Category: Reflections

Rather than attempt to untangle the mysteries of gender or lack of gender in The Female Man, I have decided to post this week on the use of names in postmodern literature.  I am interested in knowing if an attribute of postmodern literature is the symbolic (and often overtly so) naming of characters.  The prosecution offers the the generic women in The Female Man as Exhibit A:  Spossisa (“three times divorced”), Eglantissa (“thinks only of clothes”), Aphrodissa (“cannot keep her eyes open because of her false eyelashes”), Clarissa (“will commit suicide”), Lucrissa (“strained forehead shows that she’s making more money than her husband”), Wailissa (“engaged in a game of ain’t-it-awful”), Lamentissa (Wailissa’s partner for the “ain’t-it-awful” game), Travailissa (“usually only works”), Saccharissa (“naughty” and “playing a round of His Little Girl across the bar with the host”), Amicissa (“the Good Sport”), Ludicrissa (“too plain to be invited”), Amphibissa (“never invited…for obvious reasons”), Domicissa (“never opens her mouth in public”), Dulcississa (“whose standard line is, ‘Oh, you’re so wonderful!’”). . .(34)

 

According to my trusty 1995 Webster’s New World Dictionary, here are the meanings of words similar in spelling:

spouse = husband or wife

eglantine = a European rose with sweet-scented leaves and pink flowers

aphrodisiac = arousing sexual desire

clarity (?) = clearness

lucre = riches; money

wail = to make a long, loud, sad cry, as in grief or pain

lament = to mourn

travail = very hard work OR intense pain; agony

saccharine = of or like sugar OR too sweet

amicable (?) = friendly; peaceable

OR amiss (?) = astray OR improper

ludicrous = causing laughter because absurd or ridiculous

amphibious = [living a double life] that can live or operate on land or water

domestic = of the home or family OR tame; said of animals

dulcet = soothing or pleasant to hear

Some of the connections seem rather blatant and, in The Female Man, seem to clearly reinforce the existence of female stereotypes [Aphrodissa, for example, attempts to arouse sexual desire with the stereotypical girl-maker, that is, make-up (the pinnacle of which may be the false eyelashes, associated clearly with a female eye-batting approach to winning a male’s attention)]; however, some I find surprisingly intriguing (Domicissa, for example, who never speaks in public, matching with the “tame” meaning for domestic, and even furthermore, tame in a way to be “said of animals,” perhaps indicating that Domicissa falls into an animal-like silence in public – due to repeated male domination?)

 

As Exhibits B and C in the symbolic name trial, I offer the names from Crying [Oedipa, of course, (with an Oedipus correlation), but also “Mucho” Maas (“much more”), Dr. Hilarius, San Narciso [name of a place, but comparable to narcissism – self-love – or Narcissus, Manny Di Presso (manic depression?), Metzger’s “actor/lawyer friend,” and the list goes on…] and from Lathe (the obvious George Orr – noticeably similar to George Orwell).

Is it an attribute of postmodernism to make heavy symbolic use of character names, or does it just happen to work out in these cases?  Also, is the symbolism/meaning/comparison always so blatant, or are these authors trying to ridicule a "need" (of their readers) to make such obvious connections?  Lastly, are the meanings of the names as obvious as we/I think they are, or is there more to them?

