no. 37 Aesthetics of Gender Embodiment

W O R K I N G PA P E R S
SERIES TWO
no. 37 Aesthetics of
Gender Embodiment
Jack Migdalek
deakin.edu.au/alfred-deakin-research-institute
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W O R K I N G PA P E R S
SERIES TWO
Aesthetics of
Gender Embodiment
no. 37
Jack Migdalek
SERIES EDITOR
Peter Kelly
ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE
Deakin University
Geelong VIC 3217
AUSTRALIA
ISBN 978-1-921745-36-2
ISSN (online) 1837-7440
ISSN (print) 1837-7432
AUGUST 2012
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© Alfred Deakin Research Institute, Deakin University
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication data:
Migdalek, Jack.
Aesthetics of gender embodiment
Bibliography
ISBN 978-1-921745-36-2
1. Feminine beauty (Aesthetics). 2. Masculine beauty (Aesthetics).
I. Migdalek, Jack.
II. Alfred Deakin Research Institute.
III. Title. (Series: Alfred Deakin Research Institute;
Working Paper No. 37).
305.3
Disclaimer
This article has been written as part of a series of publications issued from the Alfred Deakin Research
Institute. The views contained in this article are representative of the author only. The publishing of this article
does not constitute an endorsement of or any other expression of opinion by Deakin University. Deakin
University does not accept any loss, damage or injury howsoever arising that may result from this article.
The Alfred Deakin Research Institute Working Papers
SERIES TWO
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The working papers are selected with the following criteria in mind: To share knowledge,
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Lowe, D. The Colombo Plan and ‘soft’ regionalism
in the Asia-Pacific: Australian and New Zealand
cultural diplomacy in the 1950s and 1960s.
April 2010.
No. 18
No. 02 Murphy, K. and Cherney, A. Policing ethnic minority
groups with procedural justice: An empirical study.
April 2010.
No. 20
Lowe, D. ‘Old Wine, New Bloggers: Public Diplomacy,
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No. 03 Ritchie, J. ‘We need one district government to be
set up to replace other district governments’: The
beginnings of provincial government in Papua New
Guinea. April 2010.
No. 21
Foster, J. E., McGillivray, M. and Seth, S. ‘Composite
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Murphy, B. and Murphy, K. ‘The Australian
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Turner, M. ‘Historians as Expert Witnesses: How do
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No. 23
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Feeny, S. and McGillivray, M. Scaling-up foreign aid:
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Turner, M. ‘The Irving-Lipstadt Libel Trial: Historians
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Murphy, K. and Gaylor, A. Policing Youth: Can
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Campbell, P., Kelly, P. & Harrison, L. ‘Transitional Labour
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No. 25
Brown, T.M. The Anglican Church and the Vanuatu
Independence Movement: Solidarity and Ambiguity.
August 2010.
Robinson, G. ‘American liberalism and capitalism from
William Jennings Bryan to Barack Obama’, December
2011.
No. 26
No. 08
Moore, C. Decolonising the Solomon Islands: British
Theory and Melanesian Practice. August 2010.
Koehne, S. ‘“Peaceful and Secure”: Reading Nazi
Germany through Reason and Emotion’, December 2011.
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Hayes, M. Re-framing Polynesian Journalism: From
Tusitala to Liquid Modernity. August 2010.
No. 10
Dickson-Waiko, A. Taking over, of what and from
whom?: Women and Independence, the PNG
experience. August 2010.
No. 01 No. 04 No. 07 No. 11
Hancock, L. and O’Neil, M. Risky business: Why
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No. 12 Bryant-Tokalau, J. The Fijian Qoliqoli and Urban
Squatting in Fiji: Righting an Historical Wrong?
August 2010.
No. 13 Murphy, B., Murphy, K. and Mearns, M. The
Australian Tax System Survey of Tax Scheme
Investors: Methodology and Preliminary Findings for
the Third Follow-up Survey. September 2010.
No. 14 Hancock, L. How ‘responsible’ is Crown Casino?:
What Crown employees say. November 2010.
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Murphy, K. and Cherney, A. Understanding minority
group willingness to cooperate with police: Taking
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2010.
