, instead, claim Pope showed that he supported human rights because unlike that economic conservatism and governmental democracy liberation theology, these were easily malleable and allowed were the Vatican-approved methods to obtain salvation. him to be politically conservative without explicitly rejecting Under the excuse that the Church could only involve itself the class struggles of the poor. Specifically, John Paul II’s call in politics when governments were not following the correct for work to be the method to relieve poverty showed that path to salvation, the Pope established the Vatican as a whole he did not believe that the Church had any specific duty to and Jesus himself to be both democratic and conservative. help the poor in their class struggle; rather it needed to help them overcome socioeconomic adversity by guiding them to find their rightful place in society within the established Conclusion governments. The Pope’s visit had an unquestionable impact on Chile. In June 1987, two months after the Pontiff left the On the Church’s Political Involvement country, bishops began to encourage voter registration in hopes that if citizens voted, they would be able to bring the John Paul II’s speeches in Chile were disguised as the dictatorship to an end. Their efforts were rewarded when Church’s divine mission to foster peace and promulgate the Chile voted Pinochet out of office through the 1988 pleb- values of the Gospel amongst its constituents. The Pope iscite, where over fifty percent of those who participated explained that the Church was encouraging human rights chose to end a regime that had been in power for fifteen ideology not because of any political affiliations, but because years.xxiv human rights were a mandate of God, and therefore should be respected as such. This was clearly illustrated by the In analyzing the changes that the papal visit caused address to Chilean politicians, given on April 3, 1987: within Chile, it is important to understand the conditions “The Church . . . does not identify itself in any way that allowed for these changes to occur. First, the Pope with the political community, nor is it attached to went to Chile at a time when many people, including any political system. However, it is also true that Conservative Catholics who had once supported the dicta- the Church, as part of the mission it has been given torship, were disillusioned with its human rights violations by Jesus Christ, must spread the light of the Gospel and its ailing economy.xxv By 1987, the people of Chile were over current realities, including political activity, ready to hear the Pope’s message because the dictatorship so that ethics and morals that highlight the tran- had been losing support for several years. Second, the Pope scendental character of the individual and the need 97 98 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 a whole.Thankyou. of thisessay, and,moreimportantly, myacademiccareeras about lifeingeneral,yourguidance wasaninvaluablepart American history, writing techniques,orsimplytalking from the verybeginning. Whether we werediscussing Latin University forsupportingandencouragingmyresearch cially liketothankProfessorRaymondCraibatCornell where Icouldsharemyresearch.Finally, Iwouldespe - Fellowship Journalstaff,thankyouforprovidingaplatform my researchinterests.To theMellonMaysUndergraduate ing me to the topic of this essay and helping me solidify Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Münchenforintroduc- In addition,thankyoutoProfessorMartinGeyeratthe fellows couldlettheirindependentresearchprojectsbloom. the realm of academia and for providing a space where the Fellowship atCornellUniversityforhelpingmenavigate Acknowledgements global affairs,andtheymustberecognizedassuch. used Catholicismasamediumtofacilitateinvolvementin about religion.Instead,bothwerepoliticalideologiesthat ther liberation theology nor human rights were really ever being toofocusedonpoliticsandnotdivinitywhennei- then, that John Paul II attacked liberation theology for was wrongintheeyesofCatholicChurch.Itisironic, outlining the difference between what was right and what moves thatunquestionablychangedthehistoryofChileby and actions proved otherwise: they were powerful political a whole—wasonlymessengerofGod,buthisspeeches ism. ThePopealwaysclaimedthathe—andtheChurchas and becausehe,notGod,wasagainstradicalismsocial- rejected becauseJohnPaulIIwasastaunchconservative, did notwanttopartake.Liberationtheologywasactually in aclassstrugglewiththelowerclasseswhichPope the realitywasthatliberationtheologyinvolvedChurch true whentheideologyfirstgainedpoliticalmomentum, to beMarxistand socialist, and while this mayhavebeen ologies. TheCatholicChurchperceivedliberationtheology but becauseitassociateditselfwiththewrongpoliticalide- criticized liberationtheologynotbecauseitwastoopolitical, from thegovernment. were livinginthecountry, hedidnotfearanyretaliation regime becauseunliketheclergyandlayCatholicsthat never have.ItwaseasierforthePopetospeakagainst authority thatlocalorganizationsliketheVicariate would represented theVatican, andthisgavehimaninternational I wanttothanktheMellonMaysUndergraduate Using ChileasanexamplerevealsthatJohnPaulII Endnotes vii vi v iv iii ii i xi x ix viii Founded in1976byCardinalRaúlSilvaHenríquez,theVicariate helped This provedtobeadisturbanceofthecrowdstagedbyRegimeinan Ibid. Ibid., 338. in Struggles Stern, SteveJ.,BattlingforHeartsandMinds:Memory Lake Sagaris,“ChilepreparesforPope’s visit,”Times This essayreferencesandcitesworksinSpanish.Alltranslations,unless Papa JuanPabloII,“Discursodel enelParqueO’Higgins.” A right-wingmilitarycoupoverthrewSalvador Allende’s governmentin Papa JuanPabloII,“Discursodel enelParqueO’Higgins.” Papa JuanPabloII“DiscursodelenelParqueO’Higgins”Seis Dame, IN:UniversityofNotreDamePress,1996). (Notre and BrianH.Smith,TheChurchDemocracyinChilePeru Cardinal Silvahadinitiated,includingtheVicariate. SeeMichaelFleet sor’s, CardinalFresnocontinuedtosupportmanyofthe programs that his conservativepoliticalviewsvastlydifferedfromliberalpredeces- Fresno replacedCardinalSilvaastheArchbishopofSantiago.Although action againsttheCatholicChurchasawhole. government tosilenceit;anyactiontakenagainsttheVicariate wasan an officialministryoftheArchdioceseSantiago,itwasdifficultfor strategies againsttheRegime.BecauseVicariate wasestablishedas one another, andasaplacewherepeoplecouldorganizetodiscuss ical subversivestosharetheirideasandexpresssolidaritytowards against militarydictatorships.Italsofunctionedasasafespaceforpolit- human rightsdiscoursewasgainingpoliticalmomentumindiscussions raise awarenessofhumanrightsviolationsinChileatatimewhen were violent.SeeStern,BattlingforHeartsandMinds. attempt toshowthatitspracticeswerevalidbecausepoliticalinsurgents Press, 2006),354. Pinochet’s Chile,1973–1988(UnitedStatesofAmerica:DukeUniversity Apr. 1,1987.AccessedonJuly2015http://bit.ly/1VtrpcF. otherwise indicated,aremyown. junta. SeeStern,BattlingforHeartsandMinds. coup, PinochetassumedpowerinChile andruledalongwithamilitary 1973. Allende,whohadbeendemocratically elected,wasleftist.Afterthe addressed theeventanditssignificance. assassination, andthesecondoneisaGeneralAudiencewherePope Pope wrotetotheEpiscopateofElSalvadorinresponseRomero’s Libreria EditriceVaticana, 1980).Thefirstdocumentisaletterthatthe 1980). Also:PapaJuanPabloII,AudienciaGeneral(Vatican City, Italy: al EpiscopadodeElSalvador(Vatican City:Libreria EditriceVaticana: ciliation inthecountry. See:PapaJuanPabloII,CartadelSantoPadre of “criminalactions”thatwerehinderingtheprocesspoliticalrecon- tary regime.ThePopesaidthattheArchbishop’s deathwastheresult people ofElSalvadorwhowerebeingpersecutedbyaright-wingmili- in 1980.To this,thePoperesponded byshowingsolidaritytowardthe did. ThiswasdemonstratedbytheassassinationofArchbishopRomero Catholic, andthepeoplewerethereforepersuadedbywhatclergy danger fordictatorshipsbecausethecontinentwasoverwhelmingly The politicalactivitiesoftheLatinAmericanChurchposedagreat . The ChurchandDemocracyinChilePeru that hedidnottrytocoerceitintoclosingdown.SeeFleetandSmith, directly becauseitwasprotectedbytheVatican, butthisdidnotmean problematic fortheRegime.PinochetwasunabletoattackVicariate refer toitassuchbecauseIbelievethattheirpoliticalactivitieswere Vicariate wasnotnecessarily“subversive.”However, Ihave chosento Professor RaymondCraibfromCornellUniversitysuggestedthatthe vp5qw4uf5x.search.serialssolutions.com.proxy.library.cornell.edu. Centro deEstudiosPúblicos,1987).AccessedJuly6,2015onhttp:// discursos delPapaJuanPabloIIenChile(textosíntegros)(Santiago,Chile:

In 1983 (London, England)

