WGST Take Home Exam
Question One
In today world relations to body, gender and sexuality are largely predetermined by space and geographical position. Such situation is largely connected to the difference between areas where body is placed. It is also should be mentioned that racist and sexist understanding of space explains different acts of violence toward women, homosexual and transgender people. In addition, such state of affairs is also supported by law and stereotypical perception of the society as well as police, judges and courts. In some cases the division of space has historical roots and based on the existence of the areas which are inhabited by poor and areas which are inhabited by middle-class.
Moreover, often in poor areas live people of the racial minorities, such as areas of Indian Aboriginals or Chinatowns which is also made perception of body in different areas connected to race. It is also should be mentioned that specific perception of the body is especially present in the areas where men and women are clearly separated such as public toilets and prisons. However, separation in these areas is largely based on the dichotomy men-women and virtually eliminates cisgender and transgender. In addition, the relation to the body is also largely connected to the fact how in different places perceived homosexual people, for example body in the gay-friendly places perceived differently from the body in the homophobic places. That is why, in this essay considered how space contributes to the perception of the body, gender and sexuality. In the article “Race, Space and the Law: Unmapping a White Settler society” Sherene Razack considered on the example of one law case how space predetermines perception of the body. In this case two white men have raped and brutally killed Indian prostitute from the Aboriginals people’s area in Regina. In fact court reacts on this situation by finding excuse for the men and understatement of their guilt. As Razac noted, “the men’s and the court’s capacity do dehumanize Pamela George came from their understanding of her as the (gendered) racial Other whose degradation confirmed their own identities as white – that is, a men entitled to the land and the full benefits of citizenship” (Razac, 126).
It could be said that understatement of Alex Ternowetsky and Steven Kummerfield’s guilt was happened because of number of factors. First of all, it could be assumed that white women in the similar circumstances as Pamela George will be treated the same way, however; in fact the reason that leads Pamela George to this place was largely because of her race. Talking about Regina it should be noted that division between Aboriginals people’s area and white people’s area was happened because of colonization which separated colonizers from colonized. It is also should be mentioned that, “White men in position of authority often beat Aboriginal women, sometimes fatally. Oral narratives of late-nineteenth-century Lakota women suggest that the NWMP had easy sexual access to Aboriginal women whose families were starving” (Razac, 131). So, it …
