Art and feminsim

Commentators have suggested that Nella Larsen’s Passing rejects the view that there is some sort of black essence. I want to challenge this reading. Since Irene is the most vocal advocate of an essence in respect to which all blacks are homogeneous, much of the evidence for thinking that Passing is skeptical about such an essence amounts to evidence for not trusting Irene’s judgment in general, and for not trusting her judgment on this matter in particular. My arguments, then, will often involve explaining why Passing is not leading the reader to mistrust Irene’s judgment on this matter. Now, what exactly is meant by a black essence is, explicitly in this book, mysterious. Nevertheless, I hope to shed some light on how Passing understands the nature of this something, this je ne sais quoi, peculiar to blacks. My tentative interpretation is that this something is an intangible and indefinite manner of being that is neither a conscious choice nor an inborn fact of biology, but rather a given of culture. I take this, in effect, blackness manner to be, so Passing seems to indicate, a function of one’s belief that one is black in a milieu of pervasive anti-black prejudice. Passing, as I see it, thus has something to offer those of us today who struggle to adjudicate between a pull towards essentialism and a pull towards constructionism. What Passing emphasizes in this discussion is the possibility that, in addition to biological and societal influences, one’s mind state is a crucial ingredient to one’s racial identity.

This paper proposes an analysis of the reception of La Chunga. A modern opera, by the composer Carlos J. Castro, based on a play by Mario Vargas Llosa.  e opera was released in Costa Rica in 1995, accompanied by an absolute “silence” by the critics.  is “opera” embodies a sound and bio-political landscape. Performativity is an architecture, unique in the elected bodies, especially in that of Guadalu- pe Urbina. A Cultural icon by her own right.
e bodies chosen to “represent” the opera are “accomplices”. Only the score, the videotape and some photographs or notes on the work have survived. From them, an e ort was made to glimpse that “lo- cus-abyss” to which we are invited by Vargas Llosa and Carlos J. Castro, but not as a play or as an opera.  is essay takes the risk of thinking of them as an abyss, gushing from a radio station that in their tropi- cal music, pop-rock and romantic ballads, places the beings in a decrepit bar, where the “covenant” can be real, and where the bodies are, indeed, exchangeable meat and decadence.

In this paper I will be discussing why some artists, musicians and writers use the 'Goddess' as a spiritual ideal in their work and life. We are going to see why during these last few decades images of goddesses became very popular with some female artists. In the early 1970's a good number of female artists were significantly influenced by the Goddess Movement. Women especially in the Women's Spirituality Movement in the 1960's felt that they had no authoritative role in conventional religions. Female artists started to include images of Goddesses in their work and the prehistoric goddess became for them the symbol of female spirituality. Primarily goddesses appeal to all those who are dissatisfied with mainstream religions, political institutions and all male-centred cultures. Many feminists find that institutionalised religions are dissatisfying because of the missing female element.