A Symbolic Reading of Adrienne Rich’s An Unsaid Word

Hassan, Mohamad Fleih; Kaur, Hardev; Mani, Manimangai

doi:10.18052/www.scipress.com/ILSHS.68.55

ILSHS > ILSHS Volume 68 > A Symbolic Reading of Adrienne Rich’s An Unsaid...

< Back to Volume

A Symbolic Reading of Adrienne Rich’s An Unsaid Word

Full Text PDF

Abstract:

An imitation of the literary styles and modes of expression of the great writers in the post-World War II was the criterion of success for any male or female writer. The conventions of T.S. Eliot and W.H. Auden influenced the poetics and thought of the younger generation poets. For example, Adrienne Rich (1929-2012) was an ardent disciple of these conventions in her early career. She was influenced by the phallogocentric discourse of subject formation. She followed this man-made discourse to be accepted within the literary circle as a successful woman writer, but she realized that this discourse didn’t help women in the expression of their female voices. This study explores the failure of the phallogocentric techniques and modes of writing in the expression of Rich’s female voice in An Unsaid Word (1951). The study is conducted in the light of Lacanian Symbolic system of identification. The study concludes that Lacanian system of identification was behind the distortions of meanings associated with women and the failure of the symbolic order in the self-expression of Rich’s female character in her poem An Unsaid Word.

Info:

Periodical:

International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences (Volume 68)

Pages:

55-60

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18052/www.scipress.com/ILSHS.68.55

Citation:

M. F. Hassan et al., "A Symbolic Reading of Adrienne Rich’s An Unsaid Word", International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, Vol. 68, pp. 55-60, 2016

Online since:

April 2016

Authors:

Mohamad Fleih Hassan, Hardev Kaur, Manimangai Mani

Keywords:

Adrienne Rich, Lacan, Phallogocentrism, Symbolic Language

Export:

RIS, BibTeX, Text

Distribution:

Open Access

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

References:

[1] Hassan, M. F., bin Talif, R., & Kaur, H. (2015). Resurfacing Female Identity via Language in Adrienne Rich's Diving into the Wreck. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 6(6 S2), 245.

[2] Jameson, F. (1977). Imaginary and Symbolic in Lacan: Marxism, Psychoanalytic Criticism, and the Problem of the Subject. Yale French Studies, 338-395.

[3] Joodaki, A. H., & Elyasi, Z. (2015). Deconstructing Phallogocentrism in Shahrnush Parsipur's Touba and the Meaning of Night: A Psycho-Feminist Study. GEMA Online® Journal of Language Studies, 15(2), 165.

[4] Keith, M. D. (2012). Cantatas of the Wild: Memoir, Mysticism, and Modern Feminist Poetry. (Doctoral Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley).

[5] Keyes, C. (1986). The Aesthetics of Power the Poetry of Adrienne Rich. University of Georgia Press: Athens and London.

[6] Kirsch, M. H. (2000). Queer Theory and Social Change. Psychology Press.

[7] McAfee, N. (2004). Julia Kristeva. Psychology Press.

[8] Martin, W. (1984). An American Triptych: Anne Bradstreet, Emily Dickinson, Adrienne Rich. UNC Press Books.

[9] Montashery, I. (2012). Virginia Woolf's New Intellectualism in Relation to the Construction of a Third Gender based on Desire in her Selected Works (Doctoral dissertation, Universiti Putra Malaysia).

[10] Reisman, Rosemary M. Canfield (2012). Critical Survey of Poetry: Feminist Poets. Salem Press.

[11] Rich, A. C. (1980). On lies, Secrets and Silence: Selected Prose 1966-1978. W. W. Norton &Company.

[12] Rich, A., Gelpi, B. C., & Gelpi, A. (1993). Adrienne Rich's Poetry and Prose. New York: Norton.

[13] Rich, A. (1986). Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution. WW Norton & Company.

[14] Rich, A. (1972). When We Dead Awaken: Writing as Re-Vision. College English, 18-30.

[15] Scott, J. C. (1990). Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. Yale University Press.

Show More Hide

Cited By:

[1] M. Azad, "Female Depression through Symbolism: A Study on the Selected Poems of Adrienne Rich", IJOHMN (International Journal online of Humanities), Vol. 5, p. 10, 2019

DOI: https://doi.org/10.24113/ijohmn.v5i6.150