Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2006. / Advisors: Jean Graham-Jones, Brenda Cappuccio, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Dept. of Modern Languages and Linguistics. Includes bibliographical references. Also available online.

This thesis will aim to investigate the extent to which Tracey Rose's Ciao Bella can be said to allegorically perform a dialectical enfolding of the dichotomous categories of meaning/nonmeaning; image/text; past/present and original/translation. The dual concepts of performance and performativity will be utilized as a means to explore the notion of interpretation as a meaning-making process and as an engagement between artist, artwork and viewer that is necessarily open-ended and in a state of constant change and flux. Rose's performance of Ciao Bella will be read as one that questions the illusion of unmediated representation by parodying and creatively misreading a multiplicity of visual, textual and musical representations so as to foreground the politics of representation. The representational figure of allegory, as one that defines itself in opposition to the Romantic conception of the unified symbol, will be put to work so as to reveal the ways in which Rose's performance works to critically undermine various positivistic attitudes toward self-identity, gender, race, politics, history, authorial intention and interpretation.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Este artigo apresenta os resultados de minha pesquisa de mestrado, que investigou a sobrevivência do mito clássico de Vênus e suas implicações para a representação da imagem da mulher em obras de arte que lhe fazem referência. Este trabalho tentará demonstrar como tal mito, tendo sido configurado - para o bem ou para o mal - como um paradigma de beleza, em grande parte influencia o ideal de "feminino" que foi espalhado ao longo do tempo, discutindo, assim, de que modo esse paradigma aparece e interfere na arte

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Este artigo apresenta os resultados de minha pesquisa de mestrado, que investigou a sobrevivência do mito clássico de Vênus e suas implicações para a representação da imagem da mulher em obras de arte que lhe fazem referência. Este trabalho tentará demonstrar como tal mito, tendo sido configurado - para o bem ou para o mal - como um paradigma de beleza, em grande parte influencia o ideal de "feminino" que foi espalhado ao longo do tempo, discutindo, assim, de que modo esse paradigma aparece e interfere na arte

Nicholas Hlobo, a sculptor and performance artist, and Zanele Muholi, a photographer and activist, explore different ways of representing sexuality, particularly homosexuality. It is extremely difficult to discuss African sexuality in light of the stain of colonial attitudes that have exoticised and ascribed hypersexuality to African bodies. Moreover, sexuality is often not discussed in the construction of so-called African traditions and this has contributed to rendering African-ness as an exclusive identity. Tensions within and between categories of African-ness are compounded by constituted regulations. For example, Hlobo investigates the obligation of circumcision which seems to contrast the lifestyle and contexts in which he works and resides, and Muholi represents the existence of homosexual and transgender relations, even within conservative categories. The visual imagery of these two artists investigates the boundaries set by different social constructs. These set boundaries have also affected crimes against bisexual, transgender and homosexual individuals, which are reaching an alarming rate. Hlobo questions the validity of structures that marginalise homosexual individuals through drawing attention to the ambivalence of certain statutes. Muholi seeks to publicise the injustices imposed upon homosexual individuals in order to demonstrate the weight of that crisis. Although the South African legal system condones liberated expressions of sexual identity, due to social prejudices homosexual individuals are still treated as if they are not entitled to basic human rights. As a result, hate-crimes are not reported, and when they are they are not taken seriously. Hlobo and Muholi not only bring these issues to light, but also point out the dilemma inscribed in the social and political history of (South) Africa with regards to collective and individual identities. This thesis seeks to provide an analysis of the visual language used by Hlobo and Muholi to subvert the notion that homosexuality is “un-African” and to complicate concepts of gender, sexuality and identity.

