File spoon-archives/modernism.archive/modernism_2003/modernism.0305, message 18


Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 04:56:23 +0400
From: "Dr. Salwa Ghaly" <sghaly-AT-sharjah.ac.ae>
Subject: Re: Response to Re: Response to Re: Response to Re: modernism and


Hi again John,

>While
>there is always a range of behaviors and "sensibilities" (habitual ways of
>responding emotionally and aesthetically to stimuli -- I'll try not to
>sound too much like a psychologist here), there are lower and upper limits
>within the bell-shaped curve of possibilities. 
>

Agreed.  I would suggest, though, that in the case of many women 
readers, schooling in the feminist tradition
has meant that our response to a text or an idea tends to be a 
femin*ist* response, one that is consciously triggered by our 
understanding of  how patriarchal values, worldviews and mental tools 
insinuate themselves into a given text, while, at the same time, 
underpinning the institutions within which that text is produced and 
peddled.   For  women, this feminist radar is always registering 
instances of stereotyping, homogenizing, pedestalizing, commodifying, 
etc... This honed radar is built into our horizon of expectations. 
 While this is equally true of many male readers, men, in general, still 
tend to have gender blindspots, and are often  less able (in some cases, 
less willing) to see the degree to which our societies continue to be 
invested in patriarchal structures and institutions.  Over and over, we 
witness in the literature classroom and beyond instances in which women 
show themselves to be far more sensitive than  men to gender bias.  This 
sensitivity predetermines, to a large extent, how we read and respond... 
 Another point, you mention the improved gender balance on academic 
editorial boards etc.  Better representation of women is laudable, to be 
sure, and is an objective for us all to pursue.  However, while there is 
strength in numbers, less biased hiring practices and an embellished, 
less starkly sexist picture, are not necessarily a sign that a certain 
institution has truly been  overhauled.

Of course, this is all grist to the "verbal combat" mill;)

Cheers,

Salwa

> I enjoy tweeking my feminist colleagues and
>family when they keep using cliches from twenty-five years ago to explain
>what is hardly the case anymore.  All one needs to do in our own
>discipline is to look at the editorial boards of either MLA or NCTE
>publications or the direction of many many essays to see how such claims
>in 2003 are about as valid as conservative declamations of "liberal bias"
>in the media dominated by Limbaugh, O'Reilly, and Paul Harvey.
>  
>


   

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