Sullivan, Moynagh (2002) I am, therefore I'm not (Woman). International Journal of English Studies, 2 (2). pp. 123-134. ISSN 1578-7044

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Abstract

This paper uses Object Relations theory to think about the dynamics governing the production of cultural identity in Irish Studies. Arguably women’s writing is positioned within Irish studies in what Luce Irigaray terms “the place of the mother”. The mother within the nuclear and patriarchal determined family is allocated the function of object through which the other members of the family derive their own identity. When a woman writer inscribes her subjective presence then she disrupts the production of other’s identity, and challenges the dynamics of a family structure that need to rely on her absence from it. Such refusal to be simply an object is often met with resistance. This paper argues that Eavan Boland’s collection The Lost Land alters Boland’s object use within the cultural context of Irish studies, and it examines so moth the criticism attaching to it accordingly.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	daughter; inter-subjective; Irish Studies; maternal body; Mother Ireland; Oedipal crisis; Object Relations; phallic mother; the place of the mother; Eavan Boland;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Social Sciences Faculty of Arts & Humanities > School of English, Media & Theatre Studies
Item ID:	5487
Depositing User:	Moynagh Sullivan
Date Deposited:	14 Oct 2014 15:50
Journal or Publication Title:	International Journal of English Studies
Publisher:	University of Murcia
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://revistas.um.es/ijes/article/view/...
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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