Evil Woman Research Articles

‘Sugaring the Pill’: Gregory of Nazianzus' Advice to Olympias (Carm. 2.2.6)

Advice on marriage and the proper deportment for wives begins with the earliest Greek literature. While Homer's Andromache and Penelope provide practical role models, Hesiod (Works and Days 695-705, Theogony 568-612), followed (in iambics) by Semonides (frr. 6, 7), forcefully articulates male concerns about evil wives and women's wicked wiles. Hesiod's imperatival infinitives as well as his viewpoint reverberate more than a millennium later in a poem of advice composed, probably in the early 380s, by the Christian Gregory of Nazianzus for the marriage (νῦν μὲν σοὶ τόδ' ἔδωκα γαμήλιον, ‘now I have given you this wedding gift’, 2.2.6.108) of Olympias, elder daughter of Vitalian, a local Nazianzene worthy. This paper seeks to contribute to recent revaluations of Gregory's poetry—and hence of his place in the larger development of later Greek hexameter poetry—by illustrating how reading of the Olympias poem is enriched by exploration of its literary allusions and intertexts and its poetic craftsmanship. My title adopts Gregory's own image of ‘sugaring the pill’ of instruction for the young by writing in verse, but I extend the expression to include the pleasure that any reader may obtain in recognising Gregory's literary artistry, even when unpalatable prescriptions for female married life are the theme. Since the corpus is not well known, I begin by locating the poem within the context of Gregory's verse.

Fantasies of Female Evil: The Dynamics of Gender and Power in Shakespearean Tragedy by Cristina Leon Alfar (review)

484 Reviews accounts for 'the mild manner of [Mistress Page's] husband, George Page, who gives the impression of a middle-class man who has married money', and yet at the same time, in arranging for his wealth to skip a generation, the grandfather has 'not only short-changed George Page but [. . .] also deprived his daughter of a certain amount of income, perhaps creating some bitterness and giving Mistress Page reason to think hard about the transfer of wealth' (p. 13). The less speculative chapter on The Mer? chant of Venicethat concludes the book is much more helpful. Its discussion of Portia's prosecution of Shylock and the penalty she imposes (the transferof assets again) leads to some provocative conclusions. Thenegotiatedadjustmentto Shylock's punishment leaves Jessica as a beneficiary, a position she would have enjoyed had Shylock himself engaged in fraudulent convey ancing. And in suggesting that Shylock's 'I am content', which echoes Antonio and Petruchio, is part of public, legal discourse rather than a statement of private belief, Ross provides a more humane reading of the play than is usually the case. The research in both these volumes is prodigious and both benefit from the duodisciplinary skills of their authors: they are fine additions to the developing area of Law and Literature. University of Birmingham Catherine M. S. Alexander Fantasies of Female Evil: The Dynamics of Gender and Power in Shakespearean Tragedy. By Cristina Leon Alfar. Cranbury, NJ: University of Delaware Press; London: Associated University Presses. 2003. 254 pp. ?36. ISBN o87413 -781-0. Any performer would prefer playing Lady Macbeth to playing Lady Macduff. Lady Macduff is a dramatic role of a woman who is good. Lady Macbeth, in contrast, is a dramatic role of a woman who has all the good lines. In her study of those women in Shakespeare's tragedies who are regarded as evil, Alfar argues fortheir recuperation. Not only does Alfar interrogate what early modern culture regarded as evil, she also argues that the characters regarded as evil women do little more than what is done by other characters, male and female, regarded as admirable. In making her analysis, Alfar focuses Lady Macbeth, Goneril, and Regan as women who 'become evil through a simple double standard, arrogating forthemselves behaviors that would be laudable or at least condoned in men' (p. 25). She also considers such characters as Juliet,Cleopatra, Hermione, and Paulina, characters in three other plays who defyconvention without the sort ofcondemnation that audiences and critics have used in discussions of Lady Macbeth or the Lear sisters. That limited scope creates some difnculty.Alfar has nothing at all to say about the women of Shakespearean history plays, many ofwhom would provide useful instances of strong women who act to take or keep power, nor has she much to say about the women of Titus Andronicus, jfulius Caesar, or Hamlet. (Her omission of Timon ofAthens is understandable, while she does speak brieflyabout Volumnia in Coriolanus.) Aftera short introduction in which Alfar places her analysis in a theoretical frame? work, distinguishing her work from feminist psychoanalytical studies, while acknowledging the strength of Kristeva's idea of the abject, Chapters 1 and 2 turn to a discussion ofconduct books. Again Alfar begins with the theoretical, forshe considers 'female evil as culturally produced out of the patrilineal structure's anxieties about the female body's ability to threaten its investment in prestige and power' (p. 32). After some additional discussion of two historical women, Elizabeth Cary and Queen Elizabeth I, this section concludes with a consideration of Juliet and how her defi? ance of convention becomes acceptable, even admirable, because she acts to achieve romantic love. MLR, 100.2, 2005 485 In Chapters 3-5, Alfar considers in turn the sisters in Lear, Lady Macbeth, and Cleopatra. Goneril and Regan, she argues, are trapped by the pressures on any mon? arch in this period: ifthey behave like tyrants it is because all early modern monarchs are forced by their situation to behave like tyrants on occasion. Lady Macbeth is a differentand altogether more interesting case: in the book's strongest chapter, Al? far argues that Lady Macbeth is a parodic version of the perfect early...

