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Both/and: language, art and identity in Brigid Brophy's 'In Transit' and Ali Smith's 'How to Be Both'

Andermahr, S. (2017) Both/and: language, art and identity in Brigid Brophy's 'In Transit' and Ali Smith's 'How to Be Both'. Paper presented to: School of Humanities Research Seminar Series, Bishop Grosseteste University, Lincoln, 03 May 2017.

Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Abstract: This paper sets out to read Brigid Brophy’s 1969 novel In Transit: An Heroi-cyclic Novel alongside a more recent example of contemporary women’s writing, How to Be Both (2014) by the Scottish writer Ali Smith. I argue that Brophy’s work anatomises the artificial relationship between sex and gender, the dominance of heterosexual narratives and their relation to pornography, and the ways in which art, music and language mediate concepts of gender. The paper will provide an in-depth comparative analysis of In Transit and How to be Both to show how both writers refuse binary oppositions in a “both/and” writing practice that is simultaneously self-consciously aesthetic and political.
Uncontrolled Keywords: Brigid Brophy, Ali Smith, contemporary women's writing, gender, language, sexuality
Subjects: P Language and Literature > PR English literature > PR6050 1961-2000
P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN441 Literary history > PN471 Women authors
Creators: Andermahr, Sonya
Faculties, Divisions and Institutes: University Faculties, Divisions and Research Centres - OLD > Faculty of Education & Humanities > English and Creative Writing
University Faculties, Divisions and Research Centres - OLD > Research Centre > Centre for Critical and Creative Writing
Faculties > Faculty of Education & Humanities > English and Creative Writing
Research Centres > Centre for Critical and Creative Writing
Date: 3 May 2017
Date Type: Publication
Event Title: School of Humanities Research Seminar Series
Event Dates: 03 May 2017
Event Location: Bishop Grosseteste University, Lincoln
Event Type: Other
Language: English
Status: Published / Disseminated
URI: http://nectar.northampton.ac.uk/id/eprint/9464

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