The politics of Jane Austen’s novels have long been a topic of scholarly interest. Many scholars see Austen’s heroines as women embedded in the typical, conservative marriage plot while others see them as proto-feminist figures of intelligence and power. Her heroines have now become famous for their moral and intellectual lives, but many scholars argue that all of Austen’s heroines must be brought down through the correction of a superior male character in order to atone for their freedom of manner early in the novel and secure a suitable mate. In “Jane Austen and the Masturbating Girl,” Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick identifies this as “the Girl Being Taught a Lesson” tradition of Austen scholarship. In this thesis, I argue that the scene of the girl being taught a lesson is actually a cover for the more progressive correction that the heroine gives to her family, friends and, most importantly, her male counterpart. We see that these intelligent women do not need to be taught a lesson in order to correct flaws in their characters. On the contrary, these women correct themselves through careful self-analysis and self-correction and use their intelligence and knowledge to teach other characters. In my three chapters, I argue that Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice, Emma Woodhouse in Emma, and Anne Elliot in Persuasion act as moral centers in these Austen novels. We see particular emphasis on these women’s corrections of the male characters in Elizabeth’s continual correction of Mr. Darcy, particularly in her rebuff of his proposal, in Emma’s correcting Mr. Knightley’s opinions of Harriet Smith and in teaching him to respect her impressive intellect, and in Anne’s teaching Captain Wentworth to respect her decision to give him up and to acknowledge, once again, her superior sense, intellect and moral character. These women are not contained by marriage; instead, they teach their male counterparts before marriage and show that they will continue these lessons after their respective unions. I show that these three heroines teach and correct those around them, offering a new perspective on female intellectual work and its importance within marriage and in improving society, one character at a time. / Thesis / Master

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 119-122).

Ce travail de recherche s’intéresse au rôle politique des femmes de l’aristocratie dans la Fronde et aux représentations dont il fait l’objet au XVIIe siècle, de façon à en faire apparaître les enjeux politiques, sociaux et culturels. Les actions accomplies, mais surtout les discours, les mises en scène et, plus généralement, toutes les stratégies de communication qu’emploient les Frondeuses et leur entourage pour intervenir dans la guerre civile sont examinés, de mêmes que les témoignages des contemporains. Or, les sources écrites et la documentation iconographique révèlent une conception du pouvoir, du champ d’action des femmes et des rapports entre femmes et pouvoir bien plus ouverte et audacieuse que ne le laisse entendre la règle de l’exclusif masculin. Tous les projets politiques auxquels participent ces femmes, une quinzaine environ, sont considérés, du début de la régence d’Anne d’Autriche en 1643 à l’avènement du règne personnel de Louis XIV en 1661. Deux modes d’action principaux apparaissent : les interventions à caractère militaire des Amazones de la Fronde d’une part, celles qui relèvent de la diplomatie occulte accomplies par les « intrigantes » d’autre part. L’examen des moyens employés conduit à souligner l’ancrage des Frondeuses dans des réseaux familiaux, amicaux et clientélaires puissants où elles occupent des positions stratégiques. Pour plusieurs d’entre elles, l’analyse des actes et des discours avant, pendant et après les troubles civils pose la question d’une éventuelle démarche d’émancipation à caractère féministe. / This work aims at analysing the political role played by women of the aristocracy in the Fronde, as well as its representations in the XVIIth century, in order to highlight what is at stake politically, socially and culturally. The actions accomplished by women, but above all the views expressed about them, and all the communication strategies used by the Frondeuses to take part in the civil war are examined, as well as the strategies they and their contemporaries used to underline the part these women played in the political life. All those points reveal ideas about power, the field of activity of women and the relationships between power and women, which seem to be far more open and daring than the principle of male exclusive rights gives us to understand. All the political projects in which these fifteen women or so took part are taken into account, from the beginning of Ann of Austria’s regency in 1643 to the eve of Louis XIV’s personal reign in 1661. Two main means of action appear: the Amazons of the Fronde used military methods whereas the intriguers used diplomatic ones. A closer look at their behaviours leads to underline how deeply the Frondeuses were rooted in powerful networks of families, friends and clientage, where they held strategic positions. For several of them, the analysis of actions and discourses before, during and after the upheaval questions a possible attempt at feminist emancipation.

