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Adrienne Kennedy'nin Funnyhouse of a Negro ve The Owl Answers adlı Oyunlarında Kesişen Sınırlar

Year 2023, Volume: 17 Issue: 1, 14 - 29, 30.06.2023
https://doi.org/10.47777/cankujhss.1220273

Abstract

Bu makale, Adrienne Kennedy’nin Funnyhouse of a Negro ve The Owl Answers adlı oyunlarının incelenmesiyle, toplumsal oluşumların inşa edilişindeki kesişimsel sınırları keşfetmeyi amaçlar. Kesişimsellik, eşzamanlı ve etkileşimli baskıya maruz kalan sıra dışı seslerin deneyimlerini sorgulayarak iktidar eksenlerine meydan okur. Bu oyunlarda dezavantajlı kimliklerin kültürel bir inşa yoluyla önceden belirlenmiş konumları, kimlik krizinin hem siyah hem de kadın olmanın ne anlama geldiğine işaret ettiği bir kavşakta ayrımcılık tartışmalarını ve farklılıkları canlı tutan kesişimlerin inkâr edildiğini ortaya koymaktadır. Ayrıcalıklı seslere karşı kesişen sesler, kişinin baskı ve eşitsizliğin sistematik doğasını anlayabileceği bir mercek sağlar. Kişinin kendi konumunun farkında olması, karşı karşıya olduğu kimliklerin nasıl inşa edildiğini ve konumlandığını/konumlandırıldığını fark etmesi anlamına gelir. Dolayısıyla, tahakküme ve görünmezliğe karşı mücadele etmeye çalışmak, kendini tanıma, tanımlama ve direnme için gerekli olan bilinçlenmeye doğru ilerleyen bir yolculuğun yol haritasını çizer. Bu çalışma, oyunların kesişimsellik çerçevesinde incelenmesiyle, siyah kadınların deneyimlerine ve ırk, cinsiyet, toplumsal cinsiyet ve sınıf üzerinden kültürel olarak inşa edilmiş bir yapının toplumsal ve politik sonuçlarına odaklanır.

