“trapped between two furies” of Capitalist Domination; a Marxist Reading of Race, Gender and

Capital in Valerie Martin’s Property across Discourses of Sociology and English Literature

Jade Crimson Rose Da Costa

Western University

English 9117B April 20th 2015

Introduction

Dorothy E. Smith’s essay “Exploring the Social Relations of Discourse” investigates

social theory as a product of institutional hegemony. Smith frames her argument within a

discussion of Mikhail M. Bakhtin’s dialogical theory of the novel. A discussion she accompanies

with her own sociological theory of standpoint. Here, Smith compares and contrasts the

dialogical characteristic of sociological inquiry with that of literary texts. She does this to aid in

the establishment of her epistemological claim, in which she presents sociology as an authorized

system of regulated knowledge (Smith, 1999: 146). The latter, Smith’s premise, is not a concern

of this paper. Instead, this paper draws on Smith’s essay to conceptualize Valerie Martin’s

Property from a Marxist perspective. In a re-appropriation of Smith’s writing, this paper

proposes that Property can be read as a hybrid form of social theory and literature, and functions

as a literary text of sociological standpoint. I employ Smith’s concept of standpoint in order to

situate Martin’s Property within a materialist ontology of social knowledge, one that draws on

the relationship between property, race and gender. This is in an effort to identity Property as a

socio-cultural text critical of the role of white feminism in gender conceptualization. This is a

critique of white feminism that is realized through the dialogical medium of the novel, and

therefore presents an imagined reading of sexism and racism that is formed within the non-

authoritarian standpoint of Manon. As a result, gender conceptualization is Valerie Martin’s

Property is rooted in the everyday realities of the individual. This puts fourth an understanding of

the social world that is developed in the intimate and diverging relations of property that are, in

turn, posed within the real relations of capitalist production.

Theoretical Framework

Epistemology: The Dialogic and Standpoint

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 It must first be noted that this paper is only interested in Smith’s reading of the dialogic.

Therefore, the work of Bakhtin will solely be considered with regards to Smith’s appropriation of

the dialogic, and not the theory itself. In “Exploring the Social Relations of Discourse,” Smith

outlines how Bakhtin’s theorization of the novel is essentially dialogical. She recognizes that

within the theory of the dialogic language is perceived as a “socio-ideological concrete thing,”

which is embedded in what Bakhtin calls a “sphere of activity” (Smith, 1999: 135). Smith defines

spheres of activity as contextual moments of shared social reality that comprise of “the whole” of

language, in which “the specific nature” of language is considered apiori to the individual

(Smith, 1999: 135). The individual is thought to appropriate “the whole” of language when they

speak, since how one uses language is dependent on their unique understanding of language as a

predetermined form. This is how Smith reads Bakhtin’s concept of “speech genres,” which she

defines as the “local practices of speaking, writing, hearing and reading” that individuals engage

in, in their appropriation of language and knowledge (Smith 1999: 141). The novel, as a literary

form, draws on a variety of these speech genres. In creating the novel, the author attempts to

encapsulate the multitude of voices that compose the society they seek to represent. Smith argues

that this is inherently a dialogical project, since the representations of diverse characters are

always mediated through the speech genre of the author. Therefore, the multiple voices of society

are always read with and against the voice of the author. As Smith (1999) states, “the author’s

voice draws in and subdues another’s speech, in irony where the author’s voice reflects on others,

and in movement between one voice and another in narrative sequences so that one reflects on (is

in a dialogue with) another (Smith 1999: 137).” The novel is thought to be embedded within a

specific socio-historical context of language that is comprised of diverse forms of expression. It

is from this multitude of voices that the author draws on and appropriates in their textual

formulation of social reality. For Smith, this is a reading and depiction of the social world that is
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solely mediated through the personal voice of the narrator. The novel becomes an articulated

imagination of real world expressions that are derived from the unique standpoint of the author.

Therefore, this personally mediated imagination of social existence illustrates social reality

through the context of one’s lived reality (Smith 1999: 137).

