The Prosthetic Other:
on physical disability and care
relationships
University of Amsterdam
Faculty of Humanities
rMA Cultural Analysis
Student Name:
Ymke Kelders
Student Number: 5908736
Supervisor:
Dr. Jules Sturm
Second reader:
Prof. dr. Mireille Rosello
Date:
9
thNovember, 2014
ABSTRACT
Taking disability as both a social and medical issue, this research project deals with care relationships concerning physical disability. I will inquire how the caregiver can be seen as prosthesis for the care recipient that might disrupt the given notions of agency as well as considering what it means to be autonomous. As such, several filmic representations of care relationships that question the discourse on disability and care will be explored. These cases evoke different readings of care by focusing on affect and the interdependent character of the relationships. Through a thorough analysis of these films, this thesis opens up questions of the (disabled/non-disabled) body, the necessity of movement for agency and autonomy and the way subjects relate in care.
The dance of day
As you turn the lights on in the morning and whisper gently in my ear
While removing the blankets with a warning I can smell you’re near
You touch my legs that spent the night in stiff position And I feel your fingers on my knee
Every muscle changes in transition It’s this move that sets them free
When you hold my glass and fill the dryness of my mouth Wipe the water drops that go down my neck
You wait patiently as I swallow loud My body doesn’t feel like such a wreck
You put me down on the toilet and give me time to pee You wash my hands, my face, my shoulder
And gently kneel beside me I know you are the beholder Through you
I still belong to me1
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Abstract……… ………2
Introduction……… ………5
1. De rouille et d’os: prosthetic
thinking………9 = Subjects and objects in De rouille et
d’os………..10 = (Re)thinking
prosthesis………..12 = Affect and
prosthesis……….15 = Agency and the other as
prosthesis………..17
2. Interdependence and autonomy: a reading of care through The Hours………23
= The exclusion of autonomy in
care………..…24 = (Affective) care
relationships in The Hours……….29
3. Movement as prosthetic travel: the motionless travel notes of The Diving Bell and the
Butterfly……… ……….38
= Movement versus
mobility………39 = The act of
performance………43 = The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and the
political………45 Conclusion……… ………48 Bibliography……… ……….50 INTRODUCTION2
Let me begin by explaining that this research project finds its roots in a personal and academic interest in care and disability. For as long as I can remember, I know what it feels like to “be someone’s hands”, as I am asked to fulfil tasks for my mother who is physically unable to do so
herself. The performance of these tasks has always been accompanied by a sense of responsibility, love and obligation. But performing these tasks as her care taker also gives rise to a feeling of functioning as her
prosthesis: being an extension of her body. Not only to enhance her mobility (like a wheelchair does), but feeling that, through care, we are becoming differently connected. My actions influence hers, and the other way around. This is of course present in all relationships, but because I take care of her physically, the way our bodies operate in the relationship is of more importance. It is a relationship that – both physically and
mentally - forms and reforms us constantly. Once my academic study began to take shape, I was able not only to engage with these feelings on
a personal level, but conceptualize them, and relate them to the discourse on disability and care. Therefore, the three main concepts of this
research project are disability, care and prosthesis.
In humanities, Disability Studies and Feminist theories deal with the position of the care taker and the care recipient, but hardly ever discuss the relationship between the two positions as such. Although it is obvious that this relationship exists because there is an exchange of care, it
seems that the subject positions in the relationship should be dealt with separately. I find this a problematic and limited perspective on care. For policy making it is important to suggest changes concerning the position of the care taker and recipient. However, if the relationship is not taken into account in these analyses, a gap occurs between these two positions that is unproductive for the discourse on care. To me, these theories forget that both positions in a care relationship are not fixed, but
constantly shifting. To give an example: although I provide physical care for my mother, she offers (different) care in return. We constantly shift positions showing that care is not a fixed concept. But how to deal with such a changing concept?
As Nel Noddings writes in her book Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics (1984), “Thinking of care begins in relation.”(114) . A focus on the relationship of care removes the analysis from the fixed positions of people in the relationship and gives space to the relationship to move. Care is often associated with love and nurture, but also with dependency, inequality and vulnerability. Because care is as much a theoretical
concept as a basic need of all people, it is important to find a productive way of dealing with it. My focus lies on care relationships that are based on love, rather than institutionalized care as labour. Conceptualizing care is necessary in order to remove the discussion from its traditional
references of inequality and dependency that often carry a negative connotation. It allows a focus on interdependency that is the necessary basis to deal differently with care and physical disability. Because people with disabilities are “ritually defined as dependent on the moral fitness of
nondisabled people” (Shildrick, 2009:220), the discourse on disability demands a reconceptualization of these terms. In her article
“Dependency Demystified: Inscriptions of Power in a Keyword of the Welfare State” (1994) Nancy Fraser calls for a genealogy of
interdependency in the context of modern states that challenges the assumption that the rational, economically independent social actor must prevail. Interdependency provides a productive starting point for an analysis of care relationships. It sets the basis of how to think of the care taker as the prosthesis of the care recipient. This idea will be at the centre of this thesis.
In academia, the term “disability” is used in various ways. There are three models that deal with disability3. The “medical model”, where
disability and impairment are synonym for one another and where the focus lies on fixing/curing the body through medical intervention. In this model, disability is undesirable and medical/scientific/institutional care should be provided. This model received a lot of criticism from disability theorists and activists. They favour the “social model”, which is premised on the binary split between impairment (seen as the physical specifics of individual embodiment) and disability (the socio-cultural, economic and institutional oppression visited upon particular bodies). A concrete
example of how the social model operates is: a man without a leg has an impairment because he has difficulties walking. He is disabled when he enters an environment that does not permit him to navigate through. The third model created by the two disability scholars David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder is called the “cultural model”. It recognizes disability as in part historically determined and located in culture.
My way of dealing with disability in this research project aims to combine those three models. I want to recognize the physical difficulties a disabled person experiences in society that derive from the inaccessibility of the world. Additionally, it is important to acknowledge the medical problems a disabled person experiences. For me, it is too much of a
3 These models are discussed and criticized in Disability Studies. My explanation of these models is based on the article by Sharon Snyder and David Mitchell, called “Cultural Locations of Disability”, Scandinavian Journal
shortcut to claim that disability is completely socially constructed. Of course, I remain critical of the ways in which disability is represented in society and I recognize the problematic. But on the other hand, the physical limitations of a body should be recognized and not be hidden behind the claim that “we all have something to worry about”4. Therefore,
in this research project I will speak of “physical disability” because to me, it touches upon the two most important aspects of the models; the
physical limits and possibilities of the body and about how disabled people are perceived in society.
