“Every Letter Is a Love Letter”: Exploring the Various Aspects of the Stigmatization of Female Sexuality in Chris Kraus’s I Love Dick

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“Every Letter Is a Love Letter”:

Exploring the Various Aspects of the Stigmatization of

Female Sexuality in Chris Kraus’s I Love Dick

Master Thesis

Literary Studies: Literature and Culture (English) University of Amsterdam

Natalia Lloyd Student number: 10205217

Supervisor: Dr. R. Glitz

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Acknowledgement on Plagiarism

I hereby acknowledge to have read and understood the UvA guidelines on plagiarism, and I confirm that this thesis is my own work. I have also acknowledged all references and quotations from both primary and secondary sources.

Natalia Lloyd June 29, 2018

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Abstract

Chris Kraus’s novel is not the first to explore the position of women in society and female sexuality. However, due to its explicit title and Kraus’s explicitness throughout the text, the novel stands out from others that have explored the same subject. By exploring her personal sexual desires and those of other women she has encountered in real life and in literature, Kraus transforms her infatuation for a man into a project to find her own voice. The unembellished text and use of first-person letters make the narrative approachable for a large public; readers can engage with the text and recognize the inner workings of a woman’s mind.

This thesis addresses the various different aspects womanhood and femininity as discussed in I Love Dick and the different ways they draw on the stigmatization of female sexuality in current society. Even though the position of women in society has improved greatly since the Victorian era, during which time women lacked a great deal of agency and autonomy over their own bodies and sexuality. In analyzing these different aspects of womanhood and femininity, this thesis applies Judith Butler’s theory on gender performativity in Gender Trouble, Simone de Beauvoir’s theories on womanhood The Second Sex, and Catherine Hakim’s analysis of erotic capital in Erotic

Capital. Kraus’s I Love Dick tackles several subjects, such as identity, the sexual double standard,

and the silencing of women in relation to the aforementioned stigma firsthand. By referring to personal examples and those from academic texts, real life, and literature, the novel blurs the line between memoir and fiction. Furthermore, the personal experiences from various women in addition to Kraus’s illustrate the stigma over female sexuality and the lack of agency and autonomy that women still experience.

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Introduction

In recent years there has been an increase in the discussion about how women and their roles are presented in the media, including novels and films. The recent events of the #MeToo movement that took place on social media, and was initiated by civil rights activist Tarana Burke, involved women confronting the power structures that are in play in sexual harassment and the silencing of women. This movement has highlighted the idea that it remains important to look into women’s representation in media, both new and old, and further analyze how women are represented. There are many different opinions about how women should be represented and what characteristics should be involved to form a coherent representation. Often there seems to be difficulty in the understanding of what being a strong female (character) entails. In many cases strong female characters, such as Beatrix Kiddo from the film franchise Kill Bill or Brienne of Tarth from Game

of Thrones are represented through masculine qualities, such as being physically strong, assertive

and aggressive. However, the importance lies in the idea that a strong female character can be portrayed with a wide range of emotions, in charge of her character arc, and able to express her sexuality, without having a particular distinction between masculine and feminine qualities. Chris Kraus’s novel I Love Dick portrays a woman, herself, who confronts the idea of womanhood and how the sexual stigma that surrounds female sexuality still influences her life and those of other women.

A diverse representation of women in literature and other media forms is important because it plays a role in conveying messages about what could be seen as specific female behavior and feminine qualities. As many people could take their ideas of what it entails to be a woman from novels or television, it is important that women are represented in different manners that either reflect or influence how women tend to be valued by society. Diversity in media could aid many women in their ability to identify with different versions of femininity and womanhood. However, there remain many controversies over this idea as there are a wide range of opinions about acceptable behavior and looks for women and the feminine. As Peter Barry describes, “The representation of women in literature, [...] was felt to be one of the most important forms of ‘socialization,’ since it provided the role models which indicated to women, and men, what constituted acceptable versions of the ‘feminine’ and legitimate feminine goals and aspirations” (117). Literature greatly influences how a woman thinks she needs to conform to the norms of acceptable social behavior in society. Therefore, it is important to discover what Kraus critiques

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and confronts about the expectations of women in current Western society.

One of the most controversial issues around femininity is the idea of a woman discussing and being in charge of her sexuality. The general occurrence in society is that a woman is judged more harshly in regards to her sexuality and that she should not be too open or forward about it. In their article “Does the Sexual Double Standard Still Exist? Perceptions of University Women”,

Milhausen and Herold state that “[n]inety-five percent [of female participants in their research]

indicated that they definitely or probably believed a double standard exists (a standard in which it is more acceptable for a man to have more sexual partners than a woman). Ninety-three percent indicated that they definitely or probably agreed that women who have many sex partners are judged more harshly than men who have many sex partners” (364). On the contrary, a man is almost never judged harshly when he speaks openly about his sexual activities in relation to the amount of sexual activity. This is a double standard and is due to the sexual stigma that rests on women in Western society. Furthermore, in their article, Milhausen and Herold also state that the sexual double standard was also explained through the use of Oliver and Shibley Hyde’s and Sprecher, Ragan, McKinney, Maxwell, and Wazienski’s social learning theory: “‘According to social learning theory women are punished for behaving in sexually permissive ways by being stigmatized or isolated, whereas men are rewarded by achieving popularity or administration for the identical behaviors’” (Oliver and Shibley Hyde, 1993; Sprecher et al.,1997 qtd. in Milhausen and Herold 361). It can be said that this treatment of female sexuality stems from the Victorian era and, even earlier, the establishment of the Christian church, when women were expected to cover their entire body in clothing because showing skin would otherwise elicit sexual behavior from the opposite sex. Therefore, women were expected to protect men’s sexuality as well as their own, in the sense that they had to be cautious not to entice any sexual behavior in the opposite sex—except in the context of marriage.

Female sexuality has been labeled as perverse—abject even. Barbara Creed addressed this

notion in her study The Monstrous-Feminine: Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis, “On the one hand

those [images from horror films] which define woman as monstrous in relation to her reproductive functions work to reinforce the phallocentric notion that female sexuality is abject” (151). For a woman to be open about sex is to expose herself as unabashed and unashamed. In I Love Dick, Chris Kraus exposes and confronts female abjection by completely laying bare her own sexual endeavors and her pursuit of a man named Dick. In doing so, she assumes full responsibility for

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her actions and critiques society’s perspective on female sexuality.