Bakhtin is interested in the novel as a literary form, and not as a socio-cultural text. As a

result, Smith argues that the concept of the dialogic is only used by Bakhtin to understand forms

of language. This is opposed to using the dialogic to understand forms of socio-cultural

knowledge that operate both within, and outside of, the literary form (Smith 1999: 144). While

his notion of “spheres of activity” ontologically situates speech genres into forms of social

activity, Bakhtin’s focus is on the dialogical expression of language formation within the novel,

and not on the dialogical relationship between the novel and social knowledge (Smith 1999:

143). Smith notes that sociology, like the novel, attempts to appropriate multiple social voices

into a text mediated discourse of, and located in, a heterogeneous society. Unlike the novel,

however, sociology seeks to “claim a reality beyond itself (Smith 1999: 143).” A depiction of

social reality that is proposed by a sociologist can therefore be read dialogically with the rest of

the social world. This is done through the author’s production of, and the reader’s engagement

with, sociological texts. Smith argues that while this is the essential character of sociology, it is

still highly problematic within the production of sociological writings. Sociological discourse is

often articulated from the standpoint of the white, male sociologist, who subjects the diverse

nature of society to a monologism of hegemonic expression (Smith 1999: 143). As a result,

Smith argues for a sociology of “standpoint,” in which conceptualizations of the social world are

rooted in the everyday realities of the individual. These realities do not construct the social world

for Smith. Instead, they contextualize it, while keeping the dialogical characteristic of sociology

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intact (Smith 1999: 143). It is this definition of “standpoint” that this paper employs as a way to

deconstruct the novel as a literary text of sociological analysis, and criticism.

Literature and Sociology

For Smith the dialogic of the novel is read strictly as an “in text” project” concerned with

the appropriation of multiple forms of language, vis-à-vis the author’s voice. In contrast,

sociology’s dialogic is a mosaic of social voices, and experiences, which Smith believes are

obliterated by the scientific paradigm of sociological discourse. The form of the novel is

considered to keep the dialogical element of society intact, while sociology is thought to subject

the multitude of social voices to a monologism of standardized knowledge. Moreover, the

content of sociology is considered to focus on the dialogical element of experience, whereas the

novel is thought to focus on the dialogical element of language. Therefore, Smith distinguishes

the dialogic of the novel from that of sociology based on differences of both form and content. In

contrast, this paper does not draw a clear distinction between the two, and instead reads Martin’s

Property as a literary text of sociological standpoint. That is, akin to the dialogic of the novel,

this paper argues that Martin’s Property appropriates multiple social voices through the voice of

the author. Specifically, the voice of the female slave, Sarah, is appropriated through the voice of

the white mistress, Manon. This creates a hybrid of expression as the voice of Sarah, the black,

female slave, is read through, with, and against, the voice of Manon. However, unlike the

“novel’s dialogic,’ this is not considered to be just a function of language; the experience of the

black, female slave is read through, with, and against, the experience of the white mistress. This

is in an imagination of social reality that is situated within a specific sociological standpoint,

wherein, the representation of the oppressed, black body is mediated through the gendered

standpoint of the white mistress. Manon’s conceptualization of the oppression, domination and

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exploitation that is felt by the racialized body of Sarah is read through, and against, her own

experiences of oppression, domination and exploitation. Martin does this in an effort to

problematize the “universal” notion of gender identity that is maintained by white feminism.

Manon’s appropriation of Sarah’s “voice,” and the female slave experience, compares and

contrasts the sexism Manon feels as a white woman with the sexism and racism Sarah

experiences as a black woman. This allows Martin to compare and relate the experiences of the

female slave with the experiences of the mistress. As a result, Valerie Martin’s Property aims to

illustrate the hypocrisy of mainstream western feminism to theoretically obscure the black female

body. Here, Martin conceptualizes both racism and sexism as functions of property in capitalist

production, which illustrates the social intimacies between the two as forms of domination.

Ontology: Marxism

This paper builds off of the actual writings of Marx to position gender and race as

expressions of capital. In the context of this paper, then, race and gender refer to ideological

codes, scripts and texts that compose “pure” forms of racial and gender identity. These “pure”

forms of identity are ontologically grounded in material relations of production, and are thought

of as social constructions of the body. However, “racial” identity and “gender” identity are

perceived as forms of expression that are enacted on a continuum of racial and gender

expression. Such forms of expression are epistemologically realized within the diverse social

locations of social reality. In other words, race and gender are abstract forms of identity that are

not real, and yet are treated as if they were. This is a material definition of both race and gender,

which propositions human consciousness as directly tied to our corporeal bond with the material

world. “Racialized” and “gendered” expressions of identity are epistemologically known and

constructed based on forms of consciousness ontologically conceived within a material world of

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production (Marx 1932: 173). Gender and race as expressions of capital, then, refers to race and

gender identification as a process of abstraction that is framed within capitalist production.

