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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Cultural Intimacy'
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Filmer, Jan Philipp. "Infrastructures of Intimacy: Queer (re)configurations of cultural space." Thesis, University of Sydney, 2020. https://hdl.handle.net/2123/23531.
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This thesis explores queer people’s everyday encounters with forms of governance and social regulation in contemporary Sydney, Australia. It considers how queer people and communities are impacted by recent policy decisions and debates. These include the regulation of queer party cultures through zoning laws; the formal recognition of non-heterosexual relationships through marriage; and sustained ‘heteroactivist’ campaigns against LGBTIQ-positive education programmes. To that end, this thesis utilises a mixed-methods approach, combining analysis of policies, policy debate, and media coverage with qualitative interviews and cartographic mapping techniques. This blend of approaches enables an account of how the constraints of governance also animate the formation of new relations, places, communities, activisms, and politics. Tracing what I call ‘infrastructures of intimacy’, I thus set out to map where and how ordinary queer lives are lived and sustained despite sometimes adverse circumstances. Although the forms of power which may seek to contain such lives can be acknowledged in such an approach, my emphasis is not on exposing oppression or marginalisation, and in this respect my thesis is committed to what Eve Sedgwick calls a ‘reparative’ mode of analysis. This resists queer theory’s dominant framing of ‘normal culture’ as a regimenting and totalising arrangement in which queer spaces and lives figure as exemplars of resistance to ‘the powers that be’. This logic simultaneously disregards the dispersed infrastructures of contemporary queer life, neglects the multiple exclusions which operate in supposedly progressive ‘queer spaces’, and dismisses the ordinariness which is crucial to queer lives in practice. Instead of positing transgression and assimilation as opposed choices, I argue that queer intimacies are better understood as pluralisations of the continually shifting cultural formation that is ‘normal’ life.
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Núñez, Noriega Guillermo. "The politics of male identity and intimacy in Mexico." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/298776.
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The point of departure of this dissertation is the identification of the existence of a (historic) realm of affection and eroticism among men in Mexico that have not been accounted for neither by dominant discourses on Mexican men or Mexican homoerotic practices and identities, nor by Anthropological and epidemiological studies of the homoerotic experience: affective and/or erotic relations that take place outside dominant categories like gay, homosexual, joto or mayate (or other terms used for sexual deviants) and contesting the heterosexual ideal of manhood. Far from explaining and identifying this realm of intimacy, the dissertation makes an ethnographically and theoretically informed criticism on how these dominant discourses, and their sexual and gender categories, work to sustain the sex/gender system by render them invisible. The dissertation explores masculinity identity as a heterogeneous space of power and resistance. Masculine identity is considered to be a contradictory space where intimate relations may take place and even where homophobia can be resisted. At the same time, the dissertation shows the heterogeneous character of the homoerotic experience in Mexico; a heterogeneity that contest the theoretical effort to construct a single narrative as pretended by the terms "homosexual subjectivity" or "gay world".
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Wang, Chia-Chih DC. "Cultural ideal of secure adult attachment : a comparison of three cultural groups /." free to MU campus, to others for purchase, 2004. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/mo/fullcit?p3144466.
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Hoefinger, Heidi. "Negotiating intimacy : transactional sex and relationships among Cambodian professional girlfriends." Thesis, Goldsmiths College (University of London), 2010. http://research.gold.ac.uk/3419/.
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This research focuses on the transactional nature of sexual and non-sexual relationships between certain young women in Cambodia described as ‘professional girlfriends’, and their ‘western boyfriends’. In this case, the term ‘transactional’ refers to the initial material motivation behind their interactions. While the majority of women are employed as bartenders or waitresses in tourist areas of Phnom Penh, outside observers tend to erroneously label them as ‘prostitutes’ or ‘broken women’ because of the gift-based nature of the intimate exchanges. Ethnographic evidence demonstrates, however, that they make up a diverse and nuanced group of individuals who engage in relationships more complex than simply ‘sex-for-cash’ exchanges, and often seek marriage and love in addition to material comforts. Though they do not view themselves as ‘prostitutes’, the distinction of the term ‘professional’ is used to emphasize that 1) they do rely on the formation of these relationships as a means of livelihood and their motivations are initially materially-based; 2) they engage in multiple overlapping transactional relationships, usually unbeknownst to their other partners; 3) there is a performance of intimacy, whereby the professed feelings of love and dedication lie somewhere on a continuum between genuine and feigned, and where the term ‘love’ itself carries multiple meanings. The research further reveals not only the stereotypes, contradictions, and structural constraints experienced by these young women, but also their entrepreneurialism, determination and creativity. Despite trauma related to recent political past, sexual violence, stigma, depression and self-harming, they use tools of global feminine youth culture, consumption, linguistic ability, ‘bar girl’ subculture, and interpersonal relationships to make socioeconomic advancements and find enjoyment in their lives. The practice of 'intimate ethnography' also illuminates the negotiation of intimacy and friendship between the participants and researcher, as well as the general materiality and exchange of everyday sex and relationships around the globe.
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Gunkel, Henriette. "The cultural politics of female same-sex intimacy in post-apartheid South Africa." Thesis, University of East London, 2007. http://roar.uel.ac.uk/1248/.
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In 1996 South Africa became the first country in the world that explicitly incorporated lesbian and gay rights within the Bill of Rights of the post-apartheid constitution. Since then the discussion and proclamation of sexual identities has increasingly emerged. This has brought not only the subject of rights but also the question of gender relations and cultural authenticity, as visible for example in the emerging populist notion of homosexuality as un-African, into the focus of the nation state's politics. The thesis examines the politics behind the claim homosexuality is un-African and its historical anchorage in the history of colonialism and apartheid. The thesis explores how colonialism and apartheid have historically shaped constructions of gender and sexuality and how these concepts are not only re-introduced by discourses of homosexuality as un-African but also through the post-apartheid constitution itself. As the interpretation of rights in relation to sexuality generally focuses on gay identities this thesis reflects on the effects of these discourses on non-normative modes of sexuality and intimacy. More specifically the thesis focuses on the interviews that I have conducted in Johannesburg on 'mummy-baby' relationships. By contextualizing these relationships in the historical and cultural framework of sexual cultures and cultures of intimacy this thesis argues that the South African history and cultures provided/provide a space which accommodates forms of female same-sex intimacy that are not necessarily linked to metropolitan sexual cultures. The thesis discusses the tensions between nonlesbian same-sex intimacy and metropolitan lesbianism and it explores the extent that these forms of intimacy are further marginalized by a post-apartheid constitution which reinforces a homosexual/heterosexual binarized identity. Therefore, the thesis questions the regulatory functions of identity and (Western) notions of sexual subjectivities and problematizes the practice of 'coming out' as always being a liberating moment. To do this the thesis pays attention to cultural and historical categories of sexualities, to normative and/or subversive forms of masculinities and femininities, and to social inclusion and exclusion on the basis of gender, sexuality and race. By doing so the thesis explores the suitability of queer theory in the South African context.
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Carstens, Carol Albritton. "Defining sexual abuse : social worker assessment of family intimacy behavior in cultural context /." The Ohio State University, 1999. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1488187763847549.
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Miles, Elizabeth Frances. "Men of No Value| Contemporary Japanese Manhood and the Economies of Intimacy." Thesis, Yale University, 2017. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=10633258.
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<p> This dissertation is an ethnographic examination of how young Japanese men in contemporary Japan are negotiating the effects of postindustrial shifts on the production, consumption, and performance of heterosexual male desire within the "economies of intimacy" of sex, love, and marriage. Moving beyond popular pathologies of Japanese men and of "crisis," I argue that men have been increasingly economically and socially alienated from intimate institutions, provoking either anger toward the larger gender system or a reorganization of personal paths to manhood. This dissertation is based on fifteen-months of research in Tokyo between 2013 and 2014. In addition to interviews with young, unmarried Japanese men and masculinities studies scholars, I conducted participant observation in several key sites, such as "anti-love" demonstrations, matchmaking parties (<i>machikon</i>), and gender equality workshops. My work draws on historical and contemporary popular culture to examine modern discourses of male virginity, debates on romantic love, and the history of sexuality.</p><p> Setting the scene of contemporary Japanese manhood, the dissertation begins with a gendered history of postwar Japan culminating in the ideal of the <i>dekiru otoko</i> or "man who can do." This conception of masculinity as ability directly affects the three key intimacies of concern to both the greater Japanese public and to young men themselves. These intimacies of sex, love, and marriage, what I term the "economies of intimacy," and their varied articulations with—and affects on—the lives of young Japanese men form the core of this dissertation. I argue that it is through their ability to "do" sex, love, and marriage that men receive social recognition and value in postmainstream Japan. Amidst the continuing importance of marriage to social ideals of male adulthood and personal desires for children, many young men find the marital union to be unachievable. These men, broadly categorized as "undesirable" (<i>himote</i>), are questioning the current marital-gender order. Specifically addressing the financial burdens and feelings of economic objectification that marriage engenders, I argue that these "undesirables" are challenging feminist scholarship on men as the primary beneficiaries of marriage. </p><p> Historically situating the contemporary ideology of "love supremacy-ism" (<i>ren'ai shijō shugi</i>) within the longer trajectory of Japan's modernization, I engage with the various critics of this new ideology, examining how romantic love in contemporary Japan is both intimately entwined with, and mimics, capitalism. Termed "love-capitalism" (<i>ren'ai shihon shugi</i>), this system is a form of evaluative schema in which men are valued and recognized based on their ability to do the <i>work</i> of love. Lastly, I discuss Japan's sexual modernity and the increasing importance of what I term the postwar "sexual contract"—the implicit agreement between the state and its citizens that they will engage in <i>reproductive </i> sex—within a contemporary pronatalist regime. Challenging this contract is the rise of male virgin (<i>dōtei</i>) "movements" whose members and allies are questioning the importance of sexual activity (broadly defined) to both themselves and to the greater public.</p><p> Writing against claims that gender exerts less of an influence on men's life choices—a claim predicated on women's upward social mobility globally—I argue that the Japanese gender system, with its increasing demands on men, is forcing young men to renegotiate their desires and abilities. This research brings men's concerns to the forefront of current feminist and queer studies debates on institutions such as marriage and love, particularly the absence of financial concerns and the globally circulating discourses on how sex, love, and marriage are all social goods.</p><p>
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Forgash, Rebecca. "Military transnational marriage in Okinawa: Intimacy across boundaries of nation, race, and class." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/280696.
