Thesis
The Gothic, the goddess, and the prayer for waking: A hystery of feminist theology in Gothic literature
Washington State University
Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
05/2018
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7273/000003953
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/123026
Abstract
The Female Gothic is a genre that uses the particular abilities of Gothic literature-- literalizing the abstract, making of indescribable forces describable bodies and phenomena--to meditate upon and communicate the realities of living as a woman in a violently enforced phallocentric hierarchy. I argue that a part of the work that the Female Gothic has done since its nascence has been the formation and depictions of what I call spaces of feminine empowerment. These are consultative spaces that offer to women and men a space for empathy and identity without the traumas and impediments of the phallocentric, misogynistic symbology in which empathy and identification usually take place. They are, then, spaces of mutual empowerment through egalitarian and non-consumptive communication. These spaces accomplish this by being spaces in which femininity is not suppressed in the human identity and spirit. This last is my particular focus. I argue that these are spaces for experiencing the spiritual power of and providing spiritual empowerment to the feminine that has been suppressed and forgotten in a mainstream spirituality that has been appropriated by and morphed to the phallocentric culture. In order to argue that the space of empowered femininity has been and is an essential part of the Female Gothic form, I draw a history through representative texts from each of the major periods of the last two hundred years--Romantic, Victorian, Modern, and Post-Modern. I examine each text along-side major historicizing texts either from or diligently studying the time period. I seek, thus, to understand the role of the empowered feminine space in that period, and also to ultimately craft an image of how that role and that space itself have evolved over the centuries.
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Details
- Title
- The Gothic, the goddess, and the prayer for waking
- Creators
- Travis Andrew Bryant
- Contributors
- Carol R Siegel (Advisor) - Washington State University, Department of English
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Department of English
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University
- Identifiers
- 99900890805301842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis