• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.53 no.2
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• pp.203-218
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• 2007

The early eighteenth century witnessed the birth of homosexuality as an identity and the emergence of a homosexual subculture in Britain. The homosexual subculture revealed itself through identified walkways and parks, gestures by which men might signal their interests to each other, and meeting places called "molly houses" where homosexuals could gather in relative safety. As early as 1703 the homosexuals seem to have overrun London. Homosexuals in eighteenth-century Britain provides a figure on which a variety of social anxieties could be displaced. Homosexuality is partly sexual transgression; mostly, it represents a variety of class, national, political transgressions. The association of British homosexuality with the fashion for Italian tastes was commonplace, and the growth of homosexuality was regarded as the greatest threat to the glorious Britain by destroying all its masculine virtues. Homosexuality was widely believed to be particularly common among the aristocracy and to be symptomatic of the increasing depravity of that class. The radicals in eighteenth-century Britain did not hesitate to exploit the surge in homophobia. They identified aristocratic patronage as one of the aristocratic practices that encouraged homosexuality and thus stigmatized the sort of male bonding that helped sustain aristocratic hegemony.

• International Journal of Costume and Fashion
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.26-41
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• 2005

In this study homosexuality as a discourse represented in contemporary fashion magazines is explored in context. The main concerns are the contemporary construction of homosexuality, fashion symbols to identify homosexuals, and relationships between homosexuality and heterosexual masculinity in fashion images today. After elaborating homosexuality conceptualized historically, an analytical framework from Foucault's discursive approach was made up to interpret the fashion spreads since 2000. As a result, as it is assumed that the concept of homosexuality is constructed by historical specificity, homosexual fashion styles are dynamic. So, it should be recognized that they are formed by power relationships with heterosexuality, and other social factors such as class, race, age, and consumer culture and market trends. On the basis of photographic themes and fashion looks homosexual images are classified into 3 kinds of versions, the effeminate trend setter, the masculine athlete or biker, and the neo camp. However, most of contemporary homosexual photographs are not also so conspicuously different from heterosexual ones. Therefore, in the contemporary structure at least from fashion images, homosexuals can be recognized equally with heterosexual people only except for sexual preference. Thus, homosexual fashion also shares a lot of fashionable products with heterosexual one, with often homosexuals' role as trend -setter.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.12 no.12
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• pp.555-566
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• 2012

The purpose of this study is to investigate the strategy of representation of homosexuality in the mainstream media and its meaning. And it also concerns what would be the limit of representations of homosexuality and what would be the discourse these representations produce in the major terrestrial broadcasting. For this investigation, we conducted the analysis of , the mainstream television drama, focused on the gay couple characters and their representations of conflicts and resolutions by comparing with the two heterosexual couples to figure out the differentiated representation strategies of homosexuality. As results of the analysis, the representation of sociogenic cause of conflict is absent for gay couple while it was found in the case of one heterosexual couple. And gay couple is exposed to the interpersonal conflicts against their family members than heterosexual couples and described as victims. Lastly, gay couple was represented as needing mediators to solve their problems while heterosexual couple was represented as ensuring subjectivity for the resolutions of conflicts.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.5-44
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• 2010

The main purpose of this study is to critically examine the existing theoretical as well as analytical scope of 'sexual minority' in Social Welfare, and to (re)construct and expand it incorporating feminist theories on sexuality. The body of literature on sexual minority or homosexuality in social welfare in Korea as well as in the West can be characterized as two distinct features: first, medical discourse leaning on pathological perspective which perceives homosexuality as a disease or defect, homosexual as a pervert; and second, human rights perspective premised upon the idea of diversity and multi-culturalism, both which are anchoring at 'essentialism.' Based upon the understanding of sexuality as a social construct, we argue that feminist insight on sexuality can lead to reconceptualizing homosexuality and reorienting theories and practices in social welfare. From radical feminism to postmodern queer theories, feminists have developed diverse ideas and complex theories on sexuality and homosexuality, including the concept of 'compulsory heterosexuality,' 'lesbianism as political resistance,' and 'performative gender.' For feminists, particularly, sexuality which is constructed in the complex power matrix of dominations to producing and maintaining inequalities and discriminations is not merely a distinctive variable, but one of the important organizational principles such as gender, class, race, age, and nationality. This epistemological principle will hopefully shed lights on alternative 'knowledge' on homosexuality in social welfare, and lead to significant contribution to its critical expansion in theory and practice.

• American Studies
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.1-23
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• 2020

This paper is an effort to critique the heteronormative interpretations of Kate Chopin's The Awakening and to examine the relationships of three women-Edna Pontellier, Adele Ratignolle, Mademoiselle Reisz-in the homosocial climate of the Grand Isle. Through the disclosure of erotic encounters between these women and their deferred gratification, Chopin reveals the social imperative which suppresses and fixates female desire on a male object choice. Chopin also sheds light upon the masculine language appropriating romance and chivalry that renders it impossible for Edna to articulate her sexuality within the matrix of the phallocentric society. The Awakening is not a conventionalized plot which ends in Edna's subordination to the patriarchal order; rather, the story demonstrates the "process" of how her sexual awakening becomes negotiated under the patriarchal system and exposes the excess of desire that fails to be subsumed under the hegemonic discourse.

