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Queer Reading of Middlesex: Discourses of Intersexuality in the Novel by Jeffrey Eugenides
Hamšíková, Marie ; Kolářová, Kateřina (advisor) ; Nováková, Soňa (referee)
The thesis dedicates to discourses of intersexuality in the novel Middlesex written by the American author Jeffrey Eugenides. For the analysis, the method of queer reading was deployed, within the broader perspective of cultural studies. After introducing the context of the novel, and the theoretical framework, three analytical chapters follow which seek queer moments on the background of critical reviews of the novel. First chapter focuses on heteronormativity, performativity, and identity politics. Second chapter is interested in the confession genre and subject in confession. Third, and last chapter closes the analysis with finding moments of queer pleasure.
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Grotesque, or Queer? Homosexual characters in Tennessee Williams's selected short stories
Novák, Vladimír ; Ulmanová, Hana (advisor) ; Nováková, Soňa (referee)
This interdisciplinary thesis examines the portrayal of homosexual characters in Tennessee Williams's selected stories. Although the theme of homosexuality reoccurs throughout Williams's work, his short fiction constitutes a unique example, as it addresses this issue explicitly. The traditional scholarly view of Williams's depiction of homosexuality highlights the negative portrayal, which could be considered as verging on homophobia. This is closely related to the features of the Southern grotesque, which has become a mode typical for Williams's work. The thesis will largely confirm this view, yet at the same time, it will attempt to find out whether the male homosexual protagonists could be read as queer, i.e. whether they display any features, which would oppose the traditional concept of human sexuality as stable and unchanging. The second chapter will provide the theoretical background of the Southern Grotesque, the specific nature of which stems primarily from the characters, who (for various reasons) do not meet the criteria of normality and thus become misfits excluded from the society. Taking into account the conservative and strongly religious environment of the American South, homosexuality undoubtedly is one of such deviations. To cover the theory of the grotesque fully, the subchapters...
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Sexual Identity as Cinematic Subversion: the Discourse of New Queer Cinema
Kajánková, Lucia ; Hanáková, Petra (advisor) ; Bláhová, Jindřiška (referee)
The thesis proposes the New Queer Cinema chapter of film history as a paradigm of queer film's subversive practices. The theoretically and historically focused first part establishes the term queer, expounds its possible applications to film in the realm of queer film studies and in the third chapter critically introduces the 'new wave' of queer film New Queer Cinema. The analytical part assigns queer and its possible functions as its basis for inquiry. It consists of two parts: the first performs the formal-content analysis of the pivotal film Swoon (1992); the final chapter builds on its conclusions and examines the corpus of New Queer Cinema films along four analytical cuts in order to describe how they produce the queer discourse. The final output of the thesis is an open model of prospective approaches to queer film.
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Development of public space of non-heterosexual people in Czechia: Prague as a "queer" capital?
Sak, Jan ; Pitoňák, Michal (advisor) ; Pospíšilová, Lucie (referee)
This bachelor's thesis analyses the development of spatial organisation of Czech non- heterosexual people, it offers a study of public socializing possibilities of this group in Prague since the beginning of socialism to the present. Thesis deals with a question of what direction is Prague as the "gay capital" being developed at the present. The research part of the work is based on a secondary geographical content analysis of available literature drawing mainly from data based on so called oral historical method. Carried out research found that the biggest milestone in this development was the year 1989 enabling for rapid growth of non- heterosexuals' socializing possibilities in the 1990s. This rapid development currently produces metropolis of Prague, offering a range of gay and lesbian activities, that able Prague to compete with other big cities in Western Europe. key words: non-heterosexual, homosexual, gay, lesbian, queer, Prague, socialism, public space, heteronormativity
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Transgender identity
Kováriková, Juliána ; Skupnik, Jaroslav (advisor) ; Štěpánová, Irena (referee)
The main purpose of the present diploma thesis is to introduce the transgender identity as a newly emerging lifestyle and political activism of transpeople. Because the transgenderism has been formed in opposition to the dominant medical discourse of transsexuality, it is necessary to include the transsexual stand of view which transgender people are defining against. I regard the transsexuality and transgenderism as two different discourses forming new different identity categories, having specific impact on lives of people they are naming. I focus mainly on the impact of different concepts of sex, gender and sexuality on formation of specific shapes of these ideologies. In the empirical part, I am applying my mind on the narrative construction of transgender identity. Through some parts of interview with a person diagnosed with transsexuality, that has accepted the identity of a transgender in the course of his life, I try to mediate a more realistic and sculpturesque image of transgender/transsexual life, identity and sense of self.
