Anonymous 1 Anonymous WGSS 2367.01 Andrea Breau Date Shifting Power Is there a disparity between how you define yourself and how others define and label you? In their life narratives, Two of Three Things I Know for Sure and Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More, Dorothy Allison and Janet Mock use their novels for the construction of self from how the world defines them into how they want to be defined. Throughout her novel, Dorothy Allison presses the issue that some individuals are seen as objects rather than subjects, such as those who are not leading “normal” lives, the nonwhite, the LGTBQ, the female, and poor individual. She argues that people who aren’t afforded a livable life nor leading lives of normalcy are being confined to a one dimensional item rather than being seen as a complicated three dimensional person of many layers. This object benefits those who are human and living standard lives by giving them the security of knowing they aren’t the ones being oppressed. Dorothy Allison writes herself into being by transitioning from an object of incest to a subject within her own story. In comparison, Janet Mock also uses her novel to write a self into being. Thought her novel, she writes about all the ways trans individuals are marginalized within society due to their socially constructed differences, the inability to fit into society’s definitions of normal. She reasons that these definitions are exclusionary, harmful and place certain individuals, the non-white, the LGTBQ, the female, and poor individual, on the margins of society. Janet Mock writes herself into being by challenging society’s definitions of what it means to be normal and real. In their novels, Dorothy Allison and Anonymous 2 Janet Mock use storytelling as a way to write a self into being in a world which dismisses and dehumanizes women placed at the margins of society due to their race, gender, class, and sexuality. Janet Mock and Dorothy Allison both write a self into meaning, by either challenging the definitions of normal and real or constructing themselves into a subject within their own story. Allison outlines these ideas of writing a self into being when she says, “the story becomes the thing needed” (Allison 3). She also talks about “what it means to have no loved version of your life but the one you make” (Allison 3). When talking about writing her story she says, “I am the only one who can tell the story of my life and say what it means” (Allison 70). Dorothy Allison is demonstrating that, as she writes her novel, she is writing herself into being what she wants to be rather than what the world has labeled her. The story becomes something she needs in order to confront everything she has ever been told she should be. Mock also speaks of the act of writing a self into being. The first time we encounter her in the book, she talks about the piece written on her in Marie Claire. She writes, “it was a stranger’s story to me” (Mock xiii). She was portrayed as a “heroine...embodying the do it yourself bravado that Americans celebrate…untouchable, unscathed, a bit of an anomaly” (Mock xiv). Further on in the book, Mock expresses the “power in naming yourself, in proclaiming to the world that this is who you are” (Mock 144). When she talks about telling Aaron about who she is she writes “through the intimate act of storytelling, I’d shattered that shell and replaced it with the truth” (Mock 245). Through these quotes, Janet Mock is expressing how she has been able to shatter the identities given to her by society and, through storytelling, write a new version of herself into living, just as Dorothy Allison does. Without her novel, she would have ultimately been identified as everything the magazine article author Anonymous 3 assumed she was, but through her own acts of writing she is able write the real version of herself using her own definitions. The need to write a self into being for Janet Mock, a transwoman from a poor background, and Dorothy Allison, a queer woman from the same background, indicates where power lays within society. Why is it that we don’t have many women autobiographies out there? Why is it that of the few women autobiographies published even fewer are those of marginalized women? As Audre Lorde writes, “history conditions us to see human difference in simplistic opposition to each other: dominate/subordinate, good/bad, up/down, superior/inferior” (Lorde 114). Maybe the answer to why we have so few marginalized women authors come from Lorde’s interpretation that “we have all been programed to respond to human differences between us with fear and loathing and to handle it in one of three ways: ignore it…copy it if we think it is dominant, or destroy it if we think it is subordinate” (Lorde 115). Without the act of writing, these women would be held up to identities as constructed by society. Both Allison and Mock argue that self-definition is a duty that is a responsibility of the individual rather than a responsibility for society. By writing their own stories, Allison and Mock are able to go from the societies push to “pluck out some