Juan Francisco xii Papa Juan Pablo II, “Discurso del Papa en la Cepal” Seis discursos del Works Cited Papa Juan Pablo II en Chile (textos íntegros) (Santiago, Chile: Centro de Estudios Públicos, 1987). Accessed July 6, 2015 on http://vp5qw4uf5x. Barrett, Edward. Persons and Liberal Democracy: The Ethical and search.serialssolutions.com.proxy.library.cornell.edu. Political Thought of Karol Wojtyla/Pope John Paul II. Lanham, xiii Many liberation theologians believed that only radical change would Md.: Lexington Books, 2010. have an impact on the socioeconomic status of the poor. Notably, Gustavo Gutiérrez’s early writings focused strongly on the need for a Boff, Leonardo. Iglesia, Carisma y Poder: Ensayos De Eclesiología social revolution. Gutiérrez was one of the most influential voices of Militante. Bogotá: Indo-American Press Service, 1985. Latin American liberation theology. See Gutiérrez, Gustavo Teología de la liberación: perspectivas 8a. edición (Centro de estudios y publicaciones: Lima, Perú, 1991). Fleet, Michael, and Smith, Brian H. The Catholic Church and Democracy in Chile and . Notre Dame, Ind.: University of xiv Papa Juan Pablo II, “Discurso del Papa en la Cepal.” Notre Dame Press, 1996. xv Ibid. xvi Between 1977 and 1980, the Chilean economy witnessed a boost due to Gutiérrez, Gustavo. Teología De La Liberación: Perspectivas. 8. ed., imports, easy credit from international institutions, and a stable currency según la 6. ed., rev. y corr. Lima, Perú: Centro de Estudios y exchange rate. This economic “miracle,” however, was not to last, Publicaciones, 1991. because it concentrated the wealth within a few local institutions that assumed that these would always be able to count on international loans Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger. Instruction on Certain Aspects of the to maintain their stability. This model was unsustainable, and by 1982, “Theology of Liberation.” Vatican City, Italy: Libreria Editrice Chile’s economy began to suffer. See Stern, Battling for Hearts and Minds. Vaticana, 1984. xvii Stern, Battling for Hearts and Minds, 350. xviii Papa Juan Pablo II, “Discurso del Papa en la Cepal.” Papa Juan Pablo II, Audiencia General. Vatican City, Italy: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1980. xix A key aspect of liberation theology in the twentieth century was depen- dency theory, or the idea that Latin America was exploited by developed nations in an attempt to fuel capitalism and their own material gain. In Papa Juan Pablo II. Carta del Santo Padre al Episcopado de El doing so, they were also creating inequality throughout Latin America. Salvador. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana: 1980. See Boff, Leonardo, Iglesia: carisma y poder: ensayos de eclesiología mili- tante (Bogotá, : Indo-American Press Service, 1985), 37. Also: Papa Juan Pablo II. Seis discursos del Papa Juan Pablo II en Chile Paul E. Sigmund, “Gustavo Gutiérrez (b. 1928): Commentary” in The (textos íntegros). Santiago, Chile: Centro de Estudios Públicos, Teachings of Modern Roman Catholicism on Law, Politics, and Human Nature, eds. John Witte Jr. and Frank S. Alexander (New York, NY: Columbia 1987. University Press, 2007). Sagaris, Lake. “Chile prepares for Pope’s visit,” Times. London, xx Edward Barrett, Persons and Liberal Democracy: The Ethical and Political England, Apr. 1, 1987. Thought of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2010), 94. Stern, Steve J. Battling for Hearts and Minds: Memory Struggles in xxi Papa Juan Pablo II, “Discurso del Papa en la Cepal.” Pinochet’s Chile, 1973–1988. Durham: Duke University Press, xxii It is important to note that while some branches of liberation theology 2006. were indeed Marxist, this was not always the case. Many liberation theo- logians emphasized change through established institutions of power Witte, John, and Alexander, Frank S. The Teachings of Modern rather than social revolutions. The Vatican attacked liberation theology Roman Catholicism on Law, Politics, and Human Nature. New because it was Marxist, but this was not necessarily well-deserved criticism considering the various aspects of liberation theology. See York: Columbia University Press, 2007. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Instruction on certain Aspects of the “Theology of Liberation” (Vatican City, Italy: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1984), preface. xxiii Papa Juan Pablo II, “Discurso del Papa a los Políticos.” Seis discursos del Papa Juan Pablo II en Chile (textos íntegros) (Santiago, Chile: Centro de Estudios Públicos, 1987). Accessed July 6, 2015 on http://vp5qw4uf5x. search.serialssolutions.com.proxy.library.cornell.edu. Emphasis added. xxiv Although the majority of those who participated on the plebiscite voted to end Pinochet’s Regime, a solid forty-three percent voted for the dictator to continue his rule in Chile. This shows that while a sizable majority of people opposed the Regime, not everyone in Chile was against the dictator’s policies. See: Stern, Battling for Hearts and Minds. xxv When Pinochet first ascended to power, he had a lot of support, partic- ularly from the middle- and land-owning classes who disliked Allende’s leftist politics. See Stern, Battling for Hearts and Minds.

99 To See Is to Feel: Feminist Symbols of Perception in Woolf and Lispector Georgia Soares, University of Southern California

Georgia Soares graduated in May 2016 from the University of happens when one tries to see life from the position of a Southern California with a major in English (concentration in woman, as informed by herself and her society? creative writing) and a double minor in French and comparative literature. She is interested in the intersection of arts and cul- This is one of the rare, direct links that exist between ture, education, and human rights. Georgia spent the summer writers Clarice Lispector and Virginia Woolf. It is also in Bosnia and Herzegovina under the Humanity in Action an overt expression of feminist critique rarely found in fellowship, and is currently working as an English teacher in Lispector’s writings. Although separated by a hemisphere, Nice, France under the French Ministry of Education’s TAPIF an ocean, and a generation, Lispector and Woolf’s works program. have been in conversation with each other since Lispector’s debut as a literary writer in 1943. American translator Gregory Rabassa remarked that Lispector “looked like Abstract Marlene Dietrich and wrote like Virginia Woolf” (70), while Brazilian critic Lêdo Ivo recounted that, “under the impact This article is the introduction to a thesis that exam- of her book, [he] felt that [he] was standing before Virginia ines the symbolism of windows in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Woolf” (161). Yet, it remains uncommon that readers of Dalloway and Clarice Lispector’s Near to the Wild Heart and Woolf know of Lispector, and vice versa, in part because what they reveal about women’s position in society. In both Lispector’s oeuvre has remained little studied in the United novels, the window symbolizes a limited mode of perception States and England. imposed upon women by patriarchal society, which creates an oppositional separation between male and female spaces Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway (1925) and Lispector’s Near in the narratives. This analysis also particularly examines to the Wild Heart (1943) are remarkable examples of these Hélène Cixous’ theory of écriture féminine with respect to authors’ literary achievements in using the power of lan- Lispector and Woolf’s novels. guage to construct complex social critiques. In both novels, each writer explores and questions modes of seeing and perceiving life for a woman in the first half of the twenti- Myopia was her fault, her lead, her imperceptible eth century as a way to create awareness about the social native veil. Strange: she could see that she could not see, but she could not see clearly. Every day there constrictions women faced in their time periods. Near to the was refusal, but who could say where the refusal Wild Heart is an atypical bildungsroman that recounts the came from: who was refusing, the world, or she? story of Joana’s decision to relinquish participating in her —Hélène Cixous, Veils society in the name of self-liberation. The fragmentation of her character presents her as existing within society only Introduction insofar as she is obliged to, preferring most of the time to believe herself an independent, wild entity of unconstrained, In a Brazilian newspaper column written in 1952, “pure life.” Joana is a major contrast to the middle-aged Clarice Lispector reacts to Virginia Woolf’s fictional story Clarissa Dalloway, who Woolf chooses to present also as of Judith Shakespeare narrated in A Room of One’s Own. a character fragmented between her past and present, but Lispector calls Judith “the other Shakespeare” and declares one who ultimately accepts society’s impositions upon her that the only difference between her and her brother William self-definition, and strives to retain an outward appearance is that, “because of nature’s kind fate, she would wear skirts” of composure so as not to give away her fragmented self. (Correio Feminino 125). Lispector identifies Judith as a victim Each novel makes a distinct statement about the stage in of a socially constructed gender difference which robs the which women find themselves in their fight for liberation, woman of her ability to pursue a writing career. Like Woolf, and a comparative study of these two novels helps to better Lispector discusses in her article the consequences that this understand the reasons for Woolf’s historical, realistic vision gender difference would cause on Judith’s destiny: the girl and Lispector’s utopian envisioning. would not have access to education, to books, or any pros- pect of pursuing a career because her worth was inherently Despite the fact that Virginia Woolf and Clarice and exclusively tied to her marriageability. Lispector then Lispector come from disparate socio-historical and cultural quotes Woolf’s famous observation: “Who shall measure backgrounds, there exist similarities between their novels the heat and violence of the poet’s heart when caught and and in their struggles as women writers. Woolf is a canonical tangled in a woman’s body?” and closes the column by figure in the English-speaking world and a major feminist emphasizing that Judith’s story is one that never existed (1). figure from the first half of the twentieth century. Born in Writing on this topic, both Lispector and Woolf express the Victorian period in 1882, Woolf grew up in a society their interest in engaging with the following question: what that sustained a deep divide between the sexes: while her