American Jezebel: the uncommon life of Anne Hutchinson, the woman who defied the Puritans

Anne Hutchinson, a forty-six- year-old midwife who was pregnant with her sixteenth child, stood before forty male judges of Massachusetts General Court, charged with heresy and sedition. In a time when women could vote, hold public office, or teach outside home, charismatic Hutchinson wielded remarkable political power. Her unconventional ideas had attracted a following of prominent citizens eager for social reform. Hutchinson defended herself brilliantly, but judges, faced with a perceived threat to public order, banished her for behaving in a manner not comely for [her] sex. Until now, Hutchinson has been a polarizing figure in history and letters, attracting either disdain or exaltation. Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was haunted by sainted Hutchinson, used her as a model for Hester Prynne in Scarlet Letter. Much of praise for her, however, is muted by a wish to domesticate heroine: bronze statue of Hutchinson at Massachusetts State House depicts a prayerful mother -- eyes raised to heaven, a child at her side -- rather than a of power standing alone before humanity and God. Her detractors, starting with her neighbor John Winthrop, first governor of Massachusetts, referred to her as the instrument of Satan, new Eve, disturber of Israel, a witch, more bold than a man, and -- ancient Israeli queen who, on account of her tremendous political power, was the most evil woman in Bible. Written by one of Hutchinson's direct descendants, American Jezebel brings both balance and perspective to Hutchinson's story. It captures this heroine's life in all its complexity, presenting hernot as a religious fanatic, a cardboard feminist, or a raging crank -- as some have portrayed her -- but as a flesh-and-blood wife, mother, theologian, and political leader. Opening in a colonial courtroom, American Jezebel moves back in time to Hutchinson's childhood in Elizabethan England, exploring intimate details of her marriage and family life. The book narrates her dramatic expulsion from Massachusetts, after which her judges, still threatened by her challenges, promptly built Harvard College to enforce religious and social orthodoxies -- making her midwife to nation's first college. In exile, she settled Rhode Island (which later merged with Roger Williams's Providence Plantation), becoming only ever to co-found an colony. The seeds of struggle for women's and human rights can be found in story of this one woman's courageous life. American Jezebel illuminates origins of our modern concepts of religious freedom, equal rights, and free speech, and showcases an extraordinary whose achievements are astonishing by standards of any era.