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Murphy, K., Murphy, B., and Mearns, M. ‘The 2007
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Murphy, K., Murphy, B. and Mearns, M. ‘The 2009
Crime, Safety and Policing in Australia Survey’:
Survey Methodology and Preliminary Findings.
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Kelly, P. ‘A Social Science of Risk: The Trap of Empiricism,
the Problem of Ambivalence? September 2011.
Campbell, P., Kelly, P. and Harrison, L. ‘Social Enterprise:
Challenges and Opportunities’, September 2011.
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King, T. J. & Murphy, K. Procedural Justice as a
component of the Not In My Backyard (NIMBY)
syndrome: Understanding opposition to the building of a
desalination plant in Victoria, Australia, June 2012.
No. 28
Jackson, R. Birthing Kits, NGOs and reducing maternal
and neonatal mortality in Ethiopia, June 2012.
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Speldewinde, C. & Verso, M. Winchelsea: A Health and
Wellbeing Profile, June 2012.
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Speldewinde, C. & Verso, M. Lorne: A Health and
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Campbell, P., Kelly, P. & Harrison, L. The Problem of
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Jackson, R., Jatrana, S., Johnson, L., Kilpatrick, S. &
King, T. Making connections in Geelong: Migrants, social
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Jones, P., Managing Urbanisation in Papua New Guinea:
Planning for Planning’s Sake? August 2012.
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Phillips, S., Widening Participation in Higher Education
for People from Low SES Backgrounds: A Case Study of
Deakin University’s Existing Community Partnerships and
Collaborations, August 2012.
No. 35
Charles, C., Constructions of Education and Resistance
within Popular Feminist Commentary on Girls and
Sexualisation, August 2012.
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Graham, M. & Rich, S., What’s ‘childless’ got to do with
it? August 2012.
No. 37
Migdalek, J., Aesthetics of Gender Embodiment, August
2012
ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE WORKING PAPER SERIES
Gender: Revisited, Revised, Reconfigured
Introduction: Adam Brown and Kim Toffoletti
The three papers comprising this series (Working Papers 35, 36 and 37) emerged from
a one day symposium titled Gender: Revisited, Revised, Reconfigured, held at Deakin
University in November 2011. An initiative of the Faculty of Arts and Education’s Processes
of Signification Emerging Research Group (PSERG), the symposium aimed to showcase
current research in the fields of gender, feminist, women’s and masculinity studies being
undertaken across the University. The symposium provided a forum for emerging and
established scholars to participate in theoretical, methodological and critical debates around
gender, with a view to identifying intellectual synergies, points of connection and sites for
potential research collaboration and exchange.
The focus of the inaugural PSERG symposium was on the re-interpretation and re-imagining
of gender in different contexts, posing broad questions: In what (new) ways are gender
stereotypes constructed in an increasingly media-saturated world? How are complex reworkings of gendered behaviour and expectations breaking down binaries and subverting
dominant paradigms? What relevance does the concept of ‘gender’ have today? Given the
wide scope of the topic, the papers presented engaged with issues relating to gender from a
variety of contemporary perspectives, offering opportunities for rich inter-disciplinary dialogue
between fields as varied as new media, psychology, literature, health, law and education.
Participants ranged from postgraduates to new and senior academic staff.
The selection of Working Papers presented here is indicative of the range and scope
of gender analysis and critique occurring across disciplinary boundaries. Taking the
mediasphere as the site of critical focus, the contributions range from explorations of
gendered discourses of childlessness in print media (Melissa Graham and Stephanie Rich,
Working Paper No.36) to ‘moral panics’ about the sexualisation of girls in mainstream
commercial culture (Claire Charles, Working Paper No.35), and the relationship between
gendered embodiment and popular television programming (Jack Migdalek, Working Paper
No.37). Each contribution demonstrates how gender, as a fluid – even unstable – concept
and category continues to impact on Australian socio-cultural and political life in complex
ways.
social sciences & humanities engaging policy
5
Aesthetics of Gender Embodiment
ABSTRACT
With reference to Bourdieu’s theories on habitus and taste, the focus
of this paper is on aesthetic sensibilities – both fluid and fixed –
toward the embodiment of masculinity and femininity as performed
by those who project as male or female respectively. Referring to
the representation and evaluation of particular forms of male/female
embodiment as aesthetic and attractive, and other forms as unaesthetic within the television program So You Think You Can Dance,
as well as fieldwork conducted with high school students, this paper
addresses tensions between individuals’ cognitive perspectives on
the embodiment of gender and the freedoms by which they allow
themselves to operate.