100 brothers were educated at Cambridge, Woolf and her sisters France and the United States, notably under the influence were lucky enough to be homeschooled, and grew up with a of Hélène Cixous. sharp awareness of the expectations of marriage and moth- erhood imposed upon them (Harris 46). In a diary entry, It goes without saying that Virginia Woolf has been Virginia Woolf admitted that, had her father lived longer, exponentially more studied in American criticism (and she would have been unable to write books because of his beyond) than Lispector. This research aims to fill part of moral and intellectual Victorian judgments that limited a lacuna in the literary studies of both authors by offer- women to domestic lives (A Writer’s Diary 138). Although ing an in-depth analysis of a symbol that has not yet been part of a more modern generation, Lispector also faced examined at length (in contrast to the symbolism of the a variety of challenges for being a woman (and) writer in sea, for instance), and what it reveals about social issues society. Born in 1920 in Tchetchelnik, Ukraine, Lispector related to gender inequality. In the vast world of Woolfian would immigrate with her Jewish parents to Brazil as a criticism, I position this analysis at the intersection of works baby and by the end of her life would be considered the like Claudia Olk’s Virginia Woolf and the Aesthetics of Vision, best woman writer Brazil had ever produced. As a young which provides an in-depth analysis of windows, mirrors and adult, Lispector sacrificed the debut of her writing career by veils, in the works of Woolf, and Jean Wyatt’s “Avoiding marrying Maury Gurgel Valente, a Brazilian diplomat and Self-Definition: In Defense of Women’s Right to Merge ambassador, immediately after publishing Near to the Wild (Julia Kristeva and Mrs Dalloway),” which traces the femi- Heart. For many years she dedicated herself to playing the nist, psychoanalytical aspects of Mrs. Dalloway. My objective role of an ambassadress, entertaining Valente’s diplomatic is also to revive and expand the dialogue between Lispector circles much like Clarissa entertains Richard Dalloway’s and Woolf’s novels. Although Lispector was often compared political circles. Despite the financial comfort and social to Virginia Woolf in her lifetime (Lindstrom 44), compar- status that came with being Valente’s wife, she eventually ative analyses between the two are scarce. The few avail- divorced and returned to Brazil as a single mother of two able have examined issues of otherness, silence, the literary boys, with the goal of pursuing her writing career full time. epiphany, écriture féminine, and the relationship between From then on she perpetually suffered financial difficulties, their works and European art. My contribution is to offer being constantly cheated by her publishers, and never able a new assessment of écriture féminine in the works of both to make a living as a fiction writer despite having been pub- writers, while also examining the aesthetics of vision and lished in several languages and achieving canonical status issues of androgyny in both novels. even before her death. Cixous was the first critic to introduce Lispector to Unlike Mrs. Dalloway, Near to the Wild Heart remains a French audience, and a major driving force behind the little studied even by major critics like Hélène Cixous, the discovery of Lispector’s literature in the United States and most pivotal figure in the study of Lispector’s literature to elsewhere in Europe. She has presented Lispector as the date, possibly because it is the least indicative of Lispector’s emblem of écriture féminine, and provided a major overview more prominent postmodernist texts that come to define of Lispector’s literature in Reading with Clarice Lispector the ensemble of her work later in her career. Studies of (1990), To Live the Orange (1979), and “Coming to Writing” Lispector’s works have been particularly scarce within and Other Essays (1991), among other titles, even before American criticism likely as a consequence of scant transla- translations were widely available in English. Cixous’ trac- tion, and little representation of non-Hispanic authors from ing of écriture féminine in Lispector’s works serves as an Latin America. It was not until 2012 that all of Lispector’s important feminist approach to understanding gender issues works gained a complete series of translation in the English present in Lispector’s oeuvre. First it is important to under- language, an endeavor pioneered by her American biogra- stand what écriture féminine entails. According to Cixous, pher Benjamin Moser. Earl Fitz is another notable example Western thought practices have perpetuated a systematic of a contemporary American critic who has written exten- repression of women’s experience by shutting down access sively on Lispector, including Sexuality and Being in the to and engagement with the unconscious in masculinist soci- Poststructuralist Universe of Clarice Lispector: The Différance ety. Male-centric systems legitimize only the rationalization of Desire (2001), and dozens of articles and book chapters. that originates from the male conscious. Cixous defines Most of the scholarship on Lispector is based on the frame- the conscious as male and unconscious as female accord- works of structuralism, post-structuralism, psychoanalysis, ing to Freudian psychoanalysis (Blyth, Sellers 25). Cixous existential philosophy, and feminist theories. Prior to the then offers écriture féminine as a practice that emblematizes 1970s, most criticism revolved around existential thematics feminine expression free of any male-imposed oppression. and issues of artistic representation (Lindstrom 43). The Verena Conley definesécriture féminine as: emergence of a feminist dimension to Lispector’s works then followed as a reaction to the new feminist theories in 101 a working term referring less to a writing prac- and raise the following questions: how may we move towards ticed mainly by women than, in a broader logical a greater acceptance of gender fluidity, and how do Woolf category, to textual ways of spending. It suggests and Lispector address this concern? a writing, based on an encounter with another— be it a body, a piece of writing, a social dilemma, Through their practice of écriture féminine, both a moment of passion, that leads to an undoing Woolf and Lispector exemplify the ways in which women of hierarchies and oppositions that determine can liberate themselves through language, but these texts the limits of most conscious life. By virtue of its also offer a nuanced challenge of Cixous’ theory, as they poetry that comes from the rapport of the body emphasize not the feminine writing’s relation to the female to the social world, écriture féminine disrupts social body but rather employ a more humanistic approach to practices in the ways it both discerns and literally rewrites them. (vii–viii) allowing a fuller expression of both masculine and feminine attributes in men and women. This comparative analysis By rejecting a systematized use of linear, coherent between Woolf and Lispector’s works puts two feminist, argumentation and realist narrative techniques reflective of modernist writers in dialogue with each other, reinforcing a masculine style, l’écriture féminine invites the practice of a the universal nature of the issues that these two works illu- fragmented, poetic, nonlinear style open to the expression of minate. Comparing and contrasting two novels that reflect the unconscious and the subjective. In this way, Cixous con- realities of different countries and generations helps to nects the repression of women’s bodies and desires with the elucidate the differences in possibilities and obstacles that repression of women’s language; her proposed solution is to Clarissa and Joana face in their respective narratives. It is call for a practice of écriture féminine as a means of allowing in Joana’s fearless embrace of an independent search for women and men to access language from the unconscious, freedom that we better understand Clarissa’s struggle to rise feminine source. In Cixous’ model, if women regain access above the social constrictions that her society imposes on to their desire and to language, this return of the repressed her, each character being a product of their particular envi- will challenge and restructure phallocentric society. ronment. Whereas Joana lives in Brazil, a new country still open to the formation of its national identity, Clarissa is part Near to the Wild Heart and Mrs. Dalloway use the of a centuries-old tradition of social order and customs that window as a symbol for the imposition of a patriarchal define British society. This research aims to delineate this mode of perception that dictates the ways in which women sociocultural bridge that exists between these two disparate may interpret their role in society, and by extension them- but essentially connected worlds. selves, much like Cixous argues that masculinist language is imposed upon women. Part I of this thesis, “Windows in Acknowledgements Mrs. Dalloway,” examines how the window frames and limits Clarissa’s ability to perceive and examine the inner workings I would like to thank Elda Maria Roman and Beatrice of her society, and how it creates a separation between male/ Bennett, my thesis advisors, for mentoring me throughout active and female/passive spaces as an opposition to each the development of this project, and Dr. George Sanchez, other. Throughout this section I also trace Woolf’s use of U.S.C.’s MMUF co-coordinator, for supporting me in all écriture féminine, and argue that she deliberately engages in my research endeavors. and resists this practice as a way of punctuating the impos- sibility of achieving a true sense of liberation in patriarchal Works Cited society. Part II of my thesis offers a parallel analysis of the windows as symbols in Lispector’s Near to the Wild Heart, Blyth, Ian, and Susan Sellers. Hélène Cixous: Live Theory. New with a focus on examining how Joana achieves liberation York; London: Continuum, 2004. Print. from this mode of perception. I analyze the differences Cixous, Hélène, and Deborah Jenson.“Coming to Writing” and between Clarissa and Joana’s relationship with the win- Other Essays. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1991. dow, examining the issue of intergenerational changes in Print. both novels. Finally, Part III, “Windows and Adrogynous Perception,” addresses the role of the male protagonist in ------. Reading with Clarice Lispector. Ed. Verena Andermatt Conley. each novel, and their own relation to the window. I show Minneapolis: U of Minnesota, 1990. Print. that both Woolf and Lispector were interested in examining ------. Vivre L’orange. Paris: Des Femmes, 1979. Print. the interplay of masculine and feminine attributes in male and female characters, and link this to Woolf’s concept of Conley, Verena Andermatt. Hélène Cixous: Writing the Feminine. the androgynous mind. In my conclusion, I challenge the Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1984. Print. gender dichotomy that écriture féminine might perpetuate,

102 Fitz, Earl E. Sexuality and Being in the Poststructuralist Universe of Clarice Lispector: The Différance of Desire. Austin: University of Texas Press. 2001. Web.

Harris, Alexandra. Virginia Woolf. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2011. Print.

Ivo, Lêdo. Melhores Crônicas de Lêdo Ivo. Ed. Gilberto Mendonça Teles. São Paulo: Global Editora, 2004. Print.

Lindstrom, Naomi. “Clarice Lispector: Articulating Woman’s Experience.” Chasqui 8.1 (1978): 43–52. Web.

Lispector, Clarice. Near to the Wild Heart. Trans. Alison Entrekin. New York: New Directions, 2012. Print.

------. Correio Feminino. Comp. Aparecida Maria Nunes. Rio de Janeiro: Rocco, 2006. Print.

Moser, Benjamin. Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Print.

Olk, Claudia. Virginia Woolf and the Aesthetics of Vision. Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2014. Print.

Rabassa, Gregory. If This Be Treason: Translation and Its Dyscontents: A Memoir. New York: New Directions, 2005. Print.

Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. London: Vintage, 2004. Print.

------. A Writer’s Diary: Being Extracts from the Diary of Virginia Woolf. London: Hogarth Press, 1953. Web.

Wyatt, Jean. “Avoiding Self-definition: In Defense of Women’s Right to Merge (Julia Kristeva and Mrs Dalloway).” Women’s Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal 13.1–2 (1986): 115–26. Web.

103 Black Female Sexuality and Gender Subjectivity in Ballroom Culture: Sexual Expression beyond Respectability Politics Jermaine Stewart Jr./Stewart-Webb, Grinnell College

Jermaine Andrew Stewart Jr./Stewart-Webb is an alum of and values that had used to exclude them. Grinnell College who majored in English and French. He aspires In this sense, the politics of respectability upholds het- to get his master’s in English literature and his PhD in English eronormative, white, and Victorian ideals of respectable with a focus in African American literature and/or African behavior and morality that are reinforced by black people American studies. He would like to eventually become a tenured themselves. Needless to say, black women who chose to professor within this field, all while pursuing other academic transgress norms of sexuality and gender imposed by both and general interests. He is also a Mellon Mays Undergraduate white and black people were ostracized as pathological and Fellow. accused of being a disgrace to their race.