The Lies and Connivances of an Evil Woman: Early Meiji Realism and "The Tale of Takahashi Oden the She-Devil"

The Lies and Connivances of an Evil Woman: Early Meiji Realism and "The Tale of Takahashi Oden the She-Devil"

Lilith in Myth, Melodrama, and Criminology

This article illustrates how the social construction of both knowledge and popular culture has been influenced by mythic images of “fair and virginal” good women and “dark and sensual” evil women-what is commonly called the madonna/whore duality. The article examines the myth of Lilith, first wife of Adam, and the images of good and evil women that we can distill from creation myths. We then demonstrate how these images of good and evil women are illustrated in early twentieth century criminology and the 1920s melodrama Lilith.

Gender and fitness to stand trial: A 5-year review of remands in Québec

Over the past 25 years, criminologists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and sociologists have shown an increased interest in the issue of differential treatment of men and of women at various stages of the criminal justice process (Adler & Simon, 1976; Allen, 1987; Bertrand, 1998; Bishop & Frazier, 1984; Channels & Herzberger, 1993; Chesney-Lind, 1987; Crites & Hepperle, 1987; Daly, 1994; Frazier & Hunt, 1998; Heilbrun & Heilbrun, 1986; Julian, 1993; Laberge, Morin, & Armony, 1997; Merlo & Pollock, 1995; Moyer, 1992; Riley, 1998; Steadman, 1987). The fact that women are less likely than men to commit crimes has, ironically, led criminologists to articulate two opposing views regarding the effect of gender on criminal justice outcomes: the ‘‘chivalry’’ or ‘‘paternalistic’’ theory and the ‘‘evil woman’’ or ‘‘punitive’’ theory. The ‘‘chivalry’’ theory holds that female offenders are treated more leniently than males. According to this view, women are less likely to be arrested and if found guilty, they receive shorter sentences than their male counterparts (Pollak, 1950; Simon, 1979). By contrast, the ‘‘evil woman’’ theory holds that female offenders are treated more severely than males for similar offenses. According to this view, women are more likely than men to be incarcerated and to receive longer sentences because their behavior deviates from stereotyped sex-role expectations (Simon, 1979). Most studies attempting to examine these theories have focused on sentencing practices. In a review of the literature on differential treatment in sentencing and parole decisions, Parisi (1982) found that in general, women are treated more

Gender and Case Processing Decisions

ABSTRACT Research conducted during the past twenty years has not provided definitive answers to questions concerning the effect of gender on criminal justice decision making. Some researchers conclude that females receive preferential treatment, while other conclude either that there are no differences or that females are treated more harshly than males. This study uses data on male and female defendants charged with violent felonies to examine the effect of gender on seven case processing decisions. We also probe for interactions between defendant gender and defendant race. We find that female defendants are more likely than male defendants to have all of the charges against them dismissed and that females are sentenced less harshly than males. We also find that gender and race interact. The results of our analysis cast doubt on the validity of the so-called “evil woman thesis” and highlight the importance of testing an interactive model that incorporates the effects of both gender and race.

Lawyers, gender and grievance arbitration outcomes

Why should the grievant’s gender or the presence of legal representation affect arbitration outcomes? The “chivalry hypothesis” holds that male arbitrators will tend to favor female grievants; its theoretical mirror image, the “evil woman” hypothesis, suggests that female grievants suffer a comparative disadvantage vis-a-vis similarly situated males. However, neither hypothesis (both drawn from criminologists’ studies of judicial sentencing patterns) applies all that well to the grievance arbitration process where, unlike in the court system, the parties themselves select their decision-maker. This is not to say that the grievance arbitration process is free of gender discrimination, only that arbitrators are probably not the source of any pro- or anti-female bias which may be uncovered.

