Submissive Woman Research Articles

Negotiating Self: Navigating Feminist and Submissive Identities

ABSTRACT As women navigate the intersecting meanings of feminism and submission, some struggle to reconcile their feminist politics and submissive practice (e.g., belief in equality and desire to yield authority). Bondage/discipline, dominance/submission, and sadism/masochism (BDSM) has been examined through diverse feminist lenses, including radical feminism. However, scant empirical research focuses on the intersection of feminist and submissive identities. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand how women in the BDSM community who identify as feminist and submissive navigate their identity. Data were collected through interviews with 23 feminist and submissive women. Findings revealed these women shared experiences related to identity conflict, identity compartmentalization and identity coherence living as submissive feminists. Themes related to their struggles and navigation strategies are presented within the broader structure of identity configuration. This project advances discourse about feminism, sexuality, BDSM, and identity.

ADOCTRINAMIENTO MORAL DURANTE EL FRANQUISMO: UN ESTUDIO COMPARADO DE LOS CENTROS DEL PATRONATO DE PROTECCIÓN A LA MUJER EN SEGOVIA Y SEVILLA

During the Franco regime, a moral repression was carried out that affected, in particular, the female collective. The most obvious expression of this process was carried out through the institution of the Patronato de Proteccion a la Mujer, where thousands of women were subjected to long imprisonments accused of immorality. The justification for this arbitrary control system was based on the conviction and criminalization of fallen women; while the ideal of a submissive, self-sacrificing and decent woman was extolled. Through the comparative study of two cities we will analyze how the repressive mechanisms varied according to each city.

Reading patriarchal manhood, violence and love in Kabir Singh (2019)

ABSTRACT The present essay discusses the visual representation of masculinity in Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Kabir Singh (2019). Kabir Singh is a macho-melodrama and a romantic account of the eponymous character, Kabir Singh, and his spiralling into self-destruction following his separation from his love interest, Preeti Sikka. Through the strategic exploitation of masculine tropes and symbols in the cinematic narrative, Vanga aims to construct the male protagonist, Kabir, as the public face of the hegemonic masculine ideology. The film, which offers to its audience a heteronormative heterotopia, also reinforces the patriarchal agenda through the portrayal of a sentimental, submissive woman with negligible autonomy. The article aims to develop its argument of masculinity and its association with pervasive power in the film through the reading of specific scenes through the intellectual and theoretical apparatuses of R.W. Connell, Michael Kimmell, and Michael Kaufman. It looks at the construction of masculinities as a homosocial enactment and also reads the protagonist’s borderline toxic behaviour through the theories of machoism and overcompensation of masculine identities. The paper concludes with situating Kabir Singh in Bollywood’s continuum of toxic masculinity. Through the deployment of masculinities and its nexus with sexism, this research paper also aims to query how machoistic scripts of masculinity implicate heterosexual romantic relationships.

Sketching Women: A Corpus-Based Study of Female Protagonist in A Dolls House

The This paper investigates the words used by Henrik Ibsen in his play, A Dolls House, to portray a female character. The use of adjectives for the female protagonist Nora is of primary concern in this research. The play A Dolls House was downloaded from the internet and used for the corpus compilation, which was analyzed using the corpus tools, AntConc 3.5.8 and TagAnt, and explained with the help of the Feministic theoretical framework. The findings of the study suggest that the female protagonist is a submissive woman of low self-esteem due to the treatment she receives from her husband. This suggests that women were not treated reasonably by men in Norwegian society and are mostly victims of gender inequality because of the patriarchal nature of society. The present study sought to explore male domination and supremacy by focusing on the adjectives used for Nora, the female protagonist.