one aspect of [self] and present this as the meaningful whole, eclipsing or denying the other part of [self]” to a holistic integration of all parts of as defined by the individual writing (Lorde 121). Society as it is today, through the help of history and little change, dismisses and dehumanizes women and men placed at the margins of society. These individuals are stripped of their right to name themselves and are pushed into accepting what society has deemed them to be. Without autobiographies of marginalized women that push the definitions and boundaries, such as Janet Mocks and Dorothy Allison, power within society remains in the hand of the white supremacist capitalist patriarch. Anonymous 4 While Dorothy Allison and Janet Mock both use storytelling as a way to write a self, each woman does it in a different way. Allison uses writing to transform herself from the one dimensional item society has deemed her to a complicated three dimensional person of many layers. Before Allison, the victim of incest, is able to write a new self into being, she speaks of herself as though she is not human and not in control of her body. She talks about being in “a body that is only partly my own”, “this thing the world sees”, and “a creature” (Allison 69). Here Allison is showing readers how, due to her past as a victim of incest, she was conditioned by society to see herself as unhuman, as something which she did not have full ownership of, as an object with a face but no story. She is challenging that society is identifying certain individuals, who do not live “standard” lives, such as herself, as unequal, unworthy objects which need to be oppressed in order for “normal” individuals to have the security of worthy livable lives. Allison then goes on to strongly argue that she will not be this object, this sexual abuse victim, which serves to comfort others. The metaphor she uses talks about a coat of many colors. She writes, “Incest is a coat of many colors, some of them not visible to the human eye, but so vibrant, so powerful, people looking at you wearing it see only the coat” (Allison 71). She takes the coat and demonstrates to the reader how it can be the only thing people see. She states, “I did not want to wear that coat, to be told what it meant, to be told how it changed the flesh beneath it, to let myself be made over into my rapist’s creation” (Allison 71). Allison finishes off the powerful passage by saying, “I would rather go naked than wear the coat the world has made for me” (Allison 71). The use of the coat metaphor is intended to get society to understand what it is like for an incest victim to be seen as only an incest victim and nothing else. Allison single handedly demonstrates her refusal to submit to societal needs by stating she will not wear the coat, she will not be defined by this one part of her identity. The self she is with the coat on is one which needs Anonymous 5 hiding, one of destruction, self-hatred, hopelessness, and fear. The self she can be without the coat is solely up to her, she describes herself as literally naked. She writes a new self through her book from one of sexual abuse which needs hiding and isn’t up to her to an identity she has full control of and one which is defined by multiple pieces of her past and current self. Similarly, Janet Mock is able to write a self into being by challenging societal definitions of normal and realness. Before writing a new self into being Mock talks about the identities placed on trans individuals by society. She mentions the “dehumanizing depictions of trans women that I saw in popular culture...numerous women exploited as modern day freak shows” (Mock xv), “trans women are seen as less desirable, illegitimate, devalued” (Mock 207). The value of a trans individual is based on how well they are able to ‘pass’ as ‘normal’ and ‘real’. Mock writes, “’realness’ is the ability to be seen as heteronormative, to assimilate, to not be read as other or deviate from the norm” (Mock 116). For trans individuals, “’realness’ is a pathway to survival” (Mock 116). These labels being placed on trans individuals by society are not true identities of the individuals within the trans community. If a trans person is unable to embody what society sees as the norm, then he/she is kicked to the margins of society and dehumanized. By writing her novel, Mock is able to challenge these definitions of what is normal and real, which is necessary for the survival of trans individuals, such as herself. As Janet begins to unravel herself through storytelling, she beings to redefine what society sees as normal and real. She writes, “the misconception of equating ease of life with ‘passing’ must be dismantled in our culture...cis people are not more valuable or legitimate...trans people who blend as cis are not more valuable or legitimate” (Mock 237). She argues that we “must abolish the entitlement that deludes us into believing that we have the right to make assumptions about peoples identities and project those assumptions onto their gender and bodies” (Mock 257). By living other people’s definitions and Anonymous 