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This dissertation is an ethnographic study of the lives of Okinawan women and American military men involved in long-term intimate relationships. The United States military has maintained a large-scale presence in Okinawa, Japan's southernmost prefecture, since the Second World War, and more than 50,000 military personnel, civilian employees, and family members are stationed there today. Within Japan, Okinawa Prefecture consistently has the highest rate of international marriage, but unlike in the country's northern urban centers, transnational sex and romance continue to be associated with the largely unwanted U.S. military presence. For their part, the individuals I interviewed eschewed such political symbolism, emphasizing instead the everyday successes and failures of living together and raising children, surviving in the military community, and building friendships and family relationships in off-base environments. Their stories speak volumes about on-the-ground relationships between Okinawans and U.S. servicemen, as well as processes of identity formation that blur the boundaries between on-base and off-base communities. On a conceptual level, the dissertation explores the military's impact on local processes of cultural production and reproduction. Specifically, it focuses on the transformation of popular ideas concerning intimacy and family, investigating (1) changing understandings of sexual morality, especially with reference to interracial relationships and broader conceptions of class difference; (2) the flexibility of ideas concerning family responsibilities and obligations, with particular attention to the ways in which American husbands and fathers are incorporated into actual families and communities; and (3) the influence of military institutional concerns on local families as Okinawan military wives are integrated into the global U.S. military community. I argue that military-related social transformations can be discerned within the most intimate situations involving self, sexuality, and family. Furthermore, changing understandings of intimacy and family have become integral to formulations of Okinawan identity and difference, particularly through the appropriation of military transnational couples and their children as symbols of Okinawa's continuing subjugation to both the U.S. military and the Japanese nation-state. The dissertation concludes with questions concerning the impact of the U.S. military, conceptualized as a transnational institutional complex, on similar aspects of cultural production in host communities worldwide.
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Majumdar, Anamika. "South Asian womens narratives of intimacy and marriage in the UK: Making sense of experience through cultural scripts, space and objects." Thesis, London South Bank University, 2011. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.558421.
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This thesis examines the concept of intimacy through exploring experiences of closeness in relationships and how such experiences are understood in the lives of South Asian married women living in the UK. In the context of a lack of empirical exploration of South Asian women’s experiences of intimacy in marriage, the main aim of the research was to consider how participants made sense of their experiences of intimacy/closeness and how such experiences were culturally mediated. The theoretical perspectives of narrative psychology and socio-cultural psychology were combined to explore the relationship between intimacy and culture in the experience of marriage. A narrative psycho-social approach was utilised along with visual research methods to focus on not only the stories told about relationships but also the physical settings in which relationships occurred. As such, the overall focus of the two empirical studies was the identification of experiences of feeling close or not feeling close in personal relationships, and how this was made sense of through narrative and photographs. Nineteen South Asian married women living in the UK were interviewed in total. The first study used life-history interviewing with participants’ own pre-existing photographs, to aid participants in talking about the places they had lived and the close relationships they had in these places, over the course of their lives. In the second study, participants produced a set of photographs of objects and spaces relevant to their everyday married lives, and constructed narratives around them, together with the researcher at interview. The accounts produced were analysed using a combination of narrative analytical approaches, paying attention to broad relationship storylines and particular spatially located episodes. By exploring understandings of intimacy/closeness in South Asian women’s lives over time, and in relation to social, material and spatial contexts, essentialised notions of South Asian women and marriages are problematised. Closeness had various meanings for each participant. While scripts of companionate marriage and disclosing intimacy were often upheld as ideals, ambivalent feelings were resolved by modifying such scripts to include more traditional values of commitment, gendered roles, and essentialised notions of South Asian womanhood. Everyday marital practices within the home, which were mediated by spaces and objects, were also associated with feelings of closeness, indicating participants’ understandings of intimacy beyond self-disclosure and sexuality. In this context, extended family dynamics were problematised as an obstacle to the creation of symbolic and literal iv spaces for marital intimacy. In relation to the lack of empirical literature on the experience of intimacy in South Asian women’s marriages in the UK, this thesis highlights the plurality of experiences and understandings of both intimacy and culture in South Asian women’s lives.
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Li, Haili. "Queer diaspora and digital intimacy: Chinese queer women's practices for using Rela and HER in Australia." Thesis, Queensland University of Technology, 2021. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/212527/1/Haili_Li_Thesis.pdf.
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This research explores Chinese queer women’s practices for using lesbian social and dating apps such as Rela and HER in Australia. It highlights how social and cultural contexts played instrumental roles in shaping the development trajectories and technological infrastructures of Rela and HER and the Australia-based Chinese queer women’s digital intimacy practices. Findings in this thesis enrich our understanding of queer diasporas and their digital media use in cross-cultural and transnational contexts.
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Tewell, Mackenzie Rae. ""When You Tell Them, Your Secret is Out There": Experiences of Sexuality and Intimacy Among HIV Positive Black Women." Scholar Commons, 2013. http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/etd/4592.
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HIV/AIDS infections disproportionately impact African Americans within the United States. In 2010, black Americans made up 12 percent of the United States population, yet accounted for 44 percent of new HIV/AIDS infections (Kaiser Family Foundation 2013). The majority of black women (85 percent) are infected with the virus through heterosexual contact, meaning it is critical examine their sexual lives in order to gain insight into this infection within this population (CDC 2011b). Through semi-structured interviews at a Tampa, Florida AIDS service organization, this study presents the experiences of sexuality and intimacy among HIV positive black women. Results demonstrate that HIV impacts much more than sexuality in the lives of these women, and that their sexual and romantic satisfaction, disclosure patterns and mechanisms for decreasing further transmission are influenced by emotional connections, feelings of closeness, love, and intimacy, and are often motivated by non-traditional messages about health.
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Wu, Tianqi. "Gender Indexicality and Perception of Intimacy in the Chinese Media: A Critical Discourse Analysis from Contemporary Urban-Themed Television Drama Serials." Thesis, The University of Sydney, 2021. https://hdl.handle.net/2123/26365.
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Chinese television drama has grown exponentially since 2000 to become one of the most dominant cultural forms of televisual entertainment. Its influence on everyday life is considerable. Among the range of drama genres, those featuring urban life and emotion have projected prominent social issues onto household screens. Originating as “pink dramas”, urban-themed television dramas have facilitated the creation of a contemporary public sphere where subjects pertaining to gender identities, intimacy, and changing power dynamics in romantic relationships can be openly discussed, evaluated, and further developed. This project explores televisual representations of femininities, masculinities, and male-female intimate relationships through two selected TV drama serials between 2003 and 2017.
This project showcases the intricacy of gender identities and romantic intimacy in the Chinese urban context via a critical discourse analysis. Specifically, the analysis starts with television conversations to examine aspects of femininities and masculinities as they negotiate, compromise, and come into being within interaction. This is followed by an investigation into the discursive practices, utilising YouTube comments to elucidate the processes of audience reception. Finally, the sociocultural practices are extrapolated to discuss factors emergent from the Chinese cultural and linguistic context that further contribute to the shape of the romantic relationships examined.
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Kania-Lundholm, Magdalena. "Re-Branding A Nation Online : Discourses on Polish Nationalism and Patriotism." Doctoral thesis, Uppsala universitet, Sociologiska institutionen, 2012. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-180903.
