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罗宾·沃霍尔女性主义叙事学理论研究

The Research on the Feminist Narratology Theory of Robyn R. Warhol

【作者】 孙桂芝

【导师】 谭好哲;

【作者基本信息】 山东大学 , 文艺学, 2014, 博士

【摘要】 20世纪80年代,美国学者罗宾·沃霍尔与苏珊·兰瑟率先尝试将叙事学理论引入女性主义文学批评的理论构建及批评实践中,她们被公认为女性主义叙事学创始人。1986年苏珊·兰瑟发表具有宣言意义的论文《建构女性主义叙事学》,正式提出“女性主义叙事学”这个术语,同时论证了理论建构的可能性;同年,罗宾·沃霍尔发表文章《走向一个真诚叙事者的理论:盖斯凯尔、斯托夫人和艾略特的真诚干预》及《诗学和劝导:<汤姆叔叔的小屋>作为一个现实主义小说》,利用叙事学的“叙事话语干预”理论分析19世纪英国现实主义小说,她们对女性主义叙事学相关理论的构建和应用,切实推动了女性主义叙事学的发展,影响深远。沃霍尔把美国女性主义文学批评分为三个时期:女性形象想象时期、倡导“女性写作”时期、后现代女性主义时期,这三个时期又分别以批判男作家笔下天使/魔鬼式女人的刻板形象、寻求女作家独特的书写模式、消解性别身份为批评实践重点。学界始终对女性主义文学批评存在争议,主要反对她们性别意识形态先行的批评方式,还有把男、女作家分为两个阵营、抑男扬女的做法。另外,20世纪80年代西方学界出现以多元消解性别身份的趋势,又直接危及到女性主义文学批评存在的合法性。所有的学术、理论研究最终都是针对某些问题,也是为了回答或解决某些问题而出现。沃霍尔女性主义叙事学产生的直接原因,就是对前期女性主义文学批评实践过程中出现的弊病进行总结、反思,力图解除其目前的瓶颈状态,并推动女性主义文学批评获得进一步的发展,沃霍尔女性主义叙事学以关注女性群体、回归文学领域、寻求客观分析的主张,承续并拓展了女性主义文学批评。性别意识立场与叙事学方法的结合是沃霍尔理论基本支点,女性主义叙事学阅读理论,叙事形式的性别内涵,叙事文本对性别文化观念的传播,性别研究新术语“女人气”,还有叙事新媒介研究等内容,共同组成沃霍尔女性主义叙事学理论。关于阅读活动及相关理论,沃霍尔着重研究叙事形式对读者阅读活动、性别气质的影响,她以“差异的幽灵”①称谓前期女性主义文学批评中“抗拒的读者”的阅读方法,虽然肯定“抗拒的读者”式阅读实践有助于突破女性形象的刻板模式,但更明确地指出阅读活动与文学形式具有直接、重要关系。通过对她自己以及对他人阅读活动中的体验统计、分析,沃霍尔证明特定的叙事形式将制约读者接受效果,读者的接受反应也将影响创作者对叙事形式的选择。另外,阅读活动不仅仅影响到读者心理、情绪,更会对读者的身体起到塑型作用,促使读者言行举止都折射社会性别文化特质。文本的叙事形式会引导并制约读者阅读行为,同时也会潜移默化地对读者的性别意识施加影响。女性主义文学研究者面对文学文本时,必须着重分析叙事形式,才能把握文学交流活动中性别意识传递的过程和特点。叙事形式不仅影响读者接受,更能传递出具体历史语境中叙事者的主观意图及性别气质,传统女性主义文学批评或寻找被埋没的女作家、作品然后加以颂扬,或着力打造属于女性的语言体系,但是,作为读者包括研究者在内,能接触到的主要是叙事文本,如果脱离文本而对作者进行社会历史学的研究、评论容易导致主观演绎的结论。她看到结构主义叙事学理论对“女性写作”研究的实用价值,极力主张以文学文本为研究对象,回到文学形式,借助叙事学客观的研究态度、形式分析术语进行文本的细读及探讨。沃霍尔指出文学领域不存在跨时代、跨地域、单一的“女性写作”,但每个时期、每个地域总是存在着符合当时特定语境的“女性写作”模式,她放弃对叙事作品中女性形象、故事以及女性身份等问题的概括和评价,着力对男、女作家文本中的叙事话语特点进行归纳。沃霍尔罗列19世纪现实主义小说中普遍存在的叙事干预现象,通过分析具体文本后发现男女作家在叙事干预形式方面具有不同倚重,由此证明男、女作家在特定文化情境中对叙事话语使用方式具有差异性,进而证明叙事话语形式的差异源自男、女两性作家介入社会现实观念不同,沃霍尔的叙事干预理论不但综合了萨特“文学介入”理论以及叙事学中叙事话语干预理论,更进行了具有女性主义特色的借鉴和修正。在详细分析男、女两性作家叙事话语形式方面差异性,并结合社会历史文化阐释差异根源之后,沃霍尔又聚焦于叙事者在叙述情节时的策略,分析这种策略差异的性别内涵。沃霍尔利用普林斯的“不可叙述事件”理论雏形,提出“未叙述事件”理论,对应于不同“未叙述”原因及表现,划分出不必叙述、不能叙述、不应叙述、不愿叙述四种“未叙述事件”类型。沃霍尔指出男、女作家在叙事过程中,用不同策略和方式处理情节,是因为他们对特定时期社会性别文化规约的认知不同。女作家写作过程中既要回避社会文化的审查,又要实现文学的社会道德价值,常常会利用叙事话语与情节之间张力来突破性别文化约束,这构成了女作家叙事形式的重要特点,也是女作家具有文学形式自觉性的重要证明。沃霍尔通过纵向比较19世纪现实主义小说、20世纪漫画式自传以及影视文本中的“未叙述事件”,寻找言语叙事与图画叙事、影像叙事之间叙事形式的延续性和迁移性。沃霍尔女性主义叙事学关于“女性写作”叙事研究三个纲领性方法论要素,即文本形式、性别气质、语境分析。所有女性主义研究最终都需要界定“性别”,沃霍尔试图改变二元对立思维模式,寻找一个新的词汇来重新描述性别,她提议以“女人气”为术语取代性、社会性别这两大术语,取消男人/女人的性别区分模式。所谓“女人气”是指那些具有女性气质的人们,无论男人、女人亦或是同性恋人群,只要在举止行为方面体现了性别文化中女性气质特点的都可以称之为“女人气”。“女人气”理论内涵具有反异性恋、反二元对立、反生理决定论的特性,更具有对性别多元差异的包容性。针对哭泣、感伤主义叙事长久以来被贬低为“女人气”的、人性脆弱的现象,沃霍尔分析感伤主义文学文本和肥皂剧文本,总结了7种诱发哭泣的叙事技巧,证明并非只有感伤癖的人或者是女人才会哭泣,哭泣是由特定叙事技巧和叙事形式诱发的结果,沃霍尔以此反驳传统文化把哭泣、感伤主义叙事视作低等的、感伤癖的偏见。沃霍尔女性主义叙事学相关理论及批评实践,为女性主义文学批评中性别意识的艺术传递性找到线索,具有以下几个突出价值:(1)确立了女性主义文学批评回到文学形式的研究边界,倡导以归纳而不是演绎的方法进行女性主义文学批评,有助于女性主义文学批评摆脱主观化倾向;(2)叙事形式的研究对象从语言扩展到影像、图画小说、漫画式自传等,具有理论的创新和应用性;(3)反思性别研究历程,不仅批判二元对立的思维模式,也批判异性恋社会结构的所谓“真理性”,在自由的基础上提出宽容的性别气质多元化;(4)在理论上、实践中切实促成女性主义文学批评与叙事学理论的联姻。2002年起,北京大学出版社以“新叙事学理论译丛”的形式翻译并出版系列叙事学理论著作,其中代表女性主义叙事学的作品是《虚构的权威》。《虚构的权威》是美国女性主义叙事学创始人之一苏珊·兰瑟的代表作,中国女性主义文学批评领域关于女性主义叙事学理论的认知较集中,更多来自这本书,但是对沃霍尔的理论主张及著作了解则相对较少。