Theme of Love and Suffering of Women in Rabindranath Tagore’s Novel ‘A Grain of Sand’ (Chokher Bali, 1903)

The novel, ‘A Grain of Sand’ (Chokher Bali,1903), is about the social problems of early marriages, widowhood, and extra-marital affair of a married man with a young widow. In this novel, Rabindranath Tagore has portrayed the problems of women in Indian society like widow-remarriage, child-marriage, dowry and illicit extra-marital relationship along with the predicaments of widows in Bengal at the end of the nineteenth century. The difficulties and complications of human relationships and the significance of love in the human relationships are portrayed in this novel. He has encouraged the need of female education and the abolition of social evils like child-marriage, dowry, widowhood and illiteracy of women, domestic hostility and submissiveness of women are presented in his wonderful novels and stories. In the centre of these social obstacles, female education is revealed as a greater need in the Tagore’s novels. He has portrayed the solitude, sufferings, disappointments and unfulfilled suppressed desires of sexuality of a Bengali widow Binodini in this novel ‘A Grain of Sand’. Rabindranath Tagore had seen social realities from a psychological point of view and performed the role of a social reformer or a moralist. He has presented the problems of women by examining what is happening in the society. In this novel Tagore has shown an amazing notice of the predicaments of women of the Hindu society. In this study an investigation has been made to show how Rabindranath Tagore has depicted the theme of love and suffering of women in this novel ‘A Grain of Sand’.

Mulher, o outro: seu corpo e seus constituintes biológicos, segundo Simone de Beauvoir

This article explores, based on the problem of the body and its biological constituents, the question of the movement of “wanting to be”, based on the work_O Segundo Sexo, by Simone de Beauvoir. We investigated how the philosopher reaches the genesis of the submission of women, according to the perspective of biology and which are the biological references that allowed men to recognize women as the Other. This also affirms and shows that the biological body is the starting point of all the analysis of the philosopher who produced a conceptual set, rigorously philosophical, of the body submitted to society. Finally, we argue that the analysis of biological data, carried out by Beauvoir in the light of existentialist philosophy, was essential for the unfolding of the various conceptions that guide contemporary feminism.

Nora’s Metamorphosis from A Doll Child into A Reasonable Human Being

Henrik Ibsen is deemed to be one of the major Norwegian playwrights of the late 19th century whose famous play A Doll’s House manifests a wide variety of social and individual concerns, some of which transcend times and ages and thus become all-time contemporary. This paper mainly focuses on one such concern of an individual- Nora Helmar’s quest of self-identity- which gets unfolded through many other interrelated social issues that altogether result in her complete transformation. This study identifies how Nora who we notice at the beginning of the play as a naïve and submissive woman, changes herself into an outspoken, autonomous and unyielding human being towards the end of the play. It also attempts to highlight Nora’s numerous struggles against the patriarchal hegemony of the society and outlines how these struggles contribute to developing in her a sense of progressive self-awakening which eventually shapes her self-identity as an independent woman, the ultimate destination of her journey of self-discovery. This study finally explores the underlying forces both from within and outside the family working as catalysts behind making Nora a metamorphosed one.

THE REPRESENTATION OF THE FEMALE PROTAGONIST IN JOANNE HARRIS’S NOVEL “GENTLEMEN AND PLAYERS”

The paper zeroes in on the peculiarities of representing the main female character in a British novel “Gentlemen and Players” published in 2005. The crucial point that the research encompasses is a challenge to the status quo of gender imbalance which is portrayed, inter alia, through showing a certain playfulness of the main character. Notably, playfulness must be read here as a form of (social/cultural/political) subversion, which enables one to look beyond and deconstruct “arbitrary ranks/truths”. The carnivalesque nature of the female protagonist is manifested in connection with the changing status of women in contemporary societies. The image of a submissive woman fabricated by men still lingers in many cultures. This gives rise to a mutant woman, mirrored with the help of a subversive fictional female character who is a trickster. It is evinced that the fossilized patterns of perceiving a woman, and attitudes towards her in the male-dominated environment are likely to pose an impending threat, not only to men’s lives but also to the lives of children and other women. Affected by a number of factors, the female protagonist reveals her eclectic identity and we witness how she turns into a monstrous creature with overwhelming destructive power inside. Consequently, the authenticity of the woman suffers and we may talk about her symbolic death.

