Monsters, mutants, oddities, weirdos, and freaks are terms associated with people with deformities. A person with a deformity was usually considered a monstrosity. In society, the focus of monstrosity has been commonly external and the internal aspects have become an accepted lifestyle if one’s external appearance is beautiful by society’s standards. If one is considered a monstrosity, their personality is usually portrayed as evil and wicked. In Tod Robbin’s 1923 book Spurs and Tod Browning’s 1932 film Freaks, the damaging effects of external and internal monstrosity are explored. The main male character, a midget, and the main female character, a“normal”sized beauty, in Freaks and Spurs experienced external and internal monstrosity throughout the plot, respectively. The origin of monstrosity appeared to have been a negative connotation in many different societies. There are many schools of theory that would help one understand the concept of monstrosity. However, psychological criticism seemed to coincide with the theme of monstrosity.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, monstrosity is defined as “an animal or plant, or (occas.) an organ or part, that is abnormally developed or grossly malformed.” ("Monstrosity, N."). Abnormalities are considered a ghastly sight to the majority of individuals who happen to gaze upon a “monstrosity.” In Chapter 2: Variation Under Nature of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species, Darwin describes monstrosity as a useless and unusual entity to a species (Darwin). While Darwin’s theory of monstrosity may sound offensive to some individuals, his theory is an accurate depiction of how many individuals perceive monstrosity. In ancient and modern societies, deformities tend to be associated with...
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...re by far the safest and most moderate; for the one extreme makes the soul braggart and insolent, and the other, illiberal and base; and money, and property, and distinction all go to the same tune.”
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft. “Chapter 5.” Frankenstein. 1st ed. New York: Tor, 1989. 58. Print.
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Zizek, Slavoj. Richter, David. "Courtly Love, Or,Woman as Thing." The Critical Tradition Classic Texts and ContemporaryTrends. 3rd ed. Boston (Mass.): Bedford / St. Martin's, 2007. 1181-197. Print.
Not long ago, a woman’s success was measured by the success of her husband and her domestic prowess. Today, a woman is presumed successful if she can emulate the standards of beauty portrayed in the media. Unfortunately, this subliminally enforced standard is unattainable to some women, regardless of the quality of their character. Let’s examine how western women went from being pioneering superheroes, to people who measure their worth against airbrushed photographs of impossibly beautiful women.
Asma, Stephen. On Monsters :An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Print.
know beauty in any form”(86). We are so conditioned to see female beauty as what men
Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth. How Images of Beauty are Used Against Women. New York: William Morrow, 1991.
The main focus in Frankenstein is the immense accentuation put on appearance and acceptance in the public eye. In society and in addition in the general public of Frankenstein, individuals judge one singularly on their appearance. Social bias is frequently established on looks, whether it is one 's skin color, the garments that one wears and even the way a man holds himself or herself. People make moment judgments taking into account these social biases. This recognition in light of appearance decides the conduct towards the individual. In Frankenstein, the general public of that time is like our own today. It is an appearance-based society that the ugly figure of Victor Frankenstein 's creature can be compared to a typical person of today.
Sarwer, D. B., Grossbart, T. A., & Didie, E. R. (2003). Beauty and society. Seminars in
Have you ever heard of the phrase, “Don’t judge a book by its cover”? In society, people are often judged based solely on their physical appearance. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein creates a living creature, however, he then abandons it and becomes a “deadbeat father”. Due to Victor Frankenstein’s absence from the monster’s life, the monster had to learn how to be a productive member of society by observing, stalking others, and reading books. He becomes a nice, benevolent person and has a tender heart, however, he was still eschewed by society simply because of how physically unappealing he was. Although the monster was kind at heart and true in spirit, his pariah from society poses the underlying question; Why should we
Puchner’s belief that monstrosity is defined by perspective is highlighted throughout “Beautiful Monsters.” Puchner and Swift support his theory through their differing accounts of monstrosity. Puchner’s story provides evidence of how a monster is defined in a fantasy and how the rules of society and the people living in it contribute to the development of monsters. Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” demonstrates how monstrosity is defined and how it affects society in real-life situations. The fact that Swift is capable of creating different monsters under different scenarios is unquestionably evidence that monsters are a matter of perspective.
Jeffery Cohen's first thesis states “the monster's body is a cultural body”. Monsters give meaning to culture. A monsters characteristics come from a culture's most deep-seated fears and fantasies. Monsters are metaphors and pure representative allegories. What a society chooses to make monstrous says a lot about that society’s people. Monsters help us express and find our darkest places, deepest fears, or creepiest thoughts. Monsters that scare us,vampires, zombies, witches, help us cope with what we dread most in life. Fear of the monstrous has brought communities and cultures together. Society is made up of different beliefs, ideas, and cultural actions. Within society there are always outcasts, people that do not fit into the norm or do not follow the status quo. Those people that do not fit in become monsters that are feared almost unanimously by the people who stick to the status quo.
In the article “Beating Anorexia and Ganing Feminism,” Marni Grossman shares her experiance of how she overcame her struggle with anorexia through understanding the feminist movement. Marni objectafies the ways in which society’s expectations and ideas of what it means to have “beauty” is having and negitaive impact. I had a very similar experiance to Marni, in fact the first time I hated my apperance was in the seventh grade. I have olive skin and bold brows, features which i was often complamented on, yet hated. Shawn and Lee argue that “there is no fixed idea of beauty”, suggesting how social ideals from society differs depending on the culture (183). I remember A male student was bullying all the females in the class by Inscribing Gender
A monster can be characterized by an extreme deviation from the normal standards of society including an internal or external wickedness. In the case of Mary Shelley’s Creature, his appearance overwhelms those who lay eyes upon him. A mere glance can send a villager running for the hills. It was not until the Creature caught a glance of his own reflection that he understood why villagers were so afraid of him. The realization of his ghastly appearance began the monster’s journey into hopelessness. In Peter Brooks’ article he writes, “Self recognition as the ‘filthy type’ completes the mirror stage of the Monsters development.” (Brooks 377). Seeing oneself as ugly and slovenly can cast shadows on even the most compassionate of hearts.
By means of looking at different representations of monstrosity we find how two different characters are effected by their surroundings and how their dissimilarity in nature has caused others to isolate or lower them in society. With this, we discover what monstrosity suggests about the human condition and how a living thing that does not relate closely to what is essentially “human” is seen as unnatural and
At the moment of his birth, the creature is entirely innocent; he affectionately reaches out to Frankenstein, which is interpreted as a hostile movement, only to have the latter violently abandon him. Despite his appalling appearance, his “wrinkled” grin is as guiltless as a newly-born child which, in a sense, is precisely what he is to Frankenstein (61). With the rejection of his monster based solely on a personal appearance that epitomizes everything Frankenstein fears in his life, the reader begins to recognize the profoundly unethical character of Frankenstein's experiment and of Frankenstein himself.
Ghettos start to take shape throughout German captive territories. Mass killings are perfectly and vividly described in the letters and communications within the Third Reich through communication and the war diaries of men like Lt. Col. Helmuth Groscurth about the massacres of polish citizens in October of 1939; “The woman had to climb into this grave and took her youngest child in her arms…” A culture of inhumanity was being created as certain groups were being targeted and annihilated from institutions for the handicapped and mentally disabled by the spring of 1940. Based on the calculations offered by the Germans the average daily cost for an institutionalized person in 1940 was RM 0.56. The Germans presented the information to the Aryan population as a positive money saving endeavor and affirmative reasoning to justify and execute the handicapped or disabled population institutionalized as wards of the state.
Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty are used Against Women. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1991. Print