In this thesis I explore the ways in which Chris Kraus confronts and addresses the stigmas around female sexuality and femininity. In order to explore this phenomenon, I mainly use Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex and her theories on the Western notion of womanhood and disadvantages women have been challenged with throughout history. I will also use Judith Butler’s theories on gender performativity and relation between the female gender and the body as argued in her book Gender Trouble. I will apply Julia Kristeva’s theory and concept of abjection to analyze the idea of Kraus exposing and confessing her sexual desires in her letters. In order to address I Love Dick’s semi-autobiographical structure and epistolary form I use Philippe Lejeune’s theories on the third-person narrative and autobiography. Lejeune’s theory will give insight into Kraus’s use of first-person and third-person narrative.

I Love Dick revolves around Chris Kraus, her husband Sylvère, and Chris’s love interest

Dick, and is mostly based on real life events experienced by the author Chris Kraus. The novel consists of three distinguishable writing styles: 250 love letters, accompanying texts, and transcriptions of telephone calls between Chris and Dick. Chris is the one who mainly writes the letters to Dick, but Sylvère has written a few as well. The letters are the only manner in which they currently share intimacy in their marriage. Dick is an academic and a friend of Sylvère’s and Chris meets him during a dinner at their house. During the dinner event Chris becomes enamored with Dick. From that moment forward, Chris starts writing love letters to Dick, which eventually results in a private and passionate meeting between them. Interestingly, when Kraus first started writing the letters, it was not her intention to turn them into a novel for publication. The additional texts between the letters, which are both serve as commentary and narrative, elaborate what happened in between writing the letters. These sections add another dimension to the letters; they further explore the issues presented in the letters but from the third person; they give Kraus’s perspective as an outside participant. From this point forward, the fictional Chris Kraus will be referred to as Chris throughout this discussion and the author as Kraus.

Furthermore, I analyze the reading experience of this novel. As many people find that the title suggests desire for the phallus, this assumption influences how and where people tend to read the novel. In reading the book myself, I feared holding up the cover of the book when in public. Reading a few book reviews, mainly written by women, confirmed that this phenomenon occurred with others as well. As Lesli Jamison explained in her review in The New York Times, “I was

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finally part of it, and it made me feel even more part of it—part of something—to have men making asinine comments on the 4 train, pointing at the cover: Good to know what you like! I knew I was holding white-hot text in my hands, written by a woman who had theorized what these guys were doing—with me, with their dick jokes—even before they’d done it” (“This Female Consciousness: On Chris Kraus”). Her comment clearly confirms that women get ridiculed for reading such a book in public.

To further explore the reception of this book, I analyze the paratext and interplay between the novel’s autobiographical and fictional aspects. In addition, the unusual use of the written letters to drive the story has an effect on the reception and interpretation of I Love Dick. Were the book written in third-person prose, it might not have the same effect that it does now, in not only the literary world but also the feminist movement. The written letters and the semi-autobiographical aspect of the book create a different angle to the intended message. As Stephanie Wong opens her book review, she mentions:

The front cover of the last book I loved bears neither gold seals nor laurels to rest on. If you’re looking for flashy art direction, keep moving. Here, there’s just a shadowy still life photo (inventory: one open notebook, one glass ashtray, one bowl, two pens, many loose leaves of paper) set against a plain white background. And yet, if ever there was a book that should be judged by its cover, it’s this one. (“The Last Book I Loved: I Love Dick”)

She points out that I Love Dick should be judged by its cover as its cover art is a reference to the French theorist Jean Baudrillard, who is referred to at the outset of the novel. The title and cover photo are placed on a white background without any further additions of color or text. The cover stands out from other novels’, mainly due to its simplicity. Little clues that give away the narrative of the text are present in the images.

Feminist literature is a genre that explores female agency in fiction. In a large sum of feminist novels, the female characters are fully realized women with their own problems, desires, lusts and conflicts. They are agents of their own lives and do not solely appear in the novel to move forward a male character’s storyline. The choices that women make throughout such a novel are based on their own needs and move their own story forward. Furthermore, what is important to

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not is that the female characters are often faced with the challenges of their time and society. As Rita Felski explains, “Feminist fiction can be understood as both a product of existing social conditions and a form of critical opposition to them, and this dialectic can be usefully interpreted in conjunction with an analysis of the status of feminism as a social movement within advanced capitalism” (1).

Chris Kraus’s I Love Dick follows the story of an independent filmmaker in pursuit of her infatuation with a theorist named Dick while she is stuck in her marriage with a French academic, who eventually even aids her in this pursuit of Dick. My main focus is to explore how this novel enunciates different aspects of the stigmatization in regards to female sexuality and womanhood in the current feminist climate. Furthermore, I explore the relationships the female protagonist, also named Chris Kraus, has with the two men in the novel and to what extent they play a role in her self-transformation and her ability to assume responsibility. At the core of this study is how the novel explores female agency—especially in Chris Kraus’s pursuit of her own desires— without shame or the need for explanation.

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Chapter 1:

Shame and the Sexual Double Standard

This chapter highlights the extent to which the sexual stigma around female sexuality still exists and why it remains a problem. The social constructs that have been formed around what it means to be a woman affect the way women perceive and carry themselves, including their sexuality. There is a fine line between what (behavior) is acceptable and unacceptable according to society’s standards regarding female sexuality. As Simone de Beauvoir has famously written in The Second

Sex, “One is not born, but rather becomes, woman” (293). At birth, women are not predisposed to

the ideas and morals which give meaning to femininity or womanhood. When a child comes into the world, she is subjected to the belief and social systems of the parents and, later in life, of her peers. The biological and physical correlation between woman and vagina, and man and penis, is only one simple distinction among many between the genders man and woman.

For centuries, women have not been able to explore their sexuality without limitations placed on them by society and their upbringing, as well as biology due to the lack of reliable means of contraception. They did not have freedom to discover the meaning of the sexual desire they felt. In the Victorian era, for instance, women were diagnosed as hysterical when they experienced

sexual desire. As explained by Mary Poovey in “Scenes of an Indelicate Character”: The Medical

“Treatment” of Victorian Women”, “[Dr. James Young] Simpson1_{’s passing reference to hysteria}

is telling, for what English journals repeatedly reported were not simply random ‘instances of delirium, and spasms, and convulsions;’ but specifically female displays of sexual excitation” (Poovey 142). Their symptoms such as sexual desire, pain in the abdomen, and nervousness were not recognized as aspects of functioning female sexuality. Because of ignorance about female biology, female sexuality was considered to be a disease that required a cure, and women and their close relations did not know how to classify the bodily experiences that related to healthy sexual arousal, as highlighted by Paul Chodoff, “[…] one must note that it is only the unslaked uterus that vengefully roams about the body and pressures and tortures it. Thus, hysteria occurs not in women with satisfactory sex lives but is an affliction of the sexual lack” (546). Diagnosis of female hysteria therefore occurred mainly in unmarried women and virgins. Ironically, in the Victorian era, the cure for hysteria was to have sexual intercourse with a special doctor or with oneself with

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the help of an electromechanical vibrator, as Rachel P. Maines explains: “[…] in the Western medical tradition genital massage to orgasm by a physician or midwife was a standard treatment for hysteria” (1) and “[w]hen the vibrator emerged as an electromechanical medical instrument at the end of the nineteenth century, it evolved from previous massage technologies in response to demand from physicians for more rapid and efficient physical therapies, […] for hysteria” (3). During the Middle Ages, it was forbidden by the church to express one’s sexuality publicly, and experiencing pleasure from sex was also considered a sin. Expression of female sexuality remains a controversial topic of discussion in the twenty-first century, and it is important to consider why stigma remains.