This notion of black respectability remains a Abstract concern well into the twenty-first century, especially for black feminist scholars. For example, in Private Lives, Proper In the late 1900s, Ballroom emerged as a Relations: Regulating Black Intimacy, Candice Jenkins coins transgressive space for queer and gender non-conforming “the salvific wish” to capture the way black people, espe- people of color to escape racist white spaces as well as heter- cially black women, regulate their actions and modes of onormative ones. Because the gender system of this under- presentation in public spaces to create an “inviolable black ground subculture does not reinforce the societal gender respectability” (Jenkins 12) that provides black people as binary, participants within the scene do not have to adhere a group with a collective morality to counter the negative to notions of traditional black respectability politics that racist ideals that are propagandized in American society permeate the public sphere and the black American psyche. and culture (Jenkins 14). Jenkins’ term underscores how While in the public sphere black women are constantly black women have historically had to deal with being the under the surveillance of others vis-à-vis their physical bod- embodiment of black familial pathology, while at the same ies and are haunted by historical stereotypes that paint them time trying to keep a personal sense of civility or modesty. as either hypersexual or asexual. Through critical analy- As Higginbotham and Jenkins illustrate, black women who sis of documentary and extensive ethnographic research wish to express sexual freedom receive pushback, partic- with members within the Ballroom scenes both in the U.S. ularly from black communities. Where, then, can black and overseas, I have come to the conclusion that black women begin to be their full selves, especially their sexual women can temporarily escape the violence of public spaces selves, without policing from members within their own through participation in this contemporary subculture. The community? Ballroom scene also allows black women to perform their sexuality and gender in a commemorative way. Having roots that date back to 1920s Harlem, Ballroom culture emerged as a transgressive space for black to escape both heteronormative black spaces and From as early as the nineteenth century, images racist homosexual white ones, while at the same time allow- and representations of black female sexuality and gender ing its members to create “families” beyond blood rela- have depicted black women as immoral, hypersexual, and tionships. These families served as safe spaces for gay black asexual. To push against these ideals, progressive black men. Reaching its peak in the 1980s the Ballroom scene, Baptist women of the 1900s and 1920s created a mode of along with its gay male members, was featured in Jennie self-representation, deemed the “politics of respectability,” Livingston’s documentary Paris Is Burning (1990), which a term coined by historian Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, gave mainstream attention to this underground subculture. to counter the demonizing white supremacist represen- Marlon Bailey’s seminal Butch Queens Up in Pumps: Gender, tations that permeated popular culture and the American Performance, and Ballroom Culture in Detroit, provides a psyche (Higginbotham 185–187). Through their respect- nuanced overview of how the Ballroom scene is consti- ability politics, black Baptist women reinforced dominant tuted by detailing how LGBTQ individuals within the scene white Victorian values of self-help in order to prove to their dress, , and compete with each other. Members of the white counterparts that they were morally superior. Implicit Ballroom scene create self-made and transgressive spaces within respectability politics, however, is the idea that black that allow them to perform their sexuality and gender the women need to uphold respectable behavior and a respect- way they see fit, not as a response to American racial rela- able self-image in order to alter the structure of American tions or other oppressive spaces. As Bailey states, there are: systematic race relations. This idea compelled both black men and women to police the sexuality of black people, Six gender (and sexual) categories within the scene: specifically black women, in order to show white people Butch Queens (gay men), Butches (female-to-male that their stereotypes were wrong. Consequently, many [FTM] transgender), Femme Queens (male-to- black women upheld the very same respectable behaviors female [MTF] transgender), Butch Queens Up in 104 Drag, Men, and Women. The Women category is a gender identity and represents, in many respects, Stewart argue that, “Because gender and sexuality are inter- a contrast to the other categories, for it is the only twined in nontraditional, nonconforming, and even trans- category exclusively for female-bodied (cisgender) gressive ways [in The Aggressives (2005)], others may have women who live as and, at the very least appear as, difficulty processing or labeling [the gender or sexuality women. (33) of Marquise and other black women in the documentary]” (25). In sum, the Ballroom scene serves as a sex-positive The fluid gender system of both men and women and celebratory space for black women who may need to that constitutes the Ballroom scene affords all black women be reminded that their sexuality and gender should not be to live out their full selves without negative scrutiny. By all predicated on white or black heteronormative audiences that black women, I mean that the contemporary Ballroom scene value respectability or the policing of the black female body. offers cis, trans, lesbian, and straight black women with a place where they can come to understand who they are on Here, by sex-positive and celebratory, I mean that a variety of levels without feeling negatively investigated or the Ballroom space allows black women to exercise their scrutinized. sexuality in ways not demonized by others in the scene; instead, they are encouraged to be a part of the community In my essay, I argue that the contemporary even if those outside it may see their performance as risqué. Ballroom scene serves as a celebratory space for black The physical space that Ballroom members create results women, including heterosexual and cisgender black women, from community organizing and planning that gives its to perform and construct their sexuality and gender in ways members the chance to come into themselves the way they not predicated on being viewed as hypersexual by a white wish, in a way not predicated on the outside heteronorma- heteronormative audience, or demonizing and degrading tive and violent world. As a result, black women gain the black ones. By examining documentaries and using inter- ability to carve out for themselves a personal understanding views that I conducted with prominent members of both of what their sexuality and gender looks like. As argued by the New York and Parisian scene, I demonstrate how the Bailey, “Ballroom itself is a result of the collective efforts of Ballroom scene functions as a temporary environment that its members to create a minoritarian sphere for those who allows black women to be their full selves without having to are excluded from or marginalized within the majoritarian adhere to respectability politics or withstand the scrutinizing society” (47). Overall, “this minoritarian sphere enables gaze of sexual policing that has historically been the case individuals, houses, and sectors of the community to under- in American history and continues to be so in our current take a process of identity making and remaking, against geopolitical landscape. pervasive notions of identity that are fixed and permanent” (Bailey 47–48). The liminality of the Ballroom space makes The Functionality of the Ballroom Scene in Real Life— it an ideal site for black women to explore the fluidity of An Inclusive Ethos their sexuality. As the contemporary Ballroom scene has gained Because the Ballroom scene is not a permanent mainstream attention, it has also become an international space, but rather one constructed by members within the phenomenon. My research looks at both the U.S. and scene at venues that constantly change, black women can Parisian Ballroom scenes as specific sites wherein black choose to associate themselves with people who understand women have the opportunity to express their sexual selves. the scene and view the performances of their bodies as a By portraying black women performing their gender and celebratory performance rather than a degradation to their sexuality in ways that give them confidence not to worry race. Black women are constantly under surveillance by about how others view them, Daniel Peddle’s documentary the physical gaze of both white and black people in public The Aggressives (2005) offers a necessary theoretical frame- spaces. In contrast, the Ballroom scene does not function work for understanding how Ballroom culture grants black as a completely public space. Rather, the Ballroom scene women a celebratory space to express themselves sexually. is public in that the general public knows it exists, but it is In the documentary there are specific scenes where black private in that only members within the scene really know women perform while being revered, honored, and praised. where balls take place. To date, scholarship about The Aggressives, and the Make no mistake, at times the power dynamics Ballroom scene more generally, has focused on how the gen- between houses within the scene bring about verbal alterca- der and sexuality of black women within the Ballroom scene tions, but for the most part, competition is meant to allow can be read as nonnormative and difficult to label or pro- members the opportunity to showcase their talents and skills cess. In their piece titled “Nontraditional, Nonconforming, in a commemorative way. By commemorative, I mean that and Transgressive Gender Expression and Relationship members support one another in competition because they Modalities in Black Communities,” Layli Phillips and Marla 105 106 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 culinity because theydonothavetoadhere generalized a transgressive and celebratory sense of femininity or mas- the Parisianballroomsceneallows itsmemberstoperform sexuality, andgendershould be viewed.Onadeeperlevel, lenges howonethinksabout the notionsofwomanhood, that therearemanywaystoperform afemininitythatchal- argues thatthereisa“panel of women,”whichistosay many waysonecanpresentthemselves(Lasseindra).She uality andgenderinaliberatingmannerbecausethereare heterosexual, cisgender, and otherwisetopresenttheirsex- Ballroom scene.Thesceneprovidesblackwomen, one canperformmasculinityandfemininitywithinthe (Lasseindra). Lasseindramentionsthattherearemanyways that existsingenerallife,muchlikethesceneAmerica. deal withfeelingsofexclusionduetoracismandoppression creation ofthesceneissothatmembersdonothaveto constructed family andspace that is the scene. Part of the Ballroom scene stays outside and does not penetrate the the Parisianvoguer. Everythingandeveryoneoutsidethe and world entirely. Itfunctionsasaplace of escapefor and more.TheBallroomsceneinParisisanotherdomain and backgrounds.SomeareAlgerian,African,Caribbean women inPariscomefromalldifferenttypesofethnicities or restricting, but rather celebratory and liberating. Black and genderinvariouswaysthatdonottendtobelimiting tions asaspaceforblackwomentoperformtheirsexuality the scene, gives perspective on how the Parisian scene func- black women. celebratory, andliberatoryspaceforblackpeople,especially Ballroom sceneonaglobalscalefunctionsastransgressive, insight into how tothink about theways inwhich the scene, Lasseindra Ninja. Lasseindra gave meincredible abroad inFrance,IinterviewedthefounderofParisian where theBallroomscenehastakenflight. United StatesofAmerican.Paris,Franceisonelocation phenomenon thatitishasreachedshoresoutside of the Reimagining SpaceforBlackWomen Ethnographic Interview, TheParisianScene,and of inclusioninaworldthatconstantlyexcludes. a waythataffirmstheirsexualselvesandoffersthemsense ment, blackwomenareabletocompetewithoneanotherin Thus, although the Ballroom sceneisa competitive environ- ored, and celebrated for simply participating (Bailey 150). not winningacategory;rathertheyareencouraged,hon- so black women are neither disregarded nor demonized for dynamics within the scene are “negotiable and relational,” liberating withoutsuchsupport.Also,mostofthepower understand thatthescenewouldnotbeastransgressiveor The Ballroomscenehasbecomesuchamainstream Interviewing Lasseindra,whoisthefounderof During mytime where theycan effectivelyreleasethepressure ofeveryday expressive manner. TheBallroomscene serves asaspace female bodiedindividual, inamorecelebratory, sensual,and confidence toexpresstheiridentity andsenseofselfas a gay menutilizewithinthescene, allthewhilehaving begin topickuponthelingo andwayofspeakingthat scene’s inclusive ethos.Women whoareapartofthescene fact aliberatoryspaceforblackwomen.Hestates, response givesmetheinsighttoconcludethatsceneisin of blackwomeninthescenenowasopposedtobefore.His taining tomy question about why thereissuchahuge influx sexuality andgenderinanewinnovativeway. as aspaceinwhichblackwomencancometoexploretheir tions revealhowthecontemporaryballroomscenefunctions stand whotheyareassexualandfemininebeings.Hisreflec- an environmentwherebiologicallybornwomencanunder gay andtranswomen,butithasnowdevelopedtobecome ously, theballroomscenewasmoreofanexclusivefor definitely so.Hestates, the automaticanswerthatIreceivedfromAlexwas:Yes, as atransgressiveandcelebratoryspaceforblackwomen, the questionofwhetherornotBallroomscenecanserve and liberatingenvironmentforblackwomen.WhenIposed talked abouttheBallroomsceneservingasatransgressive get an inside perspective on how another Parisian voguer poison everydaylife. and limitingviewsofgendersexualitypresentationthat Alex touchesonanimportantaspect oftheBallroom Here, Alexdrawsthedistinctionbetweenhowprevi- creative. (Alex) can be more womanly, more feminine, [and] more gold mine to do that, to reach an outlet where they gender andeverything.Ithink[women]findthisa and besexualfreewithyouridentity infatuated, andnowit’s moreacceptabletotalk gay, it startedandallthisstuff.(Alex) and theytrytounderstandwhereit’s from,andhow infatuated withtheculture,andtheytaketime there arealotofwomen.AThey ing in.Before,therewaslikeverylittlewomen;now Nowadays, therearesomanywomenthatcom- to bemorefeminineandexploretheirsexuality. I gethiredsometimestoteach[femaleartists]how they don’t possess . . . . Yeah, Ithink[women]get it’s okay to go and find some of the things that and moreaccepted,soIfeellike[women]think less andaccepted.Ithinknowadaysit’s more accepted. Before, as you go back within time, it’s I believeit’s beingmoreknownnow. It’s beingmore Additionally, Alexansweredanotherquestionper In myinterview with Alex Mugler, Iwas able to - - life and also express or explore their imaginative side of more expansive understanding of self through participation femininity. in the Ballroom scene. Not only do they have a chance to understand who they are beyond the confines of American From these interviews, one can deduce that the society in general life, but they also get a chance to create Ballroom scene functions as an environment for women, and be a part of a community of individuals that value their especially black women, to not have to adhere to norma- blackness and femaleness through affirmative and commu- tive ideals about how their sexuality should be performed. nal competition. However, the ballroom scene provides it members with the opportunity to express themselves beyond the constraining Acknowledgements and limiting views of society and general everyday life. These interviews show that the Parisian Ballroom scene is I would like to thank Associate Professor of English currently becoming a space where black women can honor Shanna Greene Benjamin for helping guide me through- their sexuality and gender expression; all the while they out my research process on this project and also for being learn to be more feminine and fierce for themselves. both my English Advisor and Mellon Mays Undergraduate Faculty mentor. I would like to thank both Lasseindra Ninja A Conclusion: Looking Forward and Imagining Beyond from the House of Ninja in Paris, France, and Alex Mugler from the House of Mugler in Paris, France, for allowing By looking into what other scholars write about me to interview them when I did a while back. I appreciate the Ballroom scene, we see other candid conversations them taking time out of their busy schedules and life to even and interviews about how this space serves as a liberatory entertain the idea of being interviewed by a curious queer space for black women to perform their gender and sexu- scholar, artist, and dancer such as myself. I would also like to ality beyond societal expectations or representations. For thank DJ Mike Q and all of the Ballroom legends, stars, kids, example, in Voguing and the House Ballroom Scene of New and members around the world for holding it down and York City, an interview with Danny Chislom, the House revolutionizing society’s understanding of gender, sexuality, Mother of Mugler, gives readers a clear understanding of performance, acceptance, and love in general. And lastly, I how the Ballroom scene categories are constructed. He would like to thank my Mellon Mays cohort for helping me states, “Also, drags became another gender. You always had stick through pretty arduous and demanding work. the butch queens and the femme queens categories, and you had biological women and butch categories” (87). This Works Cited quote explains how the gender categories of the Ballroom scene are set up and one can deduce that black women, Bailey, Marlon M. Butch Queens Up in Pumps: Gender, Performance, both heterosexual/cisgender and homosexual/transgender, and Ballroom Culture in Detroit. Ann Arbor: U of , are celebrated within the scene and deemed as integral and 2013. Print. important to the scene as their black gay male counterparts. Fleetwood, Nicole R. “Excess Flesh: Black Women Performing The Ballroom scene not only functions as a liber- Hypervisibility.” Troubling Vision: Performance, Visuality, and atory environment for black women, but it has historically Blackness. Chicago: U of Chicago, 2011. 105–45. Print. been documented that this kind of scene functions as a Higginbotham, Evelyn Brooks. “The Politics of Respectability.” space of re-imagining and creativity for those who partic- Righteous Discontent: The Women’s Movement in the Black Baptist ipate in it and it is completely embraced by participates Church, 1880–1920. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1993. and black women more specifically. In comparison to more 185–295. Print. professional or work environments, the Ballroom scene is a socially constructed place of possibility that ranges from Jenkins, Candice Marie. “Introduction: Vulnerable Subjects.” being catty or cliquish to friendly and competitive among Private Lives, Proper Relations: Regulating Black Intimacy. Minneapolis, MN: U of Minnesota, 2007. 1–35. Print. its members. Unfortunately, due to the reality and history of institutionalized racism in America, there are a limited Mugler, Alex. Personal interview. April/May 2015. Rev.com. amount of spaces where black women can be their whole selves without being stereotyped or strictly scrutinized. The Ninja, Lasseindra. Personal interview. April/May 2015. Rev.com. Ballroom scene, however, and the documentaries Paris Is Paris Is Burning. Dir. Jennie Livingston. Perf. Carmen and Brooke, Burning and The Aggressives provide and demonstrate how André Christian, . Academy Entertainment Off black women have a temporal escape and location wherein White Productions, 1990. Netflix. they can continue to explore who they are and desire to become. What we’ve learned is that through interview and Peddle, Daniel. “The Aggressives.” Hulu. N.p., 01 Dec. 2011. documentary, black women have the potential to garner a Web. 02 Nov. 2014. . 107 108 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Voguing andtheHouseBallroomSceneofNewYork City1989-92. Regnault, Chantal,StuartBaker, andTim Lawrence.“Danny Regnault, Chantal,StuartBaker, andTim Lawrence. Phillips, Layli,andMarlaR.Stewart.“Nontraditional, London: SoulJazz,2011.86–88.Print. Chislom: HouseofMugler.” 176–79. Print. Scene ofNewYork City1989–92.London:SoulJazz,2011. “Anonymous: FemmeQueen.”Voguing andtheHouseBallroom UP, 2010.17–36.Print. Juan BattleandSandraL.Barnes.NewBrunswick,NJ:Rutgers Sexualities: ProbingPowers,Passions,Practices,andPolicies.Ed. and RelationshipModalitiesinBlackCommunities.” Nonconforming, andTransgressive GenderExpression Gender in Francis Bacon’s Philosophy of Science: Marriage, Procreation, and Dominion Jiemin Tina Wei, Princeton University

