Descripción del proyecto
Los cuentos de hadas en la reinvención de las desviaciones
El género y la sexualidad se han erigido en temas destacados en los debates culturales y científicos actuales en toda Europa y América del Norte. En el siglo XIX, la psiquiatría primitiva estableció divisiones profundas entre el comportamiento «normal/anormal», «moral/desviado» y la enfermedad mental. Esto influyó en la literatura, que a su vez ha desafiado su narración patriarcal y sus normas estrictas y ha reinterpretado la codificación de la locura en la psiquiatría. Muchos cuentos de hadas de Francia, Gran Bretaña y Estados Unidos perfilan este proceso. Desde este punto de partida, el proyecto financiado con fondos europeos MadLand llevará a cabo estudios innovadores, interdisciplinarios, transnacionales y translingüísticos que investigarán el intercambio de conocimientos entre la psiquiatría y la literatura a la hora de interpretar y reinventar la desviación mediante un análisis textual comparativo del discurso sobre la enfermedad mental y los cuentos de hadas.
Objetivo
‘Madness in Fairy Land’ (MadLand) is an interdisciplinary exploration of fairy-tale and medical discourses on deviance and abnormality in 19th-century Britain, France, and the US. The project demonstrates the mutual knowledge-exchange between psychiatry and literature in interpreting, understanding, and (re)imagining deviance. In its comparative textual analysis of treatises on mental illness and fairy-tale narratives, MadLand provides the first transnational and translinguistic investigation: (1) of the ways in which 19th-century literary fairy tales reflected, incorporated, and questioned medical interpretations of moral and psychological deviance and of abnormal behaviour; and (2) of how the fairy-tale imagery and language of monstrosity, in turn, influenced and served as a point of reference for the codification of insanity by psychiatry in its formative period, 1820-1900.
MadLand examines portrayals of diverse characters and themes in fairy-tale narratives that challenged hegemonic views of (hetero)normativity. It investigates literature’s creative reaction to the rigid dividing lines between normality and deviance as established by early psychiatry, then incorporated into the dominant cultural discourse, and still very much debated today. Exploring the emergence of psychological deviance and its representation in 19th-century fairy tales from a comparative viewpoint, MadLand contributes to current discussions on perceived norms and deviations of sexual orientation and gender expression, shedding light on medical and literary debates around ab/normal behaviour, monstrosity, gender, and sexuality in Europe and North America.
As an expert in the relations between literature and medicine and 19th-century discourses of decadence, I am especially qualified to undertake this research, which will give me the opportunity to build on my existing knowledge in comparative literature as well as to acquire new skills and competences in fairy-tale and gender studies.
Ámbito científico
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MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinador
30123 Venezia
Italia