Complexities Tied to Sexual Stigma

There are particular complexities tied to the sexual stigma. There appears to be a certain degree to which women are allowed to talk about sex, sexuality and everything that lies in between those terms in terms of appearance, vocabulary, identity, and bodies. In current culture, the sexual stigma does not necessarily imply that women cannot discuss anything related to sex at all; the problem rather lies in opinions about the manners and contexts in which women talk about sex. For example, there appears to be less of a problem when men discuss their casual activities, as opposed to when women discuss similar experiences. Often these experiences of women are dismissed or judged as ‘slutty’. Pantéa Farvid, Virginia Braun, and Caseay Rowney explain this as follows:

The notion of the difference in how much men and women talk about casual sex also conjures up a particular gendered aspect of casual sex based on the sexual double standard. While the permissive discourse ostensibly works to ‘equali[z]e’ casual sex, the sexual double standard and gendered expectations around how men and women should behave sexually were implicated in relation to talk around, and display of, women’s casual sex. (551)

Women might be judged less harshly when discussing their casual sexual experiences among female friends, also because they do not talk about it as much as men. A reason for this might be that women think that it is less appropriate for women to boast about sexual casual experiences: “Traditional gender(ed) ideals demand silence in relation to women’s casual sex experiences. This

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silence was indicative of subtle but present codes of what constitutes appropriate femininity, (sexual) [behavior] and talk” (552) Farvid et al. explain.

Another significant problem involving female sexuality is body shaming and the objectification of the female body. These two phenomena are closely related; the female body is widely used as a commodity in the media where female nudity is frequently deemed acceptable under the terms of “sex sells.” However, such nudity is only permissible when it is used as a selling point and for the pleasure of others. If women display nudity for any other reason, besides perhaps in art, they are labeled “a slut,” “a whore,” “mad”, or “promiscuous.” These terms are related to their behavior, dress, or a combination of the two. Body shaming does not simply respond to the display of the naked female body; it is used in correlation with how a woman treats and uses her own body, for instance: women not removing body hair or not wearing make-up. As Catherine Hakim explains: “The most powerful and effective weapon deployed by men to curtail women’s use of erotic capital is the stigmatization of women who sell sexual services—a stigma that never affects men who sell sex quite so much” (64). For example, men are not required to shave their legs or remove their facial hair in order to be considered attractive. Women are stigmatized as a result of almost any sexual idea they might portray or dabble in, whereas men are not judged with the same criteria, as their casual sexual behavior has been accepted as normal: “‘Amidst current discourses of supposed sexual equality between men and women, it is still more socially acceptable for men to have greater numbers of sexual partners than women’” (Crawford & Popp, 2003; Greene & Faulkner, 2005; Milhausen & Herold, 1999; Muehlenhard, 1988; Ronen, 2010 qtd. in Farvid et al. 545).

Often women are more occupied with avoiding sexual shaming and controlling their own behavior, than exploring their sexual desire. Such controlling behavior is due to fear of being judged and doing something wrong. Women are aware of the possible consequences, such as damaging their reputation, sexual harassment, or unsafe sex, if they would not be as conscious of their (sexual) behavior, even though they are also aware of problems that come with monitoring their own behavior. Therefore, women are also, indirectly, part of the problem and a reason why sexual stigma persists. They have internalized the sexist expectations on their gender.

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Shame and female sexuality can be easily linked. The online Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines shame as “a painful emotion caused by consciousness of guilt, shortcoming, or impropriety.” In today’s Western society, women are still often shamed for expressing their sexuality and sexual experiences, for instance through (partially) nude pictures. There is a variety of reasons for this phenomenon, some of which date back to the Victorian era during which women were expected to behave and dress in a modest fashion. They hid most of their skin behind dresses with full skirts, stockings, and corsets. Victorian women’s bodies were hidden behind full dresses in the same way as Victorian women were in their homes. As Michel Foucault explains, “[s]exuality was carefully confined: it moved into the home” (3). Much like women’s bodies, sexuality was meant to hidden from the public. Society determined their place to be restricted to the home: “the home’s champions are often women, since it is their task to assure the happiness of the familial group; as in the days when the [domina] sat in the atrium, their role is to be ‘mistress of the house’” (Beauvoir 482).

Women’s fear of being considered too forward or shameful when she is open and explicit about sex can also be found in their cultural upbringing. In her article “Shame Resilience Theory: A Grounded Theory Study on Women and Shame,” Brené Brown explains this idea as follows: “The cultural component points to the very prevalent role of cultural expectations and the relationship between shame and the real or perceived failure of meeting cultural expectations” (45). Society teaches women from an early age that it is abnormal to be open about sex, that she should be weary of the way she dresses and behaves, and that she should be careful about her choice in sexual partners. In addition, for a woman to take part in sexual encounters outside marriage or relational commitment is often considered “loose” behavior. Regularly, women who behave so are not held in high regard by society and are therefore shamed. The media and novels reinforce this notion of shame. Often in media, men avoid judgment when they openly communicate about sex and their sex lives. They are neither shamed for having many sexual partners, nor told that they should cover themselves up in more clothing to avoid provoking sexual behavior in the opposite sex.