Jiemin Tina Wei is a recent 2016 graduate from Princeton of gender, by which I mean a reliance on notions of sexual University, majoring in philosophy and earning certificates in difference that sometimes include gendered violence, hier- Hellenic studies and values and public life. Focused on the fields archy, and domination. of history of philosophy, history of ideas, and intellectual history, her scholarship seeks new ways to think about the relationship The status of the gender trope in Bacon studies is between identities, race, gender, and canonicity. Upon graduat- heavily contested. Gendered descriptions, sometimes shock- ing, Tina worked as a teaching assistant and camp counselor at ingly explicit and graphic, appear throughout Bacon’s writ- an alternative-learning summer program for high school juniors. ings, including his New Organo, Great Instauration, Valerius Starting this past fall, she has been working full-time in People Terminus, The Masculine Birth of Time, and the Description of Operations at Google, Inc. In the future, she hopes to pursue the Intellectual Globe. The fraught nature of some of these graduate study in philosophy. passages was memorably illuminated by Carolyn Merchant’s The Death of Nature, which presents feminist criticisms of figures of the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century scientific Abstract revolution—among them Francis Bacon, whom she inter- prets as employing rape and torture imagery and metaphors Francis Bacon, the Renaissance statesman, lawyer, (164–190). The response from early modern historians has philosopher, and essayist, is sometimes referred to as the been almost unanimously negative, on account of the sup- “father of modern science.” The renown he enjoys results posedly anachronistic nature of applying contemporary fem- perhaps most notably from his writings which detail the inist criticism to an early modern discourse (Soble 212). And proper approach (or method) a scientist ought to take in the yet, a great mystery remains: What accounts for Bacon’s study of nature. Gendered descriptions, sometimes shock- (often) explicit, sometimes strange language about women? ingly explicit and graphic, appear throughout Bacon’s writ- How would this (virtually) undeniably gendered language ings. The status of this trope is heavily contested, and yet, aid him in communicating his new science? a great mystery remains: What accounts for Bacon’s (often) explicit, sometimes strange language about women? How On both sides of the debate, the dominant mode would this (virtually) undeniably gendered language aid him of discourse primarily concerns the question of blame—to in communicating his new science? The gendered nature what extent are we justified inblaming Bacon for his use of of the text focuses on marriage, procreation, and dominion. rape or torture imagery? In the following, contrary to this In this paper, I pay close attention to the rhetorical work practice, I intend to take seriously the rhetorical work that of Bacon’s text, to illustrate how he uses gender tropes and these tropes do in the text. In interpreting these key tropes, implicit notions of gender difference to articulate his new I seek to uncover Bacon’s underlying philosophy of science. program for science. That Bacon drew so heavily on con- The text, I argue, is undeniably gendered, in that it depends ceptions of gender in his formulation of ideals for science upon implicit notions of sexual difference. The gendered is significant, showing that his philosophy of science is not nature of the text focuses, as I will discuss in order, on neutral, pure, or separate from his social context—gendered marriage, procreation, and dominion. Bacon proposes his thinking was central to his understanding of science. methodology for science in fundamentally relational terms— the proper relationship between the scientist and nature is likened to the disciplined, orderly relationship between Francis Bacon, the Renaissance statesman, lawyer, a man and wife in a chaste marriage. Such a relationship philosopher, and essayist, is sometimes referred to as the is procreative , yielding the fruits of science. In such a rela- ‘father of modern science’ (Rossi xii, ix–xv; Jalobeanu 10, tionship, the scientist establishes a dominion or control over 17–19). His renown perhaps derives most notably from his nature, as the man would over his kingdom. writings which detail the proper approach (or method) a scientist should take in the study of nature. Such writings The first component of Bacon’s gender trope has to do famously served as a key source of inspiration for the found- with marriage. To see where this trope fits into Bacon’s writ- ing of the British Royal Society, featuring iconic figures of ings about his new science, we must turn to his Description of the so-called Scientific Revolution such as Robert Hooke the Intellectual Globe. He explains that natural history, which and Robert Boyle (Iliffe 430). Although Bacon’s writings is the study of particular, observational claims about nature gave rise to a phase of rapid development in science that (which, in part, gives rise to contemporary science), is in part may seem very familiar to us, he himself was writing in concerned with studying “Nature Constrained” (Spedding a Renaissance milieu and employing rhetorical practices V:505–506). When nature is constrained, sheii is “moulded, alien to most scientific or science-related writings today. translated, and made as it were new by art and the hand of Bacon’s corpus may be at its most opaque when he slips into man; as in things artificial” (Spedding V:505–506). In this metaphorical or visually descriptive language. Arguably, the area of natural history, the scientist is constraining, molding, most opaque and frequently occurring tropei is his trope 109 110 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 Farrington 124). FromtheAeneid,hecites“[a]nd girtwere cites, “Th[e]cursed darnelandbarrenoatprevail” (qtd.in tion by citing two quotes from Vergil. From the fruitful andbarren(woman’s) womb.Hemakesthistransi- this distinctionbetweenafruitful andbarrenplanttoa the progenyofplants,suchas grape orolive. metaphorical procreation—with the fruits of science being point, Baconiscomparingproductivesciencetoakindof “the fruitsofgrapeorolive”(Farrington123–124).Atthis If aphilosophywerefruitful,inthisanalogy, itwouldbear thorns ofdisputeandcontentions”(Farrington123–124). is thephilosophy“barren,”butit“bear[s]thistlesand is “barren,”thenithasnomerits.Insomecases,notonly the statusofaphilosophy. Ifaphilosophylacksfruits and The “fruits”or“works”ofasciencebecomeindicators and morenoblethanthatfromfruits”(Farrington123–124). philosophy,” we see that “[t]here is no ‘sign’ more certain strated “byworks,”heargues,whenwemayapplya“testto a philosophyisgood.Justasthe“signs”offaitharedemon- Refutation ofPhilosophies,hestatesthatthereare“signs” notions towomen’s bodiesandwombs.Forinstance,inThe non-gendered ways in some passages, but then extends the sus barrenscience.Heintroducestheseideasinseemingly and bad(natural)philosophyisthenotionofafruitfulver to dowithprocreation.CentralBacon’s notionsofgood propriety resultsinachastemarriage. ness (Spedding IV:19). Thekeyistoemphasizetheappropriate- throwing “alltheaffairsofhumanfamily”“intoconfusion” mer marriage,thelatterperverserelationshipisdisorderly, (Spedding IV:19). Incontrasttotheproprietyoffor instead an“unkindandill-starreddivorceseparation” becomes perverse or unchaste, their relationship becomes Instauration, thatwhenthescientist’s relationtonature in achastemarriage.HeexplainsworkssuchastheGreat the termsof this metaphor, joining thescientistand nature seeks toestablishthefoundationsforhisnewscienceby, in between MindandNature”(Farrington131).Baconthen he writes, “[l]et us establish a chaste and lawful marriage (Farrington 72).Similarly, inTheRefutationofPhilosophies, “with his goal as “unit[ing]” his reader, the potential scientist, For instance,intheMasculineBirthofTime, Bacondescribes and natureafterthechastemarriagebetweenmanwife. gender trope. of thisrelationshipthatBaconseekstoarticulateviahis into arelationshipwithnature.Itispreciselythecontours and making nature anew via experiments, thereby entering with whichamanshouldbehavetowardswoman.Such things themselvesinachaste,holy, andlegalwedlock” However, inthesamepassage,Baconthentranslates The secondcomponentofBacon’s gendertropehas Bacon modelstherelationshipbetweenscientist Georgics, he - - womb withthebarren,monstrous,deceptivewomb. and juxtaposesthenotionoffruitful,procreative,comely the ence appearselsewhere.For example,intheprefaceto gender trope,thecontrastbetween barrenandfruitfulsci- actually comestoisabarren science. object heseeksisaproductivescience,butthethat and monstrous.Theagentwhotravelsisthescientist. to possessprocreativepotentialbutisinactualitybarren terrain whenitisluredintodangerbyasciencethatappears The human intellect meets itsshipwreckinthis intellectual to the“shipwreckofsomanyintellects[emphasisadded].” she has caused (as is told in the traditional Greek myth) but butes Scylla’s notorietynottothetravelers’ endeavors, hissciencewillproducefruits.Yet, Baconattri- Similarly, thescientistmayhopethat,duetohismental legitimate fruitofmentalendeavour[emphasisadded].” works andthatpowerofactionwhicharetheworthy “hope” Scylla’s wombwillproducearedescribedas“those his claims about science. The fruits that the traveler would claims aboutScylla’s statusasawomanandwombparallel shipwreck ofsomanyintellects”(Farrington124). Bacon informsus,hasthusbeen“madenotoriousbythe real existenceasamonstrous,barrenwomb.Suchdeception, a “comelymaid”thatpromisesprocreativepotentialandher Scylla’s deceptionliesinthegapbetweenherappearanceas her body(thepartofabovebellyandwomb). as a“comelymaid”wasonlytrueof“theupperhalf” We come to realize that our cursory impression of Scylla find “thosehowling,barkingmouths”(Farrington124). thy and legitimate fruit of mental endeavour,” we instead “those worksandthatpowerofactionwhicharethewor In thebellyandwomb,wherewemight“hope”tofind the wombandhopeoffruitthereof”(Farrington124). “come toamorenicesurvey”and“considerthebelly or allure”(Farrington124).However, heencouragesusto losophy seems a comely maid” and “is not without charm writes, “fromafar”and“[a]tacursoryglance,”“yourphi- describes thereadersailingtowardsScylla’s womb.He as amonsterfoundonthesideofwaterchannel,Bacon the traditionofGreekmyths,inwhichScyllaisdescribed a barrenandmonstrouswombasScylla’s. Conformingto allegorical story about how one might come across such (qtd. inFarrington124).Hetellsuswhatseemstobean her whiteloinswithyelping dogs,”whichreferstoScylla the Greeksisbut liketheboyhoodofknowledge, andhas us thatthe“wisdom whichwehavederivedprincipally from with natureandthemanwho is (sexually)capable.Hetells the immature boy who is (sexually) barrenness andfruitfulnessto explain thecontrastbetween Great Instauration In employingtheconceptofScylla,Baconpresents Attesting to the expansiveness of Bacon’s use of the , Bacon uses the contrast between incapable shipwrecks that of procreating iii iv His - the characteristic property of boys: it can talk, but it cannot achieve dominion over her would involve—in this gendered generate; for it is fruitful of controversies but barren of embellishment of the same concept—nature being bound works” (Spedding IV:14). Thus, through the language of the to the scientist’s service, i.e., nature being made his slave. In gender trope, Bacon argues that his contemporaries should addition, the language of procreation is present here, too. abandon the approach to knowledge and science that they Not only is nature being put under the scientist’s control, have inherited from the Greeks. This type of knowledge he but so are nature’s fruits, which in this passage are described likens to boyhood. While the proper scientist’s science is a as “all her children.” Thus, we see that the notion of obtain- fruitful womb and produces fruits, the metaphorical boy is ing dominion over nature through science and the notion sexually immature because he “cannot generate,” and is thus of producing fruits of nature via science are closely linked.vi “barren of works.” One may argue that when Bacon evokes the contrast between non-productive boys and productive If this key text of Bacon’s methodology of science men, he may be referencing the other ways—ways that don’t is indeed, as Bacon describes it, an act of “handing on the have to do with reproduction—in which boys are unproduc- Torch of Science,” then part of the act of passing the torch tive, i.e., that they cannot accomplish things and can only from the older, knowledgeable generation of men to the talk. However, as we see here, at least one important aspect younger generation of boys involves passing on the control of the unproductiveness of boys has to do with reproduction. of nature, their slave (Farrington 61–62). It is perhaps in this contrast between the man who is a scientist and the boy The third component of Bacon’s gender trope has who has the potential to become a scientist that we see most to do with dominion. To understand the rhetorical work clearly the emergence of the character of the scientist. The that the gender trope accomplishes here, we must first con- process of shaping the character of the next generation of textualize the notion of dominion via Bacon’s other works. scientists becomes a process, in the language of the metaphor, He writes often about the notion of man’s dominion over of turning boys to men. Only when the boy becomes a man, nature, often in language that is not obviously gendered. husband, and scientist will he finally be able to properly know, For instance, in his Masculine Birth of Time, he informs constrain, and achieve dominion over his nature, his wife. the reader that “my only earthly wish” is “to stretch the deplorably narrow limits of man’s dominion over the uni- Although the heated debates in the secondary schol- verse to their promised bounds.” He hopes to “succeed” in arship about the proper critical attitude to take towards this “wish” by “prolonged examination both of the state of Bacon and his works emphasize important questions, they nature and the state of the human mind, by the most legit- are more closely concerned with our contemporary nor- imate method,” which is the method for his new science mative ideals than those at play in Bacon’s writings. In this that he communicates to his reader (Farrington 62). Thus, paper, I have attempted to pay close attention to the rhetor- a proper kind of science is the means by which man can ical work of Bacon’s text, to illustrate how he uses gender achieve a dominion over nature.v tropes and implicit notions of gender difference to articulate his new program for science. As I have sought to illustrate, The dominion over nature appears often throughout engaging in this kind of analysis reveals how one prominent Bacon’s works in language that is not obviously gendered— philosopher found it possible to think about gender in the just as it does in the above example. However, even in this seventeenth century. That Bacon drew so heavily on con- very passage, as he does elsewhere, he paraphrases, aug- ceptions of gender in his formulation of ideals for science ments, or embellishes this non-gendered conception of is significant, showing that his philosophy of science is not dominion over nature in gendered terms. This text, the neutral, pure, or separate from his social context—gendered Masculine Birth of Time, appears to take the form of a speech thinking was central to his understanding of science. that an old man gives to young boys or students about the proper method by which to pursue science. The subheading Bacon is an important case to study because, in the that Bacon gives to this work is “The Legitimate Mode of key writings I focused on in this paper, Bacon saw his key handing on the Torch of Science.” Throughout the text, task as that of heralding a new age for science. However, as the speaker consistently addresses the audience (the reader) we see from the preceding analysis, even calls to overturn as “my sons”—presumably the people to whom he seeks traditional practices may be deeply undergirded by and may to pass the Torch. The speaker’s non-gendered language perpetuate other ingrained attitudes and frameworks. Bacon about dominion over nature becomes more clearly gendered teaches us a paradoxical lesson: that familiar traditional atti- when, in addressing his “sons,” he says, “I am come in very tudes are sometimes the most useful rhetorical strategies for truth leading to you Nature with all her children to bind launching revolutions. The scholarly approach I took in this her to your service and make her your slave” (Farrington paper is to settle these textual questions without settling the 61–62). The relationship conveyed by this language con- larger normative questions of whether to condemn Bacon firms the use of the gender trope that we have examined and his ideas. thus far. Nature is depicted as a woman. For the scientist to 111 112 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 gettable intellectualjourney. Garber. forhisguidancethroughoutwhatbecameanunfor while IconductedresearchinLondon;andProfessorDaniel Professor QuentinSkinner, forhostingandmentoringme for providingthegeneroustravelandresearchscholarships; like to express sincere gratitude to Princeton University, than Ihavespacetothankhere.Mostimportantly, Iwould financial, intellectual,andmoralsupportfrommoresources project that would not have been possible without extensive Milton, John.ParadiseLost . Ed.ThomasLuxon. TheMilton Merchant, Carolyn.TheDeathofNature: Women, Ecology, andthe Francis Jalobeanu, Dana.TheArtofExperimentalNaturalHistory: Iliffe, Rob.“TheMasculineBirthofTime: Temporal Frameworks Farrington, Benjamin.ThePhilosophyofFrancisBacon.London: Briggs, JohnC.FrancisBaconandtheRhetoricofNature. Works Cited Endnotes Acknowledgements iv iii ii i vi v Reading Room,2016. Web. 12Mar. 2016. 1980. Print. Scientific Revolution.NewYork: Harper&Row, Publishers, Bacon inContext.Bucharest:ZetaBooks,2015.Print. ofScience33.4(2000):427–453.Web.the History of EarlyModernNaturalPhilosophy.” for TheBritishJournal Liverpool UniversityPress,1964.Print. Cambridge: HarvardUniversityPress,1989.Print. Scholars havedebatedthenormativityofscientist’s dominion over Bacon’s notionofdominionheavilyemploysBiblicalconnotations One maynotethattheobjectmetaphorofwomanis Scylla appearsinotherwritingsofthisperiod.Forinstance,analmost The importanceofthegrammaticalgenderLatinwordnatura, Here, Iusetheterm“trope”toreferliterarytropes;i.e.,words, of dominiondependsimplicitlyonnotionssexualdifference. settle thisnormativequestion,butseekonlytoilluminatehowtheidea nature orapositiveactofperfectingnature.Inthispaper, Iseeknotto nature thatBaconpromotes—whetheritisanegativeactofoppressing (Briggs; Warhaft). “your philosophyseemsacomelymaid[emphasisadded].” to representnaturalphilosophy(orscience).Thus,Baconwritesthat By contrast,inthisprocreationandwombmetaphor, thewomanappears the womanrepresentsnature(whilemanscientist). supposed torepresenthasshiftedslightly. Inthemarriageanalogy, (Milton II:791–802). identical imageryofScyllaappearsinSin’s iconicspeech inParadiseLost dependent aspectsofBacon’s genderedlanguage. paper, Iwillleavethisdebateasideandfocusonthenon-grammatically which isfemale,heavilycontestedinthesecondaryscholarship.Inthis symbols, motifs,themes,andmetaphorsthatrecurwithinatext. This paperisanexcerptfrommyseniorthesis,a - Warhaft, Sidney. “TheProvidentialOrderinBacon’s New Spedding, James,RobertLeslieEllis,andDouglasDenonHeath, Soble, Alan.“InDefenseofBacon.”PhilosophytheSocialSciences Rossi, Paolo.FrancisBacon:FromMagictoScience.Trans. Sacha Sessions. NewYork: AMSPress,1990.151–167.Print. Philosophy.” and Co.,1857.Print. eds. 25.2 (1995):192–215.Web. Rabinovitch. NewYork: Routledge,1968.Print. The Works ofFrancisBacon.14vols.London:Spottiswoode Francis Bacon’s LegacyofTexts. Ed.William A. On Becoming the Little Allain Girl, Introduction to “At Least We Have Our Name”: Free People of Color and the Struggle to Survive in Antebellum Louisiana and Mississippi Cary Allain Williams, Harvard University