In this research project I will incorporate theories on disability that can be seen as the foundation of my method of discussing disability. Since the focus of this thesis will be on the relationship between a physically disabled person and his/her care taker, I will mainly engage with theories that put thinking in relation at the basis of their work. In order to think of the other as prosthesis, I will first scrutinize the relationship between the subject and the prosthesis as an object. In the first chapter, new
materialist perspectives on the subject-object relation will be central. This chapter will mainly be informed by Donna Haraway’s concept of the “cyborg” (1985), and Jane Bennett’s idea of distributive agency (2010). Both theorists allow me to critically engage with the relationship between a subject and object and create space to think of this relationship as moving and unfixed. De Rouille et d’os (Jacques Audiard, 2012) reflects and challenges these assumptions and through my analysis of the film I will argue how the agency of the two main characters of the film is not limited to their bodies, but develops in their relationship.
In my second chapter I will further explicate the way in which another person can be seen as prosthesis by using the film The Hours (Stephan Daldry, 2002). This film raises questions of how autonomy and relationality connect and differentiate. Judith Butler’s Precarious Life: the Power of Mourning and Violence (2004) will serve as my theoretical background. In this book she explicates her idea of relationality and examines ways to connect this concept to the creation of a self. The
4 This idea of disability is scrutinized by Robert Mc Ruer & Abby Wilkerson in their article “Cripping the (Queer) Nation: Introduction”, GLQ, 9:1-2, 2003. 1-23. Print.
analysis of the film reflects on Butler’s theory of relationality and reveals ways of thinking about autonomy in care relationships. The final chapter will revolve around the differences and similarities of movement and mobility, while focusing on physical disability. The true story that is represented in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel, 2007) exposes the complexities of combining movement and mobility but also challenges these ideas. From a new materialist perspective that allows me to focus on the relationship between two subjects, I will investigate the limitations and possibilities of the immobile body and how it relates to my idea of the other as prosthesis. To think of the other as prosthesis should not be mistaken for an attempt to fix the vulnerable body or cover over vulnerability by trying to merge two bodies. It should be seen as a way of recognizing the presence of vulnerability of both subjects that exists in relation. Disability and vulnerability are often equated and therefore this thesis also demands attention be paid to the political aspects of this topic. What are the political consequences of my analysis of care? I attempt to answer this question in two ways. First, I will
analyse the political aspects of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and try to relate them to more pressing and current issues on disability and care. Secondly, I will imagine what happens if my theory would be practice. What would a care relationship consist of and look like?
1. De rouille et d’os: prosthetic thinking
“They are inward toward the other.” – Toni Morrison, Jazz (1992)
A medium, an image and a body, is what a film presents to us. In the usual sense, these terms are to be understood in the following
configuration: a medium is the agent through which images are
transmitted of the bodies we see on the screen. But I do not wish to speak of them as such. If we think of a medium, image and body as three actors that cannot be separated nor easily distinguished from one another, the relationship between them takes on a different dimension. This allows for a film (for example) to become active, where the circulation of images shifts places. The medium can become the body, the body the image, and so on. This manner of dealing with medium, image and body, as Hans Belting writes in “Image, Medium, Body: A New Approach to Iconology” (2004) allows us to rethink their relationship as being in constant motion. (302).
This approach will be the starting point for examining the film De rouille et d’os (Jacques Audriard, 2012). Hans Belting’s means of inquiry offers not only a different discussion of the places of medium, image, body, but also helps us think differently about how a subject and object might shift positions, and be in motion too. I hone in on this approach because this thesis deals with deviating bodies. A disabled subject that uses certain objects that are not “naturally” given, challenges the relationship and the boundaries between what is understood as subject and object. A rethinking of the subject and object is necessary if a disabled subject is to claim forms of agency and autonomy that are
normally only assigned to the normative ideas of a subject. Therefore, the relationship between a body and prosthesis is central to this chapter. First, I examine how the relationship between the subject and object is formed before going into greater depth about how we can
reconceptualise the ideas surrounding prosthesis; usually seen as a technical aid to enhance people’s mobility. Taking on the prosthesis as a
concept I want to think of how the prosthesis could be extended to other domains such as the realm of affect, relationality, care and the body. This chapter deals with the apparent impossibility yet urgency for a different understanding of human and nonhuman, subject and object while taking disability as a central issue. Disability disrupts the ideas of a stable, fixed body and forces us to rethink the boundaries of normality. Disability helps us reconsider those distinctions whilst it confronts and challenges
conceptions of the normal body.
Subjects and objects in De rouille et d’os
The title De rouille et d’os, which means “rust and bone”5 already
touches upon the central issue of this part of the chapter, namely, the relationship of a subject and object. The bones refer to the body and rust to what can appear on objects. More specifically, they refer to the main characters of the film: Stephanie and Alain. The film centres around the relationship between Alain and Stephanie in Antibes, France. Alain is trying to make a living for himself and his son by working several security jobs and filling the rest of his time with boxing and participating in street fights for money. Stephanie is a killer whale trainer. During one of the shows in Sea World, she falls into the water and a killer whale bites off her legs. Alain and Stephanie had met just before the accident happened, and it is not until she finally leaves the hospital that she calls him again. They meet up and this is the start of a relationship that is not only
romantic and sexual, but also a care relationship.