Shame is not a mere label that is placed upon women who are forward about their sexuality. Women often experience the feeling of shame when they realize they have transgressed what is expected of their gender and sex. They also feel they are violating their own set of standards which

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relates back to these gender roles. In I Love Dick, Chris Kraus illustrates what it means for a woman to feel shame when she behaves outside of the expected behavior:

Shame is what you feel after being fucked on quaaludes [a sedative] by some art world cohort who’ll pretend it never happened, shame is what you feel after giving blowjobs in the bathroom at Mac’s Kansas City because Liza Martin wants free coke. Shame is what you feel after letting someone take you someplace past control—then feeling torn up three days later between desire, paranoia, etiquette wondering if they’ll call. Dear Dick, you told me twice last weekend how much you love John Rechy’s books and you wish your writing could include more sex. Because I love you and you can’t or you’re embarrassed, maybe this is something I can do for you? (170)

What Chris Kraus describes here are examples of moments in which each time someone else took control of her and in doing so disregarded her wishes and desires. It is also interesting to note that in this moment, Kraus’s friend Liza Martin exerted pressure on her because Liza “wants free coke” (170). These moments also happened to her because she was taking advantage of due to other people’s desires. The sexual behavior that Chris Kraus describes is also often considered scandalous and immodest. In addition, the phrase “being fucked on quaaludes by some art world cohort who’ll pretend it never happened […]” (170) describes the act of rape. Chris describes these moments as shame, because women are often shamed for being raped, they are suspected of being at fault. The notion remains that women have been taught they are held responsible for men acting on their sexual desires. Such shame is formed through the ideas that the woman should have worn less revealing clothing, should not have been intoxicated, should have clearly refused, and should not have walked around at night by herself. Therefore, society upholds this vicious cycle of shaming women for any participation, even involuntary, in sexual deviance. Consequently, women are even shamed for speaking about their feelings of shame, because coming forward about feeling ashamed could mean that the woman admits that her behavior was in fact shameful.

Shame is also linked to women’s bodies. As mentioned earlier, from an early age, women are told to be conscious about what clothing to wear because exposing too much skin might be deemed “slutty.” On the other hand, not revealing skin at all could be considered prudish. In her

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article “Shame, Sexuality, and Vulnerability” Helen Resneck-Sannes further elaborates on this notion, “From a very early age, a girl is taught to cover her chest, while the boy runs with his shirt off. She is taught to be modest, especially in front of men. In the meantime, little boys are having contests to show how far they can urinate with their penises. The girl is told to cover her body so that men will not become sexually aroused and lose control” (117). This is not only a clear example of how women are taught to be ashamed of showing skin; it also clearly illustrates the aforementioned sexual double standard. Some men tend to receive appraisal for their body and sexuality, which includes the rewarding of having multiple sexual partners as well as committing to enhancing their body through exercise. At the same time, they are not taught to be aware of the amount skin they are showing, as it might entice sexual behavior from the female sex. Men have been taught that their inability to control their sexual urges can be blamed on women appearing scantily clad, however, women appear to be able to control their desires with or without exposure to a man’s naked skin. The importance herein lies that through this idea, women have been taught to feel shame about their bodies.

Furthermore, women are shamed when it comes to their menstrual cycle, which could be due to lack of education on female sexuality in school. Though menstruation might not seem closely related to sexuality, to shame a woman about menstruation is to shame her in her womanhood. Women are often reminded of the social stigma that surrounds this topic: “The stigma of menstruation is conveyed to [women] everyday through a variety of sociocultural routes. For example, negative attitudes toward menstruation and cultural beliefs about menstruating and premenstrual women are transmitted through products and media (e.g., advertisements, magazine articles, books, television) we see every day” (Chrisler 2008; Erchull 2010 qtd. in Johnston-Robledo and Chrisler 11). These sources remind women that they are not allowed to talk about it.

To be able to talk about menstruation means to talk about the female body and to talk about the body means that women should be able to talk about sexuality as well, because they are inherently connected in relation to female sexual desire. In I Love Dick, Chris Kraus provokes a discussion of sexual stigma as her language and narrative is explicit about several topics that relate to female sexuality. Her character Chris describes in detail what she desires about Dick and what she would like to experience with him sexually. She is not ashamed to explain these things to him in detail, even if she realizes she might fail in the pursuit of this man: “[...] I couldn’t remember sexual negotiations ever being this humiliatingly explicit” (Kraus 157). She is not afraid to describe

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her sexual desires to him and abstains from using subtext or innuendos, as can be seen in the following examples: “And Chris has turned into a jumpy bundle of emotions, sexually aroused for the first time in seven years” (25) and “I’m not sure I still want to fuck you” (75). Chris does not hide behind society’s morals and expectations that she should behave as a decent woman who does not confess her sexual desires in public.

Female Abjection and the Sexual Double Standard

The title I Love Dick opens up the discussion of female abjection, the state of being cast off. Judith Butler explains Julia Kristeva’s theory on abjection, as written in Powers of Horror, as follows: “The ‘abject’ designates that which has been expelled from the body, discharged as excrement, literally rendered ‘Other’” (181 2007), which means the abject becomes something that is other than the “Self.” Such moments of abjection can be related to the novel’s title. Various critical reviews, from female readers of I Love Dick, such as Philomena Epps and Dawn Foster mentioned the moments they were confronted with the idea what the title of the novel might suggest if read in public and without the context of the whole narrative. The title does not simply suggest either the love of a man named Dick or the love for the phallus; it also represents the sexual stigma and double standard that confront women, which is that women are judged more severely than men in regards to giving voice to their sexual desires. As Chris Kraus underlines, “A woman sitting, reading all alone will always be a receptacle for passersby to rant on” (243). Here, Kraus could suggest that if a woman were to sit alone in a diner or, as stated, just anywhere reading alone, there must be something wrong, as if the female is lacking the accompaniment of a male.

The term abjection is generally used to describe the state of marginalized groups in society, such as disabled and poor people, women, and homosexuals. These groups are coined as such because they are considered to be different from the established status quo and cast out from society. To be abject is to be so other that it becomes difficult or impossible to fit in with and adhere to the established norms and morals. The fictional Chris Kraus explains that “Female monsters take things as personally as they really are. They study facts. Even if rejection makes them feel like the girl who is not invited to the party, they have to understand the reason why” (218). In her letters, Kraus explores moments when women were treated as the Other by society. This thesis focuses on how women are either forced to live up to society’s standards of femininity

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and sexuality or how they consciously place themselves outside these established norms in abject status.