Cary Williams is a recently graduate of Harvard College, cum with my grandmother’s help, quite a few times before she laude. She concentrated in history and literature in the America passed away. When she wanted to see me she would say, field, and focused on studying slavery, geography, and resistance “Where’s my little Allain girl?” How fitting it is that it was in the 19th-century American South. Beyond her scholarly pur- in the closet of the woman I am named after that I found my suits, she is a published author of short fiction. For her thesis, first archive for this project: the archive of my family. of which this piece is the introduction, she was honored with three awards from Harvard University, including the esteemed This project is the story of how my family became Bowdoin Undergraduate Prize for an Essay in the English Allains. It is about the hours I have spent with Mama Glo Language. at the kitchen table hearing tales about our ancestors’ lives in “The Country” and her telling me, “That world you just couldn’t hardly believe.” It is the story of growing up in a Abstract family that cooks with Creole seasonings instead of salt and pepper. Of calling our aunts and uncles “Tant” and “Nonc,” This project studies the boundaries and limitations variations of their French roots. This project is the story of freedom for free people of color in antebellum Louisiana of how I got my middle name, of how I became the Little and Mississippi. I examine their daily experiences of free- Allain Girl. dom alongside the challenges and threats that made them vulnerable to racial terror. This paper argues that although I am concerned with refining an understanding of free people of color were free in name, their freedom was, the realities of freedom for free people of color in four com- in reality, so unstable and incomplete that we must revise munities in the Lower Mississippi Valley—Natchez, MS; our definitions of freedom and unfreedom in the context of Natchitoches, LA; New Orleans, LA; and Pointe Coupee, antebellum life. Using sources from many different textual LA—from the late 18th century through the antebellum genres, this project destabilizes freedom as a clear category period (see Figure 1).i Nearly all of my maternal ancestors and examines how corporeal, gendered, psychological, and who lived during the period that this project covers resided property-related violence limited their liberty and social in Pointe Coupee Parish, LA. The lives of free people of power. In discussing the plantation management strategies, color in this region were fraught with contradictions; at movement patterns, and gender-specific experiences of free once free and unfree, empowered and vulnerable, respected people of color, it articulates the tension between their and undermined, they lived within poorly defined and dis- empowerment and their struggle for respect, safety, and sur- orienting categories that could not adequately be captured vival. Because freedom was a category that contained such a by the rigid black-white dichotomy and ensuing racial hier- wide range of experiences, this paper argues that historians archy that organized Southern society at the time. must interrogate the terms and categories they use when assessing the lives and writings of free people of color. In My central aim in this research is to find the bound- this way, this project argues for a fundamental revision of the aries and limitations to the freedom of free people of color historiography of their freedom in the antebellum South. and challenge the notion that they were, in fact, completely free. I argue that their freedom was so highly qualified and unstable that it was, instead, a vulnerable freedom.ii This vul- My story began in my grandmother’s closet. I was in nerability meant that they were routinely exposed to subju- Baton Rouge, Louisiana, visiting her in the spring of 2014, gation, threats, and attacks against their personhood. While and she showed me binders full of newspaper clippings, their economic prosperity may suggest that they enjoyed scans of manumission papers and marriage certificates, and unprecedented opportunity and access to power, I argue lists of slave sales, all of which referenced our ancestors who that even the wealthiest of free people of color were vulner- were free people of color in Louisiana. Many last names able to degradation and punishment. No amount of money mentioned in those documents had become either the first or status could protect them from racial terror, and this or middle name of someone in my extended family, paying research explores the limits of their power and the strategies homage to those who came before us. My grandmother, and networks they developed to escape threats of corporeal, Gloria Ricard Kennedy, whom I call Mama Glo, kept this psychological, and property-related violence. Free people unlikely archive in the closet of the bedroom where her of color, a uniquely empowered class of people, lived lives mother, my great-grandmother, lived when she moved in focused on mitigating tremendous risk. with her as she grew older. My great-grandmother, Eunice Allain Ricard, whom I call Mama Eunice, was born in 1893. By examining the lives of free people of color with- I was born in 1993, a full century after her, so my parents out assuming their “freedom” as a given, I do the work of gave me “Allain” as my middle name. Mama Eunice lived this paper at the margin of their power. I read the archived until she was 102 years old, and she held me in her arms, papers attesting to their wealth and look to the margins of 113 114 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 that recognizedhimasanowner. ted thathewasilliterateandunabletoreadthedocument in themomentofasalewhenthatmastercoloradmit- rigorously studied,butIammoreinterested,forexample, slaves, suchastheMetoyerfamilythathistorianGaryMills about the free people of color who owned one hundred reveal acollapseinthatpower. Historianshavewritten these documents, to things said vaguely or left unsaid that “slave societies.” They createdfreespaceswithin,toinvokeIraBerlin’s term, ities of daily life and howthey managed those challenges. achievement butinsteadtriestounderstandthecomplex- work does not focus on their extraordinary moments of at some of their most vulnerable points. In this way, my enter into the lives of free people of color by gaining access families andcreatealegacy. Mygoalinthisprojectisto finding meaningintheirdailystruggletosurviveandraise the morequotidianexperiencesoffreewomencolor, time intheelegantsettingofquadroonballs,Iturnto culturally and economically linked to the Caribbean.” Louisiana andtheGulfCoastwere orientedsouthandwere movement ofpeopleandgoods bywaterwasthenorm, erary scholarConnieEblearguesthat,historically, “When Caribbean landscapeasitsnorthernmostportcity. The lit- French heritage, and perhapsfiguring moreneatlyinto the and dislocatedfromitasacultural“other,” tiedtoitsstrong 1803, NewOrleanswasatoncepartoftheUnitedStates precarious placeintheNorthAmericanlandscape.After munity becameasitethatwasinfluencedbyLouisiana’s Located inandaroundNewOrleans,eachrespectivecom- meanings oflandandownershiptothiscommunity. aim ofthisprojectistounderstandtheliteralandsymbolic their legalcategoryofpersonhood. archive, so “free people of color” is more consistent with It wasalsothewayinwhichtheywerereferencedmylegal important tocontinueusetheterm“free”intheirname. freedom—and tracing its limits and contradictions—it is ple of color becauseinaprojectso dedicated todefining its peoplecarvedouttheirown identity intheAtlanticworld. American Northnorthe South,NewOrleansand Fitting well into neither the landscape and culture ofthe of color.” is synonymouswithwhatsomeotherscholarscall“Creoles people ofcolor.” Forme,theterm“freepeopleofcolor” time, andsocialcontextthatwasconstantlyinflux. descended persontofashionhisorheridentityinaspace, social historyofslaveryandthetaskfreeAfrican- entrenched inslaverywilldeepenourunderstandingofthe Since geographyiscentraltoeachchapter, another It isimportanttobeclearabouthowIdefine“free vi However, Ichoosetoreferthemasfreepeo- iv Thestudyofthesefreespacesinaworld iii Insteadofspending vi