应该说,沃霍尔女性主义叙事学与兰瑟女性主义叙事学是美国女性主义叙事学的两架马车,二者理论主张既有共性,又各具特色。兰瑟和沃霍尔都赞同女性主义性别立场与叙事学理论的结合,都是有选择地借鉴、修正叙事学方法、理论,也都以宽容的姿态对待同性恋群体。但是对女性主义叙事学未来发展前景、理论流派定位,二者又各有主张,并且在具体的文学批评实践过程中,所使用的叙事学理论、研究对象也不尽相同。兰瑟认为女性主义叙事学的未来是建立一种不同于女性主义文学批评和叙事学的独特的研究方法,强调女作家第一人称的权威性、叙事视点的性别意义;沃霍尔则坚持认为女性主义叙事学本质是女性主义文学批评,叙事学理论是基本工具,只具有方法论意义。沃霍尔女性主义叙事学理论,在借鉴经典叙事学相关理论的基础上,将注意力转向作者、文本、读者与社会历史语境的交互作用,从情节概括、主题阐释转向叙事结构、叙事形式分析;研究的文本从神话、民间故事发展到小说,包括了以语言和图像媒介为载体的所有叙事文本。沃霍尔对叙事学理论的利用是以对女作家、作品关注为核心的,既丰富了女性主义文学批评的研究视角,也为叙事学理论增加了更为丰富的性别语境意义,如果忽视沃霍尔理论的存在及特点,那么对于美国女性主义叙事学理论的介绍和应用也将是不完整的。自20世纪90年代以来,中国女性主义文学批评也开始进入总结以及重构的阶段,“性别诗学”成为当下中国女性主义文学批评领域既有影响力、又有争论性的理论设想。对沃尔霍女性主义叙事学思想进行研究,不仅能够明晰美国女性主义叙事学的基本脉络、内部差异性及发展趋势,可以为中国女性主义批评叙事研究提供丰富理论储备,更可为“性别诗学”建构过程中关于性别、诗学等内涵的理解给予一定启示,促成中西方女性主义文学批评理论和实践在交流中互为镜鉴、共同发展。理论的建构总是需要实践的支撑,争论的炽烈预示发展的空间,美国女性主义叙事学的发展,沃霍尔女性主义叙事学理论的完善,中国女性主义文学批评的推进依然需要不断地探索,都还远未达到理论的巅峰或需要盖棺定论的时刻,坚持理解中有辨析、借鉴中有取舍、肯定中有反思的理念,才能对相关理论进行辩证、客观的审视和探讨。

【Abstract】 In the1980s, American scholars Robyn R.Warhol and Susan Lanser pioneered the practice of feminist narratology. Because of their theory and narrative critical practice, both of them were recognized as the founders of feminist narratology. In1986Susan Lancer published Toward a Feminist Narratology in which she put forward the terms "feminist narratology" and proposed some thoughts about how to push feminist into narrative. By the same year, Robyn Warhol published significant articles "Toward a Theory of the Engaging Narrator:Earnest Interventions in Gaskell, Stowe, and Eliot" and "Poetics and Persuasion:Uncle Tom’s Cabin as a Realist Novel". By the light of the narrative intervention theory of discourse, she analyzed British realistic novels of19th century, and gradually went deep into the application of the feminist narrative. It should be said that influence is profound.Warhol divided the development of America feminist literary criticism into three periods:the imagination period, female image of the advocacy of "women’s writing" period, and post-modern feminism period. And the literary criticism practice in these three periods separately focus on criticizing the stereotypes of angel/devil woman, seeking women writers’ unique writing mode and eliminating gender identity. All the academic study eventually is aimed at some problems, and answering or solving some problems. The direct cause that feminist narratology emerged is based on the early experience of feminist literature summary, as well as the reflection and vision for the future. Feminist literary criticism has been heavily criticized, because they insisted gender ideology ahead of the interpretation of the text,and divided the men, women writers into two camps. It is more important that in the1980s, many Western scholars began to overflew gender identity with the development diversification, which directly endangered the existence legitimacy of feminist literary criticism. Warhol’s feminist narratology focused on women, returned to literature text and seeked to objective analysis, by which she opposed to deconstruction. Both the gender ideology and narrative method were basic characteristics of Warhol’s