Chris Kraus embraces her femininity and female sexuality. In daring to express her desires with Dick and refusing to be afraid or shameful about them, as mentioned in the foreword by Eileen Myles, “She’s turned female abjection inside out and aimed it at a man” (Kraus 15). Chris is aware of society’s expectations of gender roles, the sexual stigma, and the shame that is placed on women who fully pursue their desires. In her letters to Dick, she reflects upon her own role as a woman and on womanhood in general and how this is perceived through society’s eyes:

Sylvère keeps socializing what I’m going through with you. Labeling it through other people’s eyes—Adultery in Academe, John Updike meets Marivaux ... Faculty Wife Throws Herself At Husband’s Colleague. This presumes that there’s something inherently grotesque, unspeakable, about femaleness, desire. But what I’m going through with you is real and happening for the first time. (Kraus 138)

In this passage, Chris confronts the idea of her supposed unethical behavior toward her husband and Dick, which includes Chris sharing her intimate sexual desires with a stranger, Dick, outside her marriage and having sexual intercourse with him. For a woman to embrace her womanhood and her desires is often considered as something negative rather than positive. In her letters to Dick, she clearly mentions subjects that would otherwise not be discussed in such an explicit way. In her confrontation she points out and labels ideas that are simply internalized “mistakes” in Western society, such as the idea of female desire being inappropriate. She elaborates on ideas that are often left unsaid and should not be spoken about, such as when she points out that there seems to be something abhorrent about female desire. She also dares to critique the idea that women are lowering themselves when they expose their own vulnerabilities: “Why does everybody think that women are debasing themselves when we expose the conditions of our own debasement? Why do women always have to come off clean?” (Kraus 211). Chris’s vulnerability lies in her irrepressible writing, as she does not refrain from telling Dick her sexual desires publicly and in writing. From this perspective, Chris’s openness and honesty in her letters to Dick would be considered as humiliating to herself and placing herself in a dependent position in relation to him. However, instead of addressing this idea, she assumes that this attitude toward women is nonsensical. She

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completely embraces her abject position as a woman who does not avoid opportunities to expose her desires, sexual and otherwise.

Conclusion

In order to study the stigma on women’s sexuality, it is important to discover the remaining vestiges of it and its origins. Despite the apparent sexual freedom that both men and women have in the twenty-first century, in studying Kraus’s I Love Dick, it becomes clear that the novel presents the stigma against women as still predominant. Chris’s letters reveal specific issues that underline this existence and how women are met with shame over their sexuality, body, and appearance. This shame stems from ideas that most women have grown up with, through their parents, peers, and the mass media. What stands out from the discussion on the complexities of the stigma, is that men are not met with the same judgments as women are. They are often praised for displaying casual sexual behavior or showing their skin, and they are not asked to choose between a career or parenthood. Shame also becomes apparent when women discuss their sexual encounters. Women have internalized the idea that discussing sexual desires, behavior, and adventures in full detail is unfeminine.

Chris contradicts these notions and expectations of womanhood by writing letters to a man she is infatuated with; in these she writes down her sexual desires in full and explicit detail, even though her desire for him remains mostly unreciprocated. In doing so, she also exposes her own vulnerabilities, in relation to her sexual life as well as her career. In this she points out it should be acceptable for women to debase themselves. Women have been expected to perfect and to meet society’s expectations of what it means to be female. Throughout the novel, Chris rejects this notion.

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Chapter 2:

History of the Stigma and Differences in Gender Roles

I Love Dick was originally published in 1997, and as mentioned earlier, it was not intended to be

published when it was written. In I Love Dick, Kraus has blurred the lines between fiction and memoir by writing down her deepest desires about Dick, without considering and maintaining the privacy of the man in question. The importance of the novel lies in the fact that it is about Kraus, and her desires and feelings. As she mentions in an interview for the online magazine Dazed, “When I was writing the book it seemed very important to reclaim the ‘I.’ Even now, when women use the first person, its perceived as a little sullied, compromised, not completely whole. No one blinks at the male ‘I’ because it is considered to be the universal” (Epps, “Chris Kraus on Her Radical 1997 Novel I Love Dick”). Her desire to reclaim the “I” stands for the importance of women reclaiming and maintaining their agency, particularly their ability to make decisions regarding their own sexuality without the influence and judgment from their environment and society.

Moreover, Kraus explains in another interview that “although demographically in most countries females are not a minority, they have always been treated as a minority. And any minority, any person who speaks from a minority place, is expected to be exemplary. An intellectual woman [could not] possibly be sexualized in any way. Women were supposed to be perfect” (Fulton, “The Revival of Chris Kraus and Her Radical Novel I Love Dick”). Kraus here challenges the idea that women often have to choose between their career, sexuality, and motherhood, as opposed to men, who often are not asked such questions. This decision is not necessarily always a conscious one, but it is often implicit in the ideas, morals, and stereotypes formed in their mind in response to the environment they live in. These unconsciously made decisions are a result of centuries of sexism, discrimination, and patriarchal power structures. Patriarchal power structures, which are a product of society’s treatment of women and men, still play a major role in how women experience their alleged sexual freedom. Sex is ubiquitous because of film, mass media, and the Internet. There is no longer a great importance put on censoring normative forms of sexuality. Because of its availability and demand, the female body rather has become hypersexualized. This sexualization can be defined as a woman’s body being viewed as someone else’s sexual pleasure and basing her value solely on her attractiveness. It

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should be stressed that women should be able to be sexual without being criticized for it. In taking a closer look at the structures of how these media are formed reveals that the patriarchy is responsible to a large extent for how images are portrayed, and that much media participates in the erasure, limiting, or sexualization of women. In her article “Gendered Media: The Influence of Media on Views of Gender,” Julia T. Wood explains that “[i]n general, media continue to present both women and men in stereotyped ways that limit our perceptions of human possibilities. [...] Because media pervade our lives, the ways they misrepresent genders may distort how we see ourselves and what we perceive as normal and desirable for men and women” (32). In films and advertisements, focus most of the time is on male sexuality, and female sexuality is often extra or

simply omitted from the story. As explained by Rebecca L. Collins, “One message that emerges

from these special issues [from several critical articles on media representation], and does so with overwhelming clarity, is that women and girls are under-represented across a wide variety of

media” (291). This indicates that mass media maintains the structures of gender representation and

perception. There is little room for deviating from these gender stereotypes.

A result of the hypersexualization is that girls and women form their identity through these images and become aware of the sexualization of the female body and gender. How the imagery is interpreted by women (and men) is difficult to measure on a large scale; however, it can be said that such a large number of sexual images affects the forming of one’s identity and contributing behavior: “Observers of youth culture suggest that the traditional portrayal of gender and sexual images have important consequences on adolescent consumers of popular culture” (Kalof 640). Young women receive signals through the media on how they should behave as a woman and accept this unconsciously as the truth.

Origins of the Stigma

One might say that sexual stigma seems to no longer be an issue in Western civilization, as there appears to be a great amount of sexual freedom among men as well as women, especially in the films, music, and books that have been produced in the recent years. However, in studying these media and picking out the differences in which men and women are displayed in relation to nudity and sex, it becomes clear that portraying women who are open about sex still remains an important topic of discussion, because, for instance, a television show Sex and the City was praised for its explicit portrayal of women enjoying sex.

