Femininity and the destabilization of the hegemonic masculinity in the sun also.
What is the link between masculinity and femininity? How is the embracing of masculinity also a rejection of femininity? In the exploration of the relationship between the two supposed binaries of the masculine and the feminine, it led me to question what we commonly believe to be absolute...
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| Format: | Final Year Project |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2011
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10356/45194 |
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| Institution: | Nanyang Technological University |
| Language: | English |
| Summary: | What is the link between masculinity and femininity? How is the embracing of
masculinity also a rejection of femininity? In the exploration of the relationship
between the two supposed binaries of the masculine and the feminine, it led me to
question what we commonly believe to be absolute truths about gender and gender
relations. My essay thus examines the notions of masculinity in Ernest Hemingway’s
The Sun Also Rises and Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club where ideals of masculinity are
espoused and the Other—be it women or femininity—is rejected. Deconstructing the
masculinity in these works exposes an inherent self-emasculation that subsequently
brings to light the weakness in an apparently stable gender identity, and by extension,
the weakness in the gender binary itself. It becomes clear that the concepts of
masculinity and femininity are not just opposing concepts, but fluid and intersecting
with no clear-cut dichotomy. The overt masculinity presented in these texts ironically
fractures the gender binary that masculinity was built upon, and depends upon in
order to maintain a phallocentric order in which it thrives. |
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