The Mything Link: The Feminine Voice in the Shifting Australian National Myth

Simple item page
avondale-bepress-to-dspace.facultyEducation
avondale-bepress-to-dspace.peer_review_statusPeer reviewed before publication
avondale-bepress.abstract<p>This paper is grounded in the axiom, that if narrative tells the clearest truth about the conscious layers of humanity and the truth a culture holds at a particular time, then it is poetry that provides the clearest revelation of the unconscious lies that a culture clings to as it changes. This is no more evident than in the poetry of the Australian poet, Chris Mansell<strong>,</strong> and in particular her poems, <em>Where Edges Are </em>and <em>The Good Soldier</em><strong>. </strong>Her poetry not only reflects the crisis of national identity Australia is currently<strong> </strong>embroiled in as it “struggles to free itself from residual colonial ideologies,” (Huggan 2007:ix), but the role of woman in this societal shift and their place in the ‘landscape myth’ of the ‘lucky country’. Up until recently the Australian national myth has at its core a narrative dominated by the laconic outback male ‘cattle drover’, who is able to survive in the desert landscape of the outback through sheer determination and subduing the environment and native inhabitants. His wife also surfaces in this mythic schema as a quiet, intelligent, bored and subjugated partner. However, this ‘outback survival narrative’ is being eroded as Australians begin to contemplate their national identity. This national questioning is reflected in poetry and literature, in which there is a subtextual metaphoric shift from ‘desert isolation’ to a proxemics myth related to the sea. Mansell’s poetry is arguably one of the clearest socio-psychological ‘places of mythic voice’ whereby the actual pain of female liminality as ‘archetypal echo’ in the Australian myth is morphing from out of a ‘belly of the whale’ experience’, into a driving force whereby new “myths, metaphors, symbols, rituals and philosophic systems” (Deardorff 2004:13) are being generated. Through Mansell’s poetry and mythic imagery, a lie is changing into a potential for living.</p>
avondale-bepress.articleid1034
avondale-bepress.authorsPhil Fitzsimmons
avondale-bepress.context-key9237558
avondale-bepress.coverpage-urlhttps://research.avondale.edu.au/edu_chapters/35
avondale-bepress.document-typebookchapter
avondale-bepress.field.author_faculty_disciplineEducation
avondale-bepress.field.bookWomen Versed in Myth: Essays on Modern Poets pp. 106-113
avondale-bepress.field.comments<p>From <strong>Women Versed in Myth: Essays on Modern Poets © 2016 Edited by Colleen S. Harris and Valerie Estelle Frankel by permission of McFarland & Company, Inc., Box 611, Jefferson NC 28640. www.mcfarlandbooks.com.</strong></p> <p>Staff and students of Avondale College may access the electronic version of <em>Women Versed in Myth:</em><strong> </strong><em>Essays on Modern Poets</em><strong> </strong>via library Primo search <a href="http://www.avondale.edu.au/library">here.</a></p>
avondale-bepress.field.custom_citation<p>Fitzsimmons, P. (2016). The mything link: The feminine voice in the shifting Australian national myth. In V. E. Frankel, & C. S. Harris (Eds.), <em>Women versed in myth: Essays on modern poets</em> (pp. 106-113). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.</p>
avondale-bepress.field.embargo_date2016-10-05T00:00:00Z
avondale-bepress.field.field_of_education09 Society and Culture
avondale-bepress.field.for200525 Literary Theory
avondale-bepress.field.isbn9780786471928
avondale-bepress.field.peer_reviewBefore publication
avondale-bepress.field.publication_date2016-01-01T00:00:00Z
avondale-bepress.field.reportable_itemsB1
avondale-bepress.field.source_publication<p>This book chapter was originally published as:</p> <p>Fitzsimmons, P. (2016). The mything link: The feminine voice in the shifting Australian national myth. In V. E. Frankel, & C. S. Harris (Eds.), <em>Women versed in myth: Essays on modern poets</em> (pp. 106-113). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.</p> <p>ISBN: 9780786471928</p>