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Furthermore, these differences in portrayal of men and women have been present for centuries in books, paintings, fashion, and even the professions that women inhabit. The words spoken and written about sex and women were not always liberating, and the few cases that were remained hidden. In several texts (all of them religious), sexual activity was deemed sinful, forbidden outside marriage, and encouraged only as a means of procreation:

In Europe, Christianity and patriarchy have worked in harmony to sideline sexuality and belittle the erotic. [...] Celibacy was praised as admirable, then, enforced on Catholic priests, monks, and nuns. Lust was classified as one of the Seven Deadly Sins from the sixth century onward. The term is still used pejoratively to label sexual desire as excessive, violent, uncivilized, and overwhelming rather than bold, enthusiastic, spirited, and energetic. Christian disapproval and fear of sexuality extended into the denigration of women for inciting men’s desire with their beauty, charm, and sex appeal. (Hakim 68–9)

The sexual stigma that Chris Kraus tackles in her novel I Love Dick stems from several sources. Many events, social constructs, morals, religions, and beliefs throughout history have had an influence on the perception of female sexuality in Western society. Perception is passed on from generation to generation, as people often tend to share their belief system with their surrounding social circle. Some beliefs have been altered through the centuries due to new influences, such as the waves of feminism, but the foundation remains. Regarding the perception of female sexuality, the Middle Ages and the Victorian era were particularly shaping on our beliefs. Behavioral structures concerning female sexuality are deeply rooted in the time when the church had a great deal of cultural influence.

The influence of the church on sexuality and gender can be related back to the Catholic morals and beliefs which state that sexuality is sacred and that one therefore should remain a virgin until marriage in order to form a divine complementary bond between man and woman. Simone de Beauvoir mentions that “Christianity, in spite of its loathing of the flesh, respects the devoted virgin and the chaste and docile wife” (92). Even within marriage, for a person to seek out sexual pleasure solely for the purpose of pleasure, was deemed unholy and morally incompetent. To restrain one’s sexual desires was more important than having the freedom to express such desires,

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especially out of wedlock. This was a particularly important mandate for women, who had the task to hold their virtue intact and not give in to their sexual desires. In her article “Whose Sexuality? Whose Tradition? Women, Experience, and Roman Catholic Sexual Ethics,” Barbara H. Andolsen says, “Female purity and chastity safeguarded men’s virtue as well as women’s own” (56); in this way of thinking, women were responsible for not only their own but also men’s sexual behavior. This also meant that women’s failing to uphold this unspoken code would reflect not only on themselves but also on men. Such unspoken rules meant women had to bear a great responsibility. In addition, these conditions result in a lack of social freedom, especially in regards to their sexuality, as it was reserved for the sole purpose of producing offspring.

These sorts of behavioral demands placed on women have been visible for centuries. Neither one particular moment in history nor one particular institution has promoted them, but many. The moral code and beliefs prescribed by the Catholic church have left their mark. Andsolen credits the church’s influence in society’s double standard for men and women: “The [...] vestiges of such control of female sexuality are found in the fading, but still perceptible, traces of the ‘double standard’—male sexual lapses are an understandable result of men’s inability to control their raging sexual urges, while women’s falls from purity represent grave female failures to contain not only their own sexual passions, but those of their male partners as well” (56). The apparent difference between men and women here is that male sexuality is solely linked to biology and if men were to fail to control their sexual urges they need not be held responsible. Women, however, are held responsible for not only their own sexuality but also the men’s, and their sexuality is linked to their social standing, behavior, and purity.

For centuries, women have been told from a young age what it means to be a woman and which rules and standards are important to uphold. Girls are made aware of their female body and fed with ideas about girl- and womanhood. A girl learns that she is different from boys and that she should be feminine and behave “like a girl.” De Beauvoir explains this process as follows: “[...] the passivity that essentially characterizes the ‘feminine’ woman is a trait that develops in her from her earliest years. But it is false to claim that therein lies a biological given; in fact is a destiny imposed on her by her teachers and society” (de Beauvoir 305). As the girl starts to menstruate, she is made aware of the biological nature of her reproductive system and the sexual aspect of her female body. From this moment, the onset of her adolescence, female gender norms and stereotypes continue to stress that women must be passive and submissive. This message not

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only appears in women’s private lives, but also in their careers. As Chris writes in her letter to Dick, “Dear Dick, I’m wondering why every act that narrated female lived experience in the ’70s has been read only as ‘collaborative’ and ‘feminist’” (Kraus 150). Women’s names as well as their endeavors have often been erased from history or have been mentioned only in relation to men.

Throughout the process of growing into adulthood, a woman is taught that her sexual desires take second place to those of her male peers. The media has fueled this “phenomenon” by bombarding women with hypersexualized images of the female body that serve to please the (male) public. Often the result of this process is that women see their sexuality as mainly important in relation to the man.

As a result, sexual stigma is partially a product of the hegemonic frames of masculinity that place men in the dominant position in Western society and assign social roles according to concepts of gender. Rachel Jewkes et al. explain this as follows: “A core element of the construction of hegemonic masculinity is heterosexuality, and to a greater or lesser extent hegemonic masculinity is constructed as a gender position that is as much ‘not gay’ as it is ‘not female’” (113). A hegemonic frame influences and partially shapes the manner in which female sexuality is constructed alongside the female gender. This frame pits “masculine” and “feminine” against each other and has determined that “masculine” sexual behavior is presumed to “unfeminine” and therefore that other aspects of sexual behavior have been assigned to solely to female sexuality.

Pressures on Women

A significant aspect of the sexual stigma surrounding female sexuality are the pressures that women face in Western society. These pressures relate to expectations about their outer appearance, their behavior, motherhood, career, and sexuality. They influence how women see themselves, how they view the world around them, and how the world views them. In this thesis, the main focus lies on pressure regarding looks, sexuality, and behavior. Often, these pressures contradict one another in relation to the male gaze and a woman’s own sexuality.

The pressures mentioned are byproducts of the assigned gender roles of male and female. A woman’s role, as formulated by Western society, requires her to simultaneously embrace being independent, a mother, and a productive member of society. If the woman does not adhere to one of these aspects of womanhood, society believes that something is at fault. However, the problem

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is not that the woman did not fulfill one of these roles; the problem is rather that these roles are expected of any and every woman. The lack of autonomy appears to play a factor in the expected fulfillment of these roles, due to societal and legal restrictions, such as women based job opportunities.

The difficulty is for women to fulfill society’s expectations to be sexual beings, but within society’s restrictions. As Judith Butler explains, “The identification of women with ‘sex,’ for Beauvoir as for Wittig, is a conflation of the category of women with the ostensibly sexualized features of their bodies and, hence, a refusal to grant freedom and autonomy to women as it is purportedly enjoyed by men” (2007 27). The female body is often not viewed as separate but as a direct link to sex and (male) pleasure, which means a woman can make decisions about her own body; however, the underlying thought is that a woman does so to meet society’s expectations regarding women and the male gaze. For example, when a woman changes something about her appearance—by wearing make-up, for instance—often the motivation for this decision is the benefit of a man or men. This is a small example, but it illustrates that women do not have full control and autonomy over their own bodies.

