A Study of Gender Performativity in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando: A Mocking Biography

  • Mahboubeh Moslehi MAHBOUBEH MOSLEHI English department Faculty of Foreign Languages, University of khoramabad moslehimahboubeh@yahoo.com
  • Nozar Niazi PhD in English Language and Literature,Lorestan State University,Khorramabad, Iran E-mail address: nozar_2002@yahoo.co.in
Keywords: Virginia Woolf, Orlando, androgyny, bisexuality, gender performativity

Abstract

ABSTRACT

The present paper aims at concentrating on Judith Butler’s theory of gender as performance and how Virginia Woolf  challenges  the  assumptions  of  heterosexuality in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando(1992). Woolf rebels against the traditional view of gender as two separate categories by presenting Orlando as an androgynous and bisexual character. Orlando’s transformation from male to female and exhibition of the characteristics of both feminity and masculinity expose how gender norms are socially instituted. Woolf portrays Orlando’s attraction to both men and women. He/she loves Sasha regardless of what changes her body undergoes, but he/she marries  Shelmerdine  because he/she is bisexual. Woolf also shows clothing as signifiers of the social construction of gender and how characters flout this convention by using cross dressing.

 

Keywords: Virginia Woolf, Orlando, androgyny, bisexuality, gender performativity

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Author Biographies

Mahboubeh Moslehi, MAHBOUBEH MOSLEHI English department Faculty of Foreign Languages, University of khoramabad moslehimahboubeh@yahoo.com

MA in English Language and Literature, Lorestan State University, Khorramabad, Iran

 

Nozar Niazi, PhD in English Language and Literature,Lorestan State University,Khorramabad, Iran E-mail address: nozar_2002@yahoo.co.in
Faculty member of the department of English language and Literature, Lorestan University,Iran

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Published
2016-07-05
How to Cite
Moslehi, M., & Niazi, N. (2016). A Study of Gender Performativity in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando: A Mocking Biography. K@ta: A Biannual Publication on the Study of Languange and Literature, 18(1), 1-7. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.9744/kata.18.1.1-7
Section
Articles