Segregation, Innocence, and Gender Construction

The Catholic Church ensured its teachers operated the secondary schools in such a manner that the sexes were segregated. That it did partly because of its view that if there were not appropriate safeguards, young people would readily engage in sexual relations before marriage, a practice considered gravely sinful. Thus, it promoted single-sex education to minimize threats in this regard. Equally, it promoted it to perpetuate the domestication of women and to encourage students, both male and female, to join the religious life, a matter dealt with in detail in the next chapter. For the same reasons, the Catholic bishops and the schools’ authorities also frowned on the provision of sex education. The Church also operated the secondary schools to construct as it desired those Irish Catholic males and females it recognized were not going to enter religious life.

The Metamorphosis of a Female Subject into a Gendered subject: A Study of Easterine Iralu’s A Terrible Matriarchy

It is a universally practised phenomenon across society to conveniently create a dichotomy that is based on the physiological difference between a male and a female. This difference is further defined by the dichotomy of gendered roles and labour that are imposed on them. The hegemony of the gendered ideology makes it all so natural to assign gendered role to a baby the moment it is born. Its body serves as a continuing signifier for the gendered structure of a patriarchal society. Since these gendered ideologies are disseminated through established institutions such as education, religion and law; their manifestations can be found in culture, religion, clothes, discourse, movies, and even in gestures that this polarity between a man and a woman is accepted as natural. There still is no general consent among the cultural anthropologists that an unambiguous matriarchal society existed. Classical scholars like Johann Jakob Bachofen tried to argue that matriarchal society existed on the basis of unreliable historical sources such as Iliad and Odyssey (Bamberger, p.263). Easterine Iralu’s A Terrible Matriarchy intrigues the reader with this highly deceptive title that ironically bares the patriarchy of contemporary Naga society. However, if these reasons are taken into account that Feminism is all about equality and that matriarchy is the flip side of patriarchy with all its horrors; then she is not far from the truth in prefixing “terrible” to “matriarchy”. This article is an attempt to familiarize the milieu of a quintessential Naga girl and her resistance to the anxious process of self-denial imposed upon her by her grandmother who embodies the concept of ‘terrible matriarchy’. The article also concentrates on the typical mechanism of gender construction and how such mechanisms are responsible for metamorphosing a female subject into a gendered subject.

Book review: Roli Misra (ed.), Migration, Trafficking and Gender Construction: Women in Transition

Roli Misra (ed.), Migration, Trafficking and Gender Construction: Women in Transition. New Delhi: SAGE/Stree, 2020, 226 pages, ₹1,095 (hardbound). ISBN 978-93-81345-47-4.

The Transtextual Gender Construction in the Opera Madame White Snake

The opera Madame White Snake (hereafter Madame), co-commissioned by Opera Boston and Beijing Music Festival, premiered at Boston Cutler Majestic Theater in February 2010. It was the first commissioned opera by Opera Boston.1 Based on the story from the famous Chinese ancient myth Bai She Zhuan 2 (in Chinese: 白蛇传), this opera’s libretto was created by a Singaporean American librettist, who has shed the story’s “traditional skin and taking on modern trappings” (Smith, 2019: 27) on purpose. When sniffing at male librettists’ discourses about female characters’ vulnerable and tragic lives in their operas, opera Madame’s initiator and librettist Cerise Lim Jacobs argues that women should seize the initiative to make their own decisions in life. The white snake, in her mind, ought to be a whole woman who is powerful and demonic, and yet, is also nurturing and caring, is capable of deep and intense love. In the first section of this article, I introduce the original legend’s background and the story outline in its operatic adaptation; I also trace back the opera’s commissioning process. After providing the background information of the story and the operatic version, then, in the second section I analyze the opera in terms of its transtextual figural gender construction in her characterization through comparative studies of the white and green snakes’ images from the sources of literary works, traditional xiqu scripts and operatic librettos. Referring to Lim’s personal growth and migrating history, as well as she and her husband co-founded charitable foundation’s missions and its recent IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access) opera grant program partnering with Opera America, I aim to examine her gender construction of the “female” roles in the opera from the perspectives of feminism, interracial marriage; and heterosexual, transsexual, and homosexual relationships.