Furthermore, the lack of female autonomy becomes apparent when we consider the female experience of her own body. Among the many influences on women’s view and experience of their bodies is the media. As highlighted by Judith C. Daniluk in “The Meaning and Experience of Female Sexuality: A Phenomenological Analysis,” “a much more subtle but pervasive source of influence on the women’s experience of their sexuality [is] the various forms of communications media: television, music, movies, magazines, and videos” (60). Though the media, women are fed unrealistic standards of image, beauty, and behavior. These unrealistic standards feed the presumption that these standards are the norm and should always be adhered to if a woman would be deemed woman enough. This pressure creates a sense of failure, inadequacy, and shame if these expectations are not met.

Unrealistic standards of beauty and behavior also influence women’s experience of their sexuality. It is fair to say that ingrained expectations can affect a woman’s body image and engender almost complete self-awareness, in and outside the bedroom. Images in women’s and men’s magazines highlight how female sexuality and the female body is often portrayed and viewed. As Daniluk discovered during her study, during which women were asked to make collages with images from such magazines; “[c]onsistent with phallic-centered constructions of

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sexuality, the women experienced their sexual needs and desires to become secondary to those of men. Heterosexuality was viewed as compulsory and female-centered sexual desire was portrayed as something perverse and forbidden” (61). Symbols and displays of sexuality, such as in advertisements, are mainly dominated by symbols that serve male desire. The message sent is that sexuality is to be enjoyed in heterosexual contexts, or not at all. Moreover, women’s sexuality is meant to be enjoyed by their male companions, and not by the women themselves as in the aforementioned heterosexual context. In one of her letters to Dick, Chris describes an event in a disco in the seventies: “’Cause shame was what we always felt, me and all my girlfriends, for expecting sex to breed complicity” (169). She expresses the shame women felt for even hoping to establish some kind of intimacy through the act of sex.

For a large part of history, women have faced a great deal of suppression and oppression, ranging from being enslaved, being subjected to violence, not being allowed to marry, not being allowed to choose their marriage partner, not being allowed to vote, hold leadership positions, or form and express opinions. Of course, such oppression has included the lack of autonomy over their own bodies. The display of sexual freedom was often deemed sinful, scandalous, and unladylike. Fortunately, in the twenty-first century in the West, most of these forms of oppression have either become less or disappeared in entirety. Women as a whole are no longer violated in such extremes.

Differences in Gender Roles

Differences in gender, male and female, could help in understanding how both genders experience their sexuality and how they are influenced by sexual stigma. How people experience their own sexuality is of course specific to each individual; however, it is important to consider how their experiences might be influenced by gendered preconceptions about sexuality. Additionally, the stigma is particularly noticeable in opinions about casual sex and having multiple sexual partners. As mentioned in Chapter 1, men are often praised for having many casual sexual partners, whereas women tend to receive backlash when portraying similar “masculine” behavior.

There is a societal assumption that women who desire to have multiple sexual partners, to be independent, experiment, and to have sexual intercourse on a regular basis are desiring to be treated “as men.” This desire to be treated the same as men is not necessarily that women want to be like men, but to receive the same response for their actions. Moreover, women in fact want to

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be treated and viewed separately from men, and this implies that their (sexual) behavior, desires, choices, and who they are as people should not be judged in relation to men. An example from I

Love Dick highlights how women are often viewed: “‘Who’s Chris Kraus?’ she screamed. ‘She’s

no one! She’s Sylvère Lotringer’s wife! She’s his “Plus-One”!’ No matter how many films she made or books she edited, she’d always keep being seen as no one by anyone who mattered so long as she was living with Sylvère” (Kraus 116). This passage is commentary from Chris on a memory when she was at a party with her husband. In her experience, Chris was viewed in relation to her husband and named as such. This description is specific to one woman in a particular situation; however, many women have experienced similar situations and the feeling of disappearing in the view of one’s relationship to a man: “[…] she remembered all the times they’d worked together when her name had been omitted, how equivocal Sylvere’d been, how reluctant to offend anyone who paid them” (Kraus 116-7)

Even though many women want to give in to their sexual desires and not adhere to the societal expectations or indulge double standards, they often adjust their behavior to fit the stereotype of the respected woman. As aforementioned in Chapter 1, internalized societal expectations cause women to become self-conscious about their own behavior. Such adjustments of behavior are often because of the fear of receiving backlash from their environment. In the article, “Backlash from the Bedroom: Stigma Mediates Gender Differences in Acceptance of Casual Sex Offers”, “Rudman and Fairchild (2004) proposed a working model of the role of the threat of backlash in stereotype maintenance processes. This model posits that those who fear backlash may hide their deviance (i.e., counter-stereotypical behaviors) and conform to stereotypes to avoid social rejection and maintain their self-esteem” (Conley et al. 393). Proposing such a model reveals the prevalence of fear and awareness of sexual stigma among women. Stigma reaches as far as influencing women to avoid casual sex, to avoid wearing clothing that could suggest casual or “slutty” sexual behavior, and to adjust “sexual” body movements.

Female Agency

Female agency is an important component in sexual freedom. To fully embrace this freedom, women must be the agent of their own sexuality. However, in the current narrative, women lack or have been denied such agency. Female sexuality is not a biological aspect present in the woman as she is born; it is rather a molded product of the society she is born into: “Female sexuality

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(indeed, heterosexuality in general) isn’t just there ‘naturally’ from the start, but is formed by early experiences and adjustments [...]” (Barry 125). This is similar to Simone de Beauvoir’s notion that a person is not born a woman, but is rather transformed into one.

Female agency is related to the concept of autonomy, which, as previously discussed, is a component of female sexuality. Judith Butler’s study on gender performativity presents the theory that people behave, i.e., perform, according to their prescribed gender. Women thus adjust their behavior to the attributes that belong to the female gender: “The appearance of an abiding substance or gendered self, what the psychiatrist Robert Stoller refers to as a ‘gender core,’ is thus produced by the regulation of attributes along culturally established lines of coherence. As a result, the exposure of this fictive production is conditioned by the deregulated play of attributes that resist assimilation into the readymade framework of primary nouns and subordinate adjectives” (Butler 2007 33). According to Butler, certain behaviors or physical appearance features, such as sitting with crossed legs, taking care of someone, and wearing dresses and make-up, have been marked as feminine—they do not inherently belong to the female gender, they simply have been assigned as such.

