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Victorian Literature, Culture, and Power: By Ava Reisman - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Especially in Margaret's relationship and interactions with Mr. Thornton, their sexuality and desires are conveyed very implicitly. They channel their sexual energies into getting married, thus teaching readers that the proper way to direct their sexuality was in outlets that were socially acceptable.
    - - Victorian novels expresses sexual desires within the context of the social boundaries that middle-class readers were comfortable with. Sexuality was promoted in disguised and coded terms and language.
    - - Foucault speaks on a phenomenon known as "the speaker's benefit." The speaker's benefit is the notion that we talk about sex as though it’s repressed because we get power from talking about it. We get this power because we’re “upsetting the norm” and talking about something we’re not supposed to. The irony is that Victorians were not actually sexually repressed, because they were talking about it constantly, but they gained power through talking about sex as if they were repressed.
  - - - The entire novel includes interactions of Dorian's relationships with older men, including Basil and Henry. Dorian's relationship with Henry in particular is very much of the paiderastia relationships, as Henry is constantly teaching Dorian little pieces of advice. In the end, the novel implies that Dorian's relationship was immoral, as seen from the fact that his behavior ages him in the painting.
    - - The Wilde Trials effectively established the boundary between what was considered normal and abnormal sexuality and sexual behavior. Part of the purpose of the trial was social. Not only was the trial to punish gay men for their behavior, but to simultaneously show straight men not to act in a way that was effeminate. The trial resulted from Wilde's relationship with a younger man.
  - - - Ellis justified against the persecution of homosexuality in a variety of ways. First, he argued that homosexuality is natural, and people can't help it. Second, he reasoned that people who are homosexual haven't sinned against society if they're homosexual but haven't committed any sexual act. Third, he said that being gay was punishment enough because of social hostility and internal repression, so why further punish those who were homosexual?
    - - “Domestic fiction” introduced a new form of political power by putting women in charge of the domestic sphere. Domesticity was political be seeming apolitical and implicitly justifying women being sexually dominant beings by placing them in the dominant position in domesticity. Power in domesticity was a metaphor for power in a sexual context as well as a political one.
- - - - Imperialism was tied to the notion of progress. The British racialized pseudo-sciences, conceptualizing race as biological differences and putting white people above people of color. The idea was that the white people would help people of color "modernize."
    - - Victorian literature justified imperialism through culture. Victorians created binaries that effectively categorized people into "us" and "them" binaries. This categorization was established through orientalism, anthropology, "scientific" racism, and the denial of coevalness.
    - - During Victoria's reign, England was the center of a global empire that brought Britain into contact with a huge variety of other peoples and cultures. Imperialism bolstered British national identity, and promoted the idea that the British Empire was a universal force for good that benefitted not only the British, but the entire world because they would learn the ways of the Brits.
  - - - Industrialization allowed for increased social mobility, with families beginning to amass large fortunes in industry, thus overtaking the previously powerful: the aristocracy. A modernized approach to socialization emerged, in which family history no longer offered a guide to social identity. Victorians now had to rely on dress, speech, behavior, and place of residence to distinguish one's class.
    - - Engels was revolutionary in that he used highly emotional appeals in his writing in an attempt to convince the masses, most notably those of the lower class, to turn to a support in communism. Engels exposes the disgusting life that is lived by industrial workers in an effort to convert them to what he believes is the more modern and equitable form of society.
    - - Carlyle articulates the new, modern existence of what are called "captains of industry." These captains of industry were business leaders who amassed incredible fortunes through industry and contributed that fortune in some positive way. Opposed to "robber barons" who did not contribute their fortune to their country, captains of industry were used to promote how these new industrial leaders should behave now that they've found themselves in a position of extreme wealth.
  - - - The New Woman was revolutionary in that, as opposed to the "Old Woman," she was daring, outspoken, and unafraid to critique men on their mistreatment of women. This instilled a huge societal fear of women taking the place of men, thus making men no longer socially necessary.
    - - New theories and challenges to tradition increased the number of opportunities available to women in a male-dominated world. When women were given increased educational and work opportunities, the world of motherhood and domesticity was no longer the only viable option for a woman to maintain a secure life. A new air of sexual freedom was also promoted in this era of "New Women."
    - - Haggard uses Ayesha as a kind of metaphor for the "New Woman." He blames women for using their sexuality to manipulate men into their eventual downful. This was a response to the surge of female empowerment and an attempt to show women that their "New Woman" behavior will eventually lead to their downfall.
  - - - Eagleton argues that there is a direct relationship between literature and ideology. Literature has the power to reflect back, so that audiences are capable of recognizing something as ideology. Art is a medium in which society can progressively move out of the ideology and realize the distorted reality that they have been existing in.
    - - Marx and Engels argued that the bourgeoisie had thrown all morality out the window in favor of capitalism. The middle-class is creating their own demise because they have consumed and exploited so much that they will feel the consequences of their actions. Overall, "The Communist Manifesto" was revolutionary in an attempt to modernize society, and overturn the previously known economic system in favor of an entirely new one.
- - - - To properly established what he believed to be the correct relationship between white people and people of color, Kipling tasked Americans with the "white man's burden." This "burden" was an push to imperialize other nations in order to teach them the ways of white people.
    - - In "Jane Eyre," Bertha became the novel's archetypal image of the oppressed "dark races." Brontë used Bertha as a metaphor to express the relationship between the English and colonized nations. She implies that oppression is foreign to the English, thus the nonwhite races in the novel signify oppression in England, which is something that other races brought to the nation.
  - - - Macaulay was of the opinion that industrialization benefitted everyone socially. He was a Whig politician who supported industrial, capitalist values. This piece advocated for the lower class to stay in their place and continue to be industry laborers, reasoning that statistics show that life is now better for the working class than it was pre-industrialization.
    - - Arnold saw the faults in the emerging middle-class, and used Hellenism to argue against some of their values. He promoted deviance away from the middle-class obsession with morality. When one could be distinguished as middle-class through their behavior, Arnold promoted that society do away with these behavioral rules and obligations.
    - - As an advocate for the old, vertical relationship between the classes, Southey is not in favor of an industrialized society. He reasons that the old agricultural way should be reverted back to because peasants lived in better conditions during that time.
  - - - The role of women was "to be accepted as divinely willed," meaning that women were to be submissive to men, because that was how God desired it to be. They were to be an "angel of the house," in that they thrived in the world of domesticity and devoted everything to their family, especially their husband.
    - - This piece was created as another justification between the concrete binary between men and women. Men are progressive and defensive, the ones who go out and conquer the world. Women are powerful as well, but only in the realm of decision making, which is encoded language for staying in the home and making decisions there.
    - - In an attempt to redefine relationships, Jackson still promoted a societal standard for homosexual relationships, what he coined "the New Chivalry." The New Chivalry had more to do with intellect, and less to do with creating a lineage, which was all the old chivalry was comprised of. Even with a more modern approach, this Victorian is still attempting to put a societal standard on what a relationship should be.
    - - This piece was written as a message to Victorian women as a kind of guide regarding how they should behave socially and why they should follow their domestic duties. The argument was that while men are out in the world trying to grab power, women must be at home to remind them of their morality. It placed women on a moral pedestal to justify their exclusion from the public world.
    - - While Jane initially starts off as a woman intent on creating her own path, one who works and creates a financially independent life for herself, she finds herself following traditional gender roles and getting married at the end of the novel. The domestic ending of the novel is a promotion for the happiness a woman will find if she follows societal roles and gets married.