Jack Migdalek
PhD candidate, School of Health and Social Development, Deakin University
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ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE WORKING PAPER SERIES
Introduction
This paper concerns aesthetic sensibilities regarding the embodiment of masculinity and
femininity as performed by those who project as male or female respectively. It questions
why social mores, socially constructed states of mind, and socially constructed senses of
taste learned through models seen in both public performance arenas and in the everyday,
tell us that certain kinds of embodiment are unseemly according to the biological sex of
a performer. Referring to empirical ethnographic fieldwork, this paper theorises both the
need and the potential to challenge sedimented and gender inequitable notions of aesthetic
embodiment.
Embodiment, as I engage with it in this paper, is the manner or ‘bodily technique’ (Mauss
1979) in which a physical practice (pose, repose, action) is executed, and not the matter
of embodiment (body size, shape, colour, adornment), Where I refer to gender, I refer to
socially constructed aspects of femininity and masculinity and not to biological sex. As such,
where I talk of the embodiment of gender I refer to aspects of femininity and/or masculinity
by which an action is performed. While gender categories of masculine and feminine may
be dependent on culture, setting and time, and as such are difficult to define (Butler 2004),
dominant assumptions in contemporary Western milieu align masculinities with male bodies
and femininities to female bodies (Francis 2009, see also Connell 1995), My definitions of the
descriptors for the contexts of this paper are as follows:
Feminine:
gentle, graceful, delicate, soft, pliant
Masculine:
strong, forceful, powerful, unyielding.
This paper is framed from my perspective as a male performance arts educator and
practitioner who has worked predominantly in commercial dance and theatre, as well as
from my perspectives as a person in the everyday. While this paper’s focus is predominantly
on aesthetic sensibilities of masculinity and femininity as performed by male bodies, it has
implications regarding the embodiment of gender in general. Drawing on existing theories
of gender, social development, and the body, from areas of gender studies, sociology,
education, performance arts, and queer theory, I interrogate the development of my
own sense of aesthetics regarding the embodiment of masculinity and femininity. I then
discuss issues of the aesthetics of gendernormative embodiment in relation to cultural and
temporal contexts, the representation and evaluation of particular forms of male and female
embodiment within the television program So You Think You Can Dance, and fieldwork that
I conducted with high school students. Finally I put forward suggestions regarding situations
and contexts in which ‘embodied gender inequity’, as I regard it, may be challenged and
deconstructed.
Embodied gender inequity
As an able-bodied male, there are many ways in which I am capable of performing
choreography, be it walking, sitting down, sipping a drink, or executing sequences of dance.
While it is possible for me to perform any of these actions in arguably feminine or masculine
manner, I recognise that I generally choose to, and feel more comfortable, performing these
actions in a masculine manner above feminine.
Much of how we feel when moving, both ‘on stage’ and in the everyday hinges on how we
envisage our performances are seen by others (Goffman 1959), Taking Bourdieu’s notion of
cultural capital (1990), wherein individuals are valued according to competence in various
social settings (social fields), Shilling (2003) speaks of physical capital, where the physical
body itself is the bearer of value in society. Where one’s embodiment is not valued as seemly
or appropriate, this may result in a form of physical poverty. In this way, the male figure who
projects as being feminine comes to be positioned as subordinate or suspect.
The perception and aesthetic appreciation of performances of femininity and masculinity
in mainstream Australian social fields or contexts vary according to the biological sex of
performers (Connell 1995, Gard 2006), For example, a figure performing an action with
social sciences & humanities engaging policy
7
delicate deportment signifies very differently when performed by an individual who projects
as a female from how it signifies when performed by an individual who projects as a male.
