Gender Performativity: Reading Mahasweta Devi?s Draupadi and Luisa Valenzuela?s Other Weapons
In this paper I propose to read and discuss two short stories, Luisa Valenzuela?s Other Weapons and Mahasweta Devi?s Draupadi under a comparative spectrum. This apparent unlikely comparison from two distinct social, political, linguistic and cultural paradigms, as diverse as Latin America (Cuba?) and Bengal, is the result of my curious attempt to decipher Laura and Dopdi on the lines of Judith Butler?s notion of ?gender performativity?.
In these two stories, quite distinct and diverse from each other in terms of the story line, the plot and the construction of the characters, I am more than intrigued on coming across this subtle yet compelling …show more content…
Draupadi is a guerilla informer on the run, christened to the cause of her mission and the well being of her compatriots and an ardent soldier at heart. When captured and taken to the army camps she fears the worst at heart but is a conscious calculator on guard, gauging every other move she is going to make, her mind is at work. Draupadi is ?made?, she is gang raped continuosly on the go for two nights and two days and then she is ordered to be brought to the Senanayak?s tent. Once her tied hands and legs are let loose she reacts, she starts performing. The body that till then was the marker of her gender, her ?femaleness?, which was to be wronged in particular ways of violation to conform to the ideas of ?true gender? and its code of celebrated respect, she uses it in a different way. She refuses to be clothed. She steps out in to broad daylight proudly exhibiting the raw and bloody wounds of the repeated rapes and the masters of social reasoning are left flabbergasted. If ?gender? is an element that is performed then Draupadi performs her ?female gender? with codes of conduct that disturb the androcentric bullet points of how ?female-ness? is defined in the first place. Her haunting reply to a petrified Senanayak
In this paper I propose to read and discuss two short stories, Luisa Valenzuela?s Other Weapons and Mahasweta Devi?s Draupadi under a comparative spectrum. This apparent unlikely comparison from two distinct social, political, linguistic and cultural paradigms, as diverse as Latin America (Cuba?) and Bengal, is the result of my curious attempt to decipher Laura and Dopdi on the lines of Judith Butler?s notion of ?gender performativity?.
In these two stories, quite distinct and diverse from each other in terms of the story line, the plot and the construction of the characters, I am more than intrigued on coming across this subtle yet compelling …show more content…
Draupadi is a guerilla informer on the run, christened to the cause of her mission and the well being of her compatriots and an ardent soldier at heart. When captured and taken to the army camps she fears the worst at heart but is a conscious calculator on guard, gauging every other move she is going to make, her mind is at work. Draupadi is ?made?, she is gang raped continuosly on the go for two nights and two days and then she is ordered to be brought to the Senanayak?s tent. Once her tied hands and legs are let loose she reacts, she starts performing. The body that till then was the marker of her gender, her ?femaleness?, which was to be wronged in particular ways of violation to conform to the ideas of ?true gender? and its code of celebrated respect, she uses it in a different way. She refuses to be clothed. She steps out in to broad daylight proudly exhibiting the raw and bloody wounds of the repeated rapes and the masters of social reasoning are left flabbergasted. If ?gender? is an element that is performed then Draupadi performs her ?female gender? with codes of conduct that disturb the androcentric bullet points of how ?female-ness? is defined in the first place. Her haunting reply to a petrified Senanayak