Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. [Vol. 5.] Eger Journal of American Studies. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 25)

Studies - András Tarnóc: Voices From the Wild Zone: Three Versions of the Feminist Aesthetic in American Culture

Woman, who would in turn invent the New Man (Davidson 61) recalls the mythological element of the core. Similarly to its black and Chicano counterparts, the feminist aesthetics employs methods of cultural polarization. Any essentialist rhetoric is dependent upon conation and dichotomizing devices including "wedge issues," and "versus patterns" (Virágos 21). Essentialism, based on "alleged or real in-group specificity" (Virágos 21) is manifested in Irigaray's emphasis on the female anatomy. The notion of conativity is present in l'écriture feminine's view of the writing process as a revolutionary act against patriarchy. One of the most frequently deployed wedge issues is rape defined by Brownmiller as a "conscious process of intimidation by which all men keep all women in a state of fear" ((qtd. in Beard 135). Andrea Dworkin, viewing all male-female relations as rape, considers the latter a political crime. Sexual harassment, with the survivor deciding the nature and gravity of the crime (Beard 153) is also a frequently employed dividing tool. By viewing rape and sexual harassment as a political crime, radical feminists promote centrifugality and cultural separatism. Having assumed the right to define, a move is made from the phallic order, making the woman, the heretofore defined one. the definer. The woman as a definer of rape becomes the interpreter of herself as a text, launching herself on an evolutionary process from a passive victimized object to a subject signifying agency. The establishment of versus patterns is prevalent in Showalter's notion of gynocriticism as well. In order to battle the neglect and hostile attitude toward feminist criticism, gynocriticism views and interprets literature from a female point of view, constructs paradigms based on the female experience, breaks away from male criticism, and promotes the idea of a female culture (Weedon 155). Du Plessis, putting forth the both/and vision of the female aesthetics, favoring monism over dualism, betrays conativity as the former is believed to bring forth a non-hierarchical system (132). Consequently, the artist is a producer of a social product designed to will a better world into being. The very view of the female artist as a site for the reconciliation of the domestic and public sphere (139) is also conative, as history has proven the unfeasibility of the above. Conativity is also present in the transformational notion that the feminist aesthetic will help the overthrow of existing forms (144). 105