Before analysing their relationship more deeply, I want to touch upon Stephanie’s body change and how it is portrayed in the film. This analysis, using Hans Belting’s approach of the shifting positions of
medium, image, body, can be productive for a different understanding of the relationship between subject and object, human and non-human, that is crucial if dealing with disability. In the following analysis I will focus on camera work and narrative. These are three shots of scenes that
(Image 1, 00:14:07) (Image 2, 01:09:00)
(Image 3, 01:09:48)
Image 1 shows Stephanie’s legs before the accident. This image is shot when she is in the car with Alain who takes her home after she got into a fight with a man at the club where he works. When this image is shown, Alain comments to Stephanie that showing that much leg makes her look like a prostitute. The image of the female through the male gaze is
illustrated by the narrative and camera. The wholeness of her legs and the amount of flesh that she shows is, according to Alain, how a woman would get attention from a man. At least, a woman with those kind of legs. Image 2 is from after the accident. Stephanie sits on the balcony in her wheelchair. She does not wear her prosthetic legs often because the
stub is still too sensitive. To me this is one of the most powerful scenes in which she feels empowered for the first time after her accident. She just met with Alain who came to her house to see her for the first time after her accident and who did not ask anything about her accident or make any mention her amputated legs. On the balcony, Stephanie acts out the choreography that she used to do in the killer whale shows. Although without legs, her whole body dances the choreography. Strengthened by the camera work that zooms in on her upper body, we see that her legs stop her from reliving this moment in dance, but she believes nonetheless that she can do exactly the same in a wheelchair. Therefore, this scene challenges the notions of a whole body and the notion that only a whole body is able to perform this dance. We see that her body has changed and that she makes use of the wheelchair to move - the relationship is not static or passive, and the wheelchair becomes part of the dance. Shortly after this she goes back to her former working place (image 3). Here she walks in with her prostheses that are in this shot imaging the accident. In this scene it is interesting to use Belting’s approach. He writes:
Visual media not only act as the body’s prosthesis but also serve as the body’s
reflection, which lends itself to the body’s self-inspection. The most advanced
technologies today simulate bodies in the guise of fleeting shadows or of insubstantial
mirror images, which are expected to liberate us from the laws of gravitation that we
are subject to in empirical space. (309)
For a medium to function as prosthesis for a subject, makes the medium subjective, allowing for reflection and self-inspection. The images
visualize parts of bodies, and bodies can become the medium through which these images are acted out. The shifting of places is performative, constantly changing, an open-ended becoming. This is where the
potential of an analysis of film lies: by zooming in on one part of the assemblage of what seems to be human and non-human, knowledge can be gained, understanding of how the actors in the assemblage play a role. Looking at this specific shot (Image 3) it can be argued that the medium is actually the big hall where her body is just a small spot in the audience. She became the viewer of her own show. Although the prostheses are an image of the accident, they also inhabit a place in her body because for the first time in the film she allows that to happen. In this scene the space is overwhelmingly big in contrast to how Stephanie is filmed. There is no focus or zooming in on her legs anymore, they are as much part of her body as the rest is. The prostheses are part of her as a subject as much as her legs had been. This illustrates that a certain object can become part of the subject instead of always remaining separate entities. The question of how this happens now comes to the fore. Is it because she has no other option but to use the prostheses as legs and therefore “accept” them as walking aids? I think there is more to this relation. I will explore this by looking into the development of the term prosthesis and how we might reconceptualize it in order for an object – in Stephanie’s case – to become part of the subject, or for this thesis’ question: another person to be seen as a prosthesis.
(Re)thinking prosthesis
Debates in Disability Studies deal with prosthesis as a concept, theory and object. Think of the way a prosthetic leg can help someone walk (again), or a perhaps more discrete aid: glasses and lenses to improve visual impairment. Different disability scholars try not to see these immaterial aids as attachments to a body, but as something that becomes part of the subject (Sobchack, 2006:18). One of the most well-known books that discusses the relationship between technology and the human body is Donna Haraway’s A Manifesto for Cyborgs (1991). Donna Haraway distinguishes herself from essentialism and naturalism,
approaching subjects in their ongoing becoming (83). This influential manifest complicates the separation of body and object and sees a
prosthesis, for example, as a part of the subject. This assemblage is what she calls a cyborg (122). Her theory has been taken up within Disability Studies whereby room was created for a person with a prosthesis not to be viewed as having an un-whole body that needed to be fixed by
attaching a technical aid, but as a subject that is not fixed but always in the process of becoming. However, these discussions hardly deal with the way agency functions for a disabled person with a prosthesis.
Additionally, they see these technical aids as immaterial objects without questioning the relationship of subject and object and their fixed
separation. I want to argue that the agency of a subject is not restricted to the body but is transmitted to the object too – it is apparent in the relationship; a point that I will elaborate on later.
A form of movement appears to be crucial for agency because theories on agency all emphasize the necessity of movement (Barad, 2007:137). However, in those theories the distinction between movement and mobility is not properly explained, but is crucial in relation to a
disabled person. In the third chapter I will go deeper into this topic. The focus in this chapter lies on prosthesis, hence I will start with a historical overview of how prosthesis as a concept and practicality has developed.
In “The prosthetic Imagination: Enabling and Disabling the
Prosthetic Trope” (1999) Sara S. Jain starts off by giving a clear overview of how the term prosthesis developed throughout the years. The term has a long history where it was first used in 1553. During this time it meant “attached to” or “adding a syllable to the beginning of a word”(32). Only in 1704 it became related to the body having the meaning: “replacement of a missing body part with an artificial one.”(32). This is up until today the most dominant understanding of the word. The idea of an attachment to (most likely) a body seems inherently connected to the term. As Mark Wigley writes in “Prosthetic theory: The disciplining of architecture” (1991): “a prosthesis is always structural, establishing the place to which it seems to be added,” (38). This quote shows that it is impossible to think of the prosthesis without thinking of the body. A prosthesis has no
body. This also emphasizes the potential of prosthesis to become part of the body due to the ‘inseparability’ of the two. A point that I will return to later.
A prosthesis serves a function. In “The Prosthetic Impulse: From a Posthuman Present to a Biocultural Future” (2006) Vivian Sobchack writes that she has difficulties with the post-human discourse around prosthesis while it takes away the practicalities of what a prosthesis means for people that have to deal with the use of it in everyday life. She concludes the article by saying:
Indeed, I remember long ago attending that first meeting of the support group at
which my prosthetist proudly showed a video of amputees (without Cheetah legs)
racing the Special Olympics. As I sat there, I watched the people around me – and
knew that all they wanted, as I did, was to be able to walk at work, to the store, and
maybe on a treadmill at the gym. In sum, I’ve no desire for the ‘latest’ in either literal
or figural body parts. All I want is a leg to stand on, a limb I can go out on – so I can
get about my world with a minimum of prosthetic thought. (38)
This quote emphasizes that although the prosthesis is nowadays highly connected to ideas of creating a human with more capacities than before (being able to do things that people without a prosthesis cannot), it also expresses that in the end a person with a prosthesis ‘just’ wants to get through life with the least possible thought about that prosthesis.
Therefore, I want to argue that if the prosthesis stays too much within a post-human discourse – primarily connected to enhancing the human body - a person with a prosthesis will always be viewed as un-whole, with the prosthesis as a substitute for a missing piece of the body. I want to propose a different way of dealing with the prosthesis in relation to the body, namely by moving away from the distinction between the material
object and the human subject, in order for a prosthesis and body to come together.
If a body is necessary for a prosthesis to exist, the material of the prosthesis and the body are very much linked. Within Disability Studies prosthetic theory deals with the assumptions that a body becomes whole again due to the prosthesis. Therefore, as Sarah S. Jain argues, “a double logic operates in the cultural understanding of machinery through a simultaneous self-extension and self-cancellation of both the body and human agency.” (1999:33). What she means by this is that the prosthesis is extending the human body, fills a gap of a limb that used to be there, which emphasizes that the body is not whole but should be whole again. Additionally, it suggests that agency only operates within and through the body. This understanding of agency is problematic while it disables a person with a prosthesis to claim any form of “acting”. Here, I want to go one step further by thinking of how the prosthesis does not have to be a technical aid attached to a body, but how another person can function as a prosthesis, specifically for someone who is (partly) unable to move independently.
