The Subversive Stitch, Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine

admin — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 20:00:00 +0000

In the world of contemporary art, using embroidery to express yourself is risky, and while I impart a subtle subversive message in those textile pieces, it is hard to overcome the initial impression that I am doing dainty women's work. In my attempt to understand that prejudice, I picked up the book The Subversive Stitch.

Written by Rozsika Parker who has published widely in both Art History and Psychotherapy, The Subversive Stitch delves into the history of embroidery to explore its associations with femininity. Parker defines femininity as "the behaviour expected and encouraged in women, though obviously related to the biological sex of the individual, is shaped by society." The key argument of this book is that the "changes in ideas about femininity that can be seen reflected in the history of embroidery are striking confirmation that femininity is a social and psychosocial product."

In the revised and updated edition, the book is broken down into eight chapters: The Creation of Femininity' Eternalising the Feminine; Fertility, Chastity and Power; The Domestication of Embroidery; The Inculcation of Femininity; From Milkmaids to Mothers; Femininity as Feeling; and A Naturally Revolutionary Art? This is a scholarly text, densely written with abundant quotations, endnotes, and black and white illustrations. Unfortunately, much of the richness and beauty of the photo illustrations is lost in their small size of presentation in dull gray tones. Nevertheless, the book is a thoughtful and thorough analysis of the history of embroidery and its association with femininity and women's work. Of particular interest to me was the last chapter in which Parker explores the revolutionary aspect of contemporary embroidery by such artists as Louise Bourgeois and Tracy Emin. However, this book is not for a casual reader and is more suited for research in art history, feminist issues, or embroidery.

From my reading of The Subversive Stitch, I came to understand the reasons the disparity in status between embroidery and painting. The division between women's work and men's work seems to be at the core of this deep seeded antipathy towards embroidery. This particular quote from the eighteenth century sums it up: "Sir, she's an Artist with her needle...Could anything be more laughable than a woman claiming artistic status for her sewing?." Luckily, today's definitions of art and femininity are somewhat more fluid, allowing me flexibility to chose the medium best suited for a particular message.

Cross-posted at Fashion is My Muse

Written by: Ingrid Mida, August 2nd 2010

Maria Mitchell and the Sexing of Science: An Astronomer Among the American Romantics

admin — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 11:33:00 +0000

By Renée Bergland

Beacon Press

Nineteenth century New England was a virtual breeding ground for progressive ideas. During the period, a host of feminist philosophers, jurists, and scholars emerged onto American society. Among the heroines associated with the era, you’ve probably examined those such as Dorthea Dix and Margaret Fuller in your high school U.S. History class. Many women, however, still remain relatively unacknowledged, despite their critical roles in scholarly debates of the era. Among them, mathematician and astronomer Maria Mitchell remains most prominent.

Renée Bergland’s Maria Mitchell and the Sexing of Science tells, in careful detail, the story of the glorious, if too little known, Maria Mitchell, and her triumph over what soon grew to become yet another division of the so-called masculine domain. Raised in isolated, but vibrant Nantucket, Mitchell’s interest in astronomy started at an early age.

Apprenticed by her father, as an amateur astronomer young Maria would climb, night after night, to her house’s crude rooftop observatory to diligently study the stars. In 1847, during one of her many nighttime sweeps, Mitchell discovered a comet, propelling her into international fame. Within subsequent years, she became America’s first professional astronomer and one of the founding professors of Vassar College.

Although Mitchell’s success as a feminist scholar was certainly rare for the day, she had not, contrary to what some might expect, triumphed over impossible odds. Barriers against feminist achievement in the twenty-first century are pretty intense, and upon starting the book, I that expected that conditions must have been much harsher nearly 200 years ago. The great surprise for me came when I found that Mitchell had faced, in actuality, relatively little bias. Young Nantucketeers, both male and female, were encouraged by their Quaker upbringings to rigorously pursue academic studies.

In Maria’s time, girls were thought of as naturally scientific, and were urged, rather than dissuaded, to pursue studies in the field. The discipline, given the age, was considered less politically threatening than the humanities. Sadly, in later years the scientific field began to close ranks against female students. In the later half of this biography, Bergland chronicles those changes in American society that led to original ‘sexing of science’ and its transformation into a "man’s" game.

Although the Mitchell’s story is certainly an interesting one, Bergland provides only a dull narration of facts from the astronomer’s life. What I expected was the compelling saga of one woman’s journey to achieve scientific greatness turned out to be a rather lackluster account. The author also tended to stray from the main idea, overwhelming her reader with a mass of unnecessary detail. Often, Bergland would present a pages-long description of events that had no apparent connection to the central plot. Nevertheless, Maria Mitchell and the Sexing of Science remains a satisfactory account of Maria Mitchell and her truly enormous contributions to astronomy, education, as well as the nineteenth-century feminist movement.

Written by: Sameeraa Pahwa, June 10th 2008