This is because of established narratives that construct gender in dichotomous terms of
appropriate and desirable behaviours that differ for biological males and females (see Martino
and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2001a), The foundation for this paper is that it is gender inequitable
when embodiment that is appreciated as aesthetic or attractive on a body that projects as
female is valued differently on a body that projects as male (and vice versa),
Enculturation
Why I feel comfortable performing choreography and deporting myself in an arguably
masculine manner above an arguably feminine manner – and why viewers may feel similarly
on observing such performances – is dependent on our ‘enculturation’ and conditioning
to do and view masculine embodiment as more fitting for male bodies, and feminine
embodiment as more fitting for female bodies (see Connell 1995, Shilling 2003). Gendered
aesthetic notions of embodiment deemed to befit a male body have been inscribed on
me both as a theatre practitioner and as a person in the everyday. As a performance
arts professional who worked mostly for mainstream audiences in theatre, film, and
television, masculine embodiment was the way my dancer/actor body was almost always
directed to move (I was never directed to move softly or delicately – unless for comic
effect). As a person in the everyday too, masculine embodiment is the direction in which
I was encouraged to move. I understood that it was appropriate for me to have a strong
handshake, to participate in aggressive sports such as football, to physically occupy
and command space. My understanding was that this kind of embodiment was not only
desirable but also natural for males.
Even though notions of what is attractive and tasteful to us may feel as though they are
our own, we should not overlook the relationship between culture and subjectivity, and
that notions such as these are externally imposed (McRobbie 2009, see also Mac an Ghaill
and Haywood 2007). It can be argued that representations within mass media influence
teach and encourage particular gendered behaviours and understandings of masculinity
and femininity (see Goffman 1979, Connell 1999, Bollen et al. 2008). Indeed, according to
political scientist Lane Crothers (2007) the values, norms, and social practices embedded
in popular movies, music, and television programs of a dominant culture have the potential
to shape and influence the values, aspirations, and lives of people of other cultures who
are exposed to them. We in Australia cannot underestimate the impacts of several decades
of exposure to US and UK dominated television, film, theatre, and sports in which broad,
powerful, and arguably masculine models of male embodiment are valorised, and delicate,
graceful, and arguably feminine models of male embodiment are positioned as laughable,
deviant, or pitiable. Likewise, the mass media tends to position feminine models of female
embodiment in a positive light, and masculine models of female embodiment as ‘oddball’.
In cinema, readings of a character’s personality as well as sexual orientation come through
verbal text and storyline (Russo 1981). However, these readings are also deciphered from
a performer’s embodied disposition, which frequently occur prior to and in isolation from
storyline (Migdalek 2009).
Although Australian society may be made up of diverse and pluralistic groups, recurring
exposure, through mass media, to images such as those described above, defines particular
types of embodiment forcefully. The prevalence of such representations delimits the type
of embodiment that signifies as normal and can be oppressive to the sense of identity
and self worth of those who are not inclined to embody in a gendernormative manner
(see Drummond 2005, Martino and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2005). Contexts exist in mainstream
Australia where the social, emotional, and physical well-being of the individual who embodies
in transgression of mainstream dominant social norms of gender is at risk (see Connell 1995,
Hillier et al. 2010, Martino and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2005).
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ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE WORKING PAPER SERIES
Habitus and taste
What comes to be a person’s habitual way of looking at performances of gender, and what
comes to be a person’s habitual way of doing/performing gender is connected to the force
and residue of what Pierre Bourdieu refers to as ‘habitus’: non-consciously performed
practices ‘…internalised as second nature and so forgotten’ (1990: 56). Habitus can
manifest in ‘...schemes of perception, thought and action’ (1990: 54). The first two forms
(perception and thought) involve internal response and reaction, and relate to how we might
come to automatically and unthinkingly respond to what we see, hear or read, for example
perceiving the male who moves in an effeminate manner as disquieting, unattractive, or
unaesthetic.