I will analyse one scene of the film that allows me to develop this thought. On the one hand the scene that I will analyse might disrupt the given idea that a prosthesis is ‘only’ a technical tool attached to a body, on the other hand the scene shows that another person can also be seen as a form of a prosthesis for another person. For this thought to be possible, a relationship between two subjects must be there, therefore I must also touch upon how such a relationship is established by using affect theory. These ideas might contribute to a different understanding of disability, the notions of a fixed and whole body and the relationship between bodies and objects.
Affect and prosthesis
If we think of any kind of relationship, the question arises how they came to be. What makes us love, desire, or care for the other person? I do not aim to answer such questions in this thesis, but I want to look at what
happens before those emotions. In this part I am discussing affect, that appears prior to a thought or feeling (Ahmed, 2004:120). As Susan McManus writes, we should think of affect as “a field of intensities in which the subject, finds itself manifest within and negotiates” (McManus, 2011). This makes it not a property of the body but a collection of forces that bodies find themselves in. After this there might be love, which will be my focus in the next analysis of the scene where Stephanie and Alain are making love. I will focus on camera work that emphasizes a change in how Stephanie is filmed, explaining how Stephanie’s perspective on herself might have changed and how she positions herself toward Alain.
(Image 4, 01:30:48) (Image 5, 01:32:58)
Firstly, what we see is that Stephanie is on top. This makes her look in control, powerful and strong. In previous scenes where they were having sex, she was filmed from above and Alain was on top, almost presented as
penetrating a helpless body. Then, in contrast to this scene, she looked insecure and was constantly preoccupied with what Alain thought of her legs. Still here, the medium plays with the idea of a vulnerable body, but the image of vulnerability as hopeless and insecure shifts during the film. This makes us question why this change took place and I want to argue that this has something to do with the desire Stephanie and Alain have for each other and the love for themselves. Their vulnerability is what connects them. In the relationship that they are developing Stephanie realizes that to swim in the ocean, she needs Alain, and for street fights, he needs her there. The inequality due to her disability that she thought would be dominating in all relationships is non-existent, their desire and love for one another overrules every one of those thoughts. This again makes them vulnerable, but is what binds them. The exposure is
necessary. This brings me to my second point. In this scene the stereotype of the vulnerable disabled body is there but through the
medium and its form – camera – the image has changed. Stephanie’s body is the same, but it represents a different image and therefore body. Where before, the amputated legs would refer solely to the accident, the camera now shows the strong muscles of the upper legs, the tattoos on her legs that say “left” and “right”, and the way she is positioned on top of Alain. This takes away any significance of emphasizing the missing limbs as negative, as a loss. There is a new image created because the body functions as a medium. Stephanie’s way of showing and moving her legs creates the image of how she is desiring Alain, instead of dealing with her stubs. As Shildrick writes in “Becoming Vulnerable: Contagious
Encounters and the Ethics of Risk”(2000): “Images of what we have denied turn toward us.” (216). I think this is what is happening in this scene, this image of a woman with amputated legs, sitting on top of a man while having sex is an image that is not often shown. It might be frightening, as disability is often viewed (217), but since this scene is later in the film the story changed this image.
A relationship takes place in the field of affect. My aim here is to show how another person can function as a prosthesis without dealing
with the reasons why someone wants to care for and love another. They are affected by one another, something that we cannot really explain. Because a prosthesis is subjectified, it extends desire and affect instead of limiting the possibility of two subjects to be affected. It is necessary to deal with other concepts that seem to be limited to the subject, such as agency, and the difficulty for a disabled person to claim forms of agency when a disabled body is viewed as lacking the possibilities for agency. In the next part I will discuss different forms of agency and aim to think of agency in relation instead of a possession of a person.
Agency and the other as prosthesis
If a prosthesis can make someone (re)gain a form of agency, then perhaps another person can be seen as a prosthesis that allows for agency in that relationship. How can agency appear within the entanglement of two bodies where one of the bodies is incapable of independent movement? In this part I will touch upon different forms of agency and see which one can work productively while dealing with disability. Various theorists have devoted time to the complexity of the concept of agency6. It can be political, social, discursive, material,
distributive, confederate and even affective. Some argue that agency derives from power, others emphasize the necessity of movement. For the purposes of this thesis it is not important to cover all these different forms of agency. My focus stems from a new materialist perspective while those theories explore how agency can be distributive, relational and affective. Also, new materialism has a different understanding of subject and object that is crucial for this thesis.
In Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things (2010) Jane Bennett sees agency as distributive/confederate. Although she fails to provide a clear account of the differences and similarities between distributive and confederate agency, her understanding of agency demands attention. In
6 The first theorists that touched upon this concept where Hegel and Marx (beginning and mid-19th century). Hereafter, agency has been further examined and interpreted in academia. For this thesis I have looked at the following ways of dealing with agency: political (McRuer, Wilkerson, 2004), social (Nancy, 1994), discursive (Imrie, 2000), material (Barad, 2007), distributive/confederate (Bennett, 2010), affective (Ahmed, 2004).
her book she argues for the blurring of the boundaries between the human and the nonhuman. For her, agency is always a human-nonhuman working group by which agency is located in an encounter or relation, not in the capacity of a unitary subject to act (23). All bodies play a role in the enactment of agency, which she calls the actants (viii). Taking this term from Bruno Latour7, she sees agency as being distributed through the
assemblage of matter. Here, matter is to be understood as all bodies (human and nonhuman). Agency is distributed through this assemblage. Jane Bennett’s distributive agency that she subscribes to all things allows for agency to happen in-between (xvi). She acknowledges that this is not the same for all things. The distribution of agency between a subject and object is different from distributive agency between two objects. The dynamic relation between objects and subjects is what makes it possible for agency to be distributed. This theory ties in with Karen Barad’s idea of intra-activity which emphasizes the dynamism of agency. In Meeting the Universe Halfway (2007), Karen Barad introduces the term “agential realism” for understanding agency as a material-discursive concept (803). Although this is a different way of dealing with the concept of agency, these two approaches to agency are interesting to look at together. Both theorists put emphasis on the necessity of matter for agency. Their idea of matter does not derive from an essentialist and materialist ontology, but they both see everything as matter. This statement makes the
demarcation between a subject and object less clear and it allows for agency not to be restricted to a subject. Although agency has the connotation of being very subject centered, Jane Bennett and Karen Barad formulate an understanding of agency that includes possible nonhuman actors. Acknowledging here that a material object cannot move independently out of an intention that comes from within, it is important to note that because the human and nonhuman bodies
accumulate in the assemblage, all bodies create movement. Exploring the relationship between agency and movement, and the difference with mobility is crucial for my argumentation regarding agency in a care
relationship. These issues will be dealt with in the third chapter.
