Graduate Program

English

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Semester of Degree Completion

2005

Thesis Director

Dagni Bredesen

Thesis Committee Member

Ashley Tellis

Thesis Committee Member

Dana Ringuette

Abstract

This thesis situates South African writer Zoë Wicomb's fictional work within a critical context of current feminist theory, exploring Wicomb's response to a central problem for poststructuralist feminism-how can we deconstruct femininity while simultaneously conserving a platform for feminist political activism; how can we assert. on the one hand, that there are no "women", and then, on the other, continue to campaign on behalf of "women's" rights? Wicomb's two novels to date, You Can't Get Lost in Cape Town (1987) and David's Story (2000) serve as test studies for a model of gender that fluctuates and purposefully and constructively embodies the contradiction discussed by Denise Riley, wherein feminine labels are adopted only when needed for political purposes, then traded in favor of a broader, de-gendered existence at other times. You Can't Get Lost in Cape Town, Wicomb's earlier novel, illustrates the discursive construction of the gendered self as well as language's contradictory potential for empowerment and oppression. This work of fiction employs a narrator whose insider/outsider status allows her to present multiple perspectives in a looping, cyclical narrative that interrogates authority and reveals the subversive potential of silence. David's Story builds on the earlier novel by at once deepening and complicating the reader's understanding of narrative and of gender. David's Story tests Denise Riley's theory through the character Dulcie, who stands as Wicomb's imagining of this more flexible version of gender, a version that the novel suggests cannot yet fully exist in the current political climate of the New South Africa. David's Story provides, however, a hope that is signified by the persistence of the image of Dulcie and her scrupulous commitment to equality. This image holds out the possibility (elusive, yet alive) of true equality and the potential for real change.

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