Towards a genealogy of female bodies in Wide Sargasso Sea, Beloved and the Story of Zahra

Abstract

This thesis tackles the problematic of the body in Jean Rhys Wide Sargasso, Toni Morrisons Beloved and Hanan Al-Shaykhs The Story of Zahra. This research examines the notion of bodies as inscriptive spaces upon which discourses and power relations are mapped. It argues that these novels adopt a genealogical approach that aims at deconstructing fixed concepts of truth and promote an "insurrection of subjugated knoweldges". The three novels depict female bodies inscribed by a web of discourses and systems of power that relegates their subjectivities to a "there" of madness and hysteria. Jean Rhys Antoinette performatively carries out her fate as Jane Eyres self-immolating body. However, through subversive repetition, she reclaims agency over that imprisoned body. Toni Morrisons Beloved represents the embodiment of an abject past that is summoned in order to shed light on a process of marginalization perpetuated by the system of slavery. Hanan Al Shaykhs Zahra is the usurped body-space, a receptacle for mens desires and an inscription space for proliferating opposing national discourses. Drawing on Foucaults notion of genealogy and the theories of Judith Butler, Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray, this thesis seeks to add further insight to the significance of cultural inscription, highlighting the importance of corporality in understanding subjectivity.