• Cartoon and Animation Studies
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• s.38
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• pp.1-28
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• 2015

The work appeared a featured female character in the Disney animation film begins with 'Snow White' released in 1937. After then, the 11 female characters appeared included 'Tangled' in 2010. Female characters reveal their identity due to obedient, family-oriented and marriage with prince and then gradually develop to heroine who leads to man, and is independent, pioneering, and sometimes saves the nation. Nevertheless, the ending of the Disney animation was still not escape the institutional, traditional discourse. Female characters are followed to meet the featured actor kissing and marriage, or was to show the virtues of sacrifice for the actor. However, Elsa in 'Frozen' is the character with an independent identity compared with the patriarchy, male chauvinism and heterosexual dichotomous discourse given so far in Disney. In this study, it is to explain the change of gender identity in the character of Elsa through Queer theory that deconstructs the distinction between sex and gender, and is constituted by the actions typed and performed the gender concept, and is dismantling the dichotomy itself such as male/female, heterosexual/homosexual. The performative of Queer make the boundaries between lesbian-gay, sexuality and heterosexual ambiguous. It can be said that the performative has political nature resisted to the dominant discourse through these parodiable strategy. The performative showed of Elsa is in the boundaries between the sisterhood and the heterosexual. When analyzed in a heterosexual perspective Elsa's identity is to be understood as simply just love the intimacy of a sister and a sister. On the other hand, if you focused on the relationship between women and the relationship between Elsa and Anna is recognized as the point of view of homosexuality. Because if you look at the concept of lesbian continuum, the homosexual love in the female characters of Disney seems like a bond between women, easier than heterosexual love can be hidden sexual desires. Elsa has developed into a performative identity through the expression of performative and the inhibitory of queer identity. And then the her sorcery that was initially contraindicated and the presence of a fear became to the 'lesbian phallus'. The sorcery that can be seen the signifying phallus against to the privileges of heterosexual patriarchy is recognized in the world of Arendal. Elsa is a new women featuring Disney characters. as this character is analysised by Queer theory, this study seeks to expand the area of the various character analysis methods.

• The Journal of Art Theory & Practice
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• no.2
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• pp.27-48
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• 2004

Robert Rauschenberg's artistic career has often been regarded as having reached its culmination when the artist won the first prize at the 1964 Venice Biennale. With this victory, Rauschenberg triumphantly entered the pantheon of all-American artists and firmly secured his position in the history of American art. On the other hand, despite the artist's ongoing new experiments in his art, the seemingly precocious ripeness in his career has led the critical discourses on Rauschenberg's art to the artist's early works, most of which were done in the mid-1950s and the 1960s. The crux of Rauschenberg criticism lies not only in focusing on the artist's 50's and 60's works, but also in its large dismissal of the significance of the imagery that the artist employed in his works. As art historians Roger Cranshaw and Adrian Lewis point out, the critical discourse of Rauschenberg either focuses on the formalist concerns on the picture plane, or relies on the "culturalist" interpretation of Rauschenberg's imagery which emphasizes the artist's "Americanness." Recently, a group of art historians centered around October has applied Charles Sanders Peirce's semiotics as art historical methodology and illuminated the indexical aspects of Rauschenberg's work. The semantic inquiry into Rauschenberg's imagery has also been launched by some art historians who seek the clues in the artist's personal context. The first half of this essay will examine the previous criticism on Rauschenberg's art and the other half will discuss the artist's 1955 work Rebus, which I think intersects various critical concerns of Rauschenberg's work, and yet defies the closure of discourses in one direction. The categories of signs in the semiotics of Charles Sanders Peirce and the discourse of Jean-Francois Lyotard will be used in discussing the meanings of Rebus, not to search for the semantic readings of the work, hut to make an analogy in terms of the paradoxical structures of both the work and the theory. The definitions of rebus is as follows: Rebus 1. a representation or words or syllables by pictures of object or by symbols whose names resemble the intended words or syllables in sound; also: a riddle made up wholly or in part of such pictures or symbols. 2. a badge that suggests the name of the person to whom it belongs. Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language Unabridged. Since its creation in 1955, Robert Rauschenberg's Rebus has been one of the most intriguing works in the artist's oeuvre. This monumental 'combine' painting($6feet{\times}10feet$ 10.5 inches) consists of three panels covered with fabric, paper, newspaper, and printed reproductions. On top of these, oil paints, pencil and crayon drawings connect each section into a whole. The layout of the images is overall horizontal. Starting from a torn election poster, which is partially read as "THAT REPRE," on the far left side of the painting. Rebus leads us to proceed from the left to the right, the typical direction of reading in a Western context. Along with its seemingly proper title. Rebus, the painting has triggered many art historians to seek some semantic readings of it. These art historians painstakingly reconstruct the iconography based on the artist's interviews, (auto)biography, and artistic context of his works. The interpretation of Rebus varies from a 'image-by-image' collation with a word to a more general commentary on Rauschenberg's work overall, such as a work that "bridges between art and life." Despite the title's allusion to the legitimate purpose of the painting as a decoding of the imagery into sound, Rebus, I argue, actually hinders a reading of it. By reading through Peirce to Rauschenberg, I will delve into the subtle anxiety between words and images in their works. And on this basis, I suggest Rauschenberg's strategy in playing Rebus is to hide the meaning of the imagery rather than to disclose it.