B.A. (Guelph) M.A. (Brock), Ph.D. (Trent)
Thesis: Abject Utopianism and Psychic Space: An Exploration of a Psychological Progress Toward Utopia in the Work of Samuel R. Delany and Julia Kristeva
Examining Committee:
Veronica Hollinger (Supervisor), Charmaine Eddy, Davide Panagia
External Examiner: Allan Pero, University of Western Ontario
Intenral Examiner: Elaine Stavro
Chair: Suzanne Bailey
Abstract
This dissertation utilizes the psychoanalytic theories of French psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva as a lens through which to read the novels of American author Samuel R. Delany. I argue that concepts proper to Kristeva's work--namely abjection and/or the abject--can provide a way to think what it might mean to be utopian in the 21st century. Delany's novels are received historically, which is to say his work speaks from a certain historical and cultural viewpoint that is not that of today; however, I claim that his novels are exceptional for their attempts to portray other ways of being in the world. Delany's novels, though, contain bodies, psychologies, and sexualities that are considered abject with respect to contemporary morality. Nonetheless, this dissertation argues that such manifestations of abject lived experience provide the groundwork for the possibility of thinking utopianism differently today. Throughout, what I am working toward is a notion that I call Abject Utopianism: Rather than direct attention toward those sites that closely, yet imperfectly, approximate the ideal, one should commit one's attention to those sights that others avoid, abscond, or turn their nose up at in disgust, for those are the sites of hope for a better world today.
Building upon a literature review of utopian theory relevant to the dissertation—especially Tom Moylan’s idea of the critical utopia—I follow with a theoretical exegesis of Kristeva’s work as it applies to the field of utopian studies, specifically in terms of literature. I then move on to an experimental reading of some of Delany’s novels not treated in any great detail in the present work with the intent to show how Kristevan elements such as le sémiotique function at the level of the text in Delany’s work. The remaining sections of the dissertation closely examine two works of his science fiction (i.e., Triton and Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand) and four works of his more pornographic writings (i.e., Hogg, The Mad Man, Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders, and Bread and Wine). These sections flesh out, in different respects, the various manifestations of the abject in Delany’s oeuvre and how they connect to, inform, or are informed by utopian theory. Throughout, what I am working toward is a notion that I call Abject Utopianism: Rather than direct attention toward those sites that closely, yet imperfectly, approximate the ideal, one should commit one’s attention to those sights that others avoid, abscond, or turn their nose up at in disgust, for those are the sites of hope for a better world today. These practices might appear horrifying and/or repulsive but I claim they are some of our last resources in an era all but completely bought up and hi-jacked by media, big business, and corporate interests.