In keeping with this week’s theme — deep uncertainty and an attendant tentativeness — I’d like to make a quick observation that’ll certainly bear reconsideration as soon as I click "Publish."  I’m not so sure I agree with much in Haraway’s essay, for many reasons.  The first is that, as Jarrod pointed out, the style is unnecessarily mushy.  Any call to arms that declares itself a "manifesto" might have been more effective if written more clearly.  [It’s possible that Haraway is attempting to avoid the phallogocentricism of most academic arguments, but then she might be essentializing a ‘feminine’ discourse that people like Russ are so intent on satirizing].  At any rate, that’s not the main problem I had with the essay.  I wanted to see a more thoughtful examination of how the blurring boundaries Haraway outlines lead to oppositional opportunities as opposed to an unwitting support of transnational capitalism — especially as it concerns the boundary between "animal-human (organism) and machine" (152).  When I think of cyborgs in contemporary society, I perhaps incorrectly think of the person walking along with an iPod in one ear and a phone implanted in the other — or maybe those people caressing silvery, fetishized objects upon which they push buttons in order to play some video game as they walk zombified through campus.  [I’m a Luddite, of course…].  My point is that the blurring of organism and machine seems to service the economy, in the sense that people don’t use cell phones to foment revolution; they use them because they’re a status device with cool ring tones, and perhaps they can’t bear their own thoughts for the few minutes it takes to get from the parking lot to the classroom (which becomes inevitably dull, unless you sit in the back and play that video game).  In short, I’m inclined to believe that the blurred distinction between humans and machines "is about the final imposition of a grid of control on the planet" rather than "about lived social and bodily realities" (154) — and Haraway hasn’t really given me any reason to believe otherwise.

  I thought the epigraph to the left of page one (from R. D. Laing’s The Policics of Experience) deserves some discussion.  Its placement on the left side a two-page spread, as opposed to on a page by itself undermines its importance, yet it sets the tone for how Russ perceives male-female relationships and expresses them in the novel.  It is easy for the reader to overlook this passage from a 1967 book in order to begin the main text (I admit I did at first).  However, this brief excerpt highlights major points of discussion for Russ.  Laing, using the names Jack and Jill (notice the “J” theme and how nicely that works out) as examples, says that Jack has the power to “invalidate [Jill’s] experience” and this sense of a woman needing to be validated is expressed later in the book, when Russ is talking about dating rituals and the need for women to have men acknowledge their existence.  Joanna sums this up when she says that she has said to men: “Love me, Approve me, Define me, Regulate me” (140).  She was at one point dependent on a male to define who she was.

  Jack, Laing continues, also has the ability to make the Jill doubt herself and question that an experience ever existed, by “shift[ing] the modality of her experience from memory to imagination.”  Jeannine, the most conventionally feminine of all the characters (her name resembles the word feminine as well—perhaps that is why she gets so mad when she is called Jeannie, because her name loses some of its audio ties to the adjective she identifies so closely with, or perhaps because no one is listening to her and her needs), has this experience of her memory losing credibility when she decides she wants to marry Cal despite all the inadequacies of their relationship, because she wants to be married.  She is daydreaming about being able to tell her mother she is going to have a baby (within the confines of wedlock of course) and “Cal himself hardly figures in this at all, for Jeannine has forgotten his laconism, his passivity, his strange mournfulness…” (131).  I think there are definitely people like this in society today, who get married to be married, but often times, men who have been divorced get remarried more quickly than their spouses to be married and to have someone take care of them, fulfill the role that Jeannine does for Cal (doing the dishes, all the cleaning because who else will do it), so this marriage for marriage’s sake has evolved in the past 30 years but still reinforces the “angel of the home” expectation of women.

  The last section of Laing explains how this type of manipulating another person continues because you question the sincerity of the accuser: “How can you think such a thing?” and then by placing that doubt and guilt in the accuser’s head, you make them want to prove that they don’t think that way at all.  This allows the cycle to continue, so there are multiple passages in the book where men make women are made to feel guilty and so the cycle of inequality continues. A more extreme example of this is how rape is the woman’s fault because her skirt was too short, she looked at the guy, etc.  Russ is calling the reader’s attention to the fact that society is the way it is partly because of men, and partly because women allow themselves to be manipulated by men.

