Paul Durcan’s Critique of the Sexual Politics of Postcolonial Ireland: Toward a New Irish Womanhood and Manhood
0
조회
0
다운로드
0
인용
0
참고문헌
키워드
초록
In order for the Irish people to retrieve their national sovereignty from colonial authority, they would have to prove their capacity to self-govern, having been undermined as weak and feminine by the Victorians; thus, physical and armed resistance to establish the Irish as masculine was inevitable. When the reactionary masculine image of the nation is taken for granted as national identity, that image falls into another identity fundamentalism. For contemporary poet Paul Durcan, the postcolonial statehas promoted sexual identity politics in which man and woman are forced to behave according to certain male chauvinist ideology. In his poetry Durcan exposes the way masculine violence has been imposed upon woman. He also suggests alternative models of the new Irish woman, characterized mainly by her strong sensuousness and power, values conventionally denied to Irish women, who were educated to follow the Virgin Mary, in particular, her spirituality and innocence. As for the Irish men and their culture, Durcan locates the sexual politics of the state in sports. Promoting the virtue of aggressiveness in the individual, the sport fostered by the state justifies the use of civilized violence. Notably, Durcan does not indiscriminately reject all types of sports. He instead positively reappropriates the aesthetic value in sport and the sense of emotional liberation it provides. He also suggests a new model of Irish manhood, found in a male ballet dancer, with an emphasis on the womanness in man to refute the rigid masculine ideology of Irish society.
Abstract
In order for the Irish people to retrieve their national sovereignty from colonial authority, they would have to prove their capacity to self-govern, having been undermined as weak and feminine by the Victorians; thus, physical and armed resistance to establish the Irish as masculine was inevitable. When the reactionary masculine image of the nation is taken for granted as national identity, that image falls into another identity fundamentalism. For contemporary poet Paul Durcan, the postcolonial statehas promoted sexual identity politics in which man and woman are forced to behave according to certain male chauvinist ideology. In his poetry Durcan exposes the way masculine violence has been imposed upon woman. He also suggests alternative models of the new Irish woman, characterized mainly by her strong sensuousness and power, values conventionally denied to Irish women, who were educated to follow the Virgin Mary, in particular, her spirituality and innocence. As for the Irish men and their culture, Durcan locates the sexual politics of the state in sports. Promoting the virtue of aggressiveness in the individual, the sport fostered by the state justifies the use of civilized violence. Notably, Durcan does not indiscriminately reject all types of sports. He instead positively reappropriates the aesthetic value in sport and the sense of emotional liberation it provides. He also suggests a new model of Irish manhood, found in a male ballet dancer, with an emphasis on the womanness in man to refute the rigid masculine ideology of Irish society.
참고문헌 (21)
- Arnold, Matthew, "On the Study of Celtic Literature" (1867), Smith, Elder and Co.
- Cixous, Hélène, "The Laugh of the Medusa", Signs, 1(4), pp.875~893 (1976)
- "Constitution of Ireland (1937 original text)", Art. 41. Sec. 3, ~ (1937)
- Cronin, Mike, "Ireland Beyond Boundaries", pp.215~237 (2007), Pluto P
- Cullingford, Elizabeth Butler, "Ireland’s Others" (2001), U of Notre Dame P
- Durcan, Paul, "Life Is a Dream: 40 Years Reading Poems 1967-2007" (2009), Harvill Secker
- Durcan, Paul, "Paul Durcan’s Diary" (2003), New Island
- Elliott, Maurice, "Paul Durcan: Melancholy Poet of Love", Nordic Irish Studies, 3, pp.137~155 (2004)
- Evans, Dylan, "An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis" (1996), Routledge
- Gibbons, Luke, "Transformations in Irish Culture" (1996), U of Notre Dame P
- Hobsbawm, Eric, "The Invention of Tradition", pp.263~307 (1983), Cambridge UP
- Joyce, James, "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" (2003), Penguin Books
- Joyce, James, "Ulysses" (1986), Vintage Books
- Kearney, Richard, "Postnationalist Ireland: Politics, Culture, Philosophy" (1997), Routledge
- Kiberd, Declan, "Inventing Ireland: The Literature of the Modern Nation" (1995), Harvard UP
- Longley, Edna, "The Kilfenora Teaboy: A Study of Paul Durcan", pp.102~113 (1996), New Island Books
- Marcuse, Herbert, "The Aesthetic Dimension: Toward a Critique of Marxist Aesthetics" (1978), Beacon Press Books
- Min, Taewoon, "Joyce, Empire, Gender, and Aesthetics" (2014), Chonnam National UP
- O’Brien, Peggy, "The KilfenoraTeaboy", pp.75~101 (1996), New Island Books
- Tóibín, Colm, "Reading Poems Against the Wind", Magill, 50~55 (1986)
- Valente, Joseph, "The Myth of Manliness in Irish National Culture, 1880-1922" (2011), U of Illinois P