A SURVEY OF FEMINISM ASPECTS IN THE NOVEL OF “HOUSE OF EDRISIS” AUTHORED BY GHAZALEH ALIZADEH

Ghazaleh Alizadeh is an Iranian female writer and critic. In the novel of “House of Edrisis”, which is one of her most important works, she shows her feminist thinking in various ways. In this work, she criticizes the culture of patriarchy, marriage, and motherhood. In addition, judicial and legal laws, such as permission for polygamy, are challenged by Alizadeh in this work. She believes that patriarchy has intruded the mind of the society members, including men and women, and one way to clear the minds of people of this concept is respecting and honoring women. She also demands equal rights for women in terms of the right to education and the right to work. Evaluation of female characters in this work reveals that Roxana (the symbol of liberal feminist women) is the ideal character of Alizadeh, and Mrs. Edrisi and Ligha, who were submissive women in the patriarchy culture, start to fight along with men. According to Alizadeh, the only way for victory of women is their acquaintance with their abilities and rights and ending patriarchal domination. In this paper, we analyze her thoughts with regard to the different feminist doctrines

WOMEN FROM WITCH HUNTING IN THE SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: A SOCIALIST FEMINIST CRITICISM OF CHURCHILL S VINEGAR TOM

As a socialist feminist dramatist of the 20th century, Caryl Churchill draws attention to women’s oppression through Vinegar Tom in which she experiments Brechtian theatrical techniques. She shifts in time, from the past to the present, to illuminate the historical context of women’s oppression. She combines successfully witch hunting of the seventeenth century because of which many women were executed and social economic conditions of women in the 1970s. The aim of the study is to provide a socialist feminist criticism of Caryl Churchill’s Vinegar Tom. First of all, the study gives background information about how women were oppressed under the cover of witch hunting in Britain in the seventeenth century. Then, it focuses on their ongoing tough life conditions in the twentieth-century. It also presents socialist feminist views which sought to shed light upon the influence of capitalism in reinforcing the patriarchal oppression over women at those times. After that, the study examines Churchill’s Vinegar Tom as an example of socialist feminist drama. It reveals that Churchill indicates the role of institutions, men and submissive women in legitimising and perpetuating the patriarchal oppression over women to maintain the social, economic and political status quo of Britain for centuries

Defining Islamic modernity through creative writing: a case study of Indonesian domestic workers in Hong Kong

ABSTRACTIndonesian domestic workers (IDWs) have been frequently stereotyped as uneducated and submissive women with little or no bargaining power in transnational labour migration. This article examines why and how literacy practices help foster the activism of IDWs in Hong Kong. In particular, I seek to understand the significance of IDWs’ writing in relation to Islamic modernities. Using the framework of alternative modernities, I argue that the creative process of IDWs’ writing sheds light to their attempts to exercise individual and collective agency. Specifically, the article looks at the role of Forum Lingkar Pena (Pen Circle Forum, FLP) Hong Kong, an IDW writing community, to reveal how its collective literacy practices help affirm Islamic values as part of a modernisation process on IDWs’ own terms.

The Aspects of Patriarchy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream

This paper will discuss the aspects of patriarchy, considering Shakespeare’s attitude toward the relationship between father and daughter, husband and wife presented in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Scholars such as Erickson, Novy, and Williamson observe Shakespeare as a conservative who accepted the patriarchal assumptions of the day. On the other hand, scholars such as Dusinberre and Dash regard Shakespeare as a liberal writer who advocated the position of women. Louis Montrose argues that A Midsummer Night’s Dream “reaffirms the essentials of patriarchal ideology”(74). Shakespeare’s way of dealing conflicts at the end of the play presents his reaffirmation of the dominant ideology of patriarchy. Conflicts are not eliminated but controlled by the hands of men. Titania, a queen of fairies, submits to Oberon and becomes temperate again, and Hippolyta, the queen of the Amazon, acknowledges the power of Theseus. Theseus uses the authority as a monarch to control conflicts, and his manipulation contributes to strengthening patriarchy. If the domination of men and the submission of women are the premise of the happy ending, Shakespeare is hard to escape from the accusation that he is a writer who reflects the premise of patriarchy. Shakespeare did not take a liberal position on women in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa: reprodução social da família e identidade de gênero feminina.

