#114, December 22, 2006

Anxious Corrections

Kristin Jacobson provided a very illuminating and stimulating presentation for ARHU Presents (March 2006), entitled “Anxious Male Domesticity: American Masculinity’s Corrections.” Kristin outlined the recent developments in the story of male domesticity (and domestic masculinity?), arguing that, in fact, there has been less change than one might have assumed with regard to gender divisions of labor in the home and society (and representations thereof). When push comes to shove, and there seems to be a lot of both in gender relations, certain events happen or become public concerns that seem to epitomize the continuing anxiety that exists in the public realm about gender roles. And in the publishing field in particular, not much has changed from the days when Hawthorne complained about that “damned mob of scribbling women” who, he felt, dictated what was considered fashionable and who did not seem willing to embrace serious (read male) themes. This stasis, Kristin suggested, extends from particular kinds of writing that, almost in spite of their authors’ intentions, reaffirm gender practices or assumptions about proper male roles, to events surrounding Oprah Winfrey’s book club selections.

In particular, Kristin’s paper focused on the debates swirling around the case of Jonathan Franzen and his book “The Corrections.” Assumptions about the Oprah mob-like readership, and the felt need (if one were trying to write the so-called Great American Novel) to avoid being tainted by the fact that one has received this audience’s approval, seem to have led Franzen to repudiate the Oprah book club selection of his work. Winfrey in turn withdrew her invitation to him following his comments. One of the points here is that the 19^th-century divide between realism and the domestic novel, and perceived conflicts between serious novelists and the "hacks" appealing to female audiences, is replicated in today’s age between those appealing to serious (often quasi scholarly) readers and those reaching for profit in the wake of an endorsement by Oprah.

The discussion was fun, ranging from Queer Eye to the Ancients – or was it in the other direction? Kristin showed some very interesting photos from Clarissa Sligh of men doing the ironing and in other domesticated poses that seemed to play with conventions. The question arose whether the anxiety that such things elicited might in itself be a sign of change. One only has to think of the so-called “feminization of American culture” in the 1850s and the Civil War that fundamentally altered American society, to envision a feeling of anxiety masking change until it is released in some form of convulsion. As you can tell, there was a lot of food for thought, and I went forth to tell it on the mountain pondering James Baldwin, and so that has to be a good thing.