Browsing by Subject "Women's studies"
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Item Able fairy : the feminine aesthetic in the compositions of Rolande Falcinelli(2008-12) Alford, Lenore Audrey, 1968-; Dell'Antonio, Andrew; Hancock, Gerre, 1934-This study links patriarchal Catholic Church culture and feminist studies in musicology to reveal the multi-faceted opus and career of Rolande Falcinelli, 1920-2006. Organist, composer, and pedagogue Rolande Falcinelli was the first woman to be named titular over a prestigious organ console in Paris, that of the Sacré-Coeur Basilica, in 1945; she was also a renowned organ pedagogue at the Paris Conservatory for over thirty years. Yet her rich legacy of compositions remains largely unknown. This paper explores the significance of her entrance into liturgical creative work in the Catholic Church by showing the enormous force of historical repression against women in this context. Through examples ranging from Hildegard in the 11th century to Jeanne Demessieux in the 20th, it shows how the model and persona of the nun-organist has been a tacit lifestyle requirement of women organists in the Catholic Church, and how Falcinelli’s failure to adhere to that model affected her liturgical career. Next, it presents Falcinelli’s impressive body of compositions and shows examples of feminine coded material which appear throughout her opus, both subtly and overtly. Invoking studies by McClary, Citron, Epstein, Cusick, and others, this study includes a short history of gender studies in musicology, then places Falcinelli’s opus in the context of current thought on the feminine aesthetic in music.Item American male fantasies and the articulation of Slavic women’s bodies and sexualities in American popular culture : a study of feature and gonzo pornography(2018-12) Switala, Rebekah Lucille; Campbell, Craig, Ph. D.; Heinzelman, Susan SageThis thesis examines representations and perceptions of Slavic women and sexuality in American popular culture from the nineteenth century to the present, including contemporary feature and gonzo pornography. I argue that since the late 18th century, the U.S. has racialized and sexualized Slavic women’s bodies, specifically marking the Slavic body as ‘off-white’ with a ‘deviant’ sexuality, rather than as ‘fully white’ with a ‘pure’ sexuality. In both feature and gonzo pornography, which I argue to be distinct styles of pornography, this is articulated through emphasis being placed on the economic and cultural privilege and sexual prowess of white, Western, heteromasculine identity over Slavic women. However, gonzo pornography’s technical uses of the camera and reliance on improvisation create a participatory rather than strictly voyeuristic gaze for the spectator, opening some possibilities for Slavic women to reclaim and rearticulate both American and Soviet stereotypes and silences about their bodies and sexualitiesItem Constructing Afro-Cuban womanhood : race, gender, and citizenship in Republican-era Cuba, 1902-1958(2011-08) Brunson, Takkara Keosha; Guridy, Frank Andre; Garfield, Seth; Gill, Tiffany; Arroyo, Jossianna; Smith, CheriseThis dissertation explores continuities and transformations in the construction of Afro-Cuban womanhood in Cuba between 1902 and 1958. A dynamic and evolving process, the construction of Afro-Cuban womanhood encompassed the formal and informal practices that multiple individuals—from lawmakers and professionals to intellectuals and activists to workers and their families—established and challenged through public debates and personal interactions in order to negotiate evolving systems of power. The dissertation argues that Afro-Cuban women were integral to the formation of a modern Cuban identity. Studies of pre-revolutionary Cuba dichotomize race and gender in their analyses of citizenship and national identity formation. As such, they devote insufficient attention to the role of Afro-Cuban women in engendering social transformations. The dissertation’s chapters—on patriarchal discourses of racial progress, photographic representations, la mujer negra (the black woman), and feminist, communist, and labor movements—probe how patriarchy and assumptions of black racial inferiority simultaneously informed discourses of citizenship within a society that sought to project itself as a white masculine nation. Additionally, the dissertation examines how Afro-Cuban women’s writings and social activism shaped legal reforms, perceptions of cubanidad (Cuban identity), and Afro-Cuban community formation. The study utilizes a variety of sources: organizational records, letters from women to politicians, photographic representations, periodicals, literature, and labor and education statistics. Engaging the fields of Latin American history, African diaspora studies, gender studies, and visual culture studies, the dissertation maintains that an intersectional analysis of race, gender, and nation is integral to developing a nuanced understanding of the pre-revolutionary era.Item "I'm sorry this hasn't been a fairy tale" : examining romance reality TV through The bachelor(2011-05) Hernandez, Virginia Rose; Sherry, Alissa René; O'Brien, JodiRomance reality programming has become a major player in the television field, with the most successful shows garnering huge ratings and massive audiences over the course of numerous seasons. But while the concept of finding love in a competitive environment on the national stage is new, romance reality TV programs seem to regenerate outdated stereotypes which work in a retrograde fashion to envisage love in traditional, pre-feminist heteronormative and patriarchal structures. Combining a background of literature on reality TV which