Suffrage Movement and the Subversion of the ‘Juridico-Discursive’ Power in the Victorian Period: Elizabeth Robins and The Concept of 'New Women'

Esmaeil Najar,Reza Kazemifar

doi:10.9744/kata.18.2.42-47

Abstract

This paper examines the socio-historical subversion of ‘juridico-discursive' power in the late Victorian period. It briefly investigates the rise of the British suffrage movement and highlights the role of ‘suffrage drama' as its social apparatus. The authors demonstrate how suffrage artists, especially the playwright/actress Elizabeth Robins, acted against the dominant patriarchal hegemony and were in frontline of social uprisings. It is argued that ‘Suffrage drama' as a ‘place of tolerance' functioned as an antithesis to the mainstream theatre and challenged the conventional dramatic forms practiced prior to its birth. Suffrage drama provided a space for women to have their collective voice heard in a social and political context in the early Victorian era. Elizabeth Robins, mostly acknowledged for enacting women heroines of Ibsen's plays, became an invaluable inspirational figure for suffrage women as she was the actress in whom the strong concept of the ‘New Woman' was incarnated.

Highlights

Making few references to women, the poststructuralist Michel Foucault (1926-1984) tremendously inspired feminist scholars to question about the dominant power, body, gender, and sexual relations
We provide an analysis of how women artists of suffrage movement attempted to subvert the contemporary juridico-discursive power with unscrupulously operating against the artistic hegemony of the early Victorian period
Men reacted passionately against women by ridiculing the concept of New Woman, prophesying that they would make themselves ill and destroy national life, insisting that they were rebelling against nature (Bederman, 1995)

Summary

Introduction

Making few references to women, the poststructuralist Michel Foucault (1926-1984) tremendously inspired feminist scholars to question about the dominant power, body, gender, and sexual relations. During British suffrage movement, women utilized Art, that is drama and theatre, for the first time in women‘s history to publically criticize the oppressions on them.5 In Victorian England, women centered their political activities around establishing women organizations and debating over the concept of disenfranchisement. Women in the context of suffrage movement did not have enough power and strong lobbies to produce feminist plays in mainstream theatre, because the people in charge were mostly men who managed theatres.

Results

Conclusion