ing theirreputations ascompetentowners. control, tempering theirownanxiety, and publiclyestablish- against thepeopletheyenslaved asmechanismsofexerting examine patterns of punishment enacted by masters of color made betweenthemselvesand their slaves. Finally, I will masters andfreeofcolor differedinthespacethey enslaved people,soIwillexamine thewaysinwhichwhite is thecomplexityofintimatecontactbetweenmastersand boundaries andenactdiscipline.Atthecoreofthisanxiety prove thattheycouldeffectivelymanagesocialandintimate around theirneedtoovercomevulnerabilitiesand , which revolved argue, reflected asenseofunsettled mastery exert controlandestablishorder. Theirformofdiscipline,I of aplantationandtheensuingwaysinwhichtheysoughtto masters ofcolorexpressedanxietyintheirroleatthehelm free people,andgendersexualityinslavesocieties. and control, movement patterns of antebellum enslaved and points ofdialoguecenteronantebellumplantationorder geography, andoffreepeoplecolor. Mymajoranalytical of antebellum Louisiana, of the dynamics of slavery and empowered andvulnerableexistenceonthiscontinent. mother andmygrandmotheraboutourfamily’s atonce itself. Itholdstwenty-twoyearsofconversationswithmy the languageoflaw. dynamics of the time as part of the backbone structure for tive elementsthatreflectedemotions,anxieties,andsocial I argue that the genre of legal writing incorporated affec- that scriptedmuchofthetext.Inreadingthoseconventions, documents wereoftendrawnupwithcertainconventions bills ofsale,landgrants,andmanumissionpapers.These sources uponwhichIdrawarelegaldocumentssuchas stories andpeopletogetlost. in thewaythatitsilencesanderasessomevoicesandallows Acts,” whichspeakstothearchive’s capacityforviolence to mindliteraryscholarSaidiyaHartman’s “Venus inTwo Their elusiveness and the limitations to this archive call and nationaldesignationsthatincreasinglymattered.” to trackastheymovedintoandoutoftheracial,cultural, rendered themadisappearingpeople,makingdifficult Shirley Thompson argues, “Their in-between-ness often they canbedifficulttofindinthearchive.Ashistorian ple of color lived between racialandnationalcategories, with the specificity of the cases themselves. As free peo- tension thepatternsIcangleanfromthislimitedarchive of theindividualsIstudy, andtheclaimsImakeholdin a limitedarchive,myanalysisconstructs“micro-history” cases in the first half of the nineteenth century. By studying In Chapter1,Iwillexaminethewaysinwhichfree My researchentersintoconversationwithhistorians My finalsourceismymind,foritanarchiveunto My sourcesareprimarilylegalarchivesaboutspecific viii Themajorityofarchival vii