gives insight to the manipulative tendencies of the industry; feminist scholarship on the acculturating and indoctrinating nature of classic fairy tales; and writings on the prevalence of postfeminist ideology that emphasizes self-surveillance/subjectification, the rhetoric of self-empowerment, and natural differences between the sexes, this thesis examines one of the most ubiquitous romance reality shows, The bachelor. Through the lens of nine tropes--beauty, passivity, marriage, victimization, vilification, romance rhetoric, gender roles, consumerism, and the male gaze--I analyze a full season of episodes, tallying the occurrences in each category. Using these tally numbers as general indicators and providing examples of each theme, I argue that the lessons conveyed to audiences by The bachelor and other romance reality programs bear a striking resemblance to classic fairy tales morals in which positive outcomes for heroines directly correlate to their perceived femininity, including conventionally feminine virtues like physical beauty, moral turpitude, and adherence to normative gender roles. The presence of postfeminism in the media contributes to making these outdated fairy tales themes seem congruent with female agency and empowerment by uncritically casting the failure to find love as a personal one. At the same time, men are placed in advantageous positions of authority and power, affirming the inevitability and desirability of patriarchal relationship arrangements.Item Let's have a gay old time : how lesbians shaped early Hollywood(2021-07-30) Reinschmidt, Janet; Isenberg, Noah WilliamThis thesis puts forth Alla Nazimova, Kay Francis, and Greta Garbo as case studies for early Hollywood lesbian stardom and reception and unpacks how their star personas were constructed as well as the fan responses to their image and work. Through intersections of star studies, reception studies, classic literature, and queer historical texts, I discuss each star’s life and career with textual analysis of their films and primary sources such as fan letters, fan magazines, advertisements, and newspaper articles. I argue that each star represents a queer, and more specifically lesbian and bisexual, sensibility within the early Hollywood film industry that deserves more scholarly attention. The fan letters columns within old Hollywood fan magazines such as Photoplay and Modern Screen particularly illustrate the construction of queer star personas and the impact that they had on informed movie fans. Nazimova, Francis, and Garbo were all-powerful and influential figures in the film industry during significant periods of change such as the rise of the studio era, the arrival of sound, and the shift from pre-Code to the production Code era. Their star personas reflect how they were influenced by and went on to influence these critical transitions in Old Hollywood. There is a fundamental activist function to this work, to remind audiences that queer people have always existed, even without a framework to discuss identity, and this work endeavors to show a dedicated lesbian influence and audience of early Hollywood.Item Portraiture and feminine identity(2011-05) House, Felice Louise; Petersen, Bradley; Sutherland, Dan; Charles, Michael Ray; Canright, SarahTo portray women without objectifying them is an intentional, political act. The art historical tradition is to paint women to extol their sexual beauty and to encourage possessiveness. There is a new guard of women painters who provide a counterpoint to this tradition by depicting a more multifaceted version of the female psyche. I align myself as an artist with them by attempting to broaden the depiction of women as subjects in painting. My subjects are beautiful and observable, but not consumable. They are more public than private and more iconic than intimate. My paintings have a strong connection to traditional portraiture in both style and technique. However, my subjects are contemporized through the use of modern fashion, unexpected facial expressions, unique color relationships and photographic cropping.Item Starting from scratch : community, connection, and women's culinary culture(2012-05) Haupt, Melanie Kathryn 1972-; Perez, Domino Renee, 1967-This dissertation examines how women’s food writing, from blogs to cookbooks to novels, demonstrate a desire to articulate themselves as people within communities rather than accept a dehumanized identity as a consumer or set of credit-card numbers. I argue that through an emphasis on connection with one another via a discourse of scratch cooking and locally sourced foods, women are able to push back against the hegemony of corporate food and industrial agriculture. Working from a case study model, each of my chapters examines the distinct ways in which women assert their personhood apart from the homogenizing influences of mainstream food culture. As a means of articulating this woman’s culinary culture, predicated on a foundation of scratch cooking and local ingredients and relationships, I examine the food blog Fed Up With Lunch and the author’s use of an anonymous persona to interrogate the federal school lunch program; feminist vegetarian and vegan cookbooks authored by collectives of women who rely on oppositional identities in order to push back against what they view as hegemony; how diasporic Indian women use scratch cooking as a means of self-expression within the context of migration; and the novel cookbook as an example of injecting a feminist discourse of food into a traditional fictional narrative. Read together, these discrete case studies make an argument for women’s power to effect meaningful change from within the circumscribed space of the kitchen.