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The aim of this dissertation is two-fold. First, the discussion seeks to understand the concepts of nationalism and patriotism and how they relate to one another. In respect to the more critical literature concerning nationalism, it asks whether these two concepts are as different as is sometimes assumed. Furthermore, by problematizing nation-branding as an “updated” form of nationalism, it seeks to understand whether we are facing the possible emergence of a new type of nationalism. Second, the study endeavors to discursively analyze the ”bottom-up” processes of national reproduction and re-definition in an online, post-socialist context through an empirical examination of the online debate and polemic about the new Polish patriotism. The dissertation argues that approaching nationalism as a broad phenomenon and ideology which operates discursively is helpful for understanding patriotism as an element of the nationalist rhetoric that can be employed to study national unity, sameness, and difference. Emphasizing patriotism within the Central European context as neither an alternative to nor as a type of nationalism may make it possible to explain the popularity and continuous endurance of nationalism and of practices of national identification in different and changing contexts. Instead of facing a new type of nationalism, we can then speak of new forms of engagement which take place in cyberspace that contribute to the process of reproduction of nationalism. The growing field of nation-branding, with both its practical and political implications, is presented as one of the ways in which nationalism is reproduced and maintained as a form of “soft” rather than “hard” power within the global context. The concept of nation re-branding is introduced in order to account for the role that citizens play in the process of nation branding, which has often been neglected in the literature. This concept is utilized to critically examine, understand, and explain the dynamics of nation brand construction and re-definition, with a particular focus on the discursive practices of citizens in cyberspace. It is argued that citizens in the post-socialist countries, including Poland, can engage in the process of nation re-branding online. It is also argued that this process of online nation re-branding may legitimately be regarded as a type of civic practice through which citizens connect with each other and reproduce a form of cultural national intimacy. The results of the analysis of the online empirical material illustrate that nation re-branding is a complex, dynamic, and ambivalent phenomenon. It involves a process of discursive negotiation of nation and of national identity, but also challenges, dismantles, and transforms the national image as it is communicated both internally and externally. This reveals nation re-branding as an element in the post-socialist transformation from a ”nation” to a ”Western,” ”modern,” and ”normal” country in which dealing with an ”old” nation brand is as equally important as the introduction of the new brand. Nationalism does not disappear in the digital age, but rather becomes part of the new way of doing politics online, whereby citizens are potentially granted a form of agency in the democratic process.
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Beccarelli, Marine. "Micros de nuits : histoire de la radio nocturne en France, 1945-2012." Thesis, Paris 1, 2016. http://www.theses.fr/2016PA01H210.
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Pendant plusieurs décennies, des années 1950 jusqu’au début des années 2000, les nuits des ondes hertziennes françaises étaient peuplées de voix multiples, célèbres puis anonymes, souvent feutrées et confidentes. Ces voix s’accordaient à l’atmopshère de la nuit. Trouvant refuge dans cet espace-temps alternatif, elles profitaient de ces heures, situées en dehors du temps social majoritaire, pour s’exprimer. La radio nocturne constituait un espace de rêves et d’expérimentations, de rencontres et de dialogues, offrant aux auditeurs de la nuit un accompagnement, une fenêtre ouverte sur le monde, sur les autres et sur l’intime. Ce travail propose de retracer l’histoire de ces programmes des heures noires, à travers une approche chronologique de leur évolution. L’analyse des émissions est croisée avec celle de la réception, notamment permise par les courriers d’auditeurs, ainsi qu’avec l’observation des imaginaires véhiculés autour de l’objet «radio de nuit». Histoire des productions radiophoniques, des pratiques et des perceptions nocturnes, cette thèse entend mettre en lumière le monde des ondes de la nuit, distinguer les différentes phases de son développement, ainsi que ses spécificités. Situé au carrefour de l’histoire de la radio et de celle de la nuit, Micros de nuit se présente aussi comme une contribution à l’histoire des sensibilités du second vingtième siècle<br>During several decades, from the 1950’s until the beginning of the 2000’s, french night-time radio waves were filled with numerous voices, famous or anonymous, often muted and intimate. These voices matched well with the nocturnal atmosphere. Finding a refuge in this alternate space-time, they took advantage of these hours, located outside of the majority social time, to express theirselves. Night-time radio constituted a space for dreams and experimentations, meetings and dialogues, offering a support to night-time listeners, a window open to the rest of the world, the others and the intimacy. This study recounts the history of all-night french radio, throug a chronological approach, focusing on the broadcasts, their reception, as well as the imaginaries drifting around them. History of radio productions, nocturnal habits and perceptions, this thesis intend to highlight the wave night world, to distinguish its different phases and its key features. Located at the crossroad of radio history and night-time history, Micros de nuit constitutes also a contribution to an history of sensibilities for the second half of the 20th century
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Sadowski, Helga. "Digital Intimacies : Doing Digital Media Differently." Doctoral thesis, Linköpings universitet, Tema Genus, 2016. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-132634.
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Digital media have become an integral part of many people’s everyday lives and constitute an intimate presence therein. Utilizing the concept of digital intimacy to focus on these recent developments, this doctoral dissertation takes the perspectives of feminist cultural studies and affect theory to analyze how digital media are becoming more intimate and how in turn intimacy is remediated within digital cultures. This research brings together three different strategic examples of digital intimacy. The first is chosen from the context of online hate and harassment, and works to counteract digital forms of intimidation. The second is from the world of software development training initiatives tailored for women and designed to make them digitally intimate. The third investigates the digital subculture around ASMR (‘autonomous sensory meridian response’), which is an intimate multi-sensory stimulation induced by such things as online video clips. It is argued that these three initiatives are good illustrations of contemporary gender relations in digital cultures, and also do digital media differently. This means that they develop and apply sometimes straightforward, sometimes rather playful strategies to counteract gender-based inimicalities (such as forms of discrimination or exclusion, or objectification) within digital cultures. The thesis argues that such digitally intimate strategies can be utilized analytically in order to contribute to contemporary feminist internet politics.<br>Digitala medier har blivit en integrerad del av och en intim närvaro i många människors vardag. Med hjälp av begreppet digital intimitet, som tar dessa förändringar på allvar, analyserar denna avhandling hur digitala medier blir mer intima och hur intimitet remedieras i digitala kulturer. Detta görs utifrån perspektiv hämtade från feministiska kulturstudier och affektteori. Tre olika strategiska exempel på digital intimitet diskuteras. Det första exemplet hanterar näthat och trakasserier online och utgör ett slags motståndsstrategier. Det andra handlar om utbildningsinitiativ inom programmering riktade till kvinnor, ämnade att ge kvinnor större digital tillgång, närhet och närvaro. Det tredje fallet undersöker den digitala subkulturen kring ASMR (’autonomous sensory meridian response’), en intim multi-sensorisk stimulering som ofta understöds av videoklipp online. Det hävdas här att dessa strategiska exempel, först och främst, synliggör samtida genusrelationer i digitala kulturer, men även visar hur digitala medier gör genus på nya sätt. Med detta menas att i medierna både bevaras genuskonventioner och tillämpas nya, ibland lekfulla strategier för att motverka könsrelaterad fientlighet inom digitala kulturer. Avhandlingen hävdar att de tre studerade strategierna för digital intimitet kan användas analytiskt för att bidra till en samtida feministisk internetpolitik.
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Chen, Wei-Ping. "“Parisian seduction”, romantic emotion and cultural consumption : a discursive study on the ideal of female singlehood in Taiwan and France." Thesis, Paris, EHESS, 2019. http://www.theses.fr/2019EHES0126.
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Les propos de « Parisiennes célibataires » témoignent de la quête de la femme pour un idéal d’intimité, structuré autour d’une série d’aspirations individualistes et consuméristes. Cette culture de consommation est déjà devenue prépondérante à Taïwan, en France, et dans de nombreuses autres sociétés, et elle joue un rôle important dans les liens entre les émotions et les attentes amoureuses des femmes et la consommation culturelle. La préoccupation émergente des médias pour un contrôle constant et réflexif de la présentation de soi et des actions des individus a pénétré la culture moderne relative à l’intimité et influencé de manière significative la vie des femmes. Dans le même temps, la quête d’authenticité est un élément clé obligeant les individus à interagir avec les biens de consommation et expliquer leur implication dans le capitalisme. Cette étude vise à éclairer la complexité qui relie la consommation culturelle aux subjectivités individuelles dans l’intimité moderne. Par l’étude de l’imaginaire de la « séduction à la Parisiennes » qui les pousse à adopter un mode de vie marqué par le charme féminin, l’épanouissement personnel et l’autonomie, cette analyse s’interroge sur la façon dont — et dans quelle mesure — l’aspiration individualiste offerte par l’éthos de la « célibataire parisienne » s’entremêle à la culture genrée de l’intimité. Elle cherche également à savoir par quel type de processus culturel les femmes transforment la consommation en subjectivités romantico-féministes et vice versa.Cette étude se sert de l’analyse textuelle qualitative d’articles recueillis auprès de six ressources médiatiques en ligne et d’entretiens approfondis avec 20 lectrices ou rédactrices afin de définir les relations entre les acteurs, les textes et les contextes sociaux. L’analyse de ces discours montre que les femmes ayant participé tendent à déclarer être détachées de leur rôle traditionnel « genré » et à souscrire à l’idée de l’épanouissement personnel sur le plan de la sexualité et sur le plan professionnel, alors qu’elles souffrent énormément de ces aspirations individualistes. Dans ce contexte, les discours étudiés correspondent précisément à l’ambivalence du célibat féminin et favorisent la réflexion des femmes sur elles-mêmes en leur procurant l’imagination, intégrée de façon nébuleuse à la consommation quotidienne, afin d’« auto-justifier », « auto-orienter », et « auto-ajuster » des valeurs contradictoires. Un autre combat de tous les jours envisage le concept d’« évoluer