In my close reading of scenes of De rouille et d’os I focused on
camera work and the narrative of the film. This focus may not seem such a logical choice as you can quickly end up discussing representation, which can make the objects of analysis static and fixed. Nevertheless, this is precisely why my focus could be a valuable contribution to this analysis because it challenges the ideas of the subject-object relation that I
mentioned earlier. Simultaneously, a focus on camera work and narrative gives space for the object to move and interact, and makes it possible to speak of agency while dealing with objects. Such a focus moves away from representation because it suggests that the movement of the image, medium and the body creates an interaction, and forms an entanglement. To me, the next scene is one of the most important and telling scenes of the film, because of what it reveals about the relationship Stephanie and Alain engage in, and the ideas of another person functioning as
prosthesis. The scene is Alain’s street fight at which Stephanie is present.
(Image 6, 01:16:18)
The scene opens with a tooth rolling across the floor (Image 6). The movement of the tooth suggests that it has just been knocked out of someone’s mouth. This shot shows us two things. First, it refers very literally to Alain’s street fight that we are about to see and predicts that it is going to be a rough fight. Second, this zooming in on one part of the
body forces the viewer to think about the fragility of a body – how easily things can fall out, or break. After this shot we see a wide overview shot of the street fight. There are many men present at the fight; yelling at Alain and the other fighter. Hereafter we see that Alain is lying on the floor being hit and kicked by the other street fighter. From above the camera shows his face that is full of blood. The viewer realizes that the tooth that was just shown is Alain’s. We see that Alain is giving up (or losing consciousness) because he is not fighting back anymore. Then the camera shifts to a close up of his face: we see him moving his eyes and looking at the car where Stephanie is watching the fight. The next shot is a point of view shot from Alain showing the door of the car that opens, and Stephanie is getting out (Image 7, 8).
Before carrying out an in-depth analysis of this scene, some context is needed. Prior to this scene Alain told Stephanie to stay in the car during the fight. This is to protect her from the men who had previously made comments on her way of walking before, although they are not aware of her prosthetic legs. Stephanie listened to Alain until this point in the scene, because she is affected by seeing him in pain. There is a shot of him getting kicked by the other guy while he is still standing and trying to fight back. A medium close up of the fist of this man hitting Alain’s head is shown and the camera moves towards a close up of Stephanie’s face. It expresses that she feels hurt by what is happening to Alain, which can be interpreted as her also feeling the pain that he is experiencing. After this we move on to image 7 and 8: Alain is on the floor and Stephanie gets out of the car. This moment not only illustrates how Stephanie is affected by Alain, it is also the scene in which she for the first time shows her
prostheses in public. We could make an argument for this act being interpreted as her ‘overcoming’ her shame and fear for being judged by others. However, I want to propose that her decision emphasizes how the prosthetic legs are part of her as a subject giving her as much strength to get out of the car as any other part of her body. Additionally, these two shots that are shown one after another illustrate how Stephanie can be seen as a prosthesis for Alain allowing him to find back his strength. They are tied together by their relationship and equally vulnerable in it. Here, Stephanie’s decision influences Alain in the fight. When Alain sees that Stephanie gets out of the car he regains his strength, gets up and wins the game (Image 9, 10).
(Image 9, 01:18:25) (Image 10, 01:18:27)
If we look at these images next to each other the camerawork suggests that their eyes are only focused on each other, their gazes tied. The blood on his body and the pain that Alain is experiencing does not seem to break him, and the exposure of Stephanie’s prostheses does not seem to matter; their relationship is exposed in their gaze influencing the actions that are happening in the space.
I want to argue that in this scene there are two “actions”
happening. First, Stephanie gets out of the car, which is not an action of overcoming her disability. The prostheses are as much part of her as other parts. How does agency function here? Is agency linked to her movement of getting out of the car, is it located between Alain and Stephanie which the camerawork could suggest? If we think of affective agency that is distributed in space it can be argued that agency is
between them. It is not of Stephanie nor of Alain, but their relationship makes agency possible. The second action is Alain who wins the street fight, suggested that he finds his strength through Stephanie’s
movement. It can be argued that these actions were not possible or perhaps did not happen if they were not undone by each other. The actions here come into being through their relationship and the movements that are happening between them. Their relationship is affective and vulnerable and they empower each other through it. It seems that their bodies are in dialogue: influencing the other by the movement of a part of them. The agency is relational, affective, distributed in the space.
now look back at my analysis of the scene from De Rouille et d’os it can be argued that movement is necessary, but independent movement of a subject is not crucial for agency. Therefore I want to argue that when looking at a care relationship where there is a body that is incapable of independent movement, agency is possible through/with the movement of a prosthesis: this being a prosthetic leg or, another body. This approach to agency allows for a new understanding of agency within Disability
Studies that does not deprive a disabled person from agency since it is not something that one has, but that appears in the relationship with other bodies (human and nonhuman).
In the following chapter I will return to this approach to agency and carry out an in-depth analysis of care in regards to agency being
distributed between subjects and objects. First it is necessary to illuminate the relationship between the viewer and the film. In this chapter I attempted to disentangle the complexities of the use of
prosthesis in correspondence with a new materialist account of agency. The assemblage of human and nonhuman bodies allows for agency to be distributed amongst the different actors involved. I briefly touched upon the concept of movement in relation to agency, which needs to be further examined. For this analysis I took for granted the necessity of movement although argued for an understanding of movement that does not require independent mobility but can take place within the assemblage by any of the actors involved. Therefore a disabled person that is incapable of independent movement can still experience agency; which happens in the relation. This relation is intra-active, making it difficult to distinguish between the object and subject. This approach to the subject-object relation is productive in the discourse of disability because a person with a technical aid is not viewed as having an un-whole body that is fixed by the use of this object, but the object becomes part of the assemblage formed together. The emphasis on the prosthesis and disability will shift while the coming together of human an nonhuman bodies can create a different understanding of disability.
this chapter I dealt with how to think of agency in relation, and affect seems to be a necessary condition for relationships. Agency is not
autonomous and limited to a body. While using affect theory I will explore the concept of autonomy in the next chapter.