The third form, habitus in the form of embodied action, is why a person might feel
comfortable or uncomfortable embodying in particular ways. For example, even though I
may be perfectly capable of embodying in an arguably feminine manner, ways in which I
actually embody are governed by what has become entrenched, through lifelong practice,
as my ‘embodiment of gender’ habitus. This state of being is so habitual and ingrained that
its machinations are fundamentally invisible. In my case, my regular ‘embodiment of gender’
habitus even applies in contexts and settings where effeminate embodiment on a male is
quite acceptable. Even in settings such as gay clubs, where effeminate qualities on a male
are understood to be de rigueur, males dancing in a masculine manner tend to be most
revered (see Lanzieri and Hildebrandt 2011),
My sense of taste, as a manifestation of habitus (Bourdieu 1990, Turner 1992, Shilling 2003)
that does not remain at the level of consciousness, controls and limits not only the ways
in which I perform (both on stage and in the everyday), but also the ways in which, as a
performance arts practitioner, I choreograph/direct male and female bodies. My induction
into a cultural heritage that prescribes differing repertoires of pose, repose, and action for
male bodies and female bodies, learnt through ways in which my body was choreographed
to dance and act as a subject of choreographers and directors (for mainstream television,
film and theatre), informed and shaped how I came to operate as an agent over the bodies
of others. Drawing on my growing kinaesthetic experience, knowledge and aesthetic
sensibility of dance and drama, I did not direct or choreograph males to move in a feminine
manner unless to project as comic, ludicrous, strange, or deviant. It never occurred to me
why female bodies that I choreographed and directed to move in a feminine manner did
not project in these ways. As a dance teacher, I had thought of myself as agentic when
for female bodies I would choreograph certain styles of motion. Yet, why is it that I would
not have considered choreographing the same sequences on the bodies of males who
might attend that same dance class or be cast in the same theatrical production? Why the
restriction to what I would allow myself to choreograph on male subjects?
Aesthetic sensibilities
It needs to be asked whether our senses of aesthetics and taste which govern what forms
of gender embodiment we find to be attractive, unattractive, aesthetic, and unaesthetic, are
natural, fundamental and essential to who we are, or whether, as suggested by Bourdieu
(1984), these sensibilities are products of social conditions and education processes affected
by the discourses and cultures around us. Aesthetic sensibilities toward the embodiment
of gender have not always been constant or universal. There have been social shifts in
perception and signification of the embodiment of gender within certain cultures and at
different periods of time (see Wex 1979). For example, whilst females in mainstream Australia
whose embodiment transgressed norms of femininity (such as standing or sitting with legs
straddled) were shunned and perceived negatively in the past, females who embody in the
same manner in contemporary society are no longer necessarily regarded or labelled in the
same way. Similarly, where the male standing in Contrapposto (with weight resting on one
leg, the other leg bent at the knee) was seen to project as noble and/or heroic prior to the
1900s, he is now commonly regarded as delicate and weak.
social sciences & humanities engaging policy
9
In some cultures, feminine embodiment on a male is aesthetic, if not revered. My own
experience is of traditional Japanese Kabuki dance, which I studied for six years when living
in Japan during the 1990s. In this dance form, male protagonists and heroic characters are
revered for moving with soft, graceful and arguably feminine qualities (see Sugiyama and
Fujima 1937). Through processes of globalisation, colonised cultures such as Japan have
taken on contemporary Western notions (see Crothers 2007), such as those of masculinity
and femininity, and these have resulted in common understandings and attitudes toward
gendernormative contemporary embodiment. Despite the aesthetic appreciation for
feminine embodiment on the male performer in traditional Japanese dance forms, feminine
embodiment on a male body within contemporary Japanese culture has come to be seen as
comedic and absurd. This is evidenced by the ways in which the general public respond to
effeminate embodied antics as frequently employed by comedians in that country. Basically,
contemporary embodiment that is transgressive of the gendernormative has become
commonly understood to be marked, ludicrous, weird, and un-aesthetic (see Monro 2005).
Subordinate embodiment
Research shows that social connections are commonly made between effeminacy in a male
and homosexuality (Gere 2001, Gard 2001, Martino and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2001b, Martino
and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2005). Despite cognitive shifts in mindset that have destabilized
traditional codings and categories of what it is for a male to be gay within wider society and
a broadening of attitudes toward males who display feminine qualities (‘sensitive new age
guys’), effeminate (or ‘gay’) embodiment on a male body continues – within wider society –
to be perceived as an unaesthetic mode of embodiment for a male body – positioning both
‘gay’ and ‘effeminate’ as subordinate.