ensemble » inhérent à la tension sous-jacente entre l’engagement d’une relation intime qui dure toute la vie et la nécessité d’une compatibilité amoureuse basée sur des critères idéologiques. Les émotions, les qualités personnelles et les manifestations intellectuelles qui transcendent au-delà du corps vieillissant des femmes, car les attentes supposées concernant l’intime et le sex-appeal sont largement valorisées dans ces discours. Elles sont censées plus réalisables et plus soumises à l’examen encore qu’une transformation physique. En outre, en occultant la définition de « bonne » féminité par une créativité consumériste et en minimisant en même temps l’empreinte consumériste dans la vie intime, les subjectivités des femmes oscillent entre individualisme et conformisme social. Les femmes pouvant montrer leur capacité à consommer du luxe, et le transposer d’une consommation impulsive à une consommation réflexive en tant qu’objectif collectif, sont considérées comme capables de se détacher des contraintes relatives au passage d’un rôle genré à un autre<br>The discourses regarding “single Parisian women” demonstrate women’s quest for the ideal of intimacy, structured by a series of individualistic and consumerist aspirations. This consumer culture has already become prominent in Taiwan, France, and many other societies, and plays an important role in connecting women’s romantic emotions and expectations with cultural consumption. The emerging media preoccupation with constant and reflexive monitoring of individuals’ self-presentation and actions has penetrated the contemporary culture of intimacy and significantly influenced women’s lives. Meanwhile, the quest for authenticity is a key element compelling individuals to engage with consumerist goods and justify their involvement with capitalism. This study aims to illuminate the complexity connecting cultural consumption to individual subjectivities in contemporary intimacy. By studying the imagination of “single Parisian women” that encourages women to adopt the lifestyle marked by feminine charm, self-fulfillment and autonomy, this study asks how and to what extent does the individualistic aspiration offered by the “single Parisian women” ethos intersect with the gendered culture of intimacy? Through what kind of cultural process do women turn consumption into romantic-feminist subjectivities, and vice versa?Qualitative textual analysis of the articles collected from six online media resources and the in-depth interviews with 20 readers or editors were used to define the relations between actors, texts, and social contexts. Analysis of the discourses shows that women under study tend to claim to be detached from their “traditional” gendered roles and subscribe to the idea of self-fulfillment regarding sexuality and profession, while they suffer greatly from such individualist aspiration. In this context, the discourses studied precisely respond to the ambivalence of female singlehood and facilitate women’s self-reflection by providing them with the imagination, obscurely woven into everyday consumption, to self-justify -guide, and -adjust vis-à-vis the contradictory values. Another day-to-day struggle considers the idea of “evolving together,” related to the underlying tension between the commitment of a life-long intimate relationship and the need for romantic compatibility based on ideological criteria. Emotions, personal qualities, and intellectual displays that transcend beyond women’s aging bodies as the imagined expectations of intimacy and sexiness are largely promoted in these discourses. They are believed to be even more attainable and subject to examination than a bodily makeover. Besides, by obscuring the definition of “good” femininity with consumerist creativity and simultaneously minimizing the consumerist traces in intimate life, women’s subjectivities oscillate between individuality and social conformity. Women who can demonstrate their ability to consume luxury and turn it from impulsive to reflexive consumption as a collective purpose, are deemed as capable of being detached from the overwhelming demands of switching between different gendered roles. Based on these results, I conclude that the ideal of intimacy cannot be fully understood without considering the gender issues these discourses want, pretend, or fail to tackle. Additionally, cultural consumption should relate to its subsequent variations such as gender and feminist concerns, wherein lie the complexity between imagined expectations and the limitations of individuals’ daily lives
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Nehring, Daniel. "Intimacy, Culture and Modernity in Urban Mexico." Thesis, University of Essex, 2007. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.486594.
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This thesis explores cultural constructions of couple relationships in contemporary urban Mexico in the context of recent processes of social change. Its main objectives are to explore the general understandings which young university graduates from Mexico City have regarding couple relationships and to examine the ways in which they draw on these understandings to account for relevant experiences and practices. To achieve these objectives, I conducted life history interviews with young men and women in Mexico City who at the time of our interviews were either studying or working in a range of professional and academic occupations. Furthermore, I document these young people's cultural environment and the gendered cultural logics present in it through the analysis of self-help books and self help texts in magazines.
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Lewis, Philippa Rhiannon Grodecka. "Imagining intimacy in French literature and culture, 1830-1870." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2015. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.708630.
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Jhingon, Garima. "The Relationship Between Identity and Intimacy as Moderated by Culture." Master's thesis, University of Central Florida, 2012. http://digital.library.ucf.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ETD/id/5321.
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Several important developmental processes occur in the young adulthood period. Young adults form their identities, determine trajectories regarding careers, and typically they form intimate relationships. Erikson (1963) stated that healthy identity development during adolescence is a necessary precursor to intimacy in romantic relationships during emerging adulthood. Although findings from cross-sectional and short-term longitudinal studies somewhat confirm the proposed link between identity and intimacy development, none of them addresses the role of culture in moderating Erikson's tenets of developmental ordering. The primary goal of the present investigation was to determine the role of cultural orientation in identity and intimacy development among emerging adults today. Participants included 422 university students (mean age = 20.80, sd = 3.63) were recruited from one urban university in Delhi, India (n = 96), two urban universities in Beijing, China (n = 180), and one urban university in Orlando, USA (n = 146). Among this sample, 36.7% were males, and 63.3% were females. All participants completed a battery of measures, including a Demographic Questionnaire, the Ego Identity Process Questionnaire, the Experiences in Close Relationships Scale, and the Cultural Orientation Scale. Our first hypothesis that identity would predict intimacy in relationships was confirmed. Our second hypothesis that identity development will be a negative predictor for both relationship anxiety and relationship avoidance in romantic relationships was also confirmed. The third hypothesis that females would endorse more collectivistic cultural values compared with males, who will endorse more individualistic cultural values was also confirmed. Finally, our fourth hypothesis that the relationship between identity and intimacy would be moderated by cultural orientation, such that it will be stronger among those that endorse more individualistic cultural values compared to those who endorse more collectivistic cultural values was not supported. Results from the multiple regression analysis indicated that although identity and cultural orientation considered alone were significant predictors of intimacy in relationships, the relationship between identity and intimacy were moderated by cultural orientation only for relationship anxiety, such that a strong sense of identity along with a collectivistic cultural orientation predicted less relationship anxiety. Further analyses and implications for professional practice are discussed.<br>ID: 031001324; System requirements: World Wide Web browser and PDF reader.; Mode of access: World Wide Web.; Adviser: Steven L. Berman.; Title from PDF title page (viewed April 1, 2013).; Thesis (M.A.)--University of Central Florida, 2012.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 64-71).<br>M.A.<br>Masters<br>Psychology<br>Sciences<br>Psychology; Clinical Psychology
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Mole, Thomas Seymour. "Byron's romantic celebrity : industrial culture and the hermeneutic of intimacy." Thesis, University of Bristol, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/1983/36823ff2-0435-43b5-be8e-fcc88fdc179b.
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This thesis argues that modern celebrity culture took shape in the Romantic period, and that Byron should be understood as one of its earliest examples and most astute critics. It investigates the often strained interactions of artistic endeavour and commercial enterprise, the material conditions of Byron's publications, and the place of celebrity culture in the history of the self. It understands celebrity as a cultural apparatus structured by the relations between an individual, an industry and an audience, which emerged at a distinct historical moment. In the Romantic period, it contends, industrialised print culture overcrowded the public sphere with named individuals and alienated cultural producers and consumers. Celebrity tackled the surfeit of public personality by branding an individual's identity to make it amenable to commercial promotion, and palliated the sense of alienation by constructing a hermeneutic of intimacy. The thesis investigates Byron's engagement with industrial culture, showing how it empowered and embarrassed him. It considers how changes in his sense of audience while writing Childe Harold's Pilgrimage led Byron to construct the hermeneutic of intimacy in 'To lanthe'. Byron's celebrity included an important visual dimension, which he fostered in his Turkish Tales. The thesis therefore studies the circulation of his image, in authorised and appropriated versions, and the resulting advantages and anxieties for Byron. It argues that when he tried to move his poetry in a new direction with Hebrew Melodies, his attempt was compromised by generic constraints and publishing practices. The legal wrangles of 1816, it contends, made the hermeneutic of intimacy unsustainable. When he returned to Childe Harold, Byron experimented with alternative models of writing and reading. The thesis concludes by considering Don Juan, examining Byron's reading of Montaigne and arguing that the importance of celebrity culture in normalising the modern understanding of subjectivity has been underestimated.
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Campbell, Matthew Alan. "Reel-to-Real: Intimate Audio Epistolarity During the Vietnam War." The Ohio State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1555657052871048.
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Quintana, Shannon M. "Parental and Cultural Influences on Hispanic College Women's Verbal Intimate Partner Violence Victimization: An Examination of Within-Group Differences." FIU Digital Commons, 2014. http://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/etd/1453.