BITTERDER DAN DE DOOD IS DE VROUW (KOH 7,26)

Summary The verse under consideration has raised the question whether Qohelet was a misogynist. In the context of popular philosophy of his time and in the line of Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern tradition, an antifeminist attitude of Qoh is quite possible. The more positive verse Qoh 9,9 is not capable of falsifying a misogynistic interpretation of 7,26. The problem is whether Qoh 7,26 deals only with the strange or evil woman (comp Prov 5 and passim) or with the woman in general. This question can only be answered by a close reading of the verse in its context. Exegesis of the last century has already yielded a number of interesting insights in the strucure of the pericope and in the meaning of a number of its difficult terms and expressions. A new synthesis, based on this previous exegetical research, is presented in this article Since traditional wisdom did not help him in solving his problems, Qoheleth tries it with “wisdom through research” (7,23–25). In his research he often finds the saying “Mor...

Porn in the USA

There were three reasons why I started Femme Productions. After a few years of working as an actress in adult films, I began to write for men's magazines and review adult movies. That was when I started looking closely at the films and was horrified to see how sexist they were. So I began to think about making porn movies that were aimed at women, and which could share together. I felt that adult entertainment could be very valid and life-enriching, but it wasn't being done with that in mind. Unlike the antiporn movement, I don't think porn causes violence. But the films were very exploitive of women and of sexuality in general. I didn't think that they were offering anything constructive about our sexuality. I also realized that women were beginning to watch porn, and I knew that there was nothing out there for them to watch. So I began Femme with three aims in mind. I wanted to show that it was possible to produce explicit porn that had integrity, I wanted to show that porn could be nonsexist, and I wanted to show that porn could be life-enriching. I grew up Catholic, fed on the usual menu of guilt and shame. I was a very passionate young woman with urges and feelings that I was not supposed to have. I was almost raped when I was thirteen, and although I managed to get away, my culture made me feel that I must have been asking for it: I was reaching puberty, I was becoming sexual, I was making men do these things to me. It's a very tough culture for women. So I wanted to make films that made people feel good about their sexuality and about who they are as sexual beings. I wanted to make films that say we all have a right to pleasure, and that women, especially, have a right to our own pleasure. In the beginning, the men in the business told me that there is no couples market, and that women don't watch porn. Honey, they said, you won't make a dollar. They'd say: really nice, honey. That's a really nice idea. (She's nuts. She'll be gone in a year.) But I knew that a new market had opened up that no one was addressing. I knew that, financially, it could be a very good business venture and a way to utilize the name I had created which was following me around now whether I liked it or not. When I started Femme, I was already branded as an evil woman for working in porn, so I felt that I had nothing to lose. I thought Candida Royaile

"In Accordance with the Canons of the Holy Apostles": Muscovite Dowries and Women's Property Rights

T raditional sources have long suggested that women in early modern Rus' played a much lesser role and were held in significantly lower esteem than their counterparts in Western Europe. Old Russian literary sources put emphasis on the evil woman theme.1 Formal legal codices gave women relatively little attention.2 Western travelers to Muscovy reported that Russian women were considerably worse off and existed in a state of misery.3 According to the standard view, their role declined from the fifteenth century on, and became severely restricted in the sixteenth century.4

Dangerous men, evil women: Gender and parole decisionmaking

The structure of parole decisions concerning the “need” level of parolees is examined by applying a multivariate analysis. Results show that although male and female parolees did not differ in their need scores in the various areas included in the “need assessment” form, or in the parole officers' subjective impression of the parolees' need level, there were significant differences in the factors used by the officers to arrive at their decisions. The study suggests that gender-role expectations and stereotypes guide the decision-making process in the need assessment and the prescription of treatment for parolees. The implications of such gender-based rehabilitation are discussed.

