What a Shame She Went Mad by Jamina Danielle Prepena

Eng 147 Digital Archive

jeprepena — 2023-12-08 17:40:34 UTC

Archived by:

Jamina Danielle E. Prepena

2018-01394

For Eng 147 Class

Female Rage and Muted Emotions

jeprepena — 2023-12-08 17:58:10 UTC

Women’s emotions play a vital role in the tradition of Women’s Writings. These emotions stir the stagnant surface of what has been told about women’s experiences in literature. In this collection of texts exploring women’s anger, popularly known as female rage, we delve deep into an emotion that has been historically seen as a weakness and flaw, especially for women. These stories are often personal stories that women are made to feel ashamed about. And because of that, women’s voices become completely muted in the background without the world knowing what they have to say.

mad girl, bad girl.

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 06:55:45 UTC

a playlist for angry girls.

Rage Board: What are your thoughts on these texts?

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 08:03:45 UTC

Post your comments bellow this rage board and share your thoughts on these texts! ~~(No judgement!)~~

The Yellow Wallpaper (1892)

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 08:18:07 UTC

The Yellow Wallpaper is an intriguing exploration of women's mental health and autonomy under a dominant male power. This short story follows the internal thoughts of an unnamed female narrator suffering from postpartum depression. As she unfolds her experience of "rest cure", the narrator reveals the suffocating and frustrating conditions under her physician husband's care.

The Bell Jar (1993)

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 08:20:41 UTC

The Bell Jar explores the career and descent to depression of Esther Greenwood, a young and ambitious woman who secured an internship in New York as a writer. Experiencing the glamorous side of her internship in the buzzing city, Esther struggled to find her identity and the need to belong. As she gets consumed by the overwhelming societal pressures to conform and the unspoken restrictions imposed on women, Esther succumbs to a mental illness that hits her unprecedentedly. This semi-autobiography novel by Sylvia Plath reveals the excruciating challenges faced by women in a patriarchal society that cause them to deteriorate.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 (2018)

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 08:27:17 UTC

Kim Ji-young, a woman, a daughter, a wife, and a mother, experiences a mental phenomenon where she unconsciously embodies the lives of women around her slipping into character as if she were the real person. Ji-young's story sheds light on the ingrained gender disparity in society that she experienced in every stage of her life from her childhood and adulthood to motherhood. As she grows up in modern society, Ji-young expresses her built-up anger and sentiments by switching to various female personas in her life.

Literature and Media

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 17:44:11 UTC

Female rage in the literary canon is often shown in reckless outbursts, hysteria, and madness. A prominent representation of in literature and pop culture is Medusa. Valentis and Devane (1994) characterize Medusa as the symbol of female darkness and furious anger. Infamous as a monster who turns anyone who meets the eyes of her serpent hairs into stone, Medusa was framed to show the dark side of women’s emotions. This character was created by men and equated women’s anger to insanity without exploring the nuances of this emotion. How Medusa ended up being the monstrous creature that mythology and literature framed her to be, was an amalgamation of the male gaze and the repression of female power by the dominant male perspective.

Women writers, on the other hand, portray female rage as an important part of women’s experience. Rather than using women’s anger as a literary spectacle, they used it as a tool in reclaiming one’s voice and a critique on the persisting oppressive norms and systems imposed by the patriarchal society. This is evident in the following texts included in this archive.

Contribution to the Literary Tradition of Women's Writings

jeprepena — 2023-12-09 17:49:56 UTC

In an article called Tending the Fire of Anger, Keefe (2019) explains the double-sided nature of anger which can potentially be destructive or transformative in addressing change. And by employing female rage written from the perspective of women in literature, allows the latter nature to flourish and be used in a more productive manner that rewrites the canon of mad and hysterical women. We as readers in return, get to deconstruct the device used to silence women’s voices in literature and amplify their repressed voices and emotions that should be heard and seen. Women writing about their anger empowers readers especially women to value their own voice and validates the experiences often ignored by many. It also raises awareness on certain issues that affect women exclusively and society at large.

Nature of Female Rage

jeprepena — 2023-12-13 10:20:48 UTC

In understanding this stark contrast between men's and women’s portrayal, it is important to understand the root and nature of this emotion. Rage or anger is a response often arising from wrongful situations and in this context, it may be a response to unfair treatment due to one’s gender. In extension, female rage also becomes an initial reaction to protect the people and things valued dearly by a woman. Varying factors can contribute to women’s anger including gender inequality, injustice, power dynamics, and a lot more. These factors are heavily intertwined with women’s everyday experiences in so much that they impact women’s lives profoundly.

Melancholic Rage

jeprepena — 2023-12-13 10:22:05 UTC

The texts included in this archive are The Yellow Wallpaper (1892) by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Bell Jar (1963) by Sylvia Plath, and Kim Jiyoung, Born 1989 (2018) by Cho Nam-joo. Written in different eras where society has progressed in so many aspects, these texts reveal a common denominator that prolongs an enduring problem that plagues women throughout history. The persisting gender roles and stereotypes box women to what they can be and shape their lives according to what men dictate. Common to these texts is the existence of mental illness women succumbed to while dealing with everyday societal pressures on them—gender roles being the primary reason.

Matters of mental health are often downplayed especially when it comes to women. Oftentimes they are labeled as something inevitable and “normal” for women. But what does this truly mean for women like the female narrator, Esther, and Ji-young? These stories depict the everyday experiences of women from the first point of view giving us a very subjective and personal anecdote of what it is to be a woman subjected to a male-dominated society. The authenticity of their personal experience reveals the internalized anger that has grown to consume them. Moreover, how women deteriorate mentally will represent the actuality of women’s voices, ambitions, and potential being neglected and overlooked.

Legend

jeprepena — 2023-12-13 10:31:40 UTC

Red posts - introductory write-up

Yellow posts - Texts links/synopsis

Works Cited and Other Sources:

jeprepena — 2023-12-13 10:43:42 UTC

Keefe, Alice A. “Tending the Fire of Anger: A Feminist Defense of a Much Maligned Emotion.” Buddhist-Christian Studies, vol. 39, 2019, pp. 67–76. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/48618601. Accessed 13 Dec. 2023.
Valentis, Mary, and Anne Devanne. “Female Rage : Unlocking Its Secrets, Claiming Its Power .” Internet Archive, New York : Carol Southern Books, 1 Jan. 1994, archive.org/details/femalerageunlock0000vale.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper.” The New England Magazine, 1982, Project Gutenberg, www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1952.
Plath, Sylvia. The Bell Jar, Faber and Faber, 1963, fadedpage.com, www.fadedpage.com/showbook.php?pid=20160540.
Cho, Nam-joo. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982. E-book ed., Liveright, 2018.