Buffy and warrior women
Mar. 31st, 2006 10:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethThe other day I was wondering where Buffy fits in with the F&SF tradition of warrior women, and a bit before that I was considering Halloween costume choices as being all about aspects of Buffy's power.
And if I'd tagged those better I'd link them here...
ANYways, I was thinking - Cordelia dressed in a catsuit, got called Catwoman.
One oft repeated kind of female warrior in comics and television is the animalistic, feral, usually catlike woman. Often the old association of cats with sex (ie pussy) gets involved. The idea seems roughly that violence is animal, sex is animal, these women who like sex and violence are animal.
Catwoman in DC comics has come a long way in terms of character depth, but if you add up all the cat identified heroes and villains - Catwoman, that cat woman Wonder Woman fights, probably Black Cat in Marvel comics except I don't read Marvel, that feral chick in Mutant X on TV - you get the violence=animal thing loud and clear.
So is Cordelia the cat-woman being an aspect of Buffy's power?
Next common version of the warrior woman, the cave woman. Pre civilisation, dressed in skins, using knives and with violence as a first resort. Usually has to be held in and controlled by a more cerebral (male) partner.
Slayer and Watcher?
Well in the classic Watcher's Council model, yes.
But in the specific, Buffy and Giles? I'd say no.
The First Slayer, in her rags and body paint, is very much the violent primitive. Other, dangerous, uncontrolled. But she is also very much in contrast to Buffy, who stands up in her pretty print dress and gives her a speech.
The Slayer does not walk in this world.
BUFFY: I walk. I talk. I shop, I sneeze. I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out. And I don't sleep on a bed of bones. Now give me back my friends.
Buffy is in the world. She talks - cerebral, rational. She isn't confronting the First Slayer violence to violence. She gives her reasons. She shops - is an interesting one. Commodities, consumption, as a defining part of identity. Buffy is civilized, she buys her clothes, instead of hunting them.
But in the same dream sequence, Buffy paints her face with mud, just as the First Slayer did.
So the primitive is in there, the violence is in there, but there's a whole lot more. Including her friends.
I think the Cat-Woman Cordelia costume is there in contrast to Buffy, not as an aspect of her. Buffy isn't usually associated with animal imagery. She wears a black cat t-shirt in the episode The Witch (I think, shall have to check notes) but I don't think that happens again. So in context it connects her to the magic, not the animal-sex-violence. If that animal side is in there, its a small part.
It would be easy to say male violence is represented as animal. Hyena people, werewolf. But in both cases both males and females were influenced, so it isn't as simply gendered. More like, violence is monstrous, and turns up in many forms.
But Buffy uses violence. She has a dark power, and assorted monsters try and convince her that makes her monstrous. Does it? That aspect gets represented sometimes, yes. But mostly... I think Buffy uses force, uses the appropriate means to prevent harm. The bad things use force to intimidate, harm, get their own way, wreck things. Seems to me meant to be different.
I think one of the important things about Buffy, especially as a feminist text, is the complexity of her identity. She isn't just the kick ass chick. She has family, friends, school, work, a whole complicated life, feelings and motivations of her own. She doesn't exist just for fight scenes in skimpy costumes. She has a voice, and it says a lot more than 'let me kill them'. Talks about the appropriate use of power, the right and wrong times for force. And about trying to 'be a girl', negotiate femininity as expressed in all that other stuff.
To put it another way, Buffy doesn't just have one costume. She isn't stuck with just the one mode of expression or way of being. To even represent a schematic of her power took three or four or more. She wears what she wants, whatever she finds appropriate, even if others think otherwise.
Very feminine power ;-)
And if I'd tagged those better I'd link them here...
ANYways, I was thinking - Cordelia dressed in a catsuit, got called Catwoman.
One oft repeated kind of female warrior in comics and television is the animalistic, feral, usually catlike woman. Often the old association of cats with sex (ie pussy) gets involved. The idea seems roughly that violence is animal, sex is animal, these women who like sex and violence are animal.
Catwoman in DC comics has come a long way in terms of character depth, but if you add up all the cat identified heroes and villains - Catwoman, that cat woman Wonder Woman fights, probably Black Cat in Marvel comics except I don't read Marvel, that feral chick in Mutant X on TV - you get the violence=animal thing loud and clear.
So is Cordelia the cat-woman being an aspect of Buffy's power?
Next common version of the warrior woman, the cave woman. Pre civilisation, dressed in skins, using knives and with violence as a first resort. Usually has to be held in and controlled by a more cerebral (male) partner.
Slayer and Watcher?
Well in the classic Watcher's Council model, yes.
But in the specific, Buffy and Giles? I'd say no.
The First Slayer, in her rags and body paint, is very much the violent primitive. Other, dangerous, uncontrolled. But she is also very much in contrast to Buffy, who stands up in her pretty print dress and gives her a speech.
The Slayer does not walk in this world.
BUFFY: I walk. I talk. I shop, I sneeze. I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out. And I don't sleep on a bed of bones. Now give me back my friends.
Buffy is in the world. She talks - cerebral, rational. She isn't confronting the First Slayer violence to violence. She gives her reasons. She shops - is an interesting one. Commodities, consumption, as a defining part of identity. Buffy is civilized, she buys her clothes, instead of hunting them.
But in the same dream sequence, Buffy paints her face with mud, just as the First Slayer did.
So the primitive is in there, the violence is in there, but there's a whole lot more. Including her friends.
I think the Cat-Woman Cordelia costume is there in contrast to Buffy, not as an aspect of her. Buffy isn't usually associated with animal imagery. She wears a black cat t-shirt in the episode The Witch (I think, shall have to check notes) but I don't think that happens again. So in context it connects her to the magic, not the animal-sex-violence. If that animal side is in there, its a small part.
It would be easy to say male violence is represented as animal. Hyena people, werewolf. But in both cases both males and females were influenced, so it isn't as simply gendered. More like, violence is monstrous, and turns up in many forms.
But Buffy uses violence. She has a dark power, and assorted monsters try and convince her that makes her monstrous. Does it? That aspect gets represented sometimes, yes. But mostly... I think Buffy uses force, uses the appropriate means to prevent harm. The bad things use force to intimidate, harm, get their own way, wreck things. Seems to me meant to be different.
I think one of the important things about Buffy, especially as a feminist text, is the complexity of her identity. She isn't just the kick ass chick. She has family, friends, school, work, a whole complicated life, feelings and motivations of her own. She doesn't exist just for fight scenes in skimpy costumes. She has a voice, and it says a lot more than 'let me kill them'. Talks about the appropriate use of power, the right and wrong times for force. And about trying to 'be a girl', negotiate femininity as expressed in all that other stuff.
To put it another way, Buffy doesn't just have one costume. She isn't stuck with just the one mode of expression or way of being. To even represent a schematic of her power took three or four or more. She wears what she wants, whatever she finds appropriate, even if others think otherwise.
Very feminine power ;-)