Racial and gender ideologies are abstract forms of consciousness that are forged within the

“totality of capital” relations (Marx 1932: 173).These dominant ideologies are epistemologically

realized and reconstructed by the unique individual as a result of their position within the social

world (Floyd 2009: 29). Individual racial and gender identities are what Marx calls “thinner

abstractions” of social reality. That is, they are “thinner abstractions” of the overarching

ideologies of “race” and “gender,” which are pure forms of consciousness (Marx, 1939: 237).

Marx outlines this project of abstraction in his essay The Grundisse. Marx states that the

relations of capital are first conceived with regards to the “real and concrete” material relations of

the economy, such as the relations of property and production. However, these material relations

merely propose an ontological, not an epistemological, totality of the “imagined concrete”

(Marx: 1939: 237). Within this “imagined concrete” moments of social existence that are based

on the subjects’ epistemological standpoint can be abstracted from the totality of social relations.

These moments of epistemological divergence, these “thinner abstractions,” then compose the

whole of social reality in “a rich totality of many determinations and relations (Marx 1939:

237).” Here, the social world materializes as a concentration of the whole. As such, gender and

race ideologies are rooted in premises of material production, while they are still continuously

engaged in a process of production, reproduction and appropriation within the “rich totality” of

social existence. Therefore, to claim that race and gender are expressions of capital is to identify

that within capitalist production “race” and “gender” are directly tied to the relations of capital

and private property. This observation is threefold: 1) racialized and gendered bodies employ a

specific epistemological standpoint within the social world. These standpoints are informed by

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ideologies about race and gender; 2) such racial and gender mythologies are ontologically rooted

in material forces, and serve to promote the production of capital, and legitimize the relations of

property; and 3) as a result, racialized and gendered bodies occupy a specific social location

within the social world. This location is based on their relationship to capital and private

property. This paper, therefore, is not focused on the class relations between gender, race and

elements of the economy, such as the division of labour within the institution of slavery. Instead,

this paper conceptualizes race and gender as abstract forms of property, and investigates how

these forms of property are epistemologically engaged by the white, female standpoint of Valerie

Martin’s novel. This paper argues that Martin’s novel dialogically engages the relationship

between race, gender and property as they exist within the “totality of capital” relations. This is

thought to be done in an effort to problematize the exclusionary politics of mainstream white

feminism.

The Masculine and Property

Gender ideologies, as “pure” types of identity, in North America can be rooted to the

public/private divide of industrial capitalist production. Industrial means of production in 19th

century capitalism splintered productive and consumer practices due to a subsequent division

between the public and private sphere. This division was a result of industrial means of

production shifting labour outside of the home, and into the public economy. The domestic

sphere became a space associated with consumption, which was posed in contrast to the

industrial public space of capitalist production and private property (Andersen 2011:398).

“Women,” who occupied the private sphere, became associated with the cultural ethos of

“consumption” that permeated the domestic space. In turn, the social position of “women”

became devalued, since consumer practices were valued in opposition to the public discourse of

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production (Andersen 2011:398). As a result, femininity and masculinity became the ideological

embodiments of these gendered social spaces. Womanhood became conflated with the

“valueless-ness” of the private sphere, as well as with the ideals of domesticity, consumerism and

dependency that the private sphere was associated with. Similarly, masculinity became

ideologically embedded in the public sphere of production. Notions of manhood became

symbolized by the “man’s” privileged relationship to private property and production processes.

Masculinity and femininity are, therefore, forms of consciousness that are forged in the material

relations of a capitalist economy. These pure forms of gender identity define the “masculine” as

an element of material production. The masculine body’s location within the social relations of

capital is a result of their direct relationship to the maintenance, production and ownership of

property (Oldfield 2013:9). Therefore, masculinity and property are interconnected social forces

that mark gendered social spaces. These spaces serve to reproduce power relations between

women and men based on their relations to production. “Woman,” the feminized body, is

associated with consumer practices that are ruled and dominated by the public sphere of

production. This renders the female body subordinate to the masculine body, which functions as

a symbol of property and ownership (Blunt and Rose, 1994: 3).

