[Antiquitas] HelRAW seminar 13.12: Elina Pyy, "I Speak Because I Can: Gender, Violence, and the Rewriting of Ancient Myth in Contemporary Pop Music.”

[Harjunpää, Mira M]

Hei / Dear all,

muistuttaisin ystävällisesti maanantaina 13.12. klo 17.15 pidettävästä tämän syksyn viimeisestä Helsinki Research on Ancient World (HelRAW) -seminaarista. Puhujana on Elina Pyy (Suomen Rooman-instituutti) otsikolla I Speak Because I Can: Gender, Violence, and the Rewriting of Ancient Myth in Contemporary Pop Music.
Abstrakti ja linkki Zoomiin löytyvät alla olevasta viestistä. Tervetuloa mukaan!

I would like to kindly remind you on this semester’s last Helsinki Research on Ancient World (HelRAW) seminar on Mon 13th December at 17:15. Elina Pyy (Finnish Institute in Rome) will be speaking on: I Speak Because I Can: Gender, Violence, and the Rewriting of Ancient Myth in Contemporary Pop Music.
The abstract and link to Zoom are in the message below. Welcome!

Ystävällisin terveisin / With kind regards,
Mira Harjunpää


From: Koskimäki, Mirkka E M <mirkka.koskimaki at helsinki.fi>
Sent: 30. marraskuutata 2021 15.11
To: antiquitas at lists.utu.fi
Subject: [Antiquitas] HelRAW seminar 13.12: Elina Pyy, "I Speak Because I Can: Gender, Violence, and the Rewriting of Ancient Myth in Contemporary Pop Music.”

Dear all,


The final Helsinki Research on the Ancient World (HelRAW) seminar of 2021 takes place on 13th December with Elina Pyy (Finnish Institute in Rome) and the talk “I Speak Because I Can: Gender, Violence, and the Rewriting of Ancient Myth in Contemporary Pop Music.”

Abstract:

Sexual violence is among the most predominant themes in the Graeco-Roman narrative tradition. In Athenian tragedy, in Homeric epic, and in Roman historiography and poetry alike, rape wields great narrative significance – it is an act that sets events in motion and defines the dynamics between humans and gods, and between peoples, cities, and states. It is noteworthy that the ancient rape tales often tell us more about the aggressor than about the survivor who tends to disappear from the scene as soon as violence has served its narrative function. Intriguingly, this is the same phenomenon for which contemporary Western popular culture has been repeatedly accused: in both literature and screen fiction, sexual violence is used in abundance to explain and motivate the male protagonists' actions, while the subjectivity of the survivors is often lacking entirely.



This presentation discusses contemporary writers and artists who seek to challenge this dominant storytelling tradition – by utilising the very mythology from which it stems. In this seminar, I explore what is known as "feminist revisionist mythology": a narrative tradition that rewrites ancient myths of gender-based violence, often by putting emphasis on the survivors' viewpoint. While the influence of this tradition can nowadays be observed widely in literature, cinema, and visual arts, I will here limit my discussion to its applications in the field of pop music. I examine select examples from Anglo-American (folk) pop, written and performed by female artists, where the events, characters, or topoi of Graeco-Roman mythology are deliberately reinterpreted. With the help of these examples, I discuss how, through narratological choices concerning focalization and agency, victims have been metamorphosed into survivors and patriarchal myths into feminist fairytales of inclusion and empowerment.

When: December 13th 2021 at 17.15
Where: On Zoom
https://helsinki.zoom.us/j/69602868719?pwd=elI4djlvcXBuMzJwQytmWWRDOGpvdz09
Meeting ID: 696 0286 8719
Passcode: 679918
Event page: https://www2.helsinki.fi/en/news/language-culture/online-helraw-elina-pyy-13.12.2021
About the speaker: Elina Pyy is the vice director of the Finnish institute in Rome. She has published several articles on gender and identity in Roman literature, as well as the monographs "The Semiotics of Caesar Augustus" (Bloomsbury, 2018) and "Women and War in Roman Epic" (Brill, 2020). She is currently working on a classical reception studies project “Rewriting Rape: Narratives of Sexual Violence in Ancient Myth and on the Contemporary Screen”.



The event is a part of an interdisciplinary seminar series titled Helsinki Research on the Ancient World. This monthly seminar operates under the aegis of the PapyGreek (https://www.helsinki.fi/en/researchgroups/digital-grammar-of-greek-documentary-papyri) and SpaceLaw (www.spacelaw.fi<http://www.spacelaw.fi>) projects. The seminar is open for all.

Welcome!


Mirkka Koskimäki
mirkka.koskimaki at helsinki.fi<mailto:mirkka.koskimaki at helsinki.fi>
+358504679565
Tutkimusavustaja / Research assistant
Law, Governance and Space: Questioning the Foundations of the Republican Tradition (www.spacelaw.fi<http://www.spacelaw.fi/>)
Siltavuorenpenger 1 A, huone / room 323

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