To illustrate, I turn my attention to the force of embedded gendernormative discourses
pertaining to embodied performance, as they manifested in the television program, So
You Think You Can Dance (produced by Fremantle Media Australia for Network Ten) which
premiered in 2008, and attracted approximately 3500 Australian dancers, all competing
to become Australia’s most popular dancer. The show enjoyed huge mainstream success
and was the top rating program in its timeslot from 2008 - 2010. In the program the judges
(Jason Coleman, Bonnie Lythgoe, Matt Lee, and Kelly Abbey) tended to praise males who
danced ‘hard and strong’:
‘What we have in front of us here is a real man, a bloke. …Yeah, and you danced like
a bloke. It had a male energy, a male strength about it, you know it was like a real man
dancing like a real man, and I love that. I’m a fan of that’ (Jason Coleman)
In contrast, viewers were consistently exposed to judges’ dismissal and degradation of
males who did not dance in a masculine way (‘Dance like a real man’) – indicating that deeprooted and established biases against and negative perceptions of males who embody in an
effeminate manner continue to be potent at this time.
In narrowing the field down to 20 finalists, the judges on the program controlled the forms of
male and female embodiment that were put forward to the general public week after week
as aesthetic, as the best. Although judges commended versatility and talked about the
need to stand out in order to stay in the contest through advice like ‘be brave, be different’
(episode aired in Melbourne 11/02/08), this advice clearly excluded standing out as a male
dancer who moved in a dainty, delicate, or feminine manner. Those males were criticised as
being ‘too girlie’ or ‘too effeminate’ – a form of denigration that was never leveled against
female dancers who danced in styles that were arguably powerful or aggressive.
Rhys, a male contestant on the first series of the program was severely criticised by the
judges for dancing in a ‘girlie’ manner during the auditions. While the judges apparently
had no problems with Rhys’ homosexuality, wild hairstyles, glitzy make up, or flamboyant
costuming, they were very clear that in dancing, males in the contest should ‘really push the
10
ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE WORKING PAPER SERIES
male’ (Jason Coleman), Basically, in order to stay in the competition, Rhys had to dance in
ways that the judges found appropriate and aesthetic for a male, regardless of how he might
choose to dance in other settings.
Judges’ comments clearly relayed the physical capital (Shilling 2003) and aesthetic value of
males who danced in a masculine manner over males who danced in a feminine manner,
thus impacting on and enforcing for millions of Australians viewing the program the type of
male embodiment that is admirable – masculine embodiment. This paper questions why the
aesthetic value of a male dancing or moving in an effeminate manner is so objectionable.
The denigration of effeminate embodiment on a male ties in with potent social assumptions
that link effeminate embodiment on a male with homosexuality, and the deep-seated
positioning of ‘gay’ embodiment as subordinate and undesirable. For example, Bonnie
Lythgoe, one of the female judges declared in a pleasantly surprised tone to a male dancer
whose CV listed that he had been ‘Mr Gay Australia’: ‘You’re not what I expected …Well,
on here it says “Mr Gay Australia”… so you came on the floor, and I was “O-Oh, Mr Gay is
going to dance like very effeminate”’ . When the dancer spoke of trying to dance in a strong
manner, Bonnie praised him by saying: ‘and you did dance like a man’. Clichéd expectations
of what ‘gay’ embodiment is, connecting with the devaluation of feminine embodiment in
a male, leaves little doubt about the value and place of non-masculine men and serves
to reinforce stereotypical and arguably oppressive notions of homonormativity and
heteronormativity, the former being subordinate to the latter. In shows such as So You Think
You Can Dance, the ‘expert’ judges’ assessments of what are attractive and unattractive
motions for males to perform and not perform go beyond the dance floor. They impact on
the ways in which viewers regard, value, and favour masculine embodiment on a male above
feminine in general.
Fieldwork with high school students
I took issues concerning embodied discourses and ideologies of gender, aesthetics, and
sexuality into fieldwork with approximately four-hundred high school students in four coeducational private and public institutions. My intention was to ascertain if and how students
regarded masculine or feminine embodiment differently according to the biological sex of
a performer, and to learn how students felt that they themselves should embody. Sessions
with these groups involved a performance to trigger group discussion, a workshop activity,
and the filling in of anonymous response sheets.
In general, what arose in group discussions was the strongly expressed and supported view
that individuals should be free to embody gender in any way at all:
‘Anyone should behave however they want and society should just accept them’.
‘Moving our body in masculine or effeminate ways … doesn’t have anything to do with
being a gay person’.
‘You’ve got to not care what people think’.
