Model
Digital Document
Publisher
Florida Atlantic University
Description
There is an ancient genre of discourse which has served primarily to rationalize masculine privilege. The aim of the authors of this discourse has been to establish the "natural" superiority of men by methodically certifying the "natural" inferiority of women. This genre of discourse is misogynous discourse. Designed to amplify and expose the degrading effect of misogynous discourse on the human psyche, this analysis of misogynous language and discourse is achieved through a critical technique known as defamiliarization, which allows the reader to examine the discourse from a new and incongruous perspective. In this instance defamiliarization is accomplished simply by reversing the gender of the language, making it seem as though it was written by women about men, instead of by men about women. The final goal of this study is to demythologize this language and thereby render it neutral.
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