Assignments for Chapter 1—“Gender: Is One Born a Woman?”
Assignment 1: Evaluation (4-6 pages)
Option 1
In Chapter 6 of
A Room of One’s Own
, Virginia Woolf puts forth her view that
“there [could be] two sexes in the mind corresponding to the two sexes in the body,” the male and female, and the best creative mind is one in which the “masculine” and
“feminine” work in harmony. Woolf adds, “Coleridge perhaps meant this when he said that a great mind is androgynous” (37).
Evaluate Woolf’s opinion keeping in mind the fact that she argues that the
“androgynous mind” is not one which has “special sympathy” for women’s causes or men’s causes and “is less apt to make these distinctions than the single-sexed mind” (37).
As you judge the worth of Woolf’s claim, you should explain whether you think particular traits are “masculine” or “feminine” as manifested in a work of art. If so, what would make a work of art androgynous? Would you receive this as the most successful form of art?
On the contrary, do you believe such distinctions do not hold about eighty years after the publication of A Room of One’s Own ? In that case, what would make a work of art meaningful and resonant for you? What other aspects would need to be in harmony?
Pick and discuss one work of art as you weigh the validity of Woolf’s claims.
(You should do this whether you agree or disagree with Woolf). You could select a book, a poem, a film, a painting, a musical or dance composition etc. How does this strike you as an expression of the “androgynous mind?” What other elements, if not gender, are successfully harmonized? Find and use also one or two print or online sources that address the merits or demerits of this artistic production.
Option 2
In the brief excerpt from Orlando , by Virginia Woolf, in Chapter 1, we understand that the protagonist, Orlando, is both man and woman in different stages of her life. In this regard, consider the line “And here it would seem from some ambiguity in her terms that she was censuring both sexes equally, as if she belonged to neither; and indeed, for the time being she seemed to vacillate; she was man; she was woman . . .”
(Woolf 47). Consider also the four visual images (48-51) included in the excerpt from
Orlando .
Now evaluate Woolf’s claim from Chapter 6 of A Room of One’s Own
that “It is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple; one must be woman-manly or manwomanly” (39). Although, in Room , Woolf speaks specifically of the writer, in the figure of Orlando, she gives us a literary character that is “woman-manly” or “man-womanly.”
Pick and discuss one such figure , either from real life or an artistic creation, who you think is “woman-manly” or “man-womanly.” You can, for instance, select a celebrity singer, a sports star, a character from a film, a character from a book, and so forth.
Do you think that it “is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple?” (Woolf 39)
In regards to the figure or character you have chosen to discuss, do you feel that the

androgyny has added to the charisma of the figure; helped to spread her/his message more effectively; enabled the artistic creation to have a deeper impact on you?
Find and use one or two sources , either print or online, that address the issue of androgyny in Orlando or in the figure or character you have chosen to discuss in order to evaluate Woolf’s claim.
Assignment 2: Argument (4-6 pages)
Option 1
Consider Audre Lorde’s statement in “The Transformation of Silence into
Language and Action”: “For we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition, and while we wait in silence for that final luxury of fearlessness, the weight of that silence will choke us” (81).
Although Lorde begins this piece by defining herself as a “Black lesbian poet”
(78), towards the end, she calls for dialogue between all women instead of a focusing on differences between them. In fact, she closes the essay with “And there are so many silences to be broken” (Lorde 81).
Write an argumentative essay taking a position for or against Lorde’s claims that
“we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition” and there still remain “so many silences to be broken.” In order to substantiate your position, select one group from the history of the United States, or a group from some other part of the world, that seems, to you, to be “different” from the
“norm.” Discuss whether you think silence marked the existence of members of this group, for a period of time, because of issues related to fear. Do you believe this group is still immobilized by fear and silence to some extent? Why? What could be done to change this?
Conversely, if you disagree with Lorde, argue how your chosen group, despite being “different,” has always felt free to express its opinions and define itself and its needs fearlessly. No matter which argumentative position you take, have at least one paragraph in which you show the opposing point of view. Eventually, you have to convince your audience that your position is the more credible one.
Use at least two textual sources from Chapter 1 and find and use two sources such as magazine or newspaper articles, print or online, to support your position. One or at most two of these sources can also be used to discuss the opposing viewpoint.
Option 2
In an excerpt from The Straight Mind and Other Essays , Monique Wittig says,
“The category of sex is the category that ordains slavery for women, and it works specifically, as it did for black slaves, through an operation of reduction, by taking the part for the whole, a part (color, sex) through which the whole human group has to pass as through a screen” (104).
Write an argumentative essay taking a position for or against Wittig’s statement.
Do you think her ideas are still valid seventeen years after the publication of her book?
(A suggestion: you might want to think globally in this regard before you formulate your

thesis). Wittig also notes, “For the category of sex is the category that sticks to women”
(104). Would you say that women are still marked or defined largely by their “sex;” that it is this dimension which continues to lead to their objectification and oppression?
On the other hand, you could argue that this is no longer the case; that we have moved beyond such dichotomies and such “reduction,” resultant from “sex,” is not the norm.
Select one film (such as The Ballad of the Sad Café, The Crying Game, Monster,
Revolutionary Road, or any film of your choice that addresses relevant issues) and analyze sequences that support your position. Use also material from any two essays in
Chapter 1 and two sources such as newspaper or magazine articles (print or web) that would help in fleshing out your argument.
No matter what your position, you will need to have at least a paragraph which presents the counter-argument, although you can refute this view to further emphasize the strength of yours. One or two of your sources can be used to present the counterargument.
Assignment 3: Synthesis (6-8 pages)
Towards the end of her essay “Sex and Gender,” Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick speaks of a “separatist-feminist” “lesbian interpretive framework” (119) which saw no
“commonality between gay-male and lesbian experience and identity” (120). In other words, this framework polarized lesbians and gay men, two already marginalized social groups. Sedgwick continues, “Indeed, the powerful impetus of a gender-polarized feminist ethical schema made it possible for a profoundly antihomophobic reading of lesbian desire . . . to fuel a correspondingly homophobic reading of gay male desire . . . “
(120). Sedgwick does note that since the late 1970s, there have been challenges to this framework.
Write an argumentative essay in which you build your position on what, in general, the dynamics should be between groups which have faced social/cultural marginalization. Select any two such groups (gender or sexual orientation of the groups does not, necessarily, have to determine your choices) and research interactions between them in the last thirty years or so. You could, for instance, focus on ethnic groups, class, disability, or work across such categories. If your research shows continued conflict between the two groups, do you think this is justified? Why? If, on the other hand, you think the two groups would have gained more, or did gain more, by working together, explain why you think so.
You will need at least two scholarly sources and at least two essays from
Chapter 1 (of Cultural Conversations) other than Sedgwick’s to build your argument.
Several of the essays in Chapter 1, such as by Woolf, hooks, Lorde, Wittig, and
Sedgwick, address more than one kind of disempowerment. You can use these essays to generate ideas on what two groups you wish to research.
Make sure to present and refute the opposing point of view, no matter what your argumentative position. Most importantly, since this is your synthesis paper, work on building connections between your views and the sources you use so that these different elements of your paper are in dialogue.