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Prior research has shown that college women in the United States are experiencing significantly high rates of verbal intimate partner violence (IPV); estimates indicate that approximately 20-30% of college women experience verbal IPV victimization (e.g., Hines, 2007; Muñoz-Rivas, Graña, O'Leary, & González, 2009). Verbal IPV is associated with physical consequences, such as chronic pain and migraine headaches, and psychological implications, including anxiety, depression, suicidal ideation, and substance use (Coker et al., 2002). However, few studies have examined verbal IPV in college populations, and none have focused on Hispanic college women who are members of the largest minority population on college campuses today (Pew Research Center, 2013), and experience higher rates of IPV victimization (Ingram, 2007). The current dissertation sought to address these gaps by examining the influence of familial conflict strategies on Hispanic college women’s verbal IPV victimization. Further, within group differences were explored, with specific attention paid to the role of acculturation and gender role beliefs. A total of 906 from two Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) in the southeastern (N=502) and southwestern (N=404) United States participated in the three part study. Study one examined the influence of parental conflict strategies on Hispanic women’s verbal IPV victimization in current romantic relationships. Consistent with previous research, results indicated that parental use of verbal violence influenced verbal IPV victimization in the current romantic relationship. A unidirectional effect of paternal use of verbal aggression towards the participant on maternal verbal aggression towards the participant was also found. Study two examined the influence of parental conflict strategies, acculturation, and gender role beliefs on victimization. Acculturation and gender role beliefs were found to not have an influence on participants’ verbal IPV victimization. Study three examined within-group differences using Study two’s model. Differences were found between the southeastern and southwestern participants; gender role beliefs increased rates of verbal IPV victimization in the southeastern population. The current dissertation fills a gap in the literature on IPV experiences in Hispanic college populations, the importance of examining verbal IPV trends, and highlights importance differing cultural influences within populations traditionally viewed as homogenous. The implications for future research are discussed.
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Wilson-Kovacs, Dana. "Women, pleasure and everyday life : an ethnographic investigation into the cultures of sexual intimacy." Thesis, University of Exeter, 2004. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.407305.
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Heintz, John Isaac Blanco. "Caged: Intimate Violence and the Search for Sovereignty at the Margins of the City." Thesis, Harvard University, 2016. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:33493346.
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“Caged” is an ethnographic investigation of intimate partner violence in Usme, a peripheral district of Bogotá, Colombia, where 37% of women report having experienced physical violence by a partner and 80% report some form of controlling behavior. The purpose of this research has been to understand the exercise of this violence through the lives and positions of those who survive it, those who respond to it, and most of all those who commit it. What their experiences from the margins of the city illuminate is that in the intimate dynamics of violence—the perpetrations of it and the resistances against it—are reverberations of the same spatial inscriptions and social logics that have shaped relationships of power and control from the municipal to hemispheric scales. The intricate webs of contradiction and paradox that this produces are what have provided the apertures for engagement, as well as the means by which to appreciate the tensions that cut across, connect, and constitute these acts of violence. In the context of ever-expanding legal apparatuses to address these forms of abuse, these junctures have become sites of rethinking sovereign relationships and the spaces that they have created, how consciousness emerges from them, and they have raised new questions about the place of subversion and aspirations for transformation of the self and society.<br>Anthropology
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Woolner, Christina. "The labour of love songs : voicing intimacy in Somaliland." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2018. https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/286359.
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This dissertation is about the work of love songs in Hargeysa, Somaliland. In a setting where music and expressions of love are conspicuously absent from public soundscapes, I explore the lives and labour of a genre as it moves and is moved across time and space, the singing and speaking voices that animate these songs, and the entanglement of love songs in the mediation of intimacy and the shaping of contested post-war soundscapes. What, I ask, is a love song? In a setting marked by war, where music-making and expressions of love are contested, what do love songs do? And how do they do what they do? In answering these questions, I take love songs in motion as my primary ethnographic object and investigate the "labour" of love songs in two senses: the intimate human labour by which love songs are made, circulated, heard, performed and put to assorted uses, and the social-aesthetic-affective labour that a genre itself performs. Based on eighteen months of field-research with poets, musicians, singers, music-lovers and love-suffering audiences in Hargeysa, I track love songs through various stages of their multi-faceted lives: as they first come into the world through the collaboration of a poet and his muse, a musician and a singer; as they circulate and are re-animated alongside stories of singers and stories of encounters; as they are re-figured by the ears and voices of attentive listeners; as their sounding is learned by musicians; and as their live performance is negotiated and received in contested urban terrain. I show the primary labour of love songs to be the distillation, performance and creation of intimate social relations: intimate relations predicated on "dareen-wadaag" ("feeling-sharing") that transcend everyday cleavages and prohibitions, and that have the power to shape both individuals' personal intimate lives and the socio-political worlds in which songs move and do their work. I argue that love songs' ability to distill and open space for intimacy rests on an ideology of voice that figures the voice as a deeply personal mode of self-expression and the simultaneously multi-vocal practices of voicing by which love songs are animated. In other words, the "voice" is made - and made intimate - by its multi-faceted multi-vocal sociality. In so doing, this dissertation contributes to understandings of the workings and power of popular culture in Africa and beyond, recent anthropological efforts to hold together the sonic and social dynamics of the "voice", and broader anthropological conversations about the mediated, multi-vocal making of persons and social worlds.
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Sanger, Tamara Jane. "Desiring difference? : transpeople's intimate partnerships and the cultural construction of gender and sexuality." Thesis, Queen's University Belfast, 2008. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.479334.
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Montoya, Letticia. "Surviving Love| Exploring Same-Sex Intimate Partner Violence among Women of Color." Thesis, California State University, Long Beach, 2018. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=10784418.
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<p> Within a framework of intersectionality, this thesis explores the multidimensional experiences women of color have in abusive same-sex relationships. It also explores the tremendous influence those experiences have on their lives. Although intimate partner violence (IPV) in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community has become increasingly visible within the past two decades, media and scholarship continue to focus on heterosexual incidents of domestic violence. Relying on the powerful narratives of four women of color who are IPV survivors, I examine social constructs such as familial violence, homophobia, racism, and poverty, that contribute to lesbian intimate partner violence. I also present reasons for and consequences of staying in an abusive relationship. The findings of this study indicate that intimate partner violence is a symptom of oppression for socially marginalized lesbians of color and not a source.</p><p>
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Galvez, Gino. "Work-related Intimate Partner Violence: The Role of Acculturation Among Employed Latinos in Batterer Intervention Programs." PDXScholar, 2011. https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/170.
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Intimate partner violence (IPV), typically considered in the domestic context, has been shown to have considerable effects on women's employment and health. While the literature has recently grown in this area, very few studies have examined the prevalence of work-related IPV among men. Furthermore, the extant literature on work-related IPV has largely ignored the experience of ethnic minorities, specifically Latinos. Many factors suggest that rates and forms of IPV might be different among other racial and ethnic groups. Some studies that examine IPV among Latinos have sought to understand the role of acculturation and socioeconomic contexts. The purpose of this study was to examine work-related IPV among a sample of men enrolled in batterer intervention programs. In addition, we sought to examine the relationship between acculturation, socioeconomic contexts, and reports of work-related IPV among a subset of male Latinos. Overall, the findings confirm the upper ranges of previous estimates across studies (36% to 75%) of employed victims of IPV and their harassment by abusive partners while at work (Swanberg, Logan, & Macke, 2005; Taylor & Barusch, 2004). Specifically, we found that 60% of the entire sample reported work-related IPV that involved threatening behaviors and physical violence at their partner's job. The findings among Latinos suggest that a positive relationship exists between acculturation and work-related IPV. Specifically, proxy variables of acculturation (e.g., country of birth, language of survey, number of years in the U.S.) were hypothesized to be positively associated with higher levels of acculturation. Consistent with the hypotheses, we found significant relationships in the direction proposed. Lastly, socioeconomic status (e.g., income, education, employment status) was hypothesized to play a moderating role between acculturation and work-related IPV. However, results generally suggest that socioeconomic status (i.e., income, education) did not moderate the relationship between acculturation and work-related IPV. This study makes important contributions to the literature and has implications for employers. The significant rates of work-related IPV found in this study highlight the need to address this problem among employed males as an important step in preventing work-related IPV. Among Latinos, the level of acculturation and factors such as income, employment, and education are important contextual factors that provide a better understanding of IPV in Latino communities (Gryywacz, Rao, Gentry, Marin, & Arcury, 2009).
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Wiggins, Tiffany. "Predictive Relationships Between Cultural Coping Strategies, Intimate Partner Violence, and Depression in African American Women." ScholarWorks, 2018. https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/dissertations/5290.
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Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women has been linked to long-term, negative health consequences such as depression, PTSD, and suicidal ideation. There is a growing perception that African American women are the most affected by IPV, but the current literature does not confirm this perception. The purpose of this nonexperimental, correlational study was to examine the predictive relationships between the independent variables (spiritual coping, religious coping, and levels of IPV) and the dependent variable (level of depression). The ecological systems theory provided the framework for the study. The research question addressed how well variables such as religious coping, spiritual coping, and level of IPV predicted levels of depression in African American women. Convenience sampling was used to recruit 63 participants. Data were collected using a survey methodology. Multiple linear regression was used to analyze the data. Results indicated a statistically significant negative correlation between spiritual coping and depression, as well as a statistically significant positive correlation between IPV scores and level of depression. No statistically relationship was found between religious coping and depression. Human services and other professionals could use the results to advocate for the development of educational and counseling programs that inform African American women of the benefits of culturally based coping strategies such as spiritual coping. Findings from the study could contribute to social change by adding information to the literature on coping strategies that can potentially improve negative outcomes such as levels of depression for female survivors of IPV, particularly African American Women.
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Mullen, Lisa. "Mid-century gothic : the agency and intimacy of uncanny objects in post-war British literature and culture." Thesis, Birkbeck (University of London), 2016. http://bbktheses.da.ulcc.ac.uk/189/.