Gender and Difference in Ancient Israel (review)

134 SHOFAR by the patriarchal rules, her "going out" contributed to the brothers' perversely acquiring material rewards. The Dinah story itself is analyzed in Chapter 4 with a view to assessing its use of the circumcision motif and Dinah's misfortune in encountering dangers outside the house. Redactors adjusted the Genesis stories to new ideological cOmponents working toward national permanence and commitment that was lacking in the Hebrews' more nomadic culture. The final chapter attempts to analyze the Dinah affair by the method of comparative, midrashic, and intertextual evaluation. Sheres states that there is no attempt to characterize historically the contemporary problems facing Israel and its neighbors. However, she argues that while the idea of covenant laid out the grounds for a superb philosophy of dialogue and understanding, it also encouraged questionable positions about morality and political behavior impacting on Jews and Western civilization alike. The author calls for a consideration of Dinah in a new light, as an active political figure who tried to steer the Hebrews away from brutal confrontations . Dinah's "going out" must be understood as wise and desirable, serving as a model for many Israeli women who struggle to form a coherent political, pacifistic group with an agenda of Palestinian accommodation. For Ita Sheres, Dinah becomes the prototype of other Hebrew women who have followed her footsteps and tried to mature independently of males and more inclusive of other people (p. 116). "Dinah's 'going out' fits the taxonomy of inclusion and mutuality, and in that perspective her ideal, unredacted story should be the parable for our time" (p. 125). In the Appendix the textual clues for retrieving the unredacted version of the Dinah story are presented. Valuable scholarly notes along with indices of texts and names provide valuable resources for an inquiry into issues involVed in the study of the Dinah story. This book will be valuable to students, professors, and informed readers who are interested in possible Biblical underpinnings for contemporary history. Betty Jane Lillie Athenaeum of Ohio Gender and Difference in Ancient Israel, edited by Peggy L. Day. Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1989. 209 pp. $12.95. The authors of the twelve essays in this book share a belief that past studies of women characters in the Bible have evaluated biblical literature in light of present-day values on women's experience. They assert that such research can result in ahistorical, ethnocentric perspectives on gender; the Volume 10. No.1 Fall1991 135 danger of such work is that Western images of women and men are transposed to a text from a non-Western society, thereby posing a barrier to understanding the biblical experience. While such an approach is valid for theological interpretation, explains editor Peggy L. Day in her introductory essay , it can obscure other possible readings that areavailable through the application of alternative methodologies from the social sciences, literary criticism , etc. This volume addresses gender-related topics in the Hebrew Bible, without bringing contemporary feminist theological concerns to the text. Jo Ann Hackett, in "Rehabilitating Hagar: Fragments of an Epic Pattern ," compares the conflict between Sarah and Hagar in Genesis 16 and 21 with a similar pattern in stories from Canaan and Mesopotamia and argues that the biblical author intends for the reader to sympathize with Hagar, a foreign slave woman, the underdog in the narrative. In "The Woman in Ancient Examples of the Potiphar's Wife Motif, K2111," Susan Tower Hollis also discerns a pattern connecting the biblical text to ancient Near Eastern counterparts. She discovers that the so-called evil woman in these narratives brings about a positive transformation in the male hero of the story. Susan Niditch's analysis of "Eroticism and Death in the Tale of Jael" uncovers that Israel is identified with Jael, the more vulnerable character, and that the text emphasizes the victory of the marginal over the powerful. Peggy L. Day, in "From the Child is Born the Woman: The Story of Jephthah's Daughter," argues for a woman's life-cycle ritual behind Judges 11:29-40. Phyllis Bird, "'To Play the Harlot': An Inquiry into an Old Testament Metaphor," studies the words of Hosea and contends that in ancient Israel the cultic role...

Images of the evil woman in Irish Folklore: A preliminary survey

In this paper the figure of the child murderess, a woman who kills newborn infants, as she appears in Irish folk belief and narrative, is described. In Ireland, a strong and widespread child murderess tradition contrasts with a weak and limited dead child tradition. These traditions are distinctly religious in character in Ireland and they are concerned with complex theological and moral themes. Focusing on the question of the woman's repentance or lack of it, two opposing images emerge: a Mary Magdalene sinner-saint and a witch-midwife, she-devil.