2. Interdependence and autonomy: a reading of care
through The Hours
“Let’s face it, we are undone by each other, and if we are not, we are missing out on something.” – Judith Butler, Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and
Violence (2004)
(Image 11, The Hours, 00:18:16)
The above image is part of the introduction of the third main character of The Hours (Stephan Daldry, 2001): Clarissa Vaughan. She carries flowers
in her hands that she got for Richard, whom she takes care of every day. She smiles, is happy to see him. As we come to know later on in the film, her happiness is very much connected to her relationship with Richard. The way care is portrayed in this film is the topic of inquiry in this chapter. There are two movements that mainly examine care, although from different perspectives. The Disabled People’s Movement (DPM) focuses on the position of the care recipient, and within feminism the research is concentrated on the position of the woman in a care
relationship8. They both find the term care problematic in various ways
and disability scholars have suggested to replace care with “help” or “assistance”9. For me, these approaches are unproductive if we want to
critically engage with care as both a practice and a value. Care is an everyday practice happening in all relationships, and therefore, replacing the word or simply emphasizing the problematic of gender will not
change the discourse around it. Given the political agenda of the DPM and some feminists, the incompatible meanings of ‘care’ are
understandable but it leaves us with an unresolvable gap.
The above image would be criticized by some feminists, arguing that it feeds into the male imaginary, subordinating the woman. We see Clarissa (the woman in the image) expressing her happiness in seeing Richard (the man in the chair). She has come over to clean up his house and help him get ready for the party that she is organizing for him. She carries flowers in her hands that might be viewed as a symbol of her womanhood, seeming to be fully occupied by her role as the care taker of Richard. However, if I would look at this image from the perspective of the DPM, the focus would lie on Richard, who is represented as the
vulnerable dependent. This focus is reinforced by how they are portrayed: Clarissa stands above him. She looks clean and is dressed in trendy
clothes, while he is still wearing a robe, is dirty, and portrayed from behind in his messy, dark apartment. For the DPM, these observations would be read as typical signs of an unequal relationship.
8 Kittay, Feder, Eva. Love’s Labor: Essays on Women, Equality, and Dependency. New York: Routledge, 1999. Print.
9 Hughes, Bill. “Love’s Labour’s Lost? Feminism, The Disabled People’s Movement and an Ethic of Care”,
These two approaches to care might help arguing for the specific case that these movements are fighting for, but it leaves the people in the relationship to deal with the everyday practice of care. Therefore, I want to propose another way of dealing with care that is not focused on
dependency and inequality. Through the concept of autonomy I will scrutinize different ways of viewing a care relationship. The film The Hours guides me away from the emphasis on dependency and gender, revealing instead how affect, desire and love are crucial in care
relationships. Since the DPM and feminists are one of a few that deal with care in such depth, I will first enunciate their positions more
comprehensively. I want to examine how their views are different and similar, and look at their use of the concept of autonomy in relation to care. What does autonomy in each relationship? And how might these relationships provide us with a different way of discussing care?
The exclusion of autonomy in care
In “Love’s Labour’s Lost? Feminism, The Disabled People’s
Movement and an Ethic of Care” (2005), Bill Hughes explicates the main problems disability theorists and feminists have with care, he writes:
Likewise, for disability theorists […] care constructs disability first and foremost as a
dependent, rather than a gendered, status. Care is associated with institutional
confinement, limited social engagement, partial citizenship, disempowerment and
exclusion. To be cared for is to be in deficit and to have one’s competence as a social
actor denied or questioned. Disabled recipients of care – be they male or female – live
‘tragic’ lives (Oliver, 1990), ontologically doomed to a deficit of agency. […] Where
feminists see care in terms of its role in the making of men and women, disability
disempowerment of
disabled people. (261)
This quote stresses that the common opinion is that care is to be resisted, it seems, for all parties involved. Though what remains undiscussed is the absolute necessity of care. The need of a person to receive physical or mental care; the necessity of care might be evident when thinking of people who are disabled, but less so in supposing we all need care (Kittay, 1999). The need of care for everyone can be productive in thinking of care in relation but I have problems with the idea of emphasizing that “we all have or need something”10 because it again trivializes the absolute
necessity of care for some people. A balance between those two views should be found.
In her book Dangerous Discourses of Disability, Subjectivity and Sexuality (2009), Margrit Shildrick argues for the necessity of the
exposure of vulnerability of all people (39). This does not minimalize the agency and autonomy of people, but underlines their commonalities without making their bodies equal. “The dis-integrity and permeability of bodies, the fluctuations and reversibility of touch, the inconsistency of spatial and morphological awareness, the uncertainty of the future, are all features that may be experienced with particular force in the disabled body, but they are by no means unique to it” (72). Hereby the disabled body might be the body that leaks vulnerability and becomes “abject”11
(65), but it shares an embodiment with non-disabled people. This embodiment is mutually constituted in complex and fragmentary ways and therefore we forget to take seriously “the notion of becoming-in-the-world-with-others” (74). If we translate this idea to a care relationship,
we could think of becoming as ‘embodied interdependence’12. A concept
that I will return to later.
The DPM and certain feminists want to hold on to an idea of a
10 Mc Ruer, Robert, Wilkerson, Abby. “Cripping the (Queer) Nation: Introduction”. GLQ, 9:1-2, 2003, p.1-23. 11 Margrit Shildrick has taken this term from Julia Kristeva, in: Power of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982. Print.
12 Taking this concept from Nancy Fraser. See: Fraser, Nancy, ‘Dependency Demystified: Inscriptions of Power in a Keyword of the Welfare State’, International Studies in Gender, State and Society 12:2, 1994, p. 4-31.
closed, autonomous self because it makes the care taker and recipient seem more self-determined and independent: concepts that are dominant and crucial in today’s society. But the instability of the subject is
embodied in human practices and relations, and “the body is
uncontainable, leaking and flowing into the world.” (Gibson, 2006:195). To be able to think of the people in a care relationship as “becoming-in-the-world-with-others”, an inquiry of the concept of autonomy is
necessary. Autonomy seems to be a concept that is incompatible with these ideas of becoming, because it is a concept that predominantly focuses on the self.
In this chapter I argue that instead of care being disempowering and creating an unequal relationship, it can also provide autonomy and a basis for equality between the people in the care relationship. Normally, autonomy and dependency are seen as mutually exclusive, but I want to think of how both concepts can exists within a care relationship. Theories surrounding autonomy do not seem able to find any way of theorizing autonomy within relations, always emphasizing the need for
independence. However, I aim to find ways to think of autonomy in
relationships and I am specifically focusing on care relationships because they are often viewed as unequal, where one is more independent than the other and able to be more autonomous. This is all based on the capabilities of the body to move around, but why is the focus on moving independently? Immobility disrupts the connection between the body, agency and autonomy which creates space for developing different understandings of care relationships with physical disability. The
distinction that should be made between (im)mobility and movement is something that I will look at in the next chapter.