Die vorliegende Dissertation zur Lebenskunst von Frauen mit Behinderungen ist eine Ergänzung der vorwiegend soziologischen Literatur, welche in den letzten Jahren über dieses Thema erschienen ist. Die Dissertation stellt – auf Grundlage dieser vorwiegend quantitativen Forschungen – die Lebenssituation der Frauen in Texten des kreativen Schreibens, also als qualitative Auswertung dar. Diese Texte wurden nicht für diese Arbeit geschrieben; sie entstanden teils in Schreibwerkstätten, teils privat. Als Methode der Auswertung wurde das „Zirkuläre Dekonstruieren“, welches Jaeggi, Faas und Mruck 1998 für interpretative Auswertungen vorgestellt haben, abgewandelt: Von der vorgesehenen Auswertung für qualitative Interviews hin zur Auswertung von Tagebuchaufzeichnungen, Gedichten und Texten des kreativen Schreibens jenseits germanistischer Herangehensweisen. Diese Methode erwies sich – nach einigen nötigen Veränderungen innerhalb des Prozesses – als geeignet. Eingebettet ist die Dekonstruktion der Texte (auf die Frage der Erkennbarkeit von Lebenskunst hin) in einen breiten Theorieteil über die Kraftquellen und Kraftverluste von Menschen mit Behinderungen. Kraftverluste – welche die Lebenskunst erschweren und nötig machen – liegen einerseits in den kulturellen Rahmenbedingungen: In Menschenbildern, Tabus, Normalitäts- und Schönheitsvorstellungen und im mitleidigen Verhalten der Nichtbetroffenen; andererseits in den Belastungen durch eine erschwerte Identitätsfindung, durch Scham, Leiden und die schwierigen Beziehungen der Menschen zur Medizin. Kraftverluste sind es, dass bisher weder in der Geschichte noch in anderen Kulturen eine neutraler oder wertschätzender Umgang mit Behinderung gefunden werden konnte. Kraftquellen liegen in den Umwertungen bestehender Werte, dem unter bestimmten Bedingungen möglichen Umschlag von Stigma in Charisma. Der Umschlag kann durch einen kulturellen Paradigmenwechsel (von der Pathogenese zur Salutogenese, über die Resilienzkonzepte, durch die Forschungen der disability studies und die Ausbildungen zum peer counseling und über Rituale und Reframing) vorangetrieben oder in der Religion gefunden werden. Lebenskunst ist eine philosophische Kategorie. Seit der Antike wurde sie in allen Zeiten ohne existenzielle Not (in denen es ums Überleben ging) von interessierten Gruppen gepflegt. Sie kann mit ihren Fragestellungen nach der bestmöglichen Lebensführung eine Hilfe sein für alle, die trotz Belastungen ein bewusstes und aktives Leben führen wollen. Lebenskunst steht der Kunst nahe. Das ist eine Herausforderung für Menschen, welche sich sonst nicht künstlerisch betätigen. Der Philosoph der Lebenskunst Wilhelm Schmid, dessen Gedanken die Arbeit folgt, sagte: „Die Schrift ist ein Medium der Kunst, sein Leben zu führen und zu gestalten, ist eine Geste der Existenz und der Gestaltung seiner selbst. Das Individuum formt sich in dieser Tätigkeit“. Damit wird das Kreative Schreiben zum Mittel der Arbeit an sich selbst und am eigenen Leben. Für Menschen, denen aufgrund ihrer Behinderung nur eingeschränkte Möglichkeiten zur Verfügung stehen, ist das Schreiben ein idealer Ansatz zur Gestaltung. Einige Studien der letzten Jahre beweisen, dass kreatives Schreiben eine heilende Kraft hat: körperlich, psychisch und sozial. Das beweist die Arbeit anhand von 24 ausgewerteten Texten. / This dissertation speaks about the Art of Life of women with disabilities. It is a completion to the sociological literature about this topics, issued in the last years. The dissertation describes – based on these quantitative researches – the situation of the women in their own texts in shape of a qualitative interpretation. These texts are not written for these interpretation. They derive from workshops of creative writing or are private scripts. The method of interpretation is the Circular Deconstruction by Jaeggi, Faas and Mruck (1998), developed for the evaluation of interviews. The method is changed from explaining interviews to explaining creative diary texts, poems or free texts – out of the view of German philology. This method suits the purpose after small changes. The deconstruction of texts (about the question of recognition of Art of Life) is surrounded in a wide theoretical part about the sources of power and the loss the power by people with disabilities. Loss of power makes the Art of Life hard but necessary. On the one hand the loss of power is hidden in the cultural frame: ideas of men, taboos, conceptions of normality and beauty and in the compassionate behavior of persons with no disabilities. On the other hand there are burdens through difficult findings of identity, shame, suffering and the difficult relationships between men and modern medicine. Another loss of power it is, that nowhere in history or in other cultures a neutral or value association with disability could be found. Sources of power are in the reevaluation of the existent values. On some conditions a turnover is possible from stigma to charism. It can occur by cultural paradigm shift (from pathogenesis to salutogenesis, about the concept of resilience, through the research in disability studies or the education of peer counseling, via ritual or reframing) or founded in religion. Art of Life is a philosophical fact. Interested groups have taken care of Art of Life through all times of history without hardship since antiquity. The question about the best passway of living can be a help for all persons, who want more than a simple life. Art of Life is close to art. This is a challenge for unartistic men. Wilhelm Schmid, the philosopher of Art of Life (the dissertation follows his ideas) said: “Scripture is a fluid of art, to guide and create the living, a gesture of existence and constitution of thyself. The individual is shaping himself/herself in this exercise.” So the creative writing will be the medium of work on one’s own personal life. Some studies of the last years show creative writing has healing power: physical, psychological and social. People who have limited possibilities due to disability find writing is an ideal way for creating their lives. The dissertation proof is on the basis of 24 evaluated texts.

