Citation

Pollock G. Asian J. Wom. Stud. 2006; 12(4): 7-31.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006, Asian Center for Women's Studies (ACWS) and Ewha Womans University Press)

DOI

10.1080/12259276.2006.11666015

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Can we die from shame? In what way is shame a feminist issue? How have contemporary artists explored the theme? Prompted by a news item that reported the death of a leading Korean actress, which was attributed to the shame of a role she had played in a recent movie, The Scarlet Letter, this article explores shame initially through a re-reading of Sigmund Freud's challenging theory of exuality (1905) in which he plots out the ways in which shame and disgrace come into being and specifically inflect the social management of women's adult sexuality. It then offers three case studies of ways in which contemporary artists from South Africa, Zanzibar/UK and Israel/France have explored aspects of historically created shame (apartheid and truth/reconciliation, enslavement, genocide and the Holocaust) through a variety of forms of art practice, not to submit their subjects to re-shaming, but to challenge the world to be ashamed of what has been done to diminish the humanity of those who are othered for gender, ethnicity, religion. © 2006 Asian Center for Women's Studies.

Language: en

Keywords

Suicide; Shame; Psychoanalysis; Sexuality; Film; Visual art