Research Statement

Purpose

The objective of our research is to explore the importance of gender and sexuality in the work of the artists of the New York School. More specifically, we have examined pieces of New York School writers--Tim Dlugos, Alice Notley, Eileen Myles, Ed Sanders, Bernadette Mayer--and analyzed how their publications, rich with the themes of gender, sex, and sexual orientation, identify societal oppression and generate public movement to bring about change. We were interested in studying gender and sexuality as themes in these poems, but also how these poems were political artifacts. In relation to this goal, our website aims to reveal how the distinctive interventions of each artist developed unique sociocultural identities that challenged the traditional customs of twentieth-century America. Overall, we wish to not only show how work by these New York School poets shed light on glaring problems such as governmental tension and economic disparity, but also demonstrate how they give powerful examples of how to overcome stereotypes regarding the LGBTQ+ and feminist movements.

The audience for our artifact is divided into two sections. The first group encompasses those with a general interest in the New York School, including other students taking this English 1102 course. While they may not be aware of the specifics highlighted in our website, they would be open to learning more about the New York School and improve their awareness of its gender and sexuality-focused art. The second group contains those with an existing familiarity with these artists and their aesthetic, who have a specific goal of obtaining an in-depth understanding of how the work of these poets creates new possibilities for thinking about representations of gender and sexuality in contemporary poetry.

Research Findings And Analysis

Critics of our New York School poets argued that their pieces were unnecessarily controversial, duplicated the confessionalist aesthetic of mid-century American poetry but with “extreme” and explicit individual experiences. Yet, these exact subject matters enable our group’s work to create a direct message that was used to defy oppressive cultural structures. While every artist has a distinct focus, they are all connected by combatting and commenting on societal oppression via diverse representations of gender and sexuality.

Our poets strove to eliminate traditional standards surrounding their gender and sexuality. For Eileen Myles and Tim Dlugos, this convention was heteronormative intimacy, as they utilized their work to promote gay representation and acceptance. Through Chelsea Girls, Cool for You, and I Must be Living Twice, Myles espoused a striking tone to vividly discuss their personal, sexual life and dissect other orientation-related stereotypes, just as Dlugos’s earlier works “For Years” and “Once I Let a Man Blow Me” strived to redefine homosexual stereotypes through his constant sense of freedom when discussing his sexuality. Ed Sanders was also open in about his sexuality using both his multimodality and beatnik ideals to propelled the ideas of peace through liberation, particularly a sexual liberation. We also see Mayer writing on her bisexuality in a revolutionary way, especially in her collections of poetry in Scarlet Tanager, Sonnets, Indigo Bunting, and Poetry State Forest. She strived for an accurate depiction of female sexuality and gender, and as one of the few female poets of the New York School and speaking openly about bisexuality, Mayer is able to bring a perspective to poetry that is often not represented.

Mayer along with Alice Notley serve as clear voices of women’s issues in the New York School. Mayer focuses on exposing the inequalities she faces as a woman and mother in the world, parts of womanhood that are not often talked about including pregnancy and menstruation, an accurate depiction of female sexuality, and detailing her own experiences and desires. Similarly, Notley challenges the supposed masculinity of poetry by writing on the same typically feminine concept of motherhood while also dissecting the hypocrisy of the intellectual and sexual oppression of married life.

Our poets chose not to write just on their own experience but used those to request and bring about social change. Each poet did more than write for the visibility of diverse sexuality and gender in poetry. We see Sander’s poetry, in which he mimicked iambic pentameter via his familiarity with Greek, magazines, including Fuck You Magazine, and music, including the songs he wrote and performed for the Fugs, promote the values of the avant-garde, disobedience, and freedom that were always central to his work. Later in his life, Dlugos was diagnosed with HIV/AIDS. He applies the same autonomous mentality of his earlier works on sexuality in later pieces such as “G-9” and “Powerless” to combat jaundice present against those similarly afflicted by this promiscuously stereotyped disease. We also see Notley speaking in a feminist lens with her essays “Women and Poetry” and “The Femmine Epic”. She writes on how she and other poets like Mayer, Dlugos, Sanders, and Myles appropriated the structure and forms of poetry to their own experiences. We see this in her epic The Descent of Alette as it delves not only into the place of women in society but topics surrounding the connection of sex, feminity, and power.

To create argumentative depth, we structured our research process to gather a variety of complementary information. We obtained primary sources from the GT/Emory Shared Collection, including extensive works of poetry and prose for each artist. We also acquired secondary sources, reviews of our poets’ work, academic analysis, and interviews containing critical contextual knowledge from online sources such as JSTOR. Finally, we used the Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library at Emory University for primary sources such as photographs, first editions, and other archival material to provide important textual and visual content for our project.

Contribution To The Field Of Study

Our artifact adds a unique interpretation to the New York School. The average observer views art from this movement as bold and emotional but generally does not expect this poetry and writing to be in discourse with cultural politics and works as a catalyst for social change. As first-year students at a technical institute, we were predisposed to focus more on the ‘cause-and-effect’ component of these publications. Our artifact therefore acts as a platform to showcase how these New York School artists strove to use the poetic genre as a medium to not only express their purest emotions, but also to change aspects and perceptions of society as a whole. With our website, we show the ideals and commentary they had for the world, and how they structured and focused their work accordingly to achieve these goals.

Our creation can also serve as a resource for scholars as it provides information that looks into the more personal side of the New York School, highlighting our artists’ individual struggles with gender and sexuality. Scholars can obtain extensive knowledge regarding this humanistic aspect of art, and develop a refined perspective of how poetry and prose can act as a vehicle to instill egalitarian beliefs and values that permeate throughout the population and eradicate existing negative traditions. In addition, our “societal-dissent” interpretation of the New York School allows future researchers to connect the works of our poets to counter cultural and political movements of the time, including the LGBTQ+, feminist, civil rights, and pop art movements, allowing them to discuss similarities in the use of emotional literature to manifest change across this moments.