Here’s what I’m wondering. Is it possible that Jeannine, Joanna, Jael, and Janet are all the same person? I don’t mean the same genetic material living on different worlds in different times. I mean, is there only ONE of her and the rest (or all) are schizophrenic creations of an oppressed mind? Yes, I realize that they all have their own stories and it doesn’t seem like they would mesh well into one brain in one time period. But here’s my theory: Joanna (I’ll use her for the sake of argument; it could really be any of them I guess) is a woman living in 1969 under the patriarchal values of a capitalistic, technology-driven society. She goes to parties where men spout misogynistic rhetoric at her and call her a “prude” for not putting out. Her “doctor….lawyer…janitor…president…manager…etc.” are all male. Her brother (keep in mind they’re all the same person) tells her that she should marry anyone, it doesn’t matter who. She is called “bitchy, castrating, unattractive, neurotic, etc.” when she expresses her opinion. She is expected to sit idly by while a man she does not like nuzzles her ear and gropes her. She is sexually harassed. She is raped and feels massive guilt because rape is what females live with and what males “get away with.” Couldn’t living in this world drive anyone crazy? Perhaps that is what Russ is trying to tell us. Joanna (or Jeannine or Janet or Jael) creates alternate selves to deal with each different reality that she encounters. Jeannine is the “feminine” one who DOES want marriage and children, but is confused. Jael HINTS at being there from the beginning, but doesn’t show up until the end where she is depicted as a warrior who kills men and uses them for their bodies. Is that what the rape victim in Joanna wants to do to males? Janet is the only semi-happy character and she lives on a planet where none of this is possible. Is this the escapist in Joanna? Are all of these separate, yet equally important urges within the same person? And because of these different urges did the subject have to split into different personalities to cope?

 

The part I feel where it is most evident of a multiple personality is when Janet sleeps with Laura Rose. The narrator says she is there in “spirit,” but lives among the rafters. If it is multiple personalities then this scene almost seems as if Joanna has an out-of-body experience while watching herself do something that is “wrong”—such as lesbian sex.

Well, there you have it. It’s not too well-thought out, but just a suspicion I was harboring while reading the book. I don’t know…it seems like an interesting episode of Law and Order: SVU (not that I put the TV and novel on the same level)or a companion to Fight Club. Feel free to tell me I’m wrong…

Referring to the “communication sciences,” which she claims are tools that “embody and enforce new social relations for women worldwide,” Haraway says:  “the solution to the key questions rests on a theory of language and control; the key operation is determining the rates, directions and probabilities of flow of a quantity called information….The biggest threat to such a power is interruption of communication” (164).  I immediately connected this quote to The Female Man (and perhaps I’m taking Haraway’s idea out of context, because in the article she’s referring to biotechnology), but this struck me as somewhat applicable to the overall narrative structure of Russ’ novel.  The Female Man uses what I think we can all agree is a jarring narrative technique:  Russ has essentially interrupted the flow of communication of information to the reader by presenting the story in a jumbled, incoherent way.  This idea of language as a force of domination harks back to Lacan, whom Haraway matches in a dichotomy against Freud, the former psychoanalyst representing “the informatics of domination” column (161).  (From the course reader I’m getting the impression that postmodernism is all about dichotomous columnar charts…j/k ).  It seems that feminists have embraced Lacanian theory so enthusiastically because his view of psychoanalysis is heavily dependent on language; and if sexism and patriarchy are embodied in the language we speak, then we can do something about them.  I don’t know if this “interruption” was Russ’ intention in organizing the novel the way she did, or if the effect of her narrative structure challenges our conceptions of women, feminism or gender relationships; but the novel’s presentation certainly challenged me, and this seems in step with the feminist movements–which, as I perceive them, aim to challenge traditional conceptions of women and their place in our culture, among other things.  

One of my very first questions about The Female Man is why are there four alter-selves? Why four? What is the significance? Throughout the majority of the book there are only three, and even at the end when Jael becomes more prominent in the story, the girls are still frequently referred to as the only three. And yet I still wonder, why four? I’m not well versed in literary symbolism, even the most recognizable, so while maybe most of the class might automatically know, I am honestly perplexed. So I consider the earthiness of the novel as a whole. There is a lot of significance placed on the separate “worlds.” There is a huge inner-discussion on nature vs. nurture. And about a bah-zillion references to the moon. And so I’m considering these earthy issues, and I think that there are specifically four and only four because there are four primary directions. God help me if there is a fancy word for this. But, each girl represents the different direction that the one soul (?) went, and in physical terms, there are only four possible directions one can go. However, after Jael’s explanation of how she found the girls and how her Womanland people can explore all of the separate states of “time,” you were kind of left to wonder if there were even more J’s out there in yet undiscovered worlds. So with that hanging in question, my four directions theory might fall to pieces. However, considering only the information provided, there are only four J’s and to satisfy my own curiosity, I think it’s to represent the four directions.