6 perceptions, Mock states that this shrinks us to shells of ourselves, rather than complex people embodying multiple identities. Accepting new definitions of what is real and normal would allow trans individuals to stop hiding, stop being shameful, get better jobs, and become valued within society. Dorothy Allison and Janet Mock both use their autobiographies to write themselves from marginalized women in society to owners of their own identities. While Allison chooses to write herself from an object of incest to a subject of her own story, Mock selects to challenge the definitions of realness and normalcy in order to write a new self into being. Society currently dismisses and dehumanizes individuals, such as Mock and Allison, who do not fit the norm. These individuals are stripped of their right to name themselves and are thrust into accepting the identity that society has chosen. Combined, both women are not only writing their self into being but also challenging the norm and fighting for the non-white, the LGTBQ, the female, and poor individual whose self is selected by society. These women are paving the way for changes they hope to see in future generations. Anonymous 7 Works Cited Allison, Dorothy. Two or Three Things I Know for Sure. New York: Plume, 1996. Print. Lorde, Audre. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” in Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches. Freedom, CA: Crossing Press, 1984. Pp. 114-123. Print. Mock, Janet. Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More. New York: Atria, 2014. Print. Anonymous 1 Anonymous Andrea Breau WGSS 2367.01 December 12, 2015 In the Body of a Woman Women’s bodies have long been policed by society. Girls grow up knowing that to be conventionally attractive is beautiful and that a woman must use their body selectively so that they are not seen as either promiscuous or a prude. Women’s bodies are not for their own pleasure or use but instead for the gratification of men. In their memoirs Redefining Realness and Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, both Janet Mock and Dorothy Allison explore the topic of women’s bodies, their appearance and use. Mock and Allison reject the patriarchal construction of women’s bodies through their narratives by exposing the negative effects of this patriarchal construction on women and choosing to embrace a more inclusive view of female beauty that empowers the female body as a source of personal pride. Growing up Allison never believed she could be “beautiful and female…sexed and sexual” (Allison 32). The women of her family were not beautiful, at least in her young eyes. They did not look like the women in the magazines, shiny and lithe. Instead they were dressed down working women and young mothers, “worn down and ugly” (Allison 36) by their shared life experiences of degradation by men and poverty. The men in Allison’s family verbally and sometimes physically abused the women in the family treating them as “dogs, bitches…jokes” (35-36). This misogyny was often internalized and repeated by the women in Allison’s family, contributing to the low sense of self-esteem that Allison developed as a child as she learned “the story of the female body taught to hate itself” (Allison 49). Society as a whole continued to Anonymous 2 reinforce these ideals, combining sexism and classism to create an image of Allison’s family of stupid, white trash women who will spread their legs for anyone. This reputation haunted Allison and every night she “prayed a man’s prayer” (Allison 38) for beauty and the self-worth she associated with it. Like Allison Mock similarly experienced this feeling of not meeting conventional beauty and sex standards, made even more complicated by her being a trans woman in a body others criticized for not being either male or woman enough. Like many other young women who have been bombarded with media images of photoshopped perfection since their prepubescent years, Janet found that “holding myself to this impossible beauty standard led me to pick myself apart critically” (Mock 123). Mock felt the pressure to meet rigid beauty standards of femininity, creating a vision board of women such as Tyra Banks and Beyoncé to aspire to. However the gap between this ideal image and Mock’s actual physical appearance, especially as a trans woman in a body experiencing male puberty, was wide. This caused Mock to develop increasing “insecurity” (Mock 122) about her appearance. Mock’s insecurity was made worse by the mockery she received for her efforts to express her femininity visibly through lip-gloss and arched brows. Her mother’s boyfriend and local bullies called Mock a “faggot” (Allison 126) and refused to recognize her as a woman, instead choosing to see her in their minds as a lesser man. One major way the patriarchal construction of women’s bodies affected both Mock and Allison was the sexual objectification of women’s bodies. Women’s bodies under today’s sexist rape culture are seen as toys for pleasure rather than belonging to the women themselves. Both Mock and Allison were sexual abused by male members of