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This thesis reassesses the years 1945-1955 as a hingepoint in British culture, a moment when literature, film and art responded to the wartime hiatus of consumer capitalism by resisting the turn towards conspicuous consumption and self-commodification. This resistance can be discerned in a gothic impulse in post-war culture, in which uncanny encounters with haunted, recalcitrant or overassertive objects proliferated, and provided a critique of the subject/object relationship on which consumerism was predicated. In the opening chapter, the ubiquity of bombsite rubble is brought into dialogue with mid-century mural painting both in literature and at the Festival of Britain. In the second chapter, Barbara Jones’s Black Eyes and Lemonade exhibition of ephemera is considered alongside the work of the Independent Group. The third chapter examines how the period’s new media and computing hardware further complicated the status of the subject, through an analysis of the work of George Orwell, Alan Turing and William Grey Walter. In the fourth chapter, haunted furniture and domestic ephemera threaten to become rival subjectivities, in works including Elizabeth Bowen’s The Heat of the Day and Marghanita Laski’s The Victorian Chaise Longue. The fifth chapter considers the ways in which mid-century clothes and apparel enabled or restricted the autonomy of their wearers, through a comparative analysis of the Coronation, the British Everest expedition, and Britten’s coronation opera Gloriana. Finally, the onset of atomic anxiety is explored through stories about bombs, prosthetics and bodily penetration including Powell and Pressburger’s The Small Back Room. The thesis concludes that the intimacy and agency of these unruly objects remain as half-submerged cultural signposts offering an alternative understanding of twentieth-century materialism.
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Oramas, Laura A. "The Influence of Parental Aggression and Cultural Gender Role Beliefs on Hispanic College Women's Experiences with Psychological Aggression." FIU Digital Commons, 2015. http://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/etd/2210.
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Psychological aggression is present in as many as 89-97% of college women’s intimate relationships (Cercone, Beach, & Arias, 2005; Riggs & O’Leary, 1996). Victimization has been linked to negative physical and mental health consequences including depression, anxiety, and chronic pain (Coker, Smith, Bethea, King, & McKeown, 2000; Derrick, Testa, & Leonard, 2014; Pico-Alfonso et al., 2006). Psychological aggression also serves as a risk factor for future or continued physical intimate partner violence (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2014), which can result in bruises, broken bones, or in extreme cases, even death. Parental modeling of appropriate relationship behaviors may be an important factor in young adult women’s learning how to behave in their own intimate relationships. Studies have produced mixed results when assessing the role of engendered cultural influences on this phenomenon, with many reporting that women holding traditional gender role beliefs are at an increased risk for experiencing relationship aggression (Brownridge, 2002; CDC, 2014; Eaton & Matamala, 2014; Fitzpatrick, Salgado, Suvak, King, & King, 2004). The current dissertation seeks to investigate the roles of traditional, culturally informed gender role beliefs in the intergenerational modeling of psychological aggression in Hispanic college women’s intimate relationships. A total of 687 students from a large Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) in the southeastern United States participated in this study. The results of Study 1 showed that parental use of psychological aggression and participants’ beliefs consistent with caballerismo influenced Hispanic college women’s victimization in their intimate relationships. The results of Study 2 indicated that parental use of psychological aggression, participants’ beliefs consistent with marianismo, and participants’ beliefs sanctioning their own use of psychological aggression toward their boyfriends significantly influenced Hispanic college women’s perpetration of this type of aggression in their intimate relationships. The findings from this dissertation are important as few studies have examined intimate partner violence or conflict strategies in Hispanic college populations, despite the fact that they constitute the largest group of ethnic minority women on campuses today (Fry, 2011). Further, they contribute to our ability to effectively critique traditional gender beliefs used to examine Hispanic women’s behavioral and psychological outcomes.
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Townsend, Rebecca Marie Hudson Fraser Berkley. "Webs of intimacy and influence unraveling writing culture at Harper's magazine during the Willie Morris years (1967-1971) /." Diss., Columbia, Mo. : University of Missouri--Columbia, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10355/5356.
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The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on January 19, 2010). Thesis advisor: Dr. Berkley Hudson. Includes bibliographical references.
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Hampton, Darlene Rose 1976. "Beyond resistance: Gender, performance, and fannish practice in digital culture." Thesis, University of Oregon, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/1794/11070.
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x, 160 p. : ill. (some col.)<br>Although the web appears to be a welcoming space for women, online spaces--like offline spaces--are rendered female through associations with the personal/private, embodiment, or an emphasis on intimacy. As such, these spaces are marked, marginalized, and often dismissed. Using an explicitly interdisciplinary approach that combines cultural studies models with feminist theory, new media studies, and performance, Beyond Resistance uses fandom as a way to render visible the invisible ways that repressive discourses of gender are woven throughout digital culture. I examine a variety of online fan practices that use popular media to perform individual negotiations of repressive ideologies of sex and gender, such as fan-authored fiction, role-playing games, and vids and machinima--digital videos created from re-editing television and video game texts. Although many of these negotiations are potentially resistive, I demonstrate how that potential is being limited and redirected in ways that actually reinforce constructions of gender that support the dominant culture.
The centrality of traditional notions of sex and gender in determining the value of fan practices, through both popular representation and critical analysis, serves as a microcosm of how discourses of gender are operating within digital culture to support the continued gendering of the public and private spheres within digital space. This gendering contributes to the ongoing subordination of women under patriarchy by marginalizing or dismissing their concerns, labor, and cultural tastes.<br>Committee in charge: Priscilla Ovalle, Chairperson;
Kathleen Karlyn, Member;
Michael Aronson, Member;
Kate Mondloch, Outside Member
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McKilligin, Elaine. "Characterisation and comparison of cell culture models of intimal smooth muscle cells." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 1999. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.624223.
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Downey, Genesis M. "Constructing Elysium and Playing Ugly: Methods of Intimacy in Fantasy Role-Playing Game Communities." Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1435242565.
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Light, Rachel Rose. "Fourteen Years of Silence: An Exploration of Intimate Partner Violence in the Jewish Community." Yale University, 2006. http://ymtdl.med.yale.edu/theses/available/etd-06282006-112457/.
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With the background that Jewish women stay in abusive marriages twice as long as their non-Jewish American counterparts, we attempt to understand the religious and cultural factors that may inhibit Jewish women from leaving violent relationships, and examine Scriptural and Rabbinic texts as to Jewish beliefs regarding spousal violence. A variety of academic sources and primary scriptural texts were analyzed for religious and cultural attitudes towards Jewish intimate partner violence. Eight Jewish victims of spousal abuse, five Rabbis and seventeen community support workers were interviewed. Jewish women face a variety of unique issues with regard to how domestic violence is experienced. Issues of communal shame, fear of anti-Semitism, learned accommodation, community disapproval, divorce law and other cultural and religious factors act as barriers to leaving. Biblical, Talmudic, and Rabbinic texts, however, speak clearly against marital violence and support a community effort toward victim support. There are thus conflicts between actual Jewish religious doctrine, and the interpretation of Jewish values amongst Jewish community members. There are social and cultural barriers to Jewish women leaving their abusive relationships, but an analysis of religious doctrine offers a source of strength for women to leave. The onus is on the Jewish community to effect change by breaking the silence and renouncing abuse.
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Blanco, Fernando A. "Deviants, Dissidents, Perverts: Chile Post Pinochet." The Ohio State University, 2009. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1244262894.
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LIFRANCHI, FRANCESCA. "INVARIANZA E INTERDIPENDENZA NELLE RELAZIONI INTIME DEI GIOVANI ADULTI: UNO STUDIO CROSS-CULTURALE." Doctoral thesis, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10280/706.
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Questo lavoro di ricerca ha un duplice obiettivo: valutare l’interdipendenza delle relazioni intime, valutando in particolare come la relazione romantica sia connessa a quella con i genitori, e indagare il legame tra l’individuazione e la qualità delle relazioni con il padre e con la madre in età giovane adulta. Poiché la letteratura ha messo in luce come vi siano diverse traiettorie all’età adulta, questi obiettivi sono stati esaminati confrontando tre diverse nazioni, l’Italia, la Germania e la Svezia, che rappresentano un diverso percorso di transizione, per vedere se i legami tra i costrutti possano essere considerati universali. Inoltre, per meglio comprendere come si esplica l’interdipendenza tra le relazioni, sono stati utilizzati i metodi misti. I risultati mostrano che vi è, in effetti, un’interdipendenza tra tutte le relazioni considerate e che, creando diverse tipologie di individuazione, la qualità della relazione con i genitori differisce nelle diverse tipologie. Il legame tra i diversi costrutti considerati è stato trovato sia in Italia che in Germania, benché con delle specificità culturali, mentre la Svezia è la nazione in cui l’interdipendenza risulta essere più debole.<br>The aims of this research are to assess the interdependence of intimate relationships, studying how young adults’ romantic relationship is connected to their parent-child relationship, and to investigate the association between their individuation and the relationship with their mother and father. The literature has show different paths to adulthood, so these aims have been examined by comparing three different countries: Italy, Germany and Sweden, where the transition to adulthood presents different trajectories, in order to test whether the links between the examined constructs can be considered universal. Moreover, in order to better understand how the interdependence of relationships unfolds mixed methods have been used. Findings showed that all relationships considered are indeed interdependent and that the quality of the parent-child relationship differs depending on the different types of individuation investigated. The link among the constructs studied was found both in Italy and in Germany, though with some cultural specificities, while in Sweden interdependence appears to be weaker.
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LIFRANCHI, FRANCESCA. "INVARIANZA E INTERDIPENDENZA NELLE RELAZIONI INTIME DEI GIOVANI ADULTI: UNO STUDIO CROSS-CULTURALE." Doctoral thesis, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10280/706.