However, I found that this accepting mindset was at odds with privately expressed anxieties
articulated in anonymous response sheets. Students’ comments indicated significant
panopticonic fears and concerns hinging on how gender transgressive embodiment would
be perceived by others. Their major concern was not to be perceived as homosexual:
‘People will think I’m gay and they will laugh’.
‘I don’t want people to think I’m gay’.
‘I would dance like a female only when dared to or while imitating someone. However,
while doing so I wouldn’t feel self-conscious cos I know and so does everyone else that I
am straight’.
social sciences & humanities engaging policy
11
‘I would always stop myself from moving in a feminine way with the exception of when I
am joking or impersonating someone. This is possibly because I am 16 years old and all
a 16 year old really wants is to be accepted, to know that he’s okay. Not to be ridiculed or
called “gay”’.
If certain masculinities and femininities – projected via male and female bodies respectively
– project as heterosexual and normal (heteronormative), and if heteronormativity is valued
(Martino and Pallotta-Chiarolli 2005, Vicars 2008), then it follows that embodiment and
embodied acts that project as homosexual, come to be regarded as abnormal and valueless
(Monro 2005). Clearly for these students, the cultural capital associated with heterosexuality
correlates with physical capital that can be attained through gendernormative embodiment.
More to the point, these students run the risk of cultural and physical poverty should they
embody in a manner that is regarded as homonormative.
Students’ publicly voiced declarations that individuals should be free to embody gender in
any way at all were also inconsistent with the way they handled a practical workshop activity
that I conducted with them. I read out a quote to students from So You Think You Can
Dance, which was still airing at the time. The quote was from a comment made by one of
the judges (Jason) to a female hip-hop dancer (Pania):
‘What you showed me is very aggressive and very masculine actually. It’s very masculine.
At the end of today you are a dancer that I will remember and that’s a credit to you. I
enjoyed you’.
I asked students to imagine the inverse being said to a male dancer, whereby a male might
be complimented for moving in a feminine manner.
Then I organised students to work in small mixed groups of between 4 to 8 students in
each. With the females working as choreographers and the males as dancers/subjects, the
brief was to create and choreograph a dance sequence for a male body that was feminine in
manner which would be admired and get the following positive comment from a judge on a
mainstream television program such as So You Think You Can Dance:
‘What you showed me is very soft and very feminine actually. It’s very feminine. At the end
of today you are a dancer that I will remember and that’s a credit to you. I enjoyed you’.
In each of the school fieldwork sites, female students created and taught their male
counterparts short dance sequences that for the most part involved swaying of hips, wafting
arms, and limp wrists. It was clear to me from the ways in which students undertook the
workshop activity that there was a contradiction between what students had articulated
rationally or cerebrally about non-‘normative’ embodiment of gender, in group discussion,
and the ways in which they were actually able to engage with it in practice. Apart from
one school group, it was apparent that moving in feminine ways was uncomfortable,
embarrassing, or a source of amusement for the males concerned: boys laughed or groaned
as their female choreographers showed them steps to perform; boys held back physically
from accurately reproducing steps that they were taught; boys stood with hands in pockets
until prodded by their female choreographers to do the steps they were being taught; boys
added parodic embellishments such as pouting lips and/or vocalised flourishes that mocked
the choreography that they were being asked to execute.
The girls, in handling the task of choreographing the boys, also did not work in the previously
expressed spirit that individuals should be able to embody freely. Their peals of laughter
denoted what felt to me as boorish pleasure at challenging their male choreographic
subjects to tackle steps that they put together for them to execute, enforcing notions
that males moving in an effeminate manner were incongruous, ludicrous, and objects of
amusement.
It was noteworthy for me that one of the school groups with which I worked handled
the workshop very differently to the other high school groups. The boys took the task
seriously and focussed on executing the choreography that they were given by the girls
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ALFRED DEAKIN RESEARCH INSTITUTE WORKING PAPER SERIES
as well as they were able. They appeared to perform the moves without inhibition or selfconsciousness of how others might respond. They performed neither with laughter nor any
sense of parody. On discussion with the school teacher and the vice-principal, I learned that
this particular school earnestly advocates respect, both of self and of others, an outlook that
seemed to operate in practical, not just theoretical terms within this school culture. There
was an admirable openness to exploring ‘other’ embodied possibilities without fear of being
ridiculed or labelled.