Die Dissertation "Löwinnen von Juda. Frauen als Subjekte politischer Macht in der judäischen Königszeit" behandelt den möglichen Anteil von Frauen innerhalb von Politik und Verwaltung des antiken Juda (c. 950-589 v.Chr). Eingesetzt wird mit einem kurzen Überblick zu Leben und Arbeit von Frauen in der Epoche. Hierbei erfolgt erstmals eine systematische Zusammenstellung bislang publizierter Frauensiegel. In einem zweiten Schritt werden Frauen am Jerusalemer Königshof in den Blick genommen und besonders ihr Part im "öffentlichen Leben" diskutiert. Hiervon gesondert wird die in der bisherigen Forschung aufgestellte These von einer "weiblichen Leitungsfuktion" am Jerusalemer Hof diskutiert, dem sog. "Gebirah-Amt", das meist von den Müttern der Könige von Juda besetzt worden sein soll. In einem letzten Schritt wird das die politischen Aktivitäten ebendieser Königsmütter betreffende Material untersucht. / "Lionesses of Judah. Women as agents of political power in Ancient Judah" deals with the part women might have played within the politics and administration in the classical period of the Judean Kingdom (c. 950-589 BC). After an introductory chapter, the second chapter sketches briefly what is known on women?s occupations in that period in general. Specail attention is drawn to the existence of a fair number of seals bearing women?s names: The function of these seals equials a credit card in modern times in signifying its owner?s economic and hence possibly political power. The third chapter focusus on women?s presence an functions at the royal court in Jerusalem. Former research in the field having hypothesised that the Hebrew word "Gevirah" denotes a specific office at the Judean court held exclusively by females, viz. the queen mothers, both the meaning of the Hebrew word and the attached theory are exxamined in great detail in the fourth chapter. The last chapter discusses the known material on the diverse political activities of the Judean queen mothers in chronological order.

Anne d’Autriche occupe une place importante, longtemps négligée, dans le développement de l’iconographie royale en France au XVIIe siècle. Ecartée du pouvoir sous le règne de son mari Louis XIII, elle est pourtant le sujet de très nombreuses représentations. Sa présence dans le champ des images connaît un net développement lorsqu’elle accède aux responsabilités du gouvernement à la mort du roi, en 1643, en devenant régente au nom de son fils mineur, Louis XIV. Au-delà de sa majorité en 1651, elle conserve un rôle éminent, jusqu’à la mort de Mazarin en 1661. Ces deux décennies sont marquées par une profonde crise politique qui culmine dans l’épisode de la Fronde. Dans ce contexte, l’image d’Anne d’Autriche devient le support d’un discours sur l’autorité monarchique et sur la défense du pouvoir royal. A partir d’un corpus constitué des représentations de la régente, et en les croisant avec des sources textuelles, cette thèse analyse la construction visuelle de ce discours, et ses effets sur l’évolution de l’image de la royauté en France après le règne de Louis XIII. La « majesté », qui constitue dans le corpus des textes, juridiques, politiques et symboliques, la qualité essentielle du souverain et la marque de son identité, doit ainsi être traduite visuellement dans une incarnation féminine, dans un pays où les lois fondamentales, notamment la loi salique, écartent pourtant les femmes du pouvoir. La richesse du corpus rassemblé pour cette thèse, près de cinq cent images, offre une source essentielle pour comprendre de quelle manière la reine a su dépasser cette contrainte et contribuer, en renouvelant ses modèles, à la représentation de l’autorité monarchique. Cette étude permet ainsi de reconsidérer le rapport des femmes au pouvoir. Pour analyser ces différentes questions, la thèse s’organise en quatre parties. La première partie s’attache à comprendre l’image de la reine régnante, en analysant dans un premier chapitre la définition juridique de la reine, pour montrer de quelle manière l’ordre juridique détermine l’ordre symbolique. On peut ainsi expliquer en quoi le mariage de la reine en 1615 et son introduction à la cour constitue une « naissance iconographique ». Le second chapitre explore les différents aspects de ce portrait de la reine en montrant qu’il relève à la fois de caractères propres et de réactions à la situation – politique et civile – de la reine. La deuxième partie soulève la question des moyens mis en œuvre pour opérer la transformation de cette image, qui permet à la reine d’apparaître en régente du royaume. Le troisième chapitre analyse plus particulièrement les étapes chronologiques de cette transformation, tandis que le quatrième chapitre étudie, sur un plan pratique, la « fabrication » de cette image. La troisième partie envisage ensuite le contenu des images, en dressant une analyse en trois temps de son iconographie. Le cinquième chapitre aborde ainsi le corps de la reine comme support des dimensions morales de son portrait. Le sixième chapitre approfondit cette question dans la perspective religieuse, en étudiant de quelle manière la régente parvient à produire l’image d’une reine « très chrétienne ». Le septième chapitre conclut cette analyse iconographique sur la dimension politique de l’image d’Anne d’Autriche. La quatrième et dernière partie est enfin l’occasion d’analyser le « fonctionnement » de ces images. Le huitième chapitre montre combien la situation des représentations de la reine dans les décors est déterminante pour leur interprétation, en envisageant les cas des résidences royales puis des intérieurs privés. Enfin, le neuvième chapitre propose une étude de la performance des images, en étendant l’analyse aux usages publics des représentations de la reine, dans les monuments ou au cours des cérémonies. / Anne of Austria offers an important part, yet neglected, in the the development of royal iconography in seventeenth century France. Devoided from management of power under the reign of her husband Louis XIII, she is however the subject of many representations. The number of her images increases when she accedes to the responsibilities of the government at the death of the king, in 1643, becoming regent in the name of her minor son, Louis XIV. Beyond its majority in 1651, she maintains herself at a prominent place, until the death of Mazarin in 1661. During these two decades, a deep political crisis in France culminates in the so-called Fronde. In this context, the image of Anne of Austria becomes the instrument of a visual narrative on monarchical authority and for the defense of the royal power. Crossing a large corpus of representations of the regent with textual sources, this thesis analyzes the visual construction of this narrative, and its effects on the evolution of the image of power in France after the reign of Louis XIII. In contemporary legal and symbolic literature, "majesty" is presented as he essential quality of the sovereign and the mark of his identity. It must then be visually translated in a female incarnation, despite the fundamental laws, in particular the Salic law, which however exclude women from power. The abundance of the images collected for this thesis, nearly five hundred items, offers an essential source to understand how the queen was able to overcome this constraint and contribute, by renewing its models, to the representation of the monarchical authority. This thesis allows us to reconsider the relationship between women and power. To analyze these different issues, the thesis is organized in four parts. The first part attempts to understand the image of the reigning queen, analyzing in a first chapter the legal definition of the queen, to show how the legal order determines the symbolic one. One can thus understand how the marriage of the queen in 1615 and her arrival at the court can be apprehended as an "iconographic birth". The second chapter explores the different features of this portrait of the queen, showing that it is at the same time a revelation of personal characteristics of the queen and a reaction to the queen's political and civil situation. The second part raises the question of the means implemented to operate the transformation of this image, which allows the queen to appear as regent of the kingdom. The third chapter analyzes in particular the chronological stages of this transformation, while the fourth chapter studies, from a practical point of view, the "fabrication" of this image. The third part then considers the content of the images, drawing up a three-step analysis of its iconography. The fifth chapter addresses the body of the queen as a support for the moral dimensions of her portrait. The sixth chapter deepens this question in the religious perspective, studying how the regent manages to produce the image of a queen "très chrétienne". The seventh chapter concludes this iconographic analysis by studying the political dimension of Anne of Austria's image. The fourth and last part gives finally an analysis of the way these images "operate". The eighth chapter shows how the situation of the queen's representations in decor is decisive for their interpretation, considering the cases of the royal residences and the private interiors. Finally, the ninth chapter proposes a study of the performance of images, extending the analysis to the public uses of representations of the queen, in monuments or during ceremonies.