Another issue that I debated was Russ’s obvious conclusion on nature vs. nurture. She seems to be illustrating her belief that one’s surroundings determine how an individual develops. Regardless of genes, these four girls are completely different and each has their own unique self based on where they are from and the separate lives that they’ve lived. If there are suppose to be kin-like similarities they were brief and insignificant, because although I had a hard enough time keeping the initial three J’s separate, I certainly didn’t find a repetition of similar behavior, physical attributes or thought patterns. These girls were very different. Even in the description of the Manland, where they surgically alter the sex of people, the idea was that however they were raised, that’s how they’d turn out. If they were molded from a young age to be feminine, then they would serve a feminine role in adulthood, and if they were raised in a masculine environment (the rich men’s chosen children) then they would grow up to be soldiers, etc. Russ didn’t seem to put any weight in the genetic force behind someone’s development. I don’t have a conclusion on these thoughts exactly, it’s just an issue that I kept noticing and wondering why she chose nurture over nature. The only thing I can think is that perhaps to put such determining weight in nature would be admitting that there is absolute truth. That genetically you will without a doubt become A certain person. Whereas by basing someone’s individualism on nurture, it is all up to chance, and thus the four J’s similarities and differences are surprising and unknown. Very much looking forward to class so I can better understand this crazy book.

Someone once told me that I often have an emotional reaction to literature than an analytical one. At the time, this was a huge illumination on my character and thus explained why, as an English major in undergrad and now as an English graduate student, I am sometimes unable to produce immediate analytic feedback. Unfortunately, this is ringing true for me after reading The Female Man – my analytical skills are temporarily stunned into silence by the challenging, fragmented novel. For now, I’ll have to go with my emotional reaction to the article in the course reader for this blog.  

I was particularly disturbed by a passage at the end: "…and the possibilities for our reconstitution include the utopian dream of the hope for a monstrous world without gender" (181). After reading this, I was immediately reminded of the instance in The Lathe of Heaven, where George Orr devises, through Dr. Haber, a solution to racial tension. The doctor, of course, thought that this was a cure-all – however, we quickly see race’s lack in the new reality. George is profoundly devastated by the lack of color – most especially, he misses Heather being "brown". Further, we also find that although racial tension no longer exists, other prejudice does – a man was assaulted on the street for having cancer. Would a monstrous world without gender really be a utopia? Would it really be a solution to anything? Would I want to live there? What would happen to the identity that I have now, as a woman? I suppose I would no longer be a woman? I would also argue that, considering Janet and Joanna’s reactions to Jael’s proposition at the end of The Female Man, they were skeptical about a world without gender (or with just one gender) as well. 

The article continues: "Cyborg imagery can suggest a way out of the maze of dualisms in which we have explained our bodies and our tools to ourselves" (181). I could be coming off as extreme here, but I think I might want to hang on to some dualisms. I’m not saying that everything in the world needs to be dichotomized and split into neat little boxes, but the idea of being in some kind of "monstrous" limbo-land, where "One is too few, but two are too many" (171) seems rather frighteningly amorphous. Further, I thought that jmonte had a great point about the "ambiguity of self" (I’m so sorry to use your handle – I am usually very good with names) – where is the self? Is there room for a self in this world? Can you even define a self if so few things are finite? Maybe that’s not what the author is getting at, but, in addition to liking an ultimate truth, sometimes I like some definite boundaries, too.  

In keeping with this thinking, I was frustrated with the very last statement: "…I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess" (181). Obviously, the author is stating her preference, but again, I’m saying I see nothing wrong with the parameters that "be[ing] a goddess" could offer. I don’t necessarily think that the definition of something takes away from its identity, or takes away from its’ difference or otherness.

In the spirit of fragmentation, I will now veer off onto a completely different train of thought. I was reminded strongly of Jeannette Winterson’s work (Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, The Passion, Sexing The Cherry) while reading The Female Man. I wonder if anyone else noted some similarities?