Women’s Voices in Post-Communist Eastern Europe (Vol II)
Women’s Voices in Post-Communist Eastern Europe (Vol II)
Contributor(s): Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru (Editor), Mădălina Nicolaescu (Editor), Helen Lawton Smith (Editor)
Subject(s): Social Sciences, Language and Literature Studies, Gender Studies, Studies of Literature, Sociology
Published by: Editura Universităţii din Bucureşti
Keywords: Eastern European wmen’s literature; communism; patriarchal norm;
Summary/Abstract: This volume is the second o f a collection of critical essays on Eastern European women’s literature after the fall of the communist regime. The first volume, Rewriting Histories, published last year, focuses on the need to retrieve personal perceptions of the history of women’s experiences under communism and tries to bridge the gap between a now and a then whose memory is still felt as traumatic. The essays in the current volume, whilst still deeply marked by this historical dimension, open up the perspective to a wider variety of issues by focusing more on representations of body-related experiences. A special emphasis is placed on the body as a site of knowledge-formation and of liberation from and resistance to patriarchal norm in its relation to communism. A characteristic of most essays is their focus on local interpretations and close readings, whilst theory is given comparatively less weight. The lack of an Eastern European-specific feminist theory and the rather indiscriminate borrowing of theories coming from Western Europe and the United States, which often did not match realities in the region, was the cause of much lament for feminism in Eastern Europe in the early post-communist years. More recently, as these essays suggest, attention to the local, to the mechanisms of texts in their relationships with contexts and an urge to historicise experience seem to have left the older propensity for theoretical discourse behind.The essays in this volume examine this local dimension through focusing on embodied knowledge production and representations of the female self in a comparative perspective, which reads contemporary experience against the background of the still present traumatic memory of the communist regime. Whilst trauma must be overcome so that historical evolution may be possible, such evolution cannot take place unless the negative experiences of the communist years are articulated and owned.
- Print-ISBN-13: 978-973-737-201-7
- Print-ISBN-10: 973-737-054-6
- Page Count: 208
- Publication Year: 2006
- Language: English
Ileana Mălăncioiu: Strategies of Representation. Landmarks of a Spiritual Biography
Ileana Mălăncioiu: Strategies of Representation. Landmarks of a Spiritual Biography
(Ileana Mălăncioiu: Strategies of Representation. Landmarks of a Spiritual Biography)
- Author(s):Rodica Mihăilă
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Romanian Literature
- Page Range:17-33
- No. of Pages:17
- Summary/Abstract:Mălăncioiu is ‘one of the most interesting and consistent Romanian post-war poets’ (Cristea-Enache), one of the most original and compelling Romanian contemporary poets, ‘one of the greatest’ (Rădulescu). My inquiry into the uniqueness of her achievement focuses on the representation of her spiritual biography, usually cleansed of lyricism, which draws its substance from the rich spiritual resources of the Romanian language and ancient traditions, from the poet’s firm moral consciousness and her tragic existential vision nurtured to a great extent by the terror of history.
- Price: 4.50 €
Palimpsestic Bodies in Ruxandra Cesereanu’s Poetry
Palimpsestic Bodies in Ruxandra Cesereanu’s Poetry
(Palimpsestic Bodies in Ruxandra Cesereanu’s Poetry)
- Author(s):Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Romanian Literature
- Page Range:35-56
- No. of Pages:22
- Summary/Abstract:A comparative discourse analysis of Cesereanu’s quest for embodied knowledges in her poetry and in her political writings would be highly profitable in revealing the complexities of the author’s voice. Such a study, however, would have to exceed the limited scope of this paper. To do justice to Cesereanu’s richness of symbolism and expression, I will instead focus on one representative volume only - the already mentioned anthology The Woman Crusader - in order to try to prove that, within the wider frame of Cesereanu’s symbolic representation of history from the perspective of the female self, the body is the main vehicle in a gendered, yet personal battle for knowledge and also the main site of effecting change through writing.
- Price: 4.50 €
From Border to Icon
From Border to Icon
(From Border to Icon)
- Author(s):Biljana Dojčinović
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Serbian Literature
- Page Range:57-71
- No. of Pages:15
- Summary/Abstract:The first novel by the contemporary Serbian woman author Ljubica Arsić, Čuvari kazačke ivice (Guardians of the Kazak Border), was published in 1988 and reprinted in 1997 and 2002. However, due to a set of various unfavorable circumstances, it remained almost unknown to a wider audience until the second reprint. The novel’s relative unfamiliarity may partly be attributed to the fact that at the time of its first publication there existed no appropriate theoretical language or framework to adequately account for its nomadic spirit. Unlike Guardians of the Kazak Border, Arsić’s second novel, Ikona (Icon), published in 2001, aroused immediate interest amongst readers, critics and the media, winning one prize when only in draft and another after publication. There was a lapse of thirteen years between the publication of these novels, during which time important political, ideological and economic changes took place. Although it seems tempting to ascribe the differences between them to this fact, the situation is much more complicated and interesting.