In “The Free and Autonomous Individual” from Subjectivity,
Theories from Freud to Haraway (2000) Nick Mansfield gives an overview of the development of the concept of autonomy. He locates the origin of the concept in the Enlightenment where also the first ideas of subjectivity arose. The work of René Descartes represents major developments in this field with his famous Cogito ergo sum (“I think therefore I am”) (14). His
philosophy, stating that the key to knowledge was to be found in the formulation of the word ‘I’, shows the beginning of a new understanding of the human/individual/subject’s place in the world. It refers to an idea of self-consciousness, and points toward the idea that subjectivity can only have content through an awareness of the world as separate from the subject. Here we arrive at the ideas of Emmanuel Kant. Kant equates autonomy with self-governance by universal law, as Nick Mansfield explains, Kant is seeing it as “the condition that is necessary to achieve and maintain freedom in two ordinary and, as it turns out, related senses – namely, the independence of the choices and actions of a person not only from domination by other persons, but also from domination by his own inclinations.” (18). Mansfield continues to explain that for Kant
autonomy cannot simply be equated with freedom of will. Instead, it must be understood as the aim that a person with free will must adopt if he/she is to preserve and promote his/her freedom of choice and action in an ordinary sense. The distinction between freedom of choice and
independence of domination is important. As explained, domination can be present in some ways, but this does not mean that a person is also deprived of his/her freedom to choose. This is interesting in relation to care, a relationship with domination in the sense that one is more able to move his/her body, but both people involved have freedom of choice and action. It is crucial, as Mansfield writes, that dependency does not always involve inequality, which would refer to one being dominated by the other (17). Also, there is a difference in being autonomous and having choice or free will. Freedom of choice is a form of being autonomous. It does not require a mobile, abled body, but the possibility to express oneself. Consequently, a person is being held responsible for his/her position in the world. If we think of people in need of care, this view is highly problematic, since these persons are dependent on others for care, and therefore not independent in the way the term implies. In this light, the question arises of whether care recipients can be held responsible for their actions, and whether there is any form of independence to be found in their actions?
What I want to take from this starting point is that autonomy refers to the status of being responsible, independent and able to speak for oneself. Mansfield argues that autonomy “implies that any adult who is not politically oppressed or restricted, and who is not physically impaired in a way that it interferes with his independence, is autonomous.” (22). A person that is physically disabled and in need of care from someone else has, in this respect, less autonomy. However, domination is present in relationships, and if we think of how another person can be seen as a prosthesis for someone else, could this make the care recipient more autonomous? Can autonomy be found in the relationship? In Precarious Life: the Power of Mourning and Violence (2004) Judith Butler touches upon these issues.
In her book she deals with the concept of relationality, which she calls the tie (22). She explores the concepts of loss, violence and
mourning and explains that through grief we are implicated in lives that are not our own. Through such events (for example losing someone) we realize that we are a subject through the encounter and tie with the other. Therefore, “we are something other than “autonomous” in such a condition, but that does not mean that we are merged or without
boundaries.” (27). This quote illustrates that for her, some forms of
autonomy are non-existent in the tie, however, it is not yet clear how she speaks of autonomy. Although the encounter and tie with the other makes people something other than autonomous, she continues by saying that autonomy is never fully possible. According to Butler, we are always dependent on things and people. We are acting under the law, being dominated, but we need the illusion that we can claim autonomy in order to have an idea of the self. Being tied to another person leads us to
question our autonomy:
It won’t even do to say that I am promoting a relational view of the self over an
autonomous one or trying to redescribe autonomy in terms of relationality. Despite
approach the
issue that concerns us, a way of thinking about how we are not only constituted by ou
relations but also dispossessed by them as well. (24)
This quote emphasizes the problem of connecting relationality and
autonomy, since she argues that relations not only constitute us but also dispossess us. As a consequence, the common notions of autonomy would be lost in relationality. However, in this quote Butler elucidates that we may need another language to approach this issue, to find ways to position autonomy within relations that are according to her, always dependent. Butler only alludes to this briefly, and judging from her
approach to relationality, does not aim to find that other language to deal with autonomy differently. Reflecting on a daily lived concept such as care, however, forces us to reconceptualize autonomy, hence, perhaps finding another language to deal with this matter.
Since we are depending on one another for the recognition of
ourselves, for being able to realize that the “I” and “you” are tied, coming into being together (26), emphasizes a form of dependency that is tied to this relational view of the self. Butler asks “is there a way that we might struggle for autonomy in many spheres, yet also consider the demands that are imposed upon us by living in a world of beings who are, by definition, physically dependent on one another, physically vulnerable to one another?” (27). This quote underlines that Butler is trying to think autonomy and relationality together, that dependency makes us less autonomous in the traditional form. Consequently, dependency and autonomy go together. Being involved in a care relationship means that dependency is present; however, I want to argue that this link is not only true for the care recipient, but for all people involved in the relationship.
(Affective) care relationships in The Hours
What I want to take from Judith Butler’s theory is the claim that we
are all enmeshed in a web of relations, constantly affecting and affected by others. However, instead of emphasizing independence, it would be
productive to look at subjects in their (embodied) interdependence. In the article “The Will to Care: Performance, Expectation, and Imagination” (2012) Maurice Hamington explains that “care is always practiced in a relationship, and although relationships have varying power differentials, the one cared for is never entirely powerless, thus he or she contributes to the relationship” (4). This even includes care for the self which also happens in relation. He points out that all relationships are embedded in power structures, and even though in a care relationship one might need more care from the other, this does not mean that the care recipient is powerless, which some theories stress. This troubling view is also
conveyed by disability scholars and activists. Something that Bill Hughes emphasizes in his book on the ethics of care (2005). He explicates the complex relation that the DPM has with care. He writes:
Care as a concept is waterlogged with benign and pastoral connotations, but the DPM
– drawing on the practical experience of disabled people throughout modernity – has
seen into its darker heart and begins its case with Bauman’s caveat (1993: 11) that, ‘the
impulse to care for the other, when taken to its extreme, leads to the annihilation of
the autonomy of the other, to domination and oppression. (262-263)
This quote highlights the negative connotations that care carries with it, emphasizing the negative aspects of dependence, domination and
oppression. Care leads to the annihilation of the autonomy of the care recipient, but perhaps also to that of the caretaker since he/she has to take care of someone. This view on care is striking, firstly because it comes from the DPM that is involved with the practicalities of care that disabled people need to deal with every day. Secondly, the concept of power seems so black and white in this quote that there is no space for change. Care is seen as forced upon the disabled person that unwillingly needs to receive care, which inevitably leads to the annihilation of the
autonomy of the care recipient. This approach to care is unproductive while the need for care is inevitable, and discussing it in such a negative way only makes it harder to deal with it in daily practice. A
reconceptualization of not only autonomy but also care is crucial if these fixed ideas are connected to care. Furthermore, what does it exactly mean that the autonomy of the other is annihilated? Is the disappearance of autonomy still the case if autonomy and dependency could
simultaneously exist in a relationship? Through a thorough analysis of The Hours, I hope to provide a different approach to autonomy and dependency that might be productive for the discourse on disability and care. The film shows how in a care relationship both people depend on one another, and this dependency is not negatively portrayed. The relationships in the film tie in with Butler’s ideas on relationality, and simultaneously challenge her ideas on autonomy. The film brings together the critique that some feminist theorists have of the role of the woman as the care taker and the position of the care recipient as the dependent. The Hours provides us with an example of how these care relationships involve autonomy for both people and challenges the perspective of the DPM arguing that care only holds negative connotations. The focus of my analysis will be on the camera work, editing and narrative structure, with a specific attention on dialogue.
