On Femininities in the Song of Songs and Beyond

Vita Daphna Arbel is Professor Emerita of Biblical/Early Jewish Literature at the The University of British Columbia, Canada.

Vita Daphna Arbel uses critical theories of gender to offer an alternative reading of the multilayered conceptualization of the Song of Song's feminine protagonist: "the most beautiful woman". Arbel treats "the most beautiful woman" as a culturally constructed and performed representation of "woman," and situates this representation within the cultural-­discursive contexts in which the Song partly emerged. She examines the gender norms and cultural ideologies it both reflects and constructs, and considers the manner in which this complex representation disrupts rigid, ahistorical notions of femininity, and how it consequently indirectly characterizes "womanhood" as dynamic and diverse.Finally, Arbel examines the reception and impact of these ideas on later conceptualizations of the Song of Songs' female protagonist with a heuristic examination of Mark Chagall's Song of Songs painting cycle, Le Cantique des Cantiques. These compositions-selected for their diverse depictions of the Song's protagonist, their impact on European art, and their vast popularity and bearing in the broader cultural imagination-illustrate a fascinating dialogue between the present and the past about the "most beautiful woman" and about multiple femininities.

Examines the reception of these ideas on later conceptualizations of Song's female protagonist, including in Mark Chagall's cycle Le Cantique des Cantiques

1. Introduction2. On Patriarchy, Female Eroticism, and Idealized Femininity3. On Many Shades of Femininity4. On Conformity and Resistance through Dressing and Undressing5. 'The Most Beautiful Woman" and Later GenerationsBibliographyIndex