their family as youths, by men who wanted sex and were willing to use violence and a young girl as a means to an end. The actions Anonymous 3 of these men are their own, but linked to a larger misogynistic rape culture that promotes a “man who wasn’t sure he liked women” (Allison 45). By not seeing women as equals deserving of respect, some men are able to hate women and justify actions that violate the dignity of another human. It’s not just men though but also women that are socialized into this culture of sexual objectification and demeaning a woman’s body. Mock talked about how as a teenager she “based my self-worth on the number of times I made a guy’s head turn. Objectification and sexism masked as desirability were a bittersweet part of my dream fulfilled” (Mock 156). Mock’s desire for connection became warped by her experiences with sexual abuse and the fact that she had been told all her life that only “real” women, women who are conventionally attractive and cisgender, are deserving of love. Her self-esteem became based on the objectification of her body and if it was seen as desirable by the male gaze. While Mock loved the false sense of beauty it brought her, she found that in sleeping with guys ”I could make him feel good with a body that I had yet to recognize as good” (Mock 162). Mock could use her body for male pleasure, but it brought her no sense of ownership or personal pride. Despite the critiques, abuse, and hatred directed at their bodies as women Allison and Mock did find self-empowerment of their bodies through self-love that inspired a wider understanding of female beauty. Similar to Mock, Allison struggled with the negative psychological effects of sexual abuse as well as verbal abuse and degradation, making it difficult for her to find beauty in herself. A major turning point for her was learning karate while in college. The first time she went to a karate class, she struggled to keep up with the pace and running drills, growing frustrated with herself. However after a few weeks a ballet dancer, the sensei’s wife, began to attend and assist with the class. Allison was amazed by the “example of that astonishingly perfected female body taking over the class and showing us all what a woman Anonymous 4 could do” (Allison 63). This inspiration made Allison realize the potential of her own body for her own sake, and the beauty that came with that. Mock’s journey was a story with the same themes as Allison’s narrative but with a different, individual path to realization of self-love and body pride. Mock also participated in a sport, volleyball, and initially found empowerment through that until the disconnect between her assigned team and gender became too strong for her to ignore. Instead it was through embracing her femininity and taking steps of her own accord to transition that Mock learned selfempowerment and began to see herself, as a person, as beautiful. Mock’s pursuit of hormone treatments and her sex change surgery through her own agency allowed her to develop pride in her own body as it came to better reflect how she felt on the inside. While Mock still faced body insecurities following her surgery, she also became more confident in her body and received sexual empowerment of her body through learning to “share my body in an intimate way beyond transaction” (Mock 238), a type of equal exchange that rejects patriarchal norms of women as tools for men’s pleasure. It was not until Mock and Allison learned to love the potential of their bodies that they were able to truly love in a way that was about being “important” (Allison 66) to another and not a man’s desire. It was only after Allison and Mock learned to see themselves and their bodies as something beautiful and something to be proud of that they could embrace a more inclusive concept of female beauty. It took self-realization to cast a critical eye on societal norms of beauty and the role of women’s bodies, and to reject those norms for what they are: women hating and oppressive. After all “if we are not beautiful to each other, we cannot know beauty in any form” (Allison 86). Allison began by recognizing the beauty inherent in her family members, those hard women who society never allowed to be beautiful. Looking at her sister who was once Anonymous 5 conventionally beautiful and has now been worn down by life, Allison says she is still beautiful and that her niece has the “mark of the beautiful Gibson women” (Allison 86). Allison takes back what is beautiful from society and redefines it to include women young and old, pretty and plain. This view allows her to grow past the hatred she cast upon her body as a child and serve as a positive role model for the next generation of young women. Mock also came to adopt a more universal view of female beauty. She sees that within all human bodies are “beauty and agony, certainty and murkiness, loathing and love” (Mock 258), making them equally beautiful. Mock now pushes for a view that includes all women; those who are cisgender and those who are trans, those trans women who are considered to be “fish” (Mock 115) and beautiful