Full textAbstract:
Questo lavoro di ricerca ha un duplice obiettivo: valutare l’interdipendenza delle relazioni intime, valutando in particolare come la relazione romantica sia connessa a quella con i genitori, e indagare il legame tra l’individuazione e la qualità delle relazioni con il padre e con la madre in età giovane adulta. Poiché la letteratura ha messo in luce come vi siano diverse traiettorie all’età adulta, questi obiettivi sono stati esaminati confrontando tre diverse nazioni, l’Italia, la Germania e la Svezia, che rappresentano un diverso percorso di transizione, per vedere se i legami tra i costrutti possano essere considerati universali. Inoltre, per meglio comprendere come si esplica l’interdipendenza tra le relazioni, sono stati utilizzati i metodi misti. I risultati mostrano che vi è, in effetti, un’interdipendenza tra tutte le relazioni considerate e che, creando diverse tipologie di individuazione, la qualità della relazione con i genitori differisce nelle diverse tipologie. Il legame tra i diversi costrutti considerati è stato trovato sia in Italia che in Germania, benché con delle specificità culturali, mentre la Svezia è la nazione in cui l’interdipendenza risulta essere più debole.<br>The aims of this research are to assess the interdependence of intimate relationships, studying how young adults’ romantic relationship is connected to their parent-child relationship, and to investigate the association between their individuation and the relationship with their mother and father. The literature has show different paths to adulthood, so these aims have been examined by comparing three different countries: Italy, Germany and Sweden, where the transition to adulthood presents different trajectories, in order to test whether the links between the examined constructs can be considered universal. Moreover, in order to better understand how the interdependence of relationships unfolds mixed methods have been used. Findings showed that all relationships considered are indeed interdependent and that the quality of the parent-child relationship differs depending on the different types of individuation investigated. The link among the constructs studied was found both in Italy and in Germany, though with some cultural specificities, while in Sweden interdependence appears to be weaker.
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Jemison, Sean. "In Between the Dots and Dashes: Telegrams and the Mediation of Intimacy in The Golden Bowl." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2014. http://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/1815.
Full textAbstract:
Using a poststructural and reader-response theoretical framework, the author explores competing ideas of interpretation, epistemology, and the problematic nature of truth and meaning in Henry James’s novel, The Golden Bowl. The author analyzes the ways in which emergent nineteenth century communication technologies, specifically how telegraphy both mediates and facilitates intimacy in a modern landscape. James anticipates modern forms of social media by exploring the nuances and the potential erotic nature of mediated communication and knowledge.
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Sharma, Jyotsana. "Socio-cultural contexts in trauma recovery and post trauma growth in women who experienced intimate partner violence: A social constructivist lens." Diss., Virginia Tech, 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/91891.
Full textAbstract:
Trauma recovery and post trauma growth are two desirable outcomes of a traumatic event. Meaning-making and narrative development are two processes that support both trauma recovery and post trauma growth. The way in which we make meaning or develop stories about the events in our lives however, are governed by socio-cultural contexts. Social constructivism emphasizes that the way in which individuals think, feel, and act are engrained in her being early on by the social and cultural networks that surround her. Therefore, even though an individual may think that she is generating a thought or making a choice, these processes have already been influenced by socio-cultural contexts long before she learned how to speak or formulate a worldview. This study aimed to examine the lived experiences of women who have been through intimate partner violence, tracing their journey towards trauma recovery and post trauma growth, and trying to find how and the extent to which their journeys were affected by socio-cultural contexts. This study takes a social constructivist lens that emphasizes the effects of our socio-cultural environment on individual meaning-making, narrative development, and decision making post trauma. The results of the study indicate that socio-cultural contexts play a significant role in individual responses to trauma like intimate partner violence, and there are socio-cultural components that can facilitate trauma recovery and post trauma growth.<br>Doctor of Philosophy<br>When human beings experience adverse events in life, they can develop a traumatic response to the event. Traumatic response however, is just one possibility. Sometimes individuals who have been through events that have led to a trauma response can also experience resilience, recovery, and even growth. The way in which human beings respond is not only in their power but is also influenced by their environment. Socio-cultural contexts that surround us influence the way in which we make meaning of life events and develop stories or narratives regarding those events. This purpose of this study was to find whether socio-cultural contexts affected women who had experienced intimate partner violence in their meaning-making and narrative development, and how these influences played out in their decision making process post trauma. The study intended to find to what extent trauma recovery and post trauma growth could be influenced by socio-cultural contexts. Additionally, the study wanted to explore how professional counselors may contribute to survivor’s journeys. The results indicate that socio-cultural contexts deeply influence the process of meaning-making and narrative development, thereby affecting trauma recovery and post trauma growth. Additionally, results indicate that professional counselors can play an essential role in facilitating processes that lead to recovery and growth post trauma.
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Wenham, Kathryn. "How Cultural Constructions of Gender Interact with Social Structures to Shape Intimate Partner Violence in the African Immigrant Community in Chicago." Thesis, Griffith University, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/10072/381099.
Full textAbstract:
Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is at unacceptable levels in the majority of
communities around the world, with global figures at about 30% of ever-partnered women
having experienced physical or sexual IPV in their lifetime. Prevalence rates in immigrant
communities are difficult to measure and often contested. However, we do know that the
vulnerability of many women in immigrant communities makes IPV a particular concern. As
a relatively new and fast growing immigrant group, the African immigrant community has
received little research attention, and is often inappropriately studied within the larger Black
American population. Some studies focus on those of particular national or ethnic
backgrounds, making generalisation to immigrants from other national or ethnic backgrounds
difficult.
Scant research and inadequate understanding of IPV within the African immigrant
community leaves limited options for effective prevention. The few studies that had been
conducted focused on the changes in gender roles that occur with immigration. Many men
lose their breadwinner status upon migration, which affects men’s ability to achieve
masculinity. In order to maintain their masculinity, some men resort to violence within the
domestic sphere. In order to fill the gaps in the literature, this research aimed to gain a fuller
understanding of IPV within the African immigrant community, including the types of IPV
that are used and the factors that contribute to men enacting such violence. In particular this
research investigates how cultural constructions of gender interact with social structures to
shape IPV. While recognising the diversity within this population, this study focused on some
of the commonalities that shape IPV within the various African immigrant communities.
This research drew on three theoretical frameworks: ecological framework, intersectionality,
and hegemonic and multiple masculinities. The ecological framework was used primarily to
structure the many factors that influence IPV. Its limitation is that it does not provide any
explanatory models, particularly around the research focus of gender. Intersectionality was
used to fill this gap, however its emphasis on power and oppression between genders limited
our ability to analyse differences within genders that might be shaping IPV within this
community. Therefore, multiple and hegemonic masculinities, which takes into account the
use of hegemonic masculinity for men to gain power over women as well as other men, was
also employed within this analysis.
The research used a sequential mixed methods cross-sectional research design. This included
342 questionnaires, 18 interviews, and participant observation at community events. The use
of quantitative analysis in a cross-sectional design has limitations regarding the showing of
causality. To supplement the quantitative data, the research used qualitative data to help to
explain some of the quantitative findings, to provide some contextual analysis that is unable
to be gained from quantitative data, and to triangulate the research findings. The qualitative
phase of the research took place subsequent to the quantitative phase to allow interview
questions to be designed in response to the findings from the quantitative data. This
sequencing of data collection was also in line with advice from community leaders to allow
time for trust to develop before conducting in-depth interviews. Participant observations
occurred throughout the research period and also provided contextual data as well as to
assessed the integrity of some of the data around gender roles, which was open to self-report
bias.
Results indicate that fear of the legal system moderates the prevalence of physical IPV.
However, less visible types of IPV, such as controlling behaviours and verbal IPV, may have
become more prevalent in its place, or at least have not abated in response to the legal system.
These less visible forms of IPV are often overlooked, but are nevertheless harmful to mental
health, and need to be addressed.
Although the quantitative results did not support the changed gender roles hypothesis from
the literature, the qualitative data showed that, in line with the literature, the impact of
changed gender roles through the loss of men’s breadwinner status was significant in shaping
IPV. However, there was also an emerging masculinity centred on men being responsible
community members who lead through adapting to the changes in gender roles. This more
egalitarian masculinity could facilitate progress to decrease IPV within this community but
requires further investigation.
In terms of the methodology of the research, the use of a strengths-based research approach
helped to uncover community-inspired solutions to their issues. Additionally, the use of three
theories helped to provide a contextual analysis and highlight interactions between cultural or
social norms and social structures. Significantly, this was the space where much of the
influence on IPV emerged. Findings from this research are useful to guide future research and to inform prevention programs.<br>Thesis (PhD Doctorate)<br>Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)<br>School of Medicine<br>Griffith Health<br>Full Text
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McKenzie, Donna Margaret. "Happily ever after: Discourses of emotion, love and health in the intimate relationships of young adult New Zealanders." Thesis, University of Auckland, 2004. http://wwwlib.umi.com/dissertations/fullcit/3139241.