Consequently, gender performativity also applies to sexual behavior. Terms such as passive, sensible, receptivity, and fragile are often considered to be feminine characteristics. Deviating from portraying such behavioral characteristics often results in being labeled unfeminine or even masculine. Butler describes this process as follows: “Women who fail either to recognize that sexuality as their own or understand their sexuality as partially constructed within the terms of the phallic economy are potentially written off within the terms of that theory as ‘male-identified’ or ‘unenlightened’” (2007 41). This process, in regards to sexuality, influences the gender performance of women in such a way that they “may fear social repercussion for acting with agency not only in the workplace but also in the context of expressing interest in casual sex” (Canley et al. 393). It is a setback for women when it comes to their sexual decision making, because their fear and awareness of stigmatization could result in avoiding casual sexual encounters altogether. Sexual stigma involves discriminating against those who act on their sexual desires outside the norm and expected gender specific behavior, such as when a woman participates in casual sex, which is an assigned male behavior.

A key feature in Chris’s love letters is her use of vocabulary and directness that is uncommon for the female gender. This becomes clear in the following examples: “You were so

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wet,” Dick__’d2_{said to me in the bar that Monday night about the sex we’d had on Thursday. My} heart opened and I fell beneath the polite detente that we’d established in the restaurant, your black Italian jacket, my long-sleeved buttoned shirt” (Kraus 171) and “Sex with you is so phenomenally….sexual, and I haven’t had sex with anyone for about two years” (ibid. 161). Passages such as these display Chris’s female agency and full embrace of her female sexuality. Such explicit language written by a woman is normally deemed unusual and unfeminine, because it contradicts the assumption that the feminine woman is modest and maintains her self-respect concerning her sexuality. In doing so, Chris attempts to break the unspoken oath women have taken to be silent in regards to their intimate relationships with men.

The following passage from one of Kraus’s letters describes the sensations a woman can feel as she cuts loose from modifying her behavior to fit expectations: “And sometimes I feel ashamed of this whole episode, how it must look to you or anyone outside. But just by doing it I’m giving myself the freedom of seeing from the inside out. I’m not driven any more by other people’s voices. From now on it’s the world according to me” (81). Chris takes full agency in her sexuality and desires while she simultaneously realizes that she has given other people the power to influence her behavior.

A screen adaptation of I Love Dick has given addition exposure to the novel’s goal of shedding light on the stigmatization of women’s sexuality. A recent review of the Amazon TV series mentioned that, “[w]ith every reveal of a sexual proclivity or searing heartbreak comes honesty and clarity on how women’s sexuality is so often policed, examined, and maybe most wrenching of all, dismissed” (Framke, “Amazon’s I Love Dick Is a Visceral, Intimate Exploration of What It Means to Be a Woman in Lust”). The following chapter elaborates on the story’s contribution to drawing attention to and changing the stigma.

Conclusion

The main issue Kraus brings to the front throughout the novel is that the text is about her instead of the contributing characters, such as Dick or her husband Sylvère. She gives her own sexual desires, thoughts, and opinions by projecting them onto a man she is infatuated with. This stand is considerable in light of the fact that women have been treated as a minority in society and often subdued in their career and sexual choices.

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This chapter has postulated the source of sexual stigma. Research traces this phenomenon back to the Victorian era, as well as to the establishment of the Christian church, where at least partial responsibility lies. In the ethics of these settings, the sanctity of marriage and the sacred bond between husband and wife were held in high regard; therefore, pursuing casual sex was deemed sinful and judged harshly. Women were expected to protect both their own and their fellow men’s virtue. Though both men and women were forbidden to pursue their sexual desires, women were judged more heavily. Women were pressured to be perfect, in the sense that they had to uphold their femininity and not blemish their own bodies and virtue by dabbling in casual sexual adventures.

The influences of the Victorian era and the church have resulted in the double standard as women remain judged when they pursue casual sex. On the contrary, men are almost expected to have casual sexual adventures in order to show themselves as more masculine. Women who portray this behavior that is assigned to the opposite sex are called slutty or promiscuous, and women have become ashamed of their own body and sexuality. The shame that women would be met with if they displayed similar sexual behavior sometimes results in their denying their desires and their pursuit entirely.

The female anatomy is mostly enjoyed by men, as they are able to fully enjoy the sexualization of the female naked body. Women are “allowed” to portray nudity or sexual behavior as long as it for the pleasure of men. Women in the twenty-first century, as a result, are pressured to adhere to beauty norms and to fulfill the expectations created by society. Therefore, women lack agency and autonomy over their own body and person. In I Love Dick, Chris Kraus claims female agency for herself by exposing the lack of agency and autonomy that women experience on a daily basis.

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Chapter 3:

Female Autonomy and Self-Debasement

The feminist movement has been concerned with the position of women in society, in which female sexuality is a significant component. Many feminists, such as Naomi Wolf, Kathryn Abrams, and Catharine MacKinnon have argued that women have little autonomy over their own bodies and by extension their own sexuality. This chapter explores how I Love Dick tackles this issue and how its literary strategies and voice reveal the stigma that surrounds female sexuality. Chris Kraus’s novel is not the first to challenge the position of women and their expression of sexuality and desire. Many female writers have explored this topic in the recent decades. Margaret Atwood’s

The Handmaid’s Tale explores female sexuality, desire, and female agency in a dystopian setting,

in which women’s sole destiny and purpose is to be used as breeding machines for the nation of Gilead.

In Kraus’s I Love Dick, the setting is less extreme than in Atwood’s novel; however, it is important to consider the period in which it was written, which was in 1997. The early eighties and late nineties experienced a shift in the feminist movement. The term post-feminism was coined to describe the critical perspective many feminists took at that time toward the second and third waves of feminism. The term also implies a critical understanding of the relationships between feminism, femininity, and popular culture. Peter Barry explains that “[t]he representation of women in literature, [in the 1960’s], was felt to be one of the most important forms of ‘socialization,’ since it provided the role models which indicated to women, and men, what constituted acceptable versions of the ‘feminine’ and legitimate feminine goals and aspirations” (117). The key essence and themes of such feminist novels remained and remains the same, therefore it is important that I Love Dick was written in the late nineties, because it gave rise to a discussion among artists and intellectuals.

Changing Stigmatization

Chris Kraus is candid in her letters to Dick; her vocabulary is unnuanced. She does not appear to adhere any rules restricting her gender identity. She is bold, honest, and vulnerable in statements such as “Dear Dick, I’m not sure I still want to fuck you” (Kraus 75), and “Tendrils of my hair brush back and forth across your groin and thighs. It was the most subtle, psycho-scientific kind

“Every Letter Is a Love Letter”: Exploring the Various Aspects of the Stigmatization of Female Sexuality in Chris Kraus’s I Love Dick