Fictive Psyches: The Psychological Melodrama in 40s Films

Despite the increasing importance of a deconstructive approach for film analysis, the fictive psyches of screen characters still lure film analysts to apply psychoanalysis to them as if they were patients. The characters are, after all, endowed with a psyche, with a past, with disorders (by the narrative); the duration of the film parallels the psychoanalytic session in which the patient speaks while the analyst listens and observes. In the light of his or her study, the analyst writes the case history replete with oedipal crises, fetishes or hysteria. If there is more than one film, the sessions can be multiplied to assume a greater resemblance to a real analysis. If the character changes identities slightly from film to film within the body of filmic fictions under analysis, as in the case of Hitchcock's heroes or the evil women of film noir, so much the better, for the analyst can deftly disrobe all disguises in favor of a core identity. Further, this analysis of the fictive psyche as real patient can be closely linked to traditional methods of film criticism and history such as auteurist criticism, speculation on audience identification or historical readings of national identities or cultural mythologies. One might think that structuralism would interfere, break the decoy, by presenting characters in fiction as constructions of the semic codes. From a structuralist perspective, the fictive psyches appear as bejeweled nightingales whose spring-wound mechanisms are soon

SEX, SENTENCING AND RECONVIGTION

Surprisingly little is known about whether judges and magistrates in England and Wales sentence men and women differendy. Nagel and Hagan (1983) have reviewed the American literature on this topic, contrast ing the chivalry theory (that women receive lenient disposals because of chivalrous or paternalistic behaviour by judges, prosecutors or magistrates) with the evil woman theory (that women are more harshly sentenced because they have violated not only the criminal law but also assumptions about what is appropriate and tolerable female behaviour). Nagel and Hagan found that, in general, women were sentenced more leniently than men. After controlling for other factors in multivariate analyses, the effects of sex on sentencing were small in comparison with those of other factors such as offence seriousness and prior record, but were demonstrably present . Existing English research on magistrates' sentencing provides little information about the influence of the sex of the defendant. Investigations of sentencing disparities between different courts (Hood, 1962; Tarling, I979) have studied only male offenders. In Hood's (1972) later research, sex was not nominated by magistrates in response to a question about which information was most useful to them in sentencing motoring offenders. In Softley's (1978, 1980) national study of offenders dealt with in magistrates' courts, there is no mention of how sex was related to sentencing, although it is clear that the sample contained males and females. The annual Criminal Statistics seem to suggest that men receive relatively more severe sentences than women in magistrates' courts in England and Wales. For example, for persons aged 17 or over found guilty of indictable or triable-either-way offences in 1979 (Home Office, 1980), 6-6 per cent, of men received immediate imprisonment (compared with 2-0 per cent, of women), 4-5 per cent, of men were committed to the Crown Court for sentence (compared with 1 -2 per cent, of women), and 7*3 per cent, of men were given suspended sentences of imprisonment (compared with 4 • 3 per cent, of women). Conversely, 18-5 per cent, of women received a discharge (compared with 7-9 per cent, of men), and 14-4 per cent, of women were given probation orders (compared with 6-o per cent, of men). The 1979 statistics are quoted here because the analyses in this paper are based on court appearances in 1979. The problem in interpreting these figures, of course, is that there may be many factors confounded with the sex of the defendant which explain the

Disarming the "Evil Woman": Petiole Constriction by a Sphingid Larva Circumvents Mechanical Defenses of Its Host Plant, Cnidoscolus urens (Euphorbiaceae)

In Costa Rica, the mala mujer (or evil woman) (Cn,dosol/ts urens (L.) Arthur ssp. urens, Euphorbiaceae), is protected from herbivores by urticating hairs and sticky latex. Erinnyis ello L. larvae (Lepidoptera: Sphingidae) exploit C. urens as a food source using an unusual and previously undescribed behavior. Before attempting to feed on a leaf, a larva grazes the hairs from the petiole, then constricts the petiole, effectively stopping latex flow into the leaf. The larva thus avoids the deleterious effects of copious latex flow normally resulting from a break in the plant's epidermis. The process of latex flow prevention appears to be mechanical, as shown by laboratory and field experiments.