Breaking the Silence of Patriarchal Apathy: The Graphic Reinscription of Women’s Reproductive Health in Lucy Knisley’s Kid Gloves


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Keywords:

Reproductive health, Women’s illnesses, Patriarchal attitudes, Feminist text, Graphic memoir, Motherhood, Autobiographical, Life writings, Medical humanities

Abstract

In the field of women’s reproductive health, the narratives of the ‘Wandering womb’, the non-fulfilment of sexual desires, or failure towards the duty of childbearing as reasons for women’s health issues, both physiological as well as psychological have been rife since ancient times. Even now, after the rejection of many of these theories, making way for new scientific explanations and understandings, there remain many differences in the manner in which health facilities are handed out to women when compared to men. Especially when it comes to reproductive health, depictions in literature, as well as other cultural productions, have often either glossed over these matters or have presented them in an intentionally euphemistic manner, albeit in the guise of decency. The reality of the difficulties of women’s reproductive illnesses (self-perception) complicated both by birth control fertility treatments as well as the pregnancy in itself that often bring several complications in a woman’s body are usually never considered sickness (societal recognition) or disease (recognition by medical practitioners). In using the terms illness, sickness and disease, the paper is carrying forward the accepted critical difference between the three first articulated by A. Twaddle (1964) Through the study of Lucy Knisley’s refreshingly frank graphic memoir Kid Gloves: Nine Months of Careful Chaos, this paper aims to question the process of normalisation that turns many of women’s illnesses suffered during pregnancy or in the process of birth control as ‘side-effects’ and unrecognised, how they become impossible to cure, in the first place. The paper will show how the text not only uncovers the mystification surrounding women’s health in general, revealing the patriarchal attitudes that inform such notions, but does so in a simple manner that is also fun to read- making it a compelling feminist text.

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Author Biography

Dr. Kusumika Sarkar, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, U.P., India ,Aligarh Muslim University

Dr. Kusumika Sarkar is an Assistant Professor in the English Department at Aligarh Muslim University. She has been the GIAN Coordinator for Motherhood Studies at the University of Sweden, Stockholm and has more than ten years of teaching experience, besides holding multiple administrative posts throughout her tenure. She has actively worked and published in the areas of Women’s Studies, Gender Discourse, Motherhood, and Feminist cultural frameworks. 

References

Adair, J. Mark. “Plato's View of the 'Wandering Uterus'.” The Classical Journal, vol. 91, no. 2,1995, pp. 153–163. JSTOR.www.jstor.org/stable/3298478. Accessed 16 Aug. 2020.

Archer-Hind, R. D. (ed. and trans.), 1888, The Timaeus of Plato, McMillan & Co.; reprinted, Salem, Ayers Co. Publishers, 1988.

Chattopadhyay, Sohini. June 12, 2015. https://qz.com/india/422338/in-horrific-indian-hospitals-women-in-labour-are-slapped-when-they-scream/

Merskey, Harold, and Paul Potter. "The Womb Lay Still in Ancient Egypt." British Journal of Psychiatry, 1989.

Sigerist, E. Henry. A History of Medicine: Primitive and Archaic Medicine. Vol I. Oxford University Press, 1951.

Twaddle, A. C. 1968. “Influence and illness: Definitions and definers of illness behaviour among older males in Providence, Rhode Island.” Ph. D. Thesis: Brown University.

Twaddle, A. C. Sickness behaviour and the sick role. G.K. Hall and Company, 1979.

Twaddle, A. C. 1994a. Disease, illness and sickness revisited. In: A. Twaddle & L. Nordenfelt (eds.) Disease, Illness and Sickness: Three Central Concepts in the Theory of Health. Linköping: Studies on Health and Society, 18, 118.

Twaddle, A. C. 1994b. Disease, illness, sickness and health: A response to Nordenfelt. In: A. Twaddle & L. Nordenfelt (eds.), Disease, illness and sickness: Three central concepts in the theory of health. Linköping: Studies on Health and Society, 18, 37–53

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Published

2024-10-31

How to Cite

Dr. Kusumika Sarkar. “Breaking the Silence of Patriarchal Apathy: The Graphic Reinscription of Women’s Reproductive Health in Lucy Knisley’s Kid Gloves”. The Creative Launcher, vol. 9, no. 5, Oct. 2024, pp. 77-81, https://thecreativelauncher.com/index.php/tcl/article/view/1206.

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Research Articles