- Collection:
- Atlanta University and Clark Atlanta University Theses and Dissertations
- Title:
- Dismantling and (Re) constructing notions of masculinity and femininity in African women literature, 2011
- Creator:
- Johnson, Larry D., Jr.
- Date of Original:
- 2011-05-01
- Subject:
- Degrees, Academic
Dissertations, Academic - Location:
- United States, Georgia, Fulton County, Atlanta, 33.749, -84.38798
- Medium:
- theses
- Type:
- Text
- Format:
- application/pdf
- Description:
- This study examines gender (re)presentation in three carefully selected works: Brown Girl, Brownstones; The Color Purple; and When Rocks Dance. Employing the scholarship of women writers of the Diaspora, I contend that the works dismantle and (re)construct gender identities. Where traditional notions of sexuality depict men as masculine and women as feminine, this analysis interrogates and subverts the traditiona paradigm. Methodologically, the dissertation combines literary analysis, post-colonial studies, and gender schema theory into an interdisciplinary approach. I begin by exploring gender construction to establish a theoretical perspective for characters who reject traditional heteronormative paradigms. I then extend recent critical discussions on gender and post-colonialism by examining the relationships between the men and women in each literary text. I contend that traditional notion of characters as homosexual or lesbian is dismantled and (re)constructed, thereby resulting in characters who embrace their femininity or masculinity in a more balanced construction of personality, which is the key to their self-actualization.
- External Identifiers:
- Metadata URL:
- http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12322/cau.td:2011_johnson_larry_d
- Rights Holder:
- Clark Atlanta University
- Holding Institution:
- Atlanta University Center Robert W. Woodruff Library
- Rights:
-