Gender Equality in Feminine Registers Used by Female Parents in Blitar: A Case Study of Local Wisdom of Addressing among Women with Respect to their Husbands’ Titles

The theoretical framework used in the present form is Gender Construction in content analysis. The research observed two hundred selected female parents who have practiced mixed calling among male and female genders. The Data were collected using interviews and recordings carried out through online discussion during female parental activities of the home financial industry [PKK]. The analysis revealed that during the interaction among female parents, they addressed each other's name by mentioning their husbands' names for several reasons: 1) a lack of self-confidence which is influenced by their habits of always glorifying their husbands in all their activities, 2) Javanese culture in the city of Blitar still binds them, and It is complicated to get rid of it, 3) most of the mothers still have lower occupational education than their husbands, and 4) they are more respected by others if the husband's name is always attached to every activity.

GENDER CONSTRUCTION IN MUSLIM TWEENS STORIES: A Discourse of Intersectionality of Religious and Gender Representations

The following study set out to examine the creative works of five Muslim tweens in Toronto, Canada, with focus on analysing the intersectionality of religious and gender representations in their works. Theoretical framework underlining this study is a discourse on visual representation of female Muslim characters, hybrid construction of gender, religious values, and media consumption. The primary research questions of this study are; (1) How do Muslim tween girls reproduce meaning and construct gender identity in their creative works? (2) How do their stories intersect gender construction with their religious background and media consumption? The results of this study revealed the hijab (Muslim head scarf) as significant visual representation of female Muslim characters in young adults’ stories. It affirms hybrid representation of gender, religious and media consumption which, in turn demonstrates Muslim tweens mitigation in gender construction. This study also reveals the fluidity of domination which explores aspects such as new context of non-existent male-characters, religious identity and kindness as the indicator of perceived beauty. Additionally, some of these tweens associate feminine identity and representation with nature which is deeply rooted in Western fairy tales and religious values (Judeo-Christian and Islam).

GENDER CONSTRUCTION IN MUSLIM TWEENS STORIES: A Discourse of Intersectionality of Religious and Gender Representations

The following study set out to examine the creative works of five Muslim tweens in Toronto, Canada, with focus on analysing the intersectionality of religious and gender representations in their works. Theoretical framework underlining this study is a discourse on visual representation of female Muslim characters, hybrid construction of gender, religious values, and media consumption. The primary research questions of this study are; (1) How do Muslim tween girls reproduce meaning and construct gender identity in their creative works? (2) How do their stories intersect gender construction with their religious background and media consumption? The results of this study revealed the hijab (Muslim head scarf) as significant visual representation of female Muslim characters in young adults’ stories. It affirms hybrid representation of gender, religious and media consumption which, in turn demonstrates Muslim tweens mitigation in gender construction. This study also reveals the fluidity of domination which explores aspects such as new context of non-existent male-characters, religious identity and kindness as the indicator of perceived beauty. Additionally, some of these tweens associate feminine identity and representation with nature which is deeply rooted in Western fairy tales and religious values (Judeo-Christian and Islam).

A Foucauldian Discourse Analysis of Gender Role Expectations in George Gissing’s the Odd Women

George Gissing’s The Odd Women is an engrossing study of gender role expectations in the Victorian society on the cusp of the twentieth century. It is an examination of Nineteenth century discourses on Victorian gender ideology. The novel charts and explores the life trajectories of the female protagonists within the novel. This research paper has attempted to explicate the dynamics of gender role expectations through the application of a modern theoretical framework of Foucauldian Discourse Analysis to assess how the discourses of the period inform Gissing’s narrative. The research findings suggest that the perceptions of gender in a period are directly proportionate to the norms championed through the dominant discourses. The discourses are intricately woven within the episteme of the period under analysis and a conscious review of the constitutive elements of these discursive practices reveals possibilities of change for the future through arming research investigators with insights that account for gender construction in a given period.