theory. Reading theory, narrative form of gender ideology, narrative mode of femininity culture,"effeminate", and feminist narratology methodology orientation, all were the main parts of Warhol’s theory.Warhol’s reading theory focused on how narrative form influenced the reading behavior and gender behavior of readers. Warhol took "resistng reader’that applied in the early feminist reading theory as "differences ghost". She believed that the practice of "resisting reader" promoted the reflections on traditional rigid female images in literature, but told us that the influence of literary activities must be achieved by the literary form, too. By her reading practice and the reading experience of others, Warhol proved that the activity of reading not only influenced readers’mind, but also shaped readers’body, which incited readers to reflect their indicative social genders on their behavior. The narrative form guides, restricts and shapes readers’gender action. In order to find how the gender consciousness is spread, feminist researchers must analyze specific narrative form. Personally involved, narratology methods, and the reader response all constructed Warhol’s reading theory.Not only concerned with reading, narrative form also conveyed the gender connotation of narrative techniques in the specific historical context. Facing the objective historical reality that gender culture bound women’s writing, early feminist literary criticism chose to find and praise women writers and women’s works, as well to build feminine language system only belongs to the female. Warhol stopped to study the theory and the practice of female images, female consciousness and female identity theories or definition, she set out to summarize the narrative form in women’s works. Warhol pointed out that there is no cross-era, cross-regional, or single "women’s writing ", but each era and each region always have some "women’s writing" mode conformed to the specific context. She emphasized the practical value of structuralism narrative theory for the study of "women writing", advocated strongly for the study of literary texts and literary form. As for why the phenomenon of narrative intervention existed widely in the realistic novels of19th century, she explained that it was the specific technique, which male and female writers chose consciously to intervene in social reality. Warhol listed narrative discourse intervention in English realism novel of19th century and proved that the different purposes of male and female writers in the specific cultural context would influence the different narrative forms. Warhol’s theory of narrative discourse intervention came from the "literary intervention" theory of Sartre and the "discourse intervention" theory of Booth, and she corrected both them with feminist characteristics.Besides analyzing of both gender writers’, men and women writers, different selection on narrative discourse form, Warhol also focused on the different narrative skills about plots that had gender connotation. Being strongly concerned with the issue of society