This dissertation fundamentally explores the nature of change, and the development interventions that aim to bring this change into a particular society. What emerges is the notion of a ‘spiral’: imagining the dynamic relationship between paradigms and discourses, the institutions and programmes operating in a place, and the way individual identities are constructed in intricate and contradictory ways. Within this spiral, discourse has power – ‘words matter’ – but equally significant is how these words interact dialogically with concrete social structures and institutions – ‘it takes more than changing words to change the world’. Furthermore, these changes are reacted to, and expressed in, the physical, sexed body. In essence, change is ideational, institutional, and embodied. To investigate the politics of change, this dissertation analyses the spiral relationships between gender discourses, institutions, and identities in contemporary Indonesia, focusing on their transmission across Java. It does so by exploring the Indonesian state’s gender policies in the context of globalisation, democratisation, and decentralisation. In this way, the lens of gender allows us to analyse the dynamic interactions between state and society, between ideas and institutions, which impact on everything from cultural structures to physical bodies. Research focuses on the gender policies of the Indonesian Ministry of Women’s Empowerment, substantiated with case study material from United Nations Population Fund reproductive health programmes in West Java. Employing a multi-level, multi-vocal theoretical framework, the thesis analyses gender discourses and relational structures (how discourses circulate to construct the Indonesian woman), gender institutions and social structures (how discourses are translated into programmes), and gender identities and embodied structures (how discourses enter the home and the body). Critically, studying gender requires analysing the human body as the site of both structural and symbolic power. This dissertation thus argues for renewed emphasis on a ‘politics of the body’, recognising that bodies are the material foundations from which gender discourses derive their naturalising power and hence ability to structure social relations. The danger of forgetting this politics of the body is that it allows for slippage between ‘gender’ and ‘women’; policy objectives cannot be disentangled from the reality of physical bodies and their social construction. This thesis therefore argues that there are distinct and even inverse impacts of gender policies in Indonesia. As the ‘liberal’ and ‘modern’ assumptions of gender equality are overlaid onto the patriarchal culture of a society undergoing transformation, women’s bodies and women’s sexuality are always and ever the focus of the social gaze. The gender policies and interventions affecting change on discursive and institutional levels may thus provoke reaction at the level of individual identities that are contrary to explicit intentions. In effect, projects that purport to work on ‘gender’ are often so deeply rooted in underlying gender normativity that their net effect is to reinscribe these gender hierarchies. By exposing the contradictions in these underlying paradigms we gain insight into the politics of a transforming society. Furthermore, engaging with the politics of the body allows us to analyse the spiral processes between discourse and practice, the question of power, and the way men and women embody social structures and experience social transformation.