Abstracts of Books

Authors of unsigned abstracts requested anonymity.

Abstracts of Books

Alicia Arrizón. Latina Performance: Traversing the Stage. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999. xxiii + 218 pp.; ill. ISBN 0-253-33508-6 (cl); 0-253-21285-5 (pb).

This interdisciplinary volume analyzes the history of Latina theater performances, positioning theater as a "mirror" of identity formation and reimagining Latina identity as contested, constantly in flux, and self reflexive, rather than static. Arrizón first outlines important Latino historical events as well as Latina theater's Mexican American predecessors next Chicana culture and its role in Chicano theater. She assesses theater's impact on identity formation, and how Latina lesbian performers deconstruct queer theory by complicating gender, race, ethnicity, and sexuality. The author's purpose is at once historical and theoretical; she uncovers and describes texts that are routinely overlooked, and places them within interdisciplinary dialogues on gender identity, performance theory, and social construction.------Ellen M. Gil-Gomez.

Nehama Aschkenasy. Woman at the Window: Biblical Tales of Oppression and Escape. Detroit, Mich.: Wayne State University Press, 1998. 181 pp. ISBN 0-8143-2626-9 (cl); 0-8143-2627-7 (pb).

Aschkenasy draws upon the motif of the woman at the window--long a symbol of femininity, fecundity, and sexual availability in the Near East--as a metaphor for biblical women's social, political, and spatial constriction. The study is divided into five parts, each using the metaphor of physical space to discuss an aspect of the biblical conception of women. Citing depictions of such women as Deborah, Jezebel, and Abigail, Aschkenasy contends that women had little political or social status, and that those who ventured into open spaces were subject to humiliation and ridicule, often accompanied by violence or death. Conversely, biblical texts presented women who remained within their proscribed sphere as wise, noble, and strong. The author concludes that, according to the Bible, Jewish women lived in a world that constrained them physically, socially, and politically; they ultimately were denied a voice in history, the foundation of Jewish destiny.------Lorraine Netrick Abraham

Sandra Lee Barney. Authorized to Heal: Gender, Class, and the Transformation of Medicine in Appalachia, 1880-1930. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. xiii + 222 pp.; ill.; tables; map. ISBN 0-8078- 2522-0 (cl); 0-8078-4834-4 (pb).

This history investigates the promotion of scientific medicine by nonnative, middle-class women in Appalachia. The study encompasses the period from the late nineteenth century, the beginning of women's endeavors in the region, to the 1920s, a decade that saw the decline of reform agendas and the professionalization of medicine. Barney suggests that the class, gender, and professional status of club women, settlement workers, and female physicians defined their actions and relationships with Appalachian residents. She uses numerous manuscript collections, government publications, newspapers, and other primary documents, as well as secondary literature on public health history, gender and maternalism, and Appalachian studies.------Chad Montrie

Cristelle L. Baskins. Cassone Painting, Humanism, and Gender in Early Modern Italy. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. xiv + 264 pp.; ill. ISBN 0-521-58393-4 (cl).

This book attempts to reevaluate feminist views of the cassone, a piece of furniture used as a strongbox for a bride's possessions. Fifteenth-century cassoni, typically painted with detailed portraits on the outside panels, provide the basis for this study. The author looks at those cassoni involving female protagonists, and balances the study with textual analysis. The variously interpreted theme of Amazons failed to establish gender roles, while the presentation of Dido urged viewers to redefine certain gender expectations. Other interpretations of cassoni images suggest the Italian emphasis on proper exogamic marriages, or the use of fantasy in imagery to support "territorial expansion and military aggression" (127). Finally, representations of both Lucretia and Virginia represent the importance of female chastity, except within marriage, while simultaneously confusing female and male roles.------Joshua Perkey

Juan Antonio Martínez Berbel and Roberto Castilla Pérez, eds. Las mujeres en la sociedad española del Siglo de Oro: Ficción teatral...