Esta tese tem por objeto de estudo a mulher na Romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa, enfatizando as relações de gênero, analisando o espaço da romaria como reprodução social do ideário de família patriarcal e de identidade de gênero feminina. O cenário da Pesquisa é a Romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa, que se realiza há 323 anos, naquela cidade, localizada na região Oeste da Bahia. Os sujeitos da pesquisa são mulheres romeiras que se enquadram na faixa etária entre 50 e 70 anos de idade e participam, há mais de cinco anos consecutivos, da Romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa, pertencentes a cinco Estados brasileiros (Bahia, Minas Gerais, São Paulo, Espírito Santo e Goiás) que registram um maior índice de participação nesse evento religioso. Utilizamos como metodologia a pesquisa bibliográfica, qualitativa, de campo e documental e na coleta de dados; aplicamos como técnica a observação participante e a entrevista semiestruturada. Esta tese tem por objetivo geral analisar como se articulam, no espaço do catolicismo popular, e mais particularmente no espaço da romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa, as mudanças socioculturais em curso na sociedade, as relações de gênero e a própria dinâmica do catolicismo. Dar-se-á ênfase aos impactos de tal articulação nas concepções e relações de gênero, ao interno da própria romaria e para além dela, nas relações cotidianas das mulheres em questão; à forma de inserção das mulheres nesse contexto, como as mulheres romeiras se situam (posicionam) em relação às mudanças socioculturais em curso, como as mulheres romeiras percebem o espaço da romaria, em relação ao seu cotidiano doméstico; ao desafio que se coloca aos referidos sujeitos, no sentido de que elas em alguns momentos se aproximam ou se distanciam da identidade de gênero oriunda da sociedade patriarcal, onde a submissão da mulher ao homem é uma característica determinante. A partir das falas das romeiras entrevistadas e dos aportes teóricos utilizados, concluímos que a Romaria do Bom Jesus da Lapa é um espaço de reprodução social da família e a identidade de gênero feminina, observando-se um contraste na ressignificação do papel e no perfil da mulher romeira do Bom Jesus da Lapa, alternando entre a permanência e a transformação da identidade de gênero oriunda do patriarcalismo.

The transfiguration of submissive kumauni women as portrayed through the women protagonists in the novels of namita gokhale to the entrepreneurial aptitude of the present kumauni women

The transfiguration of submissive kumauni women as portrayed through the women protagonists in the novels of namita gokhale to the entrepreneurial aptitude of the present kumauni women

Love of the Sexes in Nietzsche’s Philosophy: From Opposition to transformative Interaction

AbstractNietzsche discusses the emotional level of the love of the sexes in aphorism 363 of The Gay Science where he claims that men and women have different prejudices about love. The basic dynamics of love in GS 363 are explained in terms of the woman who gives herself and the man who takes. How can this model offer more than a reactionary idea of an opposition of a submissive woman and dominating man? It will be argued that a deeper understanding of giving oneself and taking does not warrant an opposition in the sense of a master-slave relation. The preconditions for giving and taking in Nietzsche’s philosophy disclose a richer idea of giving and taking as a dynamic and mutually transformative interaction of partners in love.

Revivalist women's submission: Women's spiritual authority, biblical feminism and cosmofeminism

The question of whether or not feminisms can be found among revivalist women has been widely debated in the field of women's and gender studies. My research with Pentecostal women in the countries of New Zealand and the USA (Missouri) argues that Pentecostal women have a unique brand of feminism intertwined with what they term ‘submission,’ a submission given to God before men. In qualitative interviews, participants revealed the multi-dimensionality of submission as an inseparable tenet of their spiritual power in faith healing, prophecy and other spiritual gifts. Using a biblical feminist perspective, a branch of feminist theology that looks at biblical representations of women through an egalitarian lens, I provide an overview of the differentiated beliefs surrounding the women's approach to submission doctrine and biblical feminism itself. I conclude by arguing that the women's positive engagement with difference in the masculine dominated social field of Pentecostalism can be understood as an expression of a grounded cosmopolitanism.

