Read, Jacinda (1998) Narratives of transformation : feminism, femininity and the rape-revenge cycle. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

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Abstract

This thesis analyses the 'rape-revenge' films of the post- 1970 period. Against the
tendency of existing work in this area to categorize rape-revenge as a sub-genre of
horror, I argue that rape-revenge is better understood as a narrative structure which,
on meeting the discourses of second-wave feminism in the 1970s, has produced an
historically specific, but generically diverse cycle of films. I suggest, therefore, that
the rape-revenge cycle might usefully be read as one of the key ways in which
Hollywood has attempted to make sense of feminism and the changing shape of
heterosexual femininity in the post-1970 period. Using a model of cultural analysis
influenced by Gramsci's theory of hegemony, I argue that it is in the struggle
between the feminist stories the rape-revenge structure attempts to tell and the
feminine stories embedded in the genres over which it has been mapped that
common-sense understandings of feminism are produced. Initial consideration is
given to the ideological effects of various generic deployments of the rape-revenge
structure in the pre-1970 period. Subsequent chapters explore the ways in which
post-1970 deployments of the structure negotiate and rework the 'mass cultural
fictions of femininity' inscribed in the genres over which they have been mapped,
and the understandings of feminism these negotiations have produced. The ways in
which extra-textual material such as reviews contribute to the construction of these
understandings is also explored. Additional consideration is given to the increasing
influence of post-modern aesthetics on Hollywood film, the emergence of the New
Right during the 1980s and the characterization of this period as one of post-feminism
or backlash. In identifying the rape-revenge cycle as one of the key sites
through which the meanings of feminism are constructed and negotiated, I suggest
that the most politically expedient form feminist film theory can take today is not one
which attempts to separate feminist film from mainstream film, the political from the
popular, but one which attempts to theorize the relationship between feminism and
film, the political and the popular.

Item Type:	Thesis or Dissertation (PhD)
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN1993 Motion Pictures
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Feminism and motion pictures, Rape in motion pictures
Official Date:	September 1998
Dates:	Date Event September 1998 Submitted
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Department of Film and Television Studies
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Brunsdon, Charlotte
Sponsors:	British Academy
Extent:	347 leaves
Language:	eng

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