and culture constraining narrative in text, based on the prototype of Prince’s "unnarrated events" theory, Warhol put forward "the unnarratable" theory, and applied the theory to analyze graphic and video narrative text. On the understanding of social culture, she divided "the unnarratable" into four styles:"the subnarratable","the supranarratable","the antinarratable" and "the paranarratable". Warhol pointed out that women writers deal with different forms of plot strategies reflected the cultural codes of gender, and these plot strategies also could help female writers to avoid the censoring, which told us how women writers use narrative form to break gender cultural constraints to achieve social value of literature, and also proved that women writers had the literary form consciousness. Meanwhile, Warhol compared "the unnarratable" among the realistic novels in19th century, autobiographic comics, soap operas and television media in20th century. Her practice outlined the continuity and renewal between linguistic narration and pictorial narration, helped the feminist theorists to find clues on gender awareness among arts’ transmission.Feminist eventually have to define the term of "gender". Warhol attempted to change the dualistic thinking eagerly. She proposed "effeminacy" as the term to study gender. The "effeminacy" referred to those people whose behavior reflected the feminine characteristics, whether men,women,or gay,all can be called "effeminacy"."Effeminacy" was a term that had characteristics with anti-heterosexual, anti-dualistic and anti-physiological, and more inclusive when faced to gender differences.Crying and sentimentalism narrative had long been regarded as "effeminacy" and human fragile nature. Warhol analyzed sentimentalism literature text and video text, and then summarized seven kinds of narrative techniques that induced weeping. Her study proved crying was not an action of sentimental or addictive women, but the result of a particular narrative techniques and narrative form. Warhol refuted the traditional culture prejudices that regarded crying and sentimentalism narrative as inferior, sentimental fetish.Warhol’s feminist narratology has the following outstanding values:(1) Established the border of feminist literary criticism by returning to literary form research, advocated an inductive, rather than a deductive, method to do feminist literary criticism, which helped feminist literary criticism get rid of subjective tendency.(2) Extended the research object of narrative form from language to video, graphic novel and pictorial autobiography, which is an innovative and practical theory.(3) Reflected the course of gender studies, she not only criticized dualistic thinking, but also criticized the so-called "truth" of heterosexual social structure, which showed Warhol treated gender diversity on the basis of tolerance and freedom.