El papel de las mujeres en el discurso de la música norteña mexicana

The nortena music, known to be the one who characterize fundamen- tally the Norwest of the Mexican Republic, it is one of the integral ele- ments of the national identity. Their songs, rhythms, instruments, spaces and practices form part of the tradition that identifies a geografic region. From the Mexican Independence it has tried to build and homogenize a “national” identity, at which it has been provided of significations that tend to “erase” the particularities of the regions. With the national or local identity exists the gender identity, also constructed historically. In the second half of the XX century, the growth of the media allowed that this identities permeate in the social imaginary. From above we ask, what types of generic identities for men and women the popular Mexi- can music known as the northern music propose? When we put in game the category of northern music with the one of gender, we consider, it could reveal some of the mechanism from which, culturally, are reprodu- ce the speeches that tend to perpetuate a cultural system. We propose that the Mexican Nortena music tends not only to reproduce but also to exacerbate the traditional prototypes of male and submissive woman.

Camilo's M(O)ther Women: Two Matricidal Narratives

Abstract: In this essay, Rebecca Atencio argues that a recurring theme in Camilo Castelo Branco’s work is the trope of the dead mother and the act of matricide itself. Theoretically informed by the pertinent and complementary theories of Luce Irigaray and Julia Kristeva, she analyzes two “matricidal narratives,” the popular narrative Maria! Não me mates! and the novella "Maria Moisés," as exemplary of these driving motifs in Camilo’s work. Moving away from the widespread tendency of biographical readings of Camilo’s gallery of fictive women, this essay proposes an innovative critical reading of these female protagonists, and relates matricide, a founding act and key plot element in these and many of the author’s texts, to gender-related issues, the repression of female desire, the submission of women, the female identification with the mother or father, and the alternatives available to women in a patriarchal society.

Reporting Sexual Assaults to the Police: the Israeli BDSM Community

This article explores what considerations members of the sadomasochistic community in Israel take into account in deciding whether to report sexual offenses and victimization to the police. This research is a qualitative study that included 20 interviews with members (men and women) of the BDSM community during 2012–2013 in Israel. The study found that members of the BDSM community in Israel have experienced sexual assault in the context of BDSM play. Respondents mentioned several reasons for not reporting this assault to the police. These reasons included fear of the victim’s being blamed, a desire to be discreet and not out themselves or others as having an interest in BDSM, shame about the practices that may have been part of the consensual part of the scene, difficulty explaining BDSM, and difficulty proving assault specifically when it requires explaining distinctions between play violence and assault. Respondents mentioned several ways that the Israeli BDSM community attempts to deal with assault and help victims, including a submissive women’s forum, a hotline that offered emotional support to victims, an informal list of people accused of assault, gossip as a way of sharing information, outing people who commit assault, and banning people from the community. Many of these considerations are common to victims of sexual assault and rape in non-BDSM contexts as well. What is different here is a layer of stigma specific to public perception of BDSM sexual interests as “deviant” or “perverse.”

The Complexities of the Internet as a Tool for Development: The Case of Pornography in South Africa.

My thesis (DEVS 502) critiques ``practitioners of development'' for promoting the Internet as a development tool in Africa while ignoring the issue of pornography. It demonstrates that theincreased availability and exposure to pornography in Africa is likely to adversely affect the lives of both men and women. Pornography fails to promote safer sex to a population at significant risk of HIV/AIDS. It perpetuates constrictive notions of femininity and masculinity, portraying men as conquering the submissive women, while making male satisfaction the only important outcome of sexual acts. Pornography is not only a gender issue, but also a racial issue: it promotes “whiteness” by idealizing the white female body and portraying the limited number of black actors in a brutal, animal-like way. Pornography, thus, is a powerful medium that may prevent a necessary re-socialization among youth in South Africa to combat the ills of racism and gender inequality. Finally, pornography reflects the ways in which the West has historically held the power to influence gender, racial and sexual norms and values. In this sense, pornography can be viewed as another instance of Western colonialism. Through the lens of South Africa I show that the Internet will have negative consequences that need to be taken into account if it is applied as a development tool.