The stakes of ownership and the possibilities to fail extraordinary life moments, such as attending a lavish ball were different and riskier for masters of color, for they or independently completing a record-breaking purchase had to prove their ability to control and to assert their of slaves, I will shift our focus to the quotidian challenges superiority through mechanisms that necessarily relied on they faced. I will expose their status of freedom not only as a something other than racial difference, all the while evading vulnerable freedom, but also as a burdened freedom. They were their vulnerability to being kidnapped into slavery. The weighed down by the vestiges of slavery, routine challenges, historian Walter Johnson, in Soul by Soul: Life Inside the and normalized patterns of subjugation and exclusion, espe- Antebellum Slave Market, explains slaveholders’ processes cially from full participation in legal action in which they of self-making through their use of slaves. I posit that free had a stake. This departure from the sensational is a move people of color who owned slaves engaged in similar proc- to avoid spectacularizing free women of color as a singular esses of self-making, although the particular anxieties and historical phenomenon and instead to introduce them as challenges they faced were markedly different because of the people to study in their unique historical context. The ordi- intraracial nature of their plantations.ix nary, I argue, reveals their routine of struggle, a struggle so dismissed and obscured by the ways in which they are sensa- In Chapter 2, I explore the movement and stillness of tionally distorted in the historiography that their struggle is free people of color through analyzing what I have named seldom adequately articulated or addressed. their geographies of dignity, i.e., the spaces in which they felt safe, empowered, cared for, and able to move without risking “Freedom” is a word so central to the history of the their status and lives. They sought out these geographies of antebellum period, and I seek to examine and challenge the dignity as refuges from vulnerability. By contrasting geog- limits of that term for free people of color. Throughout raphies of dignity with the varied geographies across which the aforementioned chapters, I find that their freedom was fugitive slaves traveled, I argue that free people of color had a highly qualified, and that many caveats and instabilities were far more constricted area they could traverse without making often attached to their condition of freedom. Sometimes themselves vulnerable to insurmountable risk. As a result, transient, and at others quite lasting, freedom was almost they settled and stayed quite still in the spaces that they always under threat. My work focuses on resisting to accept built into family networks. I will analyze the ways in which “freedom” as a secure definition of free people of color’s those communities of family networks functioned, focusing being in the world, and instead seeks to understand what particularly on how they protected and sustained themselves pressures threatened to collapse and undermine their free- within a limited space. I will interrogate the counterintuitive dom. Consequently, free people of color preoccupied them- and seemingly paradoxical relationship between freedom and selves with carving out their own free existences in spite of stillness to reveal how the framework of a geography of dig- the historical, geographic, legal, and spatial limitations to nity can challenge and reorient our conception of freedom that liberty. over one’s body and movement as a free person of color. I approach the work of this project as a descendant While scholars of the antebellum period have rig- of the people about whom I am writing. As such, this proj- orously studied the movement patterns of enslaved people, ect is deeply personal, and I have an intimate stake in it in both captive and fugitive, I engage with that tradition of addition to my commitment to it as a scholar. In the larger geographic analysis of the black body’s movement by asking thesis from which this introduction is drawn, I frame each where and how free people of color were moving at the same chapter with an opening vignette that offers a story of my moment. I am in dialogue with historians of the Middle particular connection to this history. These interludes invite Passage such as Marcus Rediker and Stephanie Smallwood, readers to engage with this project from both an academic as well as historians interested in following the varied move- and personal perspective, as that duality has shaped my ment patterns of individuals and families over many jour- experience of writing it. The core evidence for each chap- neys, both coerced and voluntary, such as Rebecca Scott.x ter is archival material, but in the interludes, I seek to fill In entering into conversation with scholars of movement in some of the silences in the archive with my anecdotal in slavery and freedom, I seek to articulate the vast differ- knowledge of my own people, gesturing to the personal and ences in free people of color’s ability to move because of the creative modes of telling history demonstrated by Hartman limited geographies, the geographies of dignity, in which they in Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route, were most safe. Aaron Sachs in “Letters to a tenured historian: imagining history as creative nonfiction—or maybe even poetry,” and In Chapter 3, I will offer a different way of reading Carol Hanisch’s foundational feminist essay “The Personal the bodies and experiences of free women of color by redi- is Political.”xi In my exploration of the geopolitical spaces of recting our attention from the sensational to the ordinary. the antebellum Deep South, I am, in a sense, surveying my Instead of seeking to understand these women through homeland. 115 116 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2016 especially MamaGlo. Owens. Finally, Ithankmyclosestfamilyandfriends, Lynne Feeley, Timothy Patrick McCarthy, and Emily warmest thanks to my advisors and mentors, Glenda Carpio, of NewOrleans.Iwouldliketoextendmydeepestand University, andtheEarlK.LongLibraryatUniversity University, theLouisianaResearchCollectionatTulane Collection, the Hill Memorial Library at Louisiana State Williams Research Center atthe Historic New Orleans was socentraltomyundergraduateyears.Ithankthe building asupportiveandrichacademiccommunitythat and apowertoendure.Thisisthatstory. struggle, ournames,shebelieved,weresymbolicofalegacy And althoughthatfreedomwaswroughtwithtensionand dom thatnevercouldbestolenordamageddegraded. She framedourfamily’s namesasthosesignifiersoffree- years following,atleastwewouldalwayshaveourname. our familyenduredduringtheantebellumperiodand the conversation,MamaGlomentionedthatnomatterwhat those moments I wish I’d had a notepad on me to record Least We HaveOurName.”Someyearsago,inoneof Figure 1. Major citiesincludedinthisthesisrenderedan1836map Acknowledgements First, IthanktheHarvardMellonMayscohortfor Finally, Iofferanoteonthetitleofthisthesis:“At by HenryS.Tanner

Endnotes Berlin, Ira.ManyThousandsGone: TheFirstTwo CenturiesofSlavery Barthelemy, Anthony. “Light,Bright,Damn NearWhite.”In Bibliography iv iii ii i xi x ix viii vii vi v 1998. in NorthAmerica.Cambridge,MA: HarvardUniversityPress, University Press,2000. edited bySybilKein,252–75.Baton Rouge,LA:LouisianaState Creole: andLegacyofLouisiana’s TheHistory Free PeopleofColor, Here, IenterintoconversationwithhistorianssuchasGaryMills,whose In articulatingmyownversionoftheprecarityfreedomforfree Henry S.Tanner, “NewMapofLouisiana,”1836. Saidiya Hartman,LoseYour Mother;AaronSachs,“LetterstoaTenured See Rediker, TheSlaveShip;Smallwood, Walter Johnson’s discussionof“self-making”in“ChapterSeven:Life Saidiya Hartman,“Venus inTwo Acts.” Shirley ElizabethThompson,ExilesatHome,14. Connie Eble,“CreoleinLouisiana,”39. Identifying one’s selfasCreoleoftensignifiedacertainlineage, racial Drawn fromIraBerlin,“Prologue:MakingSlavery, MakingRace”in was hard,whatdeadly, whatalmostfellapart. am interestedinwhatwasremarkable,butequallyinvested of thathistoricalprojectwastorevealwhatremarkableabouthim.I While theauthorsdogoontoqualifyhis“remarkability,” theintention aspires tobeahistoryofremarkablemannamedWilliam Ellison”(xi). P. JohnsonandJamesL.Roark’s BlackMastersopenswith,“Thisbook if thestrugglestheyenduredriskbeingconsequentlyobscured.Michael explaining thesubversivenatureofMetoyerfamily’s power, Iwonder and tellstheirstorywithafocusonextremewealthpower. In free peopleofcolor. MillsfocusedontheprosperousMetoyerfamily The ForgottenPeoplewasafoundationaltextinthestudyofLouisiana’s of colorfacedintheCivilWar Era. Downs’s antebellum North,primarilyPhiladelphia.SeealsothehistorianJim sketches outtheparametersoffreedomforfreewomencolorin Dunbar’s African-descended people,IfoundthehistorianEricaArmstrong Historian”; CarolHanisch,“ThePersonalIsPolitical.” Papers. see KathleenBrown, power andthecreationofhierarchies,thoughthroughagenderedlens, ical figurethroughoutthisproject.Formoreontheanxietiesrelatedto him fromWilliam Johnson,afreemanofcolorwhoiscentralhistor footnotes, IwillrefertoWalter Johnsonbyhisfullnametodistinguish to whichIallude.Throughoutthisthesis,inboththebodyand in theShadowofSlaveMarket”Soulbylaysoutprocess of knowncategoriesraceandbelonging. title ofBarthelemy’s essaysuggests,tobeCreolewasexist attheedges was uniquelyNewWorld andsingularlyNewOrleanian”(257).Asthe French culture,language,andcustomstocreateanamalgamationthat Barthelemy posits:“Regardlessofskincolor, CreolesfusedAfricanand his essay“Light,Bright,DamnNear implied Louisiana,particularlyNewOrleans,astheplaceoforigin.In and “mulatto”wasapejorativeterm(xiii,xix).TheCreolealso because “Negro”indicatedthatonewasofwhollyAfricanheritage, In hisstudy, Millsreferstothepeople,attheirrequest,asCreole, Louisianans inAliceDunbarNelson,“PeopleofColorLouisiana.” sion ofcompetingdefinitions“Creole”amongwhiteandnon-white history, andclaimofnatalcountry. SeeAliceDunbarNelson’s discus- Many ThousandsGone. Sick fromFreedom foranaccountofthechallengesfreepeople A FragileFreedom tobeuseful.Inherintroduction,Dunbar

Good Wives, NastyWenches, andAnxiousPatriarchs. White,” literaryscholarAnthony Saltwater Slavery; Scott, Saltwater Slavery; Freedom - Brown, Kathleen M. Good Wives, Nasty Wenches, and Anxious Thompson, Shirley Elizabeth. Exiles at Home: The Struggle to Patriarchs: Gender, Race, and Power in Colonial Virginia. Chapel Become American in Creole New Orleans. Cambridge, MA: Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 1996. Harvard University Press, 2009.

Downs, Jim. Sick from Freedom: African-American Illness and Suffering During the Civil War and Reconstruction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.

Dunbar, Erica Armstrong. A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008.

Eble, Connie. “Creole in Louisiana.” South Atlantic Review 73, no. 2 (2008): 39–53.

Hanisch, Carol. “The Personal Is Political.” In Notes from the Second Year: Women’s Liberation: Major Writings of the Radical Feminists, edited by Shulamith Firestone and Anne Koedt, 76–78, 1970.

Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2007.

————. “Venus in Two Acts.” Small Axe 12, no. 2 (2008): 1–14.

Johnson, Michael P., and James L. Roark. Black Masters: A Free Family of Color in the Old South. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1984.

Johnson, Walter. Soul by Soul: Life Inside the Antebellum Slave Market. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Mills, Gary. The Forgotten People: Cane River’s Creoles of Color. Edited by Elizabeth Shown Mills. Rev. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2013.

Nelson, Alice Dunbar. “People of Color in Louisiana.” In Creole: The History and Legacy of Louisiana’s Free People of Color, edited by Sybil Kein, 3–41. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2000.

Rediker, Marcus. The Slave Ship: A Human History. New York: Viking, 2007.

Sachs, Aaron. “Letters to a Tenured Historian: Imaging History as Creative Nonfiction—or Maybe Even Poetry.”Rethinking History: The Journal of Theory and Practice 14, no. 1 (2010): 5–38.

Smallwood, Stephanie. Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from African to American Diaspora. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

Tanner, Henry S. “New Map of Louisiana,” 1836. David Rumsey Map Collection. http://www.davidrumsey.com/ luna/servlet/detail/RUMSEY~8~1~557~60195:New- Map-Of- Louisiana?sort= Pub_Date%2CPub_List_ No_InitialSort&qvq=q:List_No%3D%270977.021 %27%22%2B;sort:Pub_Date%2CPub_List_No_ InitialSort;lc:RUMSEY~ 8~1&mi=0&trs=1#.

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Through subtle shades of color, the cover design represents the layers of richness and diversity that flourish within minority communities.