(4)Contributed to the marriage of feminism and narratology, not only in theory but also in the text analysis practice.Chinese feminist literary criticism scholars are more familiar with Fictions of Authority, which is masterpiece of Susan Lanser, who is one of the founders of the American feminist narratology. This book is pressed in Chinese in2002by Beijing University Press with other books on narrative theory. Untill now, Warhol’s books hadn’t been translated into Chinese, and her advocates and writings were relatively poorly understood among Chinese scholars. It should be said that Warhol’s feminist narratology and Lancer’s feminist narratology were the two carriages of American feminist narratology. There were commonalities and differences in their theoretical proposition, such as, both Lancer and Warhol were in favor of combining feminist stance and narrative form, and detailed text analysis by narrative method. But to the future development of feminist narratology, they have different ideas. Lanser thought the future of feminist narratology was a different method from the feminist literary criticism and narratology.Warhol insisted that since the paradigm of feminist narratology belonged to the category of feminist literary criticism and narrative theory is only its basic tool,then feminist narratology merely had methodological significance.Warhol’s feminist narratology turned to the interaction of author, text, reader, social and historical context, which were all different from classical narratology. she researched texts refered to myths, folk stories and novels, in a word, to all narrative texts including speeches and image media. Warhol’s use of narrative theory is based on the concern for women writers and their works, so her theory not only enriched the research perspective of feminist literary criticism, also added more contextual meanings to narrative theory. It was obviously incomplete if we introduced and applied feminist narratology theory but were blind to Warhol’s theory.Since the1990s, Chinese feminist literary criticism have begun to enter the phase of reflection and reconstruction, they proposed an assumption "Gender Poetics" which is influential and controversial. The study of Warhol’s feminist narratology not only helps us see the difference and the developmental trend of American feminist narratology thoughts, but also provides more wealth about the theory of feminist narratology, and comprehensive research paths for Chinese feminist criticism. Promoting communication between Chinese and West feminist theory will finally realize common development.The construction of theory always needs the support of practice, the passionate argument promises the development of space. The development of feminist narratology, the construction of Warhol’s feminist narratology theory, and the improvement of the Chinese feminist criticism are all still far from the peak of the theory. What they need is constantly exploration, not a final verdict. We should adhere to understanding from analysis, drawing lessons from the reflection, by which we can keep a dialectical and objective attitude to review and discuss all kinds of theories.

  • 【网络出版投稿人】 山东大学
  • 【网络出版年期】2014年 11期
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