References

  • Alexander‐Floyd, Nikol G. (2010). “Critical Race Black Feminism: A ‘Jurisprudence of Resistance’ and the Transformation of the Academy.” Signs 35(4), 810–820. doi: 10.1086/651036
  • Anthias, F. & Yuval–Davis, N. (1983). “Contextualizing Feminism: Gender, Ethnic and Class Divisions.” Feminist Review Winter (15), 62-75. doi: 10.1057/fr.1983.33
  • Bhabha, H. K. (1994). The Location of Culture, London: Routledge.
  • Brown, E. B. (2001). “Passed Over: The Tragic Mulatta and (Dis)Integration of Identity in Adrienne Kennedy’s Plays.” African American Review 35(2), 281-295. doi: 10.2307/2903258
  • Butler, J. (1999). Gender Trouble: Feminism and Subversion of Identity, London: Routledge.
  • Case, S. (1988). Feminism and Theatre, Abingdon: Routledge.
  • Collins, P. H. & Bilge, S. (2016). Intersectionality, Cambridge: Polity Press.
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (1989). “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race, and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory, and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum 1(8), 139–167.
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (1991). “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color.” Stanford Law Review 43(6), 1241-1299. doi: 10.2307/1229039
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (2018). “Beyond racism and misogyny: black feminism and 2 live crew.” In Words That Wound Critical Race Theory, Assaultive Speech, and the First Amendment, In Robert W. Gordon & Margaret Jane Radin (Eds.), 111–132. New York: Routledge.
  • Curb, R. (1992). “(Hetero)sexual terrors in Kennedy’s early plays.” In Intersecting boundaries: The theatre of Adrienne Kennedy, In Paul K. Bryant-Jackson & Lois More Overbeck (Eds.), 142 – 156. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press.
  • Davis, A. (1998). The Angela Y. Davis Reader. Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishers.
  • Davis, K. (2008). “Intersectionality as Buzzword: A Sociology of Science Perspective on What Makes a Feminist Theory Successful.” Feminist Theory 9(1), 67-85. doi: 10.1177/1464700108086364
  • Fanon, F. (2008). Black Skin, White Masks. London: Pluto Press.
  • Guy-Sheftall, B. (2002). The Body Politic: black female sexuality and the Nineteenth-Century Euro-American Imagination. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
  • Hall, S. (1996). “Introduction: Who Needs Identity.” In Questions of Cultural Identity, In Stuart Hall & Paul du Gay (Eds.), London: Sage Publications. 1-17. doi: 10.4135/9781446221907.n1
  • Kennedy, A. (2001). “Funnyhouse of a Negro.” In The Adrienne Kennedy Reader. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 11-28.
  • Kennedy, A. (2001). “The Owl Answers.” In The Adrienne Kennedy Reader. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 29-42.
  • Kolin, P. C. (2005). “The fission of Tennessee Williams’s plays into Adrienne Kennedy’s.” South Atlantic Review 70(4), 43-72. doi: 10.2307/20064687
  • Laclau, E. (1990). New Reflections on The Revolution of Our Time. London: Verso.
  • Mccall, L. (2005). “The Complexity of Intersectionality.” Signs, 30(3), 1771-1800. doi: 10.1086/426800.
  • Schechner, R. (2006). Performance Studies: An Introduction. New York: Routledge.
  • Smethurst, J. E. (2005). The Black Arts Movement: Literary Nationalism in the 1960s and 1970s. London: University of North Carolina Press.
  • Sollors, W. (1997). Neither Black Nor White Yet Both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • West, A. (2012). “Power Plays: Two Black Feminist Playwrights (En)counter Intersectionality.” In Episodes from a History of Undoing: The Heritage of Female Subversiveness, Reghina Dascal (Ed.), 137–152. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
  • Yuval-Davis, N. (2006). “Intersectionality and Feminist Politics.” European Journal of Women’s Studies 13(3), 193 - 209. doi: 10.1177/1350506806065752

Intersectional Edges in Adrienne Kennedy’s Funnyhouse of a Negro and The Owl Answers

Year 2023, Volume: 17 Issue: 1, 14 - 29, 30.06.2023
https://doi.org/10.47777/cankujhss.1220273

Abstract

This article aims to explore intersectional boundaries in the construction of formations through the analysis of Adrienne Kennedy’s plays, Funnyhouse of a Negro (1964) and The Owl Answers (1965) Intersectionality challenges the axes of power by interrogating the experiences of the marginal voices who are exposed to simultaneous and interactive oppression. Positions of the disadvantaged identities predetermined through cultural construction in these plays reveal the discrimination debates at a junction where identity crisis points out what it means to be both black and woman, and the denial of intersections to keep the differences alive. The juxtaposition of intersectional voices against privileged ones provides a lens through which one can understand the systematic nature of oppression and inequality. One’s being aware of her/his own position means realizing how confronted identities are constructed and positioned. Thus, trying to struggle against domination and invisibility in such a construct draws a road map of a journey to self-definition and required consciousness to resist. Within the framework of intersectionality, the present study offers a focus on black females’ experience and social and political consequences of a culturally adapted construction through race, gender, sex, and class.