- Price: 4.50 €
ProFemina, Feminist Literary Magazine: Reconstructing the Female Literary History of Serbia and Changing the Male Dominated Canon
ProFemina, Feminist Literary Magazine: Reconstructing the Female Literary History of Serbia and Changing the Male Dominated Canon
(ProFemina, Feminist Literary Magazine: Reconstructing the Female Literary History of Serbia and Changing the Male Dominated Canon)
- Author(s):Biljana D. Obradović
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Serbian Literature
- Page Range:73-89
- No. of Pages:17
- Summary/Abstract:In Yugoslavia during the time of communism and atheism the main (Orthodox) religion and its customs were effectively banned. After communism ended there was a revival of Serbian traditions and customs. Today much poetry in Serbia is characterised by the return to the use of archaic language and religious and mythic motifs. Women poets on the other hand tend to use contemporary (even colloquial) language and are interested in the individual rather than mythic or religious figures. They write outside the institutions of cultural power and are liberated from these conventions, they create freely, are open to the world and prepared to break away from patriarchal norms. They are willing to shed taboos. Even when they do use traditional symbols, they often change their meanings.
- Price: 4.50 €
Liminality, Hybridity, and the Aesthetic of Experimentation with Language in the Works of Carmen-Francesca Banciu
Liminality, Hybridity, and the Aesthetic of Experimentation with Language in the Works of Carmen-Francesca Banciu
(Liminality, Hybridity, and the Aesthetic of Experimentation with Language in the Works of Carmen-Francesca Banciu)
- Author(s):Anca Luca Holden
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Romanian Literature
- Page Range:91-115
- No. of Pages:25
- Summary/Abstract:Prior to the fall of the communist regime in Romania in 1989, many authors went into forced or voluntary exile as a result of their political views. Although Romania’s democratization process is lengthier and considerably more challenging than initially anticipated, writers have enjoyed greater freedom since 1990 than under Communism. Nonetheless, there are still authors who continue to leave Romania despite the demise of totalitarianism. Yet, since forced exile is not practiced by the new regime, those who leave the country could be classified as cultural expatriates. Like most exiles, however, cultural expatriates develop a hybrid identity since they are simultaneously inside and outside the cultures that they adopted and left. Operating in a liminal space, located in between cultures and languages, authors with multiple cultural and linguistic backgrounds gain a unique perspective on the role of literature as a form of representation and of experimentation with language. This privileged insight distinguishes their writings in a significant way since it can offer a more complex understanding of notions like home, homeland, and national and cultural identity.
- Price: 4.50 €
Crossing Territorial and Biographical Boundaries: Eva Hoffman’s »Lost in Translation« and Irina Grigorescu Pană’s »Melbourne Sundays«
Crossing Territorial and Biographical Boundaries: Eva Hoffman’s »Lost in Translation« and Irina Grigorescu Pană’s »Melbourne Sundays«
(Crossing Territorial and Biographical Boundaries: Eva Hoffman’s »Lost in Translation« and Irina Grigorescu Pană’s »Melbourne Sundays«)
- Author(s):Corina Anghel Crişu
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Studies of Literature, Romanian Literature
- Page Range:117-132
- No. of Pages:16
- Summary/Abstract:A close examination of Eva Hoffman’s and Irina Grigorescu Pană’s texts reveals how cultures can be understood and delimited in the case of the polytropic, exiled writer. Read together, the two books demonstrate that exile generates a complex configuration of tropes and ideas that circulate from one text to another, emphasizing their mobility and continuity. In this light, an in-depth analysis of these two exilic texts proves Edward Said’s assumption in The World, the Text, and the Critic that not only theories circulate, but also critical terms (31-53). The paper explores how the two authors reconfigure exilic identity through the intricate process of self-translation within different cultural and geographical contexts. Their intricate narratives involve a variety of competing discourses, playing with Bildungsroman motifs in atypical immigrant scenarios and negotiating innovative transnational, transatlantic female identities.
- Price: 4.50 €
Challenging Representations of Feminine Desire in Women’s Prose in Post-Communist Hungary
Challenging Representations of Feminine Desire in Women’s Prose in Post-Communist Hungary
(Challenging Representations of Feminine Desire in Women’s Prose in Post-Communist Hungary)
- Author(s):Agata Schwartz
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Hungarian Literature
- Page Range:133-144
- No. of Pages:12
- Summary/Abstract:Post-1989 political developments have brought about many changes for Hungarians. Several of these changes have affected Hungarian women in particular ways. I would like to reflect on some aspects of these changes regarding the representation of Hungarian women from women’s perspectives since, as Susan Gal and Gail Kligman have observed, ‘a gendered perspective is central to understanding the dynamics of post-socialism’ (Gal/Kligman 117). I will use three examples from contemporary Hungarian literature, all written by young women during the 1990s: Dóra Esze’s “Like Two Peas in a Pod” (Két tojás, 1996); Zsuzsa Forgács’s “The Found Woman” (Talált nő, 1996), and Agáta Gordon’s “Goat Lipstick” (Kecskerúzs, 1997). These three narratives offer good examples of the complex intertwining of different discourses regarding the representation of women’s bodies and sexuality. They reflect the diverse strategies through which young women in post-communist Hungary are permanently making an effort to make their voices heard amidst a strange mixture of neo-conservative essentialist views of femininity and some vague remnants of a communist emancipatory discourse. I will focus on how and whether these writers challenge the existing discourses about feminine sexuality and desire, and to what extent they are able to break free from predesigned patterns of representation. With the help of contemporary psychoanalytical theories, I wish to explore the discourses which meet in these texts and which are often contradictory with regard to the expression of feminine sexuality and desire.