by cisgender woman norms and those who do not pass the test of female beauty established by sexist, transphobic societal norms. By coming to terms with her own body, Mock realized that trans women are never less and that “just because you look good doesn’t make you better than anybody else” (Mock 157). Mock’s more inclusive view of beauty, even her very existence, challenges traditional definitions of gender and female beauty. This threatens the privilege of cisgender women and men by taking away their monopoly on beautiful and providing an alternative. Instead of trying to emulate unattainable fashion models and stars like Mock and Allison did, one can choose to embrace their body as good enough and find happiness in the capabilities of one’s body to great things and love. As Allison writes, “two or three things I know for sure, and one of them is how long it takes to learn to love yourself” (Allison 67). Allison and Mock, through sharing their experiences and the growth that transformed them into women who see their bodies as a source of pride and empowerment, challenged traditional female standards of beauty. This traditional conception of beauty, entrenched in a culture that demeans women and places them under impossibly high Anonymous 6 standards and sexual objectification, can only be surmounted through embracing a more inclusive view of what female beauty is. By recognizing all women as beautiful in their own right and recognizing that women’s bodies are for their own pleasure (whether in sex, recreation, or etc.) and not a man’s pleasure, the authors helped to deconstruct harmful standards of what women’s bodies should be to them. Anonymous 7 Works Cited Allison, Dorothy. Two or Three Things I Know For Sure. New York: Plume, 1995. Print. Mock, Janet. Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More. New York: Atria, 2014. Print. Breau WGSST 2367.01 Online Final Paper - Literary Analysis Essay – 80 points FULL Rough Draft Due: Wednesday, Apr. 18 @ 5:00 pm Final Draft Due: Fiday, Apr. 27 @ 5:00 PM Assignment Goal: To combine your newfound intersectional feminist lens with all of the writing skills you practiced over the course of the term in order to write a successful literary analysis. This paper is a comparative literary analysis that will require you to put Janet Mock’s text “into conversation” with at least ONE of the other life narratives we read in this course (Allison, Shakur, or Lorde). A comparative analysis is not a separate summary of each text. It is an argument made about two texts that allows you to compare and contrast your interpretations of the texts in relation to one another. Like every assignment you’ve done thus far, this paper must be organized by a thesis that takes and argues a certain perspective and demonstrates how this position is valid with evidence from the text(s). Like all else – your analysis should utilize an intersectional feminist lens, giving the reader a sense of how the authors’ race, class, sexuality, etc. impact their gendered experiences of the world. Pick a theme or topic that resonated for you throughout both books. It’s a good idea to go back to the Learning Objectives for each text and review the central themes/issues, etc. For this assignment, I strongly encourage you to use and build on any of the components that you have worked on throughout the term (boot camp reflection, thesis statement, close reading, body paragraph, peer editing) for your final paper. You have my detailed feedback on each of those assignments so you can improve upon them as you write – it’s a win-win situation! There is a detailed grading rubric for this assignment, as I do not give written feedback on final papers due to the quick turnaround for course grades. You should familiarize yourself with the rubric (see Modules > Writing Tools > Final Paper Grading Rubric) before you write your draft. Your Literary Analysis essay should: 1. Put Janet Mock’s Redefining Realness “into conversation” with at least ONE of the other life narratives read in this class (Allison, Shakur or Lorde). 2. Be a FULL 6 to 8 pages & follow the “Assignment Requirements” as specified in the course syllabus. 3. Include a (creative/unique) title at the top of the page. 4. Underline the thesis statement. 1 Breau WGSST 2367.01 Online 5. Contain an introductory and concluding paragraph. What I expect from you: 1. Go through the PowerPoint on Canvas > Modules > Unit 5 > entitled “Building Writing Skills: Literary Analysis.” 2. Refer to Canvas Modules > Writing Tools > Literary Analysis Sample 1 & 2 for examples of successful papers. 3. Submit your final draft on Canvas > Assignments > Final Paper by the due date and time listed above. List of due dates for this assignment: 1. Submit a FULL rough draft by Wed., April 18th @ 5:00 PM. 2. Workshop draft w/partner (online or in-person) between Thurs., April 19th and Fri., April 20th. 3. Submit peer feedback by Mon., April 23rd @ 5:00 PM. 4. Revise/edit your draft based on peer feedback between Tue. April 24th and Thurs., April 26th. 5. Submit final, edited/revised paper by Fri., April 27th @ 5:00 PM. 2