avondale-bepress.field.staff_classificationPermanent
avondale-bepress.fulltext-urlhttps://research.avondale.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1034&amp;context=edu_chapters&amp;unstamped=1
avondale-bepress.keywordsMansell
avondale-bepress.keywordspoetry
avondale-bepress.keywordsmyth
avondale-bepress.keywordsAustralian narrative
avondale-bepress.label35
avondale-bepress.publication-date2016-01-01T00:00:00Z
avondale-bepress.publication-titleEducation Book Chapters
avondale-bepress.statepublished
avondale-bepress.submission-date2016-10-05T20:51:34Z
avondale-bepress.submission-pathedu_chapters/35
avondale-bepress.titleThe Mything Link: The Feminine Voice in the Shifting Australian National Myth
avondale-bepress.typearticle
dc.contributor.authorFitzsimmons, Phil
dc.date.accessioned2023-11-02T05:21:34Z
dc.date.available2023-11-02T05:21:34Z
dc.date.issued2016-01-01
dc.date.submitted2016-10-05T20:51:34Z
dc.description.abstract<p>This paper is grounded in the axiom, that if narrative tells the clearest truth about the conscious layers of humanity and the truth a culture holds at a particular time, then it is poetry that provides the clearest revelation of the unconscious lies that a culture clings to as it changes. This is no more evident than in the poetry of the Australian poet, Chris Mansell<strong>,</strong> and in particular her poems, <em>Where Edges Are </em>and <em>The Good Soldier</em><strong>. </strong>Her poetry not only reflects the crisis of national identity Australia is currently<strong> </strong>embroiled in as it “struggles to free itself from residual colonial ideologies,” (Huggan 2007:ix), but the role of woman in this societal shift and their place in the ‘landscape myth’ of the ‘lucky country’. Up until recently the Australian national myth has at its core a narrative dominated by the laconic outback male ‘cattle drover’, who is able to survive in the desert landscape of the outback through sheer determination and subduing the environment and native inhabitants. His wife also surfaces in this mythic schema as a quiet, intelligent, bored and subjugated partner. However, this ‘outback survival narrative’ is being eroded as Australians begin to contemplate their national identity. This national questioning is reflected in poetry and literature, in which there is a subtextual metaphoric shift from ‘desert isolation’ to a proxemics myth related to the sea. Mansell’s poetry is arguably one of the clearest socio-psychological ‘places of mythic voice’ whereby the actual pain of female liminality as ‘archetypal echo’ in the Australian myth is morphing from out of a ‘belly of the whale’ experience’, into a driving force whereby new “myths, metaphors, symbols, rituals and philosophic systems” (Deardorff 2004:13) are being generated. Through Mansell’s poetry and mythic imagery, a lie is changing into a potential for living.</p>
dc.description.versionBefore publication
dc.identifier.citation<p>Fitzsimmons, P. (2016). The mything link: The feminine voice in the shifting Australian national myth. In V. E. Frankel, & C. S. Harris (Eds.), <em>Women versed in myth: Essays on modern poets</em> (pp. 106-113). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.</p>
dc.identifier.isbn9780786471928
dc.identifier.urihttps://research.avondale.edu.au/handle/123456789/09237558
dc.language.isoen_us
dc.provenance<p>This book chapter was originally published as:</p> <p>Fitzsimmons, P. (2016). The mything link: The feminine voice in the shifting Australian national myth. In V. E. Frankel, & C. S. Harris (Eds.), <em>Women versed in myth: Essays on modern poets</em> (pp. 106-113). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.</p> <p>ISBN: 9780786471928</p>
dc.subjectMansell
dc.subjectpoetry
dc.subjectmyth
dc.subjectAustralian narrative
dc.titleThe Mything Link: The Feminine Voice in the Shifting Australian National Myth
dc.typeBook Chapter
Files
Original bundle
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
Fitzsimmons__P._1_chapter.pdf
Size:
76.96 KB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download
Collections
Education
Christian Education Research Centre