Conclusion
In this paper I have argued that it is inequitable for the same embodiment to be valued
differently according to the perceived biological sex of the performer. In order to achieve
a more gender equitable status quo, we need to address tensions between individuals’
cognitive perspectives on the embodiment of gender and the freedoms by which individuals
– males especially – allow themselves and are allowed to operate. My findings reveal that
such freedoms are impeded by potent social assumptions that link effeminate embodiment
on a male - and to a lesser degree masculine embodiment on a female - with homosexuality,
and the deep-seated positioning of ‘gay’ (or feminine) embodiment as subordinate and
undesirable.
Whilst there have been positive changing cultural attitudes toward notions of multiple
masculinities and femininities, and a broadening of attitudes toward males who display
feminine qualities such as sensitivity, sentimentality, and gentleness, embedded social
notions of what is fitting or aesthetic embodiment for bodies that project as male or female
remain largely limited and continue to suppress and denigrate ‘other’ possibilities of
embodied gender expression. Inherent ideologies of gender, aesthetics, and embodiment
continue to work invisibly as definitive and restrictive barriers to the realm of possibilities of
gender expression and appreciation. Where perceptions of what is attractive, fitting, and
aesthetic are sedimented and fossilised, they are not easily upset or altered (Gorely et al.
2003, Migdalek 2009). As individuals do not always fit neatly into either/or categories of
male/female/masculine/feminine, it is necessary to address and challenge tacit aesthetic
assumptions steeped in inequitable binary notions that hinge on the biology of the performer.
For positive change to occur, it is desirable that we learn to deconstruct and question the
frequently invisible influences of patriarchal and heteronormative ideologies and discourses
into which we are enculturated on what we understand to be an attractive, fitting, or
aesthetic embodiment of gender. Nevertheless, even when we become mindful, and the
workings of inequitable gender aesthetics become visible to us, how we react to what we
see, and what feels appropriate in our bodies, cannot simply be unlearned.
One possible way forward involves finding ways to apply critical literacy skills, (as influenced
by feminism, post-structural studies, gender studies, queer theory, and men’s studies), –
ordinarily used to disrupt, expose, and challenge inherent ideologies in spoken and written
language – toward the deconstruction of embodied discourses and ideologies of gender,
aesthetics, and sexuality. This type of visual critical inquiry could be used to raise questions
hinging on why we regard embodied performances differently according to the perceived
biological sex of performers, why individuals don’t embody gender more freely and broadly,
why it may feel good/bad to move in certain ways, and how the ways we embody gender
may be influenced by the expectations of others (see Gard 2004). Sites in which such ‘visual
critical literacy’ work can occur would include areas of education and also the performance
arts.
Whilst performance arts practitioners/educators may be guilty of reinforcing embedded and
fossilised notions of gender through limited and repeating ‘norms’ by which they cast, direct,
and choreograph bodies, they can also be a conduit toward effecting change in the social
mindset that may broaden what becomes choreographically acceptable and aesthetic for
all persons (regardless of biological sex, or sexual orientation). To this end, I advocate the
development of teaching strategies, curricula, and resource materials that promote critical
inquiry into embodied action.
social sciences & humanities engaging policy
13
This paper advocates the fostering of gender equitable appreciation of that which is
choreographically possible for all individuals, regardless of biological sex or sexual
orientation. For this to occur, there is a need for educators and performance arts
practitioners/educators to become mindful about the ways in which ideologies and
power relations – many of which stem from arts and other disciplines into which we have
been inducted – impact on the ways in which we educate and influence those under our
charge. There is a need for professional development that challenges performance arts
practitioners/educators (and educators in general) to be self-reflective about their/our own
assumptions, positions, values, and attitudes concerning the embodiment of gender, and
the impact that these have on their/our own practices (see Ollis 2008). The prospect that
we operate in ignorance of the invisible machinations of ideologies into which we have been
enculturated is unsettling, especially to those who hold essentialist personal beliefs that how
we educate and how we create art are intrinsic to who we are, as opposed to something
very much influenced by discourses and ideologies of the cultures of which we are a part.
If unaddressed, then our own gender inequitable perspectives, blindspots, and practices
are likely to perpetuate and persist in the orientations of future generations toward gender
aesthetics and gender embodiment.
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