A quick conversation starter... Several posts on your own blogs and comments to this blog's posts have brought up the issue of performance. We often rely on a distinction between "being" a certain way and "acting" a certain way...but I'm thinking that's a line that deserves some smudging.
Specifically: in comments about Trail Maids, etc., there's a running theme of what they're thinking about as they dress up, playing "dress up" in general, and whether or not they're knowingly hashing out issues of slavery. Now, the Trail Maids and the issue of "southern womanhood" is just one example...Surely this question of consciously doing this or that can translate to all sorts of topics when discussing religion and the South.
SO, since that's the case, let me add the following (to the specific case of trail maids/femininity):
1. I would be pretty surprised if someone, as she puts on an antebellum dress, actively thinks while she picks up her parasol: "I am now choosing to be complicit in a social script steeped in the horrors of slavery."
2. I'm not sure if the fact of #1 matters though... Or does it? Tell me what you think.
3. Some theory for your reading/thinking pleasure (posted a shorter version of this in a comment to the trail maids, too):
In the chapter you read from McPherson's Reconstructing Dixie, McPherson suggests:
"Central to constructions of southern femininity is a notion of masquerade or performance...In her 1929 essay 'Womanliness as a Masquerade,' [Joan] Riviere structures an equation between femininity/womanliness and masquerade, writing that 'the reader may ask how I define womanliness or where I draw the line between genuine womanliness and the masquerade...they are the same thing'. In [Mary Ann] Doane's analysis, such a formulation of femininity renders it 'in actuality non-existent' because 'it makes femininity dependent upon masculinity for its very definition'. For Doane, femininity as masquerade is both normal and...pathological. Such an understanding of normal or aberrant femininity as always a masquerade, a performance, echoes my own claim that femininity is a social and discursive construction, and thus its contours are always sketched in relation to other markers of difference. But Doane's argument that this approach makes femininity always dependent on, derivative of, masculinity...enacts an erasure of the other social relations against which femininity takes shape and is performed (21-22).
McPherson wants to add to sexual difference the differences in race and region that also mark the masquerade, so she sees herself as adding to and expanding what Doane and Riviere do in psychoanalytic contexts. Nonetheless, the central point is still one of whether or not social actors must be CONSCIOUSLY engaged in something in order to be identified as engaging in it.
There's an interesting debate to be had here, as there's surely something to be said for personal identification (I am able to mark myself or identify as this or that no matter what scholars or peers might say to the contrary). At the same time, don't social frameworks and interests get stacked up or dismantled by our often unconscious behaviors?
Personally, I don't find a lot of use for talking about things like "intent" or the "unconscious." I'm not telepathic, and I don't know what swims in the gray matter of others. I do find a lot of use in talking about behavior and action, though. And whether these things are "conscious" or not, they seem to have material consequences in a discursive and material world.
So does it matter whether we know what we're doing if we're still doing it?
123go!
1. I think that this thought is far from the minds of these girls, but now looking back on my time as a "Hoover Belle" I see the similarities of the dresses and houses in that area from that era of history and it is disturbing. I still think it is a good community service oppurtunity for girls, but at the same time they are playing right into a patriarchal stereotype of women (previously discussed in another thread) and also the stereotype many have about the South and the images associated with it.
ReplyDeleteI think it does matter what we do even if we dont know because someone knows what these groups "represent" if not by intention. I feel that the girls participating should be educated and enlightened on what they are representing and the history behind it. And I know that my group had equal opportunities to all girls, shape, size, color, but do all the groups have this same theory and acceptance?
Just some ideas right before heading out to class!
i really wonder how many people actually know their history to know the story behind their actions. somethings are just out there like the word "retarded" or "gay" or "stop acting black", whether you are playing around with friends or just saying it in a joke like manner it is still offensive to a whole community of people. and the intervention starts with seeking the knowledge to know what it is you are about to do or who it is you are about to represent. these girls don't represent me, or anything about me, some people will say the lack of blacks being represented in the south is apart of the history, i don't agree with that because it's still a way to continue to oppress people in the south that are not white. in my eyes it's a real problem and i don't like it, and to think that way is kind of having the mentality that you are expected to have.