Full textAbstract:
Young people are often constructed in academic and lay explanations as an inherently risky population. They are the age group most likely to feature in public health statistics, especially those of intentional and unintentional injury. A common risk factor cited in these statistics is conflict within or breakdown of an inter-personal relationship, in particular intimate heterosexual relationships. Intimate relationships serve as markers of normal adulthood in New Zealand society, and many young people invest significantly in them for their emotional and material rewards. This study investigated the social processes and experiences that influence young adult New Zealanders' perceptions of their own and others' intimate relationships. It employed an inter-disciplinary framework of critical interpretive medical anthropology and a public health approach with a lifecourse perspective. A multi-interview method was used involving more than 90 people interviewed either in focus groups, as couples, or as individuals. Interviews focused on young people's ideas and experiences of healthy and unhealthy relationships, as well as the influence of families, friends, and popular culture on relationships. Intimate relationships are based on naturalised gender differences that work to construct men as masculine/active and women as feminine/passive and hide disparities based on gender within a discourse of equality. The ideal healthy relationship is based on ideas of individualism, emotional and material inter-dependence, and the addition of other social networks into a partner relationship. Families are primary sources of information about and models for relationships. Friends are significant in establishing an adult identity separate to one's parents. Both families and friends are emotional safety nets in times of relationship difficulties. Understandings of popular culture and its products are most commonly experienced through gendered romantic narratives. Because of their ubiquity and popularity, information produced by mass media is particularly influential for young people. Overall, young people reported that relationships are a considerable source of joy to them. However, when problems occur, they tend to revert to stereotypical and gendered cultural scripts rather than relying on individual knowledge. To mitigate the possible negative effects of these scripts, knowledge of the skills required to overcome relationships difficulties need to be made explicit and fostered by relevant public health and education policy and promotion activities.<br>Subscription resource available via Digital Dissertations only.
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Ruble, Amanda Christine. "Befriending the family of Christ becoming aware of the potential of intimate friendships in a postmodern culture /." Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN), 2006. http://www.tren.com/search.cfm?p062-0286.
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Whitmer, Lauren N. "“That’s How Marriage Is”: An Ethnographic Study of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in Lambayeque, Peru." Ohio University / OhioLINK, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1289595836.
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Morales, Yamile. "Parent-Infant Interaction in a Latino Family." Digital Archive @ GSU, 2013. http://digitalarchive.gsu.edu/iph_theses/287.
Full textAbstract:
Child maltreatment is a significant public health problem that increases when children live in homes in which intimate partner violence (IPV) is present. Child maltreatment and IPV often co-occur, and the sequelae of IPV frequently appear in both the victimized mother and her children. Home visitation programs, such as SafeCare®, are used as intervention strategies to reduce the risk of child maltreatment, but rarely are these programs adapted for Latino populations. The importance of cultural sensitivity in parenting programs has been highlighted as a means of producing successful outcomes when working with Latino families. The present single-case research design study evaluated the efficacy of SafeCare's Parent-Infant Interaction (PII) module when delivered in Spanish to a Latino mother with prior experiences of IPV. Observational data were used to document changes in parenting behaviors, while self-report measures assessed exposure to IPV and changes in mental health, parenting stress, and the risk of child maltreatment. Qualitative data provided suggestions for culturally adapting PII for Latino families. Data from this study suggest that PII improves parent-infant interactions when delivered in Spanish and reduces the risk of child maltreatment. Additionally, self-report measures indicate that IPV, parent mental health distress, and the risk of child maltreatment co-occur. This study also shares with the field the importance of providing culturally adapted programs when working with Latino families.
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Kanjickal, Deenu George. "Perivascular Drug Delivery Systems for the Inhibition of Intimal Hyperplasia." University of Akron / OhioLINK, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1133715441.
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Lieberman-Auerbach, Emery. "The Crisis of Migrant Motherhood: Exploring the Cultures of Servitude embedded within North Indian Domestic Work." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2014. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/458.
Full textAbstract:
This thesis predominantly seeks to explore the entanglements of class, patriarchy and global capital embedded within North Indian domestic work. The thesis firstly examines how the neoliberal policies of the 1980s and 90s shattered village economies and brought about the mass displacement of tribals and landless farmers, forced to leave the land they have cultivated for generations in pursuit of employment in India’s urban centers. While male migrants often find work in the informal sector and settle in slum communities, female rural migrants constitute the immense population of domestic workers within the confines of urban middle class homes. This thesis explores the histories, past and present, of Indian cultures of servitude that have brought migrant motherhood to a crisis point. The interdisciplinary analyses of the political economy of intimate labor are supplemented by a micro-level analysis of my own positionality within a middle class urban home in Jaipur, Rajasthan to bring an alternative perspective to the multiplicity of dialogues about ethical relationships with domestic workers. This thesis ultimately aims to open lines of inquiry about the inequalities embedded within domestic work in order to bring about a radical re-imagining of one’s own participation in the layers and chains of exploitative labor.
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Syvertsen, Jennifer L. "Love and Risk: Intimate Relationships among Female Sex Workers who Inject Drugs and their Non-Commercial Partners in Tijuana, Mexico." Scholar Commons, 2012. http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/etd/4235.
Full textAbstract:
This dissertation examines the influence of love and other emotions on sexual and drug-related HIV risk among female sex workers who inject drugs and their intimate, non-commercial partners in Tijuana, Mexico. My work on a public health study along the Mexico-U.S. border and independent ethnographic research in Tijuana suggests the importance of emotions in shaping sex workers' relationships and health risks.
Love is a universal human emotional experience embodied within broader cultural, social, and economic contexts. A growing body of cross-cultural research suggests that modern relationships have transformed to emphasize love and emotional intimacy over moral or kinship obligations. Particularly in contexts of risk and uncertainty, intimate relationships provide emotional security. Drug-using couples may engage in unprotected sex or even needle sharing to convey notions of love and trust and help sustain emotional unity, but such acts also place partners at heightened risk for HIV.
For female sex workers in Tijuana who endure poverty, marginality, and an increased risk of contracting HIV, establishing and maintaining emotional bonds with intimate partners may be of paramount importance. Yet little is known about how female sex workers' intimate male partners shape their HIV risk perceptions and practices. Moreover, male partners' perspectives are critically absent in HIV prevention strategies.
This dissertation is nested within Proyecto Parejas, a study of the social context and epidemiology of HIV among sex workers and their non-commercial male partners in Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Through semi-structured and ethnographic interviews, photo elicitation interviews, and participant observation, I got to know seven of the couples in Tijuana who are enrolled in Parejas. I examine their relationships through the lens of critical phenomenology, which combines concern with experience, emotions, and subjectivity with political economy perspectives that argue sex work, drug use, and HIV/AIDS is not randomly distributed but historically and structurally produced.
My work suggests that female sex workers and their intimate partners experience their relationships in gradations of love and emotional content. These relationships hold significant meaning in both partners' lives for emotional and material reasons, and shape each partner's HIV risk within and outside of the relationships. Couples choose not to use condoms with each other, often to define themselves as a couple. Sex outside of the relationship occurs for economic and culturally conditioned reasons, but does not necessarily diminish the meaning of the primary relationship. Motivations and ability to use condoms with clients and outside partners are context dependent and, in order to preserve trust and unity, sexual risks are typically not discussed. Partners share drugs and syringes with each other as a sign of care within a context of scarce material resources. Emotionally close couples tend to confine their sharing within the relationship, whereas less close couples also share with friends and family in more social forms of drug use.
Given their vulnerability within a milieu of poverty, social marginalization, and discrimination, love alone cannot explain the HIV risk that female sex workers and their partners face. Nevertheless, emotions are significant factors in both risk taking and risk management. This study encourages researchers, practitioners, and policy makers to consider the affective dimensions of HIV risk within sex workers' intimate relationships as an integral part of a multi-level strategy to address each partner's health and wellbeing.
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Palumbo, Allison P. "STRONG, INDEPENDENT, AND IN LOVE: FIGHTING FEMALE FANTASIES IN POPULAR CULTURE." UKnowledge, 2016. http://uknowledge.uky.edu/english_etds/35.
Full textAbstract:
During the late 1970s and 1980s, feminist critics like Janice Radway began to reconsider so-called women’s genres, like romance novels and soap operas and melodramas, in order to address the forms of subversion and expressions of agency they provided female audiences. However, in spite of greater willingness to consider the progressive potential in romance narratives, there has been little such consideration given to stories of romance for the fighting female character—defined as a protagonist who uses violence, via her body or weapons, to save herself and others. The fighting female has received a good deal of attention from critics like Yvonne Tasker, Sherrie Inness, Rikke Schubart, and Phillipa Gates because she enacts transgressive forms of femininity. However, the typical response has been to ignore the intimate or romantic relationships she has with men or to critique them based on the assumption that such hetero-relationships automatically limit her agency and attenuate her representation as a feminist-friendly heroine. This view presumes that female empowerment opposes or can only be imagined outside the dominant cultural narratives that generally organize women’s lives around their hetero-relationships—whether sexual or platonic, familial or vocational.
As I argue, some fighting female relationship narratives merit our attention because they reveal a new cache of plausible empowered female identities that women negotiate through their intimacies and romances with men. These negotiations, in turn, enable innovative representations of male-female relationships that challenge long-standing cultural scripts about the nature of dominance and subordination in such relationships. Combining cultural analysis with close readings of key popular American film and television texts since the 1980s, my dissertation argues that certain fighting female relationship themes question regressive conventions in male-female intimacies and reveal potentially progressive ideologies regarding female agency in mass culture. In essence, certain fighting female relationship narratives project feminist-friendly love fantasies that reassure audiences of the desirability of empowered women while also imagining egalitarian intimacies that further empower women.