The film centers around the lives of three women, in three different times and places. Virginia Woolf in Richmond and Sussex, 1912 and 1941, Laura Brown in post-war Los Angeles 1951, and Clarissa Vaughan in New York, 2001. The trailer of the film tells us of the protagonists that each “of them [is] living a lie, each, putting someone else’s life first”. In the
opening sequence of the film the women are connected through parallel editing. Virginia is writing her novel Mrs. Dalloway, which Laura is reading and Clarissa is living; she is Mrs. Dalloway. The lie that they are living refers to their desire for a different life, but feeling trapped in their current situations by putting someone else’s life first. This lie that they are referring to is not always so explicit for the characters themselves. Also, I want to question whether they are really lying to themselves, their
caring for others is also what forms them, as the film shows. I want to argue that the care they provide for others is not unconsciously vested in them, which the tagline implies, but that they are consciously aware of the impact the care has on them and their care recipient. There are two scenes that I want to highlight and analyze in detail that deal with care in connection with autonomy. The first scene plays in New York, when
Clarissa is visiting Richard.
Every day Clarissa goes to Richard’s apartment to bring flowers,
clean up the house and check how he is doing. Richard has been diagnosed with AIDS and is experiencing hallucinations from his
medication. On this specific day he will receive a prize for his poetry and Clarissa wants to throw a party for him afterwards. When she arrives at his house, he confronts her with what she is doing, coming to his house every day, caring for him, and as he states, forgetting about her own life: “Oh Mr.s Dalloway, always giving parties to cover the silence” (00:23:50). She ignores his words and they sit down in front of each other while he asks her the following question: “Would you be angry if I died?” (Image 12, 00:24:09).
(Image 12, 00:24:09) (Image 13, 00:24:11)
She responds surprised, saying: “If you died?” (Image 13). In these images we see that they are being filmed in a classical reverse shot, which shows us who is talking to whom and that they are looking at each other, sitting close by. Their proximity filmed in this way can be
interpreted as them having an intimate relationship. After this, Richard says: “I think I am only staying alive to satisfy you”. He makes the statement that, if it were not for Clarissa, he would have wanted to die already. His illness is making him depressed and their relationship – the only one that he has left – is not enough for him to want to live. This is the first time Richard reveals these thoughts to Clarissa, and her first
response is physical: Clarissa bends backwards and thereby breaks the classical filmic strategy (Image 14). They are now filmed alone in a shot. This aspect of the camerawork emphasizes that because of Richard’s words, they are more detached from each other.
(Image 14, 00:24:48) (Image 15, 00:24:50)
Clarissa then continues, “I don’t accept this,” and Richard responds: “Oh, and that’s for you to decide?” (Image 15). Does this dialogue emphasize power in the relationship? Is Clarissa entitled to say anything about how and if Richard wants to live? Does she have more authority because she is viewed as the one taking care of him? Or perhaps, as I want to argue, is her response showing her love for Richard? In this way, they are
depending on the other. Image 14 and 15 show that they are still sitting in front of each other, but they are isolated in the image: separated from each other. This corresponds with their dialogue that has shifted in emphasis, the relation has become precarious because of Richard’s words. The scene started off showing how Richard and Clarissa are affectionate, how they love each other and have a long history together.
They had a teenage affair and Richard decided to end this love affair, something Clarissa never really got over. The turning point came when Richard told Clarissa that he wants to die, and that the meaning of his life is only manifested in her. Thus, the scene shifted from a relational view into a more individual focus. Satisfying her by giving her the possibility of caring for him is not enough for Richard, and Clarissa feels personally attacked by his statement, responding angrily. The scene shows that Clarissa is upset, but there is more to it than that. Throughout the film we get to know Clarissa as unhappy in her daily life, holding on to what she had with Richard in the past. Clarissa has a wife and daughter, is a successful book editor and has a nice apartment, but the only moments she feels really alive, as she says, is when she is with Richard,
“everything else seems trivial” (00:55:12). The strong love that she feels for Richard makes her want to care for him, but she seems to have lost a part of herself in him that would die with him.
After this dialogue Clarissa stands up and continues her tasks in the house as if nothing has happened. She starts getting the trash out of the bin (Image 16) and is attempting to leave.
(Image 16, 00:24:55)
While this reaction shows that Clarissa continues her routine – wanting to hold on to how it was just minutes before the conversation - Richard is still sitting in the chair continuing his argument somewhat angrily, reacting to her sudden movement and again pointing out what she is doing. He says: “How long have you been doing this, coming to the
apartment, cleaning up, what about your own life, what about Sally, just wait till I die, then you have to think of yourself” (00:24:55). Richard asserts here that Clarissa is forgetting about her own life by caring for him, but she seems to not know what else to do. If a sense of self can develop in a relationship, then bodies leaving that assemblage can
change the dynamic and therefore the self. I want to argue that instead of what Richard says here, the film shows that she gets a sense of self
through caring. This corresponds with Butler’s view on relationality where the “I” and “you” are not simply two separated people but that they come into being through the other too (2004, 23). In this scene, Richard is arguing for autonomy and perhaps feeling the lack of it
because of Clarissa’s caring for him. In contrast, she is arguing for care and relationality. In another scene, she tells her daughter that when she’s not near Richard, everything seems trivial (00:55:34). I do not want to claim that depending on another person is necessarily good or bad, but with my analysis of this scene I want to show that not only the care recipient is dependent, but also the caretaker is coming into being through the care relationship.
When Clarissa attempts to leave without saying anything else to Richard the scene ends with them not having an argument anymore because Richard forces her to come back to him, and kiss him (Image 17). The strong and intimate connection that they have is undeniable.
(Image 17, 00:25:55)
They smile and all seems as if it was before the conversation, but later on in the film Clarissa asks herself: “Why is everything wrong?” (00:32:34).
