Laboring for Love: Authorial Emotional Labor as Feminist Project in the Romance Novel Outlander
Start Date
13-4-2018 11:10 AM
End Date
13-4-2018 12:10 PM
Proposal Type
Individual Presentation
Abstract
In her seminal work, “The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling,” sociologist Arlie Russel Hochschild attributes the labor of emotional control and performance to jobs and social contexts most often gendered as female or “for women.” The emotional labor of women is often invalidated or left widely unacknowledged. I argue that the common reception of the romance novel is yet another example of women’s emotional labor being regarded as frivolously sentimental when in actuality it is impactful social excavation. My project uses an analysis of emotional work to argue for the romance genre as a feminist project. Though the romance novel has been widely disputed as a viable feminist project, an in depth examination of the emotional labor of characters and writer has been widely overlooked in this argument. As example, I examine the romance novel Outlander, and the emotional labor performed by author Diana Gabaldon for the story’s heroine, Claire Randall. My textual analysis of Claire’s emotional work explores ways that performed authorial emotional labor not only construct a realistic and legible female subjectivity but also validates the emotional labor of present day women readers. Furthermore, my research examines the possibilities for alternative knowledge production afforded by emotional work as well as the applicability of this approach on numerous other works of the romance genre. While the genres anti-feminist problems are not wholly resolved by this approach, the presence and authority of female subjectivity in the novels ultimately accomplishes significant projects of feminine agency and authority.
Sources
Gabaldon, Diana. outlander. Dell, New York, 1992.
Hochschild, Arlie R. 1 and Ebook Central - Business Ebook Subscription. The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2012, doi:10.1525/j.ctt1pn9bk.
Laboring for Love: Authorial Emotional Labor as Feminist Project in the Romance Novel Outlander
In her seminal work, “The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling,” sociologist Arlie Russel Hochschild attributes the labor of emotional control and performance to jobs and social contexts most often gendered as female or “for women.” The emotional labor of women is often invalidated or left widely unacknowledged. I argue that the common reception of the romance novel is yet another example of women’s emotional labor being regarded as frivolously sentimental when in actuality it is impactful social excavation. My project uses an analysis of emotional work to argue for the romance genre as a feminist project. Though the romance novel has been widely disputed as a viable feminist project, an in depth examination of the emotional labor of characters and writer has been widely overlooked in this argument. As example, I examine the romance novel Outlander, and the emotional labor performed by author Diana Gabaldon for the story’s heroine, Claire Randall. My textual analysis of Claire’s emotional work explores ways that performed authorial emotional labor not only construct a realistic and legible female subjectivity but also validates the emotional labor of present day women readers. Furthermore, my research examines the possibilities for alternative knowledge production afforded by emotional work as well as the applicability of this approach on numerous other works of the romance genre. While the genres anti-feminist problems are not wholly resolved by this approach, the presence and authority of female subjectivity in the novels ultimately accomplishes significant projects of feminine agency and authority.
Sources
Gabaldon, Diana. outlander. Dell, New York, 1992.
Hochschild, Arlie R. 1 and Ebook Central - Business Ebook Subscription. The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2012, doi:10.1525/j.ctt1pn9bk.