ReplyDeleteI personally think, regarding the article about Obama's inaugural parade and this topic, that it is all ridiculous and seems some people have too much time on their hands to worry and get offended/defensive over irrelavant things. No young lady who puts on one of those dresses has a thought about slavery (until before now, at least) and they should not have to. Slavery was a horrendous reality for many people during that time, but it is not the only focus of the time unless we make it so. There are good things and bad things from all time periods. The things these young ladies are trying to capitalize on are things such as conservativism, the style of the time, the image of a simpler time. Just as if someone was trying to portray the 1950's they would wear poodle skirts and listen to records. Is it to say that we should not celebrate anything from the year 2001 because that must mean we support the terrorist attacks of 9/11? I think slavery was a terrible thing that we as a country should move on from and completely unattach ourselves from. But how can we ever progress from something that we continue to regress upon?
ReplyDeleteMaybe it deserves to be said the question being posed isn't about what they're thinking or what they need to think. Again--we're not telepathic, and we can only speculate about that. So let's put that off the table. Okay, so now what's left is the question of PERFORMANCE... We are always about the business of performing. Constantly. Maybe not consciously, but again, we're not telepathic (nor are we neurologists) so the brain is not our concern. This is what Riviere means in her quote about performance ("masquerade", to use her wording) and something called "womanliness". Gender and/or race performance are just examples--Trail Maids are just one stage upon which this larger question plays out. This larger question is that of the relationship between performance and what we understand to be "real."
ReplyDeleteRiviere says that what we think is "genuine", "authentic", "real" identity is all performative. That strikes me as a very different point than whether the trail maids (and again, that's only one of any number of examples) are doing right or wrong. Sure, we've all got opinions to that effect, perhaps, but what of this question of performance and identity?
I bring it up because I think it lands squarely in the middle of conversations about how we mythologize the South, how we "perform" the South, in a way...And if we buy Riviere's take on things, we would question whether there's a "real" South at all! Speaks to what we discussed yesterday--if the 18th century made one thing clear, it's that no ONE linear historical or religious tradition had a forever home in the South. There were competing traditions and cultures, various rituals and ideological frameworks in the mix...
Thoughts?
I think that if it was a competition, the ideaology that won is the one we use to mythologize the South. Because, if that is how most people view the South, there has to be a reason behind it. I agree completely that there is no single historical or religious tradition that was the sole contributor to what established the American South, but it would seem that one stereotype tends to outweigh the rest.
ReplyDeleteI too find little importance in the idea of "intent", because we can only measure the empirical impact, the phenomenon. We cannot see, or know, the content of men's hearts. However, society today fully embraces the idea of intent. After all, "It's the thought that counts".
ReplyDeleteThere are many things that society values that mean nothing to me, like Beiber Fever, WNBA finals, and intentionality. However, society imposes (or maybe I'm projecting) these ideas upon me, and leaves me with no choice but to respond accordingly.
Right--we consistently privilege something thought/intent/personal-based, even though none of that is anything that can be "known"... But yes, there are material consequences to things we think are internal (perspectives/ideologies/etc). So then, yeah, we're left with stimuli to respond to... And the notion of interiority then often becomes internalized such that we continue to pitch it as something to distinguish from and set above action/behavior/performance. ...If that makes sense...?
ReplyDeleteAs I said in the other blog post, I personally don't think these girls are thinking of issues of the past in connection w/ "trail maids". But I can see where some Blacks would be offended. Im not saying they should be offended, but I can see where they connect it w/ issue of the past, slavery, etc. But there is also a thin line in how far to take things. I think Dexter's reference to "Black Jesus" is a good example. While some Blacks may simply be referencing the past connections w/ slavery & trail maids, some may just be "blowing things out of proprtion", "making a mountain out of a mole hill", "beating a dead horse" etc I think you get it lol In some circumstances, the past issues w/ th South/slavery/Blacks are bound to arise but as far as the "trail maids", I don't see any real legitimacy.
ReplyDelete