White Feminism

The above conceptualization of gender identity is a “pure” conceptualization of gender. It

centralizes the white, female body, and obscures the black, female body. This is the gendered

narrative adopted by “white, middle class feminists.” These feminists often treat the spatial

relations within the gendered power dynamics of the public/private divide as absolute boundaries

of gendered existence (Blunt and Rose, 1994: 4). This obliterates diverging experiences of

gender that are based on diverse social locations, such as race and class (Anzaldua and Moraga

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1983: 205). Arguably, there is value in this method of gender conceptualization, since it

contextualizes the relationship between the masculine and property. I would, therefore, argue that

the ontological premise of the public/private divide is not an incorrect method for gender

conceptualization. Instead, I would suggest that it is an incomplete conceptualization of gender

identity that provides an unfinished explanation for gender oppression. It is “incomplete” because

gender and sexual inequality are solely framed within the context of the feminine, domestic

figure. This figure is derived from gender ideals that have been historically and culturally denied

to black women. For one, as an instrument of production, the slave body is inherently a body

signified by labour. Similarly, the racialized body is a body plagued with a cultural legacy of

colonialism, slavery and exploitation. This marks the black body with a social status of

inferiority, animalism and savagery that is incompatible with the figure of the dignified “true

woman” of white femininity; a figure defined by its relationship to the domestic space (Newman,

1999: 9). Therefore, this conceptualization of gender, as a “universalized” notion of gender

identity, proposes an epistemological unity of “womanness” that is focused on a common

prescription of assumed, gendered labour. This results in an epistemologically fatalistic definition

of gender identity, one that is based on Eurocentric gender ideals that are derived from a social

location of white, middle class privilege (Blunt and Rose, 1994:4).

This paper does not aim to critique the validity of the public/private divide as an

ontological premise for gender identity. Instead, this paper draws on this conceptualization of

gender in order to contextualize the epistemological context of Martin’s Property, which is read

as a literary text of sociological standpoint. This discussion is framed within a Marxist

perspective that aims to conceptualize “race” and “gender” as expressions of capital. Based on a

reading of Dorothy Smith’s essay “Exploring the Social Relations of Discourse” this paper

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argues that Martin’s novel dialogically engages the voice, and experiences, of the black, female,

slave body, from the position of “white, middle class feminism.” As a result, the narrative of

sexual and gender oppression that is illustrated by Manon’s perspective, the perspective arguably

of white feminism, is read in contrast and relation to her appropriation of the back, female voice.

This highlights the intimacies between racism and sexism, as well as the racial tensions that

undercut white feminism as a collective movement, therefore problematizing universalized

notions of gender oppression.

Analysis of Valerie Martin’s Property

The White Gendered Standpoint

This paper adopts the term “white feminism” to refer to a generalized understanding of

mainstream, western feminists. It refers to a philosophy of gender conceptualization, and

includes feminists who emphasize the social construction of gender by drawing on the division

between the masculine, public sphere and the feminine, private realm. This division, in turn, is

treated as a universal construct for female identity and gender oppression (Oldfield 2013: 11). In

the beginning of Martin’s Property, Manon’s character can be said to embody a standpoint of

“white feminism.” Manon moves the reader through sexist experiences that allude to white

feminist critiques of the family and domestic femininity. In this sense, the beginning of Manon’s

narrative sets up the political agenda of the white feminist movement. That is, Manon’s character

illuminates, disrupts and critiques notions of domestic femininity. This is done by moving

through a narrative that is subjected to the “normative” gendered script of the white, female body

of 19th century North America. For example, Manon rejects notions of the “maternal” woman,

and grapples with the social expectations placed on white women to bear children. In a scene at

her doctor’s office, for example, Manon claims that she both does not want, and cannot have,

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children. Moreover, her inability to reproduce is tied to her lack of desire to procreate with her

husband. When Manon’s doctor asks why she cannot get pregnant, Manon directly states that:

“there is no physical reason…it is because I despise my husband (Martin