『패싱』에 나타난 인종과 여성 관계

Abstract

This paper analyzes Nella Larsen's Passing (1929) as a work in which Larsen goes beyond her depiction of a black woman's predicament in Quicksand (1928), and attempts to politicize as well as sexualize the relationship between black women. In Passing, Larsen presents two black women, and shows that their relationship can be both politicized and sexualized within the discourse of racial solidarity. Irene Redfield, Larsen's protagonist in Passing, is caught between her desire for security in her marriage and her newly awakened desire for her friend Clare Kendry. Irene's desire for another woman becomes a threat to her family life and, by extension, to the ideology of the black family as a repository of racial purity. On the other hand, Larsen shows Irene trying to protect Clare because of her loyalty to her race. As opposed to the reading of Irene as interpellated by the norms governing black female sexuality, indeed as an instrument of the social power that governs the black family and confines black women's sexuality within the family, I argue that Larsen attempts to politicize the two women's relationship and situates Irene's desire for Clare within the discourse of racial solidarity. Larsen thus shows that sexuality intersects with the discourses of race and gender, thereby transforming the existing political discourses of race and gender.