- Price: 4.50 €
Exploring Embodied Identities in Contemporary Estonian Fiction and Drama by Women
Exploring Embodied Identities in Contemporary Estonian Fiction and Drama by Women
(Exploring Embodied Identities in Contemporary Estonian Fiction and Drama by Women)
- Author(s):Leena Kurvet-Käosaar
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Estonian Literature
- Page Range:145-160
- No. of Pages:16
- Summary/Abstract:My article offers an insight into the representation of women’s bodily experience and the textual articulation of cultural meanings inscribed on the female body in Estonian fiction and drama by women in the 1990’s. Rather than attempting to provide a general overview of the representation of the female body in the literature of the period, I will take a closer look at three authors whose work has placed the contained, vulnerable and frustrated female body at the heart of sociocultural practices in Estonian society and history in various contexts and frameworks. The three texts I wish to discuss differ greatly in terms of genre, cultural context and the generation the authors belong to as well as in terms of what aspects of the body are highlighted and how these are formally executed. However, I believe that the three texts illuminate relevant and diverse issues relating not only to the literary representation of the female body in the post-Soviet era but, more importantly, to the much larger issues relating to body politics in post-Soviet society in general.
- Price: 4.50 €
Negotiating Femininity in Post-Communist Poland: Katarzyna Kozyra’s Olimpia
Negotiating Femininity in Post-Communist Poland: Katarzyna Kozyra’s Olimpia
(Negotiating Femininity in Post-Communist Poland: Katarzyna Kozyra’s Olimpia)
- Author(s):Iva Popovičová
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Polish Literature
- Page Range:161-182
- No. of Pages:22
- Summary/Abstract:In this paper, I will argue that Kozyra’s Olimpia presents multiple sites of cultural critique in post-communist Poland. By casting herself into positions of social and cultural undesirability - as a naked, diseased, old, and ugly double of Manet’s Olympia, Kozyra exposed the normative parameters and taboos associated with femininity and nudity in Polish culture. Utilising the gaze as a strategy of resistance, Kozyra enacts ‘death’ as a symbol of cultural exclusion - i.e. living in public invisibility or social oblivion. Drawing attention to socially undesirable subjects, Olimpia's acts have created a forum for rethinking cultural difference and equal opportunity in Poland with regard to the situation of the disabled, the old and the sick, as well as women and men of colour. Finally, this paper insists that Kozyra’s travesty of Manet’s Olympia which challenged prevailing attitudes towards sex, commerce and race in the nineteenth-century Paris salon - further challenges the rise of western consumerism in the geopolitics of East/Central Europe.
- Price: 4.50 €
‘Paradoxes to Live With’: A Feminist Approach to Binka Zhelyazkova’s »The Tied Balloon«
‘Paradoxes to Live With’: A Feminist Approach to Binka Zhelyazkova’s »The Tied Balloon«
(‘Paradoxes to Live With’: A Feminist Approach to Binka Zhelyazkova’s »The Tied Balloon«)
- Author(s):Lilia Tőke
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Gender Studies, Studies of Literature, Film / Cinema / Cinematography
- Page Range:183-199
- No. of Pages:17
- Summary/Abstract:‘No matter how strong the ties of the imagined communities of the particular Balkan nationalities may be, the Balkans as a whole do not share a feeling of togetherness; their cultural products cannot be considered products of a group of nations which co-exist and consciously explore the same “chronotrope” (Iordanova, ‘Women’). It is no accident that Dina Iordanova’s comment on the heterogenic character of the Balkan cultures (which is also relevant to Eastern European ones) comes up in a work on images of women generated through post-communist Balkan cinema. It is the most important premise that one has to consider when talking about gender relations in cinema as well as the moving image industry. Yet, after making clear that there is no place for generalization and simplification regarding the region’s cultural representations, Iordanova finds convincing traces of similarities in the gendered nature of the cinematic image, which leads her to an overall conclusion that these images do ‘not serve any feminist cause’ (Iordanova 1995:1). While Iordanova is looking at a particular corpus of films, namely gender representations in the Balkan cinematic narratives created by men, what I would like to focus on in this paper is a possible feminist interpretation of a woman director’s career and more importantly, of one particular cinematic discourse created by her.
- Price: 4.50 €
List of Contributors
List of Contributors
(List of Contributors)
- Author(s):Author Not Specified
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Bibliography
- Page Range:201-204
- No. of Pages:4