References

  • Alexander‐Floyd, Nikol G. (2010). “Critical Race Black Feminism: A ‘Jurisprudence of Resistance’ and the Transformation of the Academy.” Signs 35(4), 810–820. doi: 10.1086/651036
  • Anthias, F. & Yuval–Davis, N. (1983). “Contextualizing Feminism: Gender, Ethnic and Class Divisions.” Feminist Review Winter (15), 62-75. doi: 10.1057/fr.1983.33
  • Bhabha, H. K. (1994). The Location of Culture, London: Routledge.
  • Brown, E. B. (2001). “Passed Over: The Tragic Mulatta and (Dis)Integration of Identity in Adrienne Kennedy’s Plays.” African American Review 35(2), 281-295. doi: 10.2307/2903258
  • Butler, J. (1999). Gender Trouble: Feminism and Subversion of Identity, London: Routledge.
  • Case, S. (1988). Feminism and Theatre, Abingdon: Routledge.
  • Collins, P. H. & Bilge, S. (2016). Intersectionality, Cambridge: Polity Press.
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (1989). “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race, and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory, and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum 1(8), 139–167.
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (1991). “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color.” Stanford Law Review 43(6), 1241-1299. doi: 10.2307/1229039
  • Crenshaw, K. W. (2018). “Beyond racism and misogyny: black feminism and 2 live crew.” In Words That Wound Critical Race Theory, Assaultive Speech, and the First Amendment, In Robert W. Gordon & Margaret Jane Radin (Eds.), 111–132. New York: Routledge.
  • Curb, R. (1992). “(Hetero)sexual terrors in Kennedy’s early plays.” In Intersecting boundaries: The theatre of Adrienne Kennedy, In Paul K. Bryant-Jackson & Lois More Overbeck (Eds.), 142 – 156. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press.
  • Davis, A. (1998). The Angela Y. Davis Reader. Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishers.
  • Davis, K. (2008). “Intersectionality as Buzzword: A Sociology of Science Perspective on What Makes a Feminist Theory Successful.” Feminist Theory 9(1), 67-85. doi: 10.1177/1464700108086364
  • Fanon, F. (2008). Black Skin, White Masks. London: Pluto Press.
  • Guy-Sheftall, B. (2002). The Body Politic: black female sexuality and the Nineteenth-Century Euro-American Imagination. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
  • Hall, S. (1996). “Introduction: Who Needs Identity.” In Questions of Cultural Identity, In Stuart Hall & Paul du Gay (Eds.), London: Sage Publications. 1-17. doi: 10.4135/9781446221907.n1
  • Kennedy, A. (2001). “Funnyhouse of a Negro.” In The Adrienne Kennedy Reader. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 11-28.
  • Kennedy, A. (2001). “The Owl Answers.” In The Adrienne Kennedy Reader. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 29-42.
  • Kolin, P. C. (2005). “The fission of Tennessee Williams’s plays into Adrienne Kennedy’s.” South Atlantic Review 70(4), 43-72. doi: 10.2307/20064687
  • Laclau, E. (1990). New Reflections on The Revolution of Our Time. London: Verso.
  • Mccall, L. (2005). “The Complexity of Intersectionality.” Signs, 30(3), 1771-1800. doi: 10.1086/426800.
  • Schechner, R. (2006). Performance Studies: An Introduction. New York: Routledge.
  • Smethurst, J. E. (2005). The Black Arts Movement: Literary Nationalism in the 1960s and 1970s. London: University of North Carolina Press.
  • Sollors, W. (1997). Neither Black Nor White Yet Both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • West, A. (2012). “Power Plays: Two Black Feminist Playwrights (En)counter Intersectionality.” In Episodes from a History of Undoing: The Heritage of Female Subversiveness, Reghina Dascal (Ed.), 137–152. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
  • Yuval-Davis, N. (2006). “Intersectionality and Feminist Politics.” European Journal of Women’s Studies 13(3), 193 - 209. doi: 10.1177/1350506806065752
There are 26 citations in total.

Details

Primary Language English
Subjects Literary Studies, Literary Theory, Cultural Studies, Creative Arts and Writing
Journal Section Articles
Authors

Tansel Göksu 0000-0002-6735-9398

Deniz Aras 0000-0003-3722-6831

Publication Date June 30, 2023
Published in Issue Year 2023 Volume: 17 Issue: 1

Cite

APA Göksu, T., & Aras, D. (2023). Intersectional Edges in Adrienne Kennedy’s Funnyhouse of a Negro and The Owl Answers. Cankaya University Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 17(1), 14-29. https://doi.org/10.47777/cankujhss.1220273

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