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The First Czech Queer Films from the Perspective of Queer Theory and Reception Studies
Hezinová, Sandra ; Hanáková, Petra (advisor) ; Svatoňová, Kateřina (referee)
The following bachelor's thesis focuses on the queer topic in the contemporary Czech feature cinema. In detail it analyses two films - The Country Teacher and Dolls, which were the first films in the history of Czech cinema who's main characters were ingenuously homosexual. The first part examines chosen films in the context of existing cinematographic tradition and describes the principles on which the film representation of gays and lesbians works. The main part analyses The Country Teacher and Dolls from the ideological perspective and tries to expose, how the heterosexual discourse operate in chosen films. By using the methodology of the queer theory it also describes, how are the information about gender and sexual identity organized. In the following chapter the films are explored in a broader section of cinematographic institution It concerns film's PR strategies and commercial campaigns on one hand and critical responses in the contemporary press on the other hand. The final part is founded by the reception study of queer audience, which coprehend not only the spectator's experience of chosen films, but reception modes and readers strategies as well.
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Translation with Commentary: Queer Fiction - The Ambiguous Emergence of a Genre
Marek, Jakub ; Abdallaova, Naděžda (advisor) ; Kalivodová, Eva (referee)
The aim of this thesis is to translate the text Queer Fiction - The Ambiguous Emergence of a Genre and make a commentary. The commentary is divided into four parts. The first one is an analysis of the source text, it is followed by a description of the method of translation I used. The third part threats the main problems I faced while translating, including their solution and their explanations. In the final part, I analyse shifts between the original and translated texts.
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Beyond the heteronormative understanding of gender and sexuality
Jahodová, Dita ; Kolářová, Kateřina (advisor) ; Sokolová, Věra (referee)
This thesis presents the basic principles of the functioning of the heteronormative order: in what way heterosexuality is constructed as the norm and in what way it is maintained as such. The thesis simultaneously examines the possibilities of disrupting the heteronormative order, creating queer spaces, and defining the term queer and queer politics in the framework of a queer subculture. The aim of the research carried out within the thesis is to contribute to the visibility of queer subculture, present ways in which the term queer is used in queer subculture and show to what degree the examined queer subcultural spaces are created as open spaces and to whom they are accessible. In the Czech Republic the term queer is used as a synonym for LGBT identities or as an umbrella term for LGBTI people and activities. Nevertheless, as follows from the analysis of semi-structured interviews, the term queer can have even other meanings. It can express criticism of heteronormativity, homonormativity, mainstream LGBT politics and culture, and the attempt to overcome the norms connected with gender and sexuality. In this regard, the term queer can refer not only to an identity and also to a political position. The interweaving of queer and feminist theory can be inspiring not only for the development of gender...
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The Death Pit and the Glowing Swamp: A Permeation
Smutný, Jan ; Marek, Petr (referee) ; Cenek, Filip (advisor)
The work is connecting well-known symbols of alchemy and various esoteric traditions and giving them visual and narrative form. There is deconstruction and glorification of this type of philosophy in the same time. The characters of the story are symbolizing the german and slavic archetypes. Their voyage from the pit of death to the glowing swamp and vice versa is representing the ageless story of life and death, creation and destruction, body and soul, light and darkness. All the symbols are used in the ironic and serious way in the same time.
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The Representation of Men with Homosexual Orientation in Czech and Slovak Contemporary Drama
DEMETER, Peter
The present thesis focuses on the representations of gays in Czech and Slovak contemporary theater plays. Its aim is to analyze the queer and campy aspects of the representations of gays in the mainstream plays and uncover the principles of creation of the gay character in the structure of dramatic Arts. The results of analysis explain the integrative mode of representation of gays in Czech and Slovak contemporary plays.
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