A Feminist Analysist of Jamaica Kincaid's Girl

A Feminist Analysist of Jamaica Kincaid’s Girl

Dayna Wilson / 300113188

ENGL 1102 – 050

Dr. Diane Stiles

08 February 2021

745 Words

 

 

As today’s generation of fourth wave feminists are quick to express, simply existing as a woman is frequently an exhausting endeavour. While women might experience more freedoms today than our sisters of the past, it is undeniable that despite any advances made we still have far to go. Jamaica Kincaid’s 1978 poem Girl, in which a mother impresses a litany of seemingly random advice upon her daughter, is a telling glimpse into a society that reduces the worth of a woman into her value as a sexual object while simultaneously chastising her for any expression of that sexuality.

            While advice to the daughter is initially primarily innocuous and focused on general instructions for cooking, cleaning, and caring for a household, a focus on appearance runs throughout. The mother tells her daughter how to “make yourself a nice blouse,” “make a button-hole,” and the like. This quickly moves on to instructions on how to smile and how to “behave in the presence of men who don’t know you well.” Throughout the poem, an emphasis is placed on the importance of physical appearance and the appropriate ways to attract men. In doing so, the mother positions men and the goal of attracting a man as central to her daughter’s existence. She is not instructed on development of her personal attributes or goals, as they are clearly inconsequential in the face of her ultimate perceived value: that of a woman who will one day make a man happy. This is reinforced in the mention of how to appropriately handle her father’s laundry. Even before the girl is a married woman, or an available sexual conquest, her worth is framed in how she can serve men. Kincaid is clearly describing a patriarchal society that is set up to benefit men and devalue women.

             A particularly disconcerting example of the dehumanization of women in the poem occurs in the casual mention of abortion in “this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it even becomes a child.” This stark mention of abortion is as though it is a choice made lightly and equates it to how one might take out the trash with the use of the provocative phrase ‘throw away.’ Kincaid’s pointed treatment of such emotionally wrought subject matter serves to repudiate the trauma involved with abortion. In doing so, the not-quite-mother is reduced to the sum of her uterus and biological ability to create or end life. Her value as a mother, as a nurturer, a teacher, and all that she has to offer as a human being are denied, as well as any trauma or emotional reaction to the potential child. Rather, focus is placed firmly on her body as a machine.

            Conversely to the running theme of a woman’s worth being tied into her ability to please men and exist as a sexual machine, however, is the constant reminder that should she be too successful in the assumed goal of attracting and retaining men, she is surely becoming a “slut.” The margin for appropriate success in this endeavour is apparently extremely narrow, as anything from the girl’s gait to the music she listens to holds the potential of earning her that undesirable label. The problem therein is that a woman is forced to exist in an ill defined plain, with her focus squarely on the quandary of maintaining the balance of appropriate sexuality. Kincaid drily expresses the irony of this dilemma with her final line: “after all you are really going to be the kind of woman who the baker won’t let near the bread?” Society measures a woman by impossible standards and when she inevitably does not meet them, she is labeled as either too sexual or not sexual enough, thus once again reducing her value as a human being.

            Girl’s account of the denigration that women experience was written over forty years ago, and specifically references Kincaid’s youth in the West Indies. Yet the poem’s relevance and accuracy persist today, even across the decades and cultures. It is a telling glimpse into the dichotomy of women’s expected behaviour, and the insidiousness of misogyny. When we speak of feminism in a modern sense, it is important to ensure that we are not perpetuating the devaluing of our daughters in how we speak to them and the advice we give. Girl is an effective, darkly funny reminder of that fact, and Kincaid is extremely successful in how she conveys it.