The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History
eBook - PDF

The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History

  1. 352 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History

Book details
Table of contents
Citations

About This Book

From South Park to Kathy Acker, and from Lars Von Trier to Sex and the City, women's sexual organs are demonized. Rees traces the fascinating evolution of this demonization, considering how calling the 'c-word' obscene both legitimates and perpetuates the fractured identities of women globally. Rees demonstrates how writers, artists, and filmmakers contend with the dilemma of the vagina's puzzlingly 'covert visibility'. In our postmodern, porn-obsessed culture, vaginas appear to be everywhere, literally or symbolically but, crucially, they are as silenced as they are objectified. The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History examines the paradox of female genitalia through five fields of artistic expression: literature, film, TV, visual, and performance art. There is a peculiar paradox – unlike any other – regarding female genitalia. Rees focuses on this paradox of what is termed the 'covert visibility' of the vagina and on its monstrous manifestations. That is, what happens when the female body refuses to be pathologized, eroticized, or rendered subordinate to the will or intention of another? Common, and often offensive, slang terms for the vagina can be seen as an attempt to divert attention away from the reality of women's lived sexual experiences such that we don't 'look' at the vagina itself – slang offers a convenient distraction to something so taboo. The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History is an important contribution to the ongoing debate in understanding the feminine identity

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Yes, you can access The Vagina: A Literary and Cultural History by Emma L. E. Rees in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Literature & Literary Criticism Theory. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Publisher
Bloomsbury Academic
Year
2013
ISBN
9781623567897
Edition
1
Topic
Literature
Subtopic
Literary Criticism Theory
Index
Literature

Table of contents

  1. Praise for The Vagina
  2. Title
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Contents
  6. Figures
  7. Preface to the Paperback Edition
  8. Acknowledgements
  9. 1 Revealing the Vagina: Introduction
  10. 2 Revealing the Vagina: Antecedents
  11. 3 Revealing the Vagina in Literature
  12. 4 Revealing the Vagina in Visual Art (1): Judy Chicago
  13. 5 Revealing the Vagina in Visual Art (2): Birth’s Wide Berth
  14. 6 Revealing the Vagina on Film and TV
  15. 7 Revealing the Vagina in Performance Art
  16. 8 Revealing the Vagina: Conclusion
  17. Notes
  18. Bibliography
  19. Index
  20. Plates