Englisches Seminar der Universität zu Köln
Hauptseminar: ‘American Sexualities’
SS 05, Köln, den 29.06.2007

The power of sex - the sex of power: a gendered approach to
A.M. Homes′ "The End of Alice"

by

Carsten Krumdiek

Content

I. Introduction 1

II. Sexuality & Power – a theoretical approach 2

i. The Construction of Gender & Sex Roles 2
ii. Gendered Power 4
iii. Childhood Trauma and Sexual Deviance 6

III. Sex & Gender: Instruments of power in Homes’ The End of Alice 8

i. Watching Chappy – A view on male power and masculinity 8
ii. Watching the Girl – A view on female power and femininity 13
iii. “The Mother”: origin of sexually deviant behaviour 16

IV. Conclusion 19

V. Bibliography 20

I. Introduction

Throughout history the differences between the sexes have always been an important and controversial issue. In our society it has usually been the male who owned the power, the one who is in charge – the pater familias. Even though today, when women are regarded as of equal status, in politics and business, men still tend to achieve more and receive higher wages. But what is this particular power based on anyway? How is it constituted and how is it maintained? Is it justifiable to think only in terms of binary genders and sexes? Is power generally something that is only determined to be masculine? Or is there such a thing as female power? What is this power like? In this paper, answers to these questions shall be found and discussed furthermore. The first section of the paper will give a short introduction and an historical overview of the ideas of gender and sex. Then, in the following, a connection shall be drawn to the notion of power and its relation to sexuality and gender in general. The last part of the first chapter will investigate the importance of the family environment with regard to the initiation of sexually deviant behaviour. Family environment, sexual deviance and gendered power are issues which form major part of A.M. Homes’ controversial novel The End of Alice, which was published in 1996. The further discussion will focus on the characters of the novel as well as on the representation of the sexes and their struggle for power. Eventually, the significance of one particular woman, the mother, as a very influential and powerful character in the book shall be analysed. The author of this paper is absolutely aware of the fact, that the novel is based on rather controversial elements, as for instance the narrator’s glorifying attitude concerning the sexual abuse of children. Since the children characters in the novel are usually not younger than twelve and do show typically male or female attributes, they shall be included in the discussion of female and male power, although they are not considered to be adults and are victims of crime actions within the novel.

II. Sexuality & Power – A theoretical approach

i. The Construction of Gender & Sex Roles

The difference between the sexes has been subject to an enormous amount of political, social and cultural discussions throughout history. From the ancient Greece until the 18th century, scholars considered men and women to be of anatomically similar structure. Precisely, men’s genitals were regarded as the reverse of the female sexual organs. (cf. Martin 1987: 16) Despite of this analogy, a particular kind of misogyny has prevailed ever since, as for example already in the ancient Greece, giving birth to a boy was believed to be normal, whereas the birth of a female represented abnormality. (cf. Braidotti 1994: 63) Furthermore, women have always been subject of repression beginning with the image of the sinful Eve as opposed to Adam, the man of virtue and ratio, until the struggle of 20th century women for an academic career beyond home and kitchen.
Only in the later 19th century, with the origin of Psychoanalysis and the contributions of Sigmund Freud, the (mostly psychological) differences between the sexes and their causes began to be looked at closer. Freud believed, as defined by his psychoanalytical theory, that the distinction between male and female became only crucial with the beginning of the phallic stage, namely when children become aware of their distinctiveness and start to define themselves as either boy or girl. (cf. Rendtorff 1998: 128) According to Freud, the little boy realizes that the girl lacks a penis, which leads him to fear of castration. Since his father’s love as well as the desire for his mother would bring along castration (as happened to the mother), the boy develops the role of a heterosexual male. The little girl, however, feels inferior, as soon as she realizes that she does not have a penis. Her anger against the supposedly responsible mother, leads her to her father, “hoping for his love, his penis (…) or his child.” (New 1991: 7) According to this Freudian idea one’s own sex role is established. However, “as an account of the social construction of gender, Freud’s is unusual.” (New 1991: 8)
In the course of the 20th century Feminists’ movement, as a reaction to the prevailing misogyny in Western society, the terms sex and gender were introduced and remain to be of great importance in the scientific field of Gender Studies. (cf. Stephan et al. 2000: 10) Sex describes the biological sex of the individual based on his/her physiognomy (reproductive organs etc.). As opposed to Gender which Lipman-Blumen (1984) defines as follows:
“Gender roles (…) are socially created expectations for masculine and feminine behaviour. Exaggerating both real and imagined aspects of biological sex, each society sorts certain polarized behaviours and attitudes into two sets it then labels ‘male’ and ‘female’.” (Lipman-Blumen 1984: 2) Thus, Gender is something that we learn during the courses of our lives, something that is determined by our environment and culture and depends on everyone’s individual context. In addition, one has to bear in mind, that there can be no masculinity without its counterpart, namely femininity. (cf. Brittan 1989: 3) The environment forces the individual into a “normative heterosexuality” in which men take on the part of the “agency”, while women are represented by “subordination”. (cf. Holland et al. 2003: 87)

[...]