schoi@teri.bio.uci.edu (SamLord Byron Choi) (03/28/91)
nriley@bootes.unm.edu (Natalie Riley Osorio) writes: >I am studying comparative literature and I have encountered something >in a couple of my classes that I wonder if anyone can make some sense out >of. I have found that many women don'r objectively evaluate or critique >women's literature. Now, I fully understand that women have been grossly >underrepresented in the world of literature throughout history. Only now >are we starting to unravel the clarity of the woman's voice in literature. >However, I don't feel that underrepresentation is an excuse for giving >women's literature a softer treatment in terms of critique. We should be >breeding an atmosphere that enables a man to give a woman's work negative >criticism without being labeled "sexist." And, likewise, we should strongly >encourage an environment where a woman can give negative criticism to a >woman's work and not be labeled "anti-woman." I've noticed this to some extent. However, my situations may not necessarily be representative of the norm. In most of my classes, the women's literature has been brought up as an alternative of the male canon which (so the assumption goes) has something very different to say, a voice from which we have generally been shielded. So the justification, I suppose, is that we currently have very little basis for criticizing the work. It is legitimate to criticize it from the perspective and background of what we consider good "men's literature"? Maybe it is? Maybe it isn't. I think because teaching women's literature is still a relatively new kind of thing, instructors are somewhat in limbo as to how to evaluate it. Not only that, from what I've noticed, when we've studied the women's literature, we've approached it as something very alien. So we spent most of the class time on figuring out what the hell it is. To illustrate what I mean, if we were in a biology class and we were studying a dog's anatomy, we could jump right in because everyone's seen a dog before. On the other hand, if we were studying some sort of nematoda, we'd start by saying, "Well, here's sorta where the head is, and well, what we'd call a brain is more or less here, and I guess you could call this its body . . ." I don't think it's really that obscure, but the point is that people tend to tip toe around things they're not used to. What's the solution? Can I say ****** is a shitty writer without having the wrath of the campus feminists roaring at me? Sam Choi schoi@teri.bio.uci.edu (disclaimers are a waste of bandwidth)