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This thesis is based on the belief that representations of women in contemporary Ugandan art serve cultural and political purposes. The premise is that the autonomous woman (seen as the new woman in this study), emerging in Uganda in the mid-1980s, agitated for the social, economic and political emancipation of women in Uganda. It has been demonstrated that the patriarchy attempted to subordinate, confine and regulate this new woman. The press, drama, music and film became powerful tools to force her into silence. This study posits that contemporary Ugandan art was part of this cultural discourse. Adopting a feminist art historical stance, it examines and assesses the gendered content of Uganda’s contemporary art masked as aesthetics. On the one hand, the study exposes the view that some men artists in Uganda use their works to construct men’s power and superiority as the necessary ingredients of gender difference. I demonstrate that some artists have engaged themes through which they have constructed women as being materialistic, gold-diggers, erotic and domesticated. I argue that this has been a strategy to tame Uganda’s new woman. On the other hand, the thesis attempts to show that some women artists have used visual discourse to challenge their marginalisation and to reclaim their ‘agency’ while revising some negative stereotypes about the new woman. This study makes an interdisciplinary contribution to Uganda’s art history, cultural studies and gender studies. / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / D. Litt. et Phil. (Art History)

This thesis is based on the belief that representations of women in contemporary Ugandan art serve cultural and political purposes. The premise is that the autonomous woman (seen as the new woman in this study), emerging in Uganda in the mid-1980s, agitated for the social, economic and political emancipation of women in Uganda. It has been demonstrated that the patriarchy attempted to subordinate, confine and regulate this new woman. The press, drama, music and film became powerful tools to force her into silence. This study posits that contemporary Ugandan art was part of this cultural discourse. Adopting a feminist art historical stance, it examines and assesses the gendered content of Uganda’s contemporary art masked as aesthetics. On the one hand, the study exposes the view that some men artists in Uganda use their works to construct men’s power and superiority as the necessary ingredients of gender difference. I demonstrate that some artists have engaged themes through which they have constructed women as being materialistic, gold-diggers, erotic and domesticated. I argue that this has been a strategy to tame Uganda’s new woman. On the other hand, the thesis attempts to show that some women artists have used visual discourse to challenge their marginalisation and to reclaim their ‘agency’ while revising some negative stereotypes about the new woman. This study makes an interdisciplinary contribution to Uganda’s art history, cultural studies and gender studies. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / D. Litt. et Phil. (Art History)