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Masculinity, Desire, And Disarmament In Four Of Shakespeare's Comedies, Jennifer L. Basye

English Dissertations

This dissertation sets out to explore Lacan’s idea of the paradoxical condition of the masculine gender construction. As privileged, favored, powerful, entitled, and hegemonic as it may seem, masculinity does not come without its awareness of what Lacan has most accurately labeled the “threat or even […] the guise of deprivation.” In fact, this construction not only assumes threat and deprivation to its identity but goes so far as to rely upon these potential attacks as necessities in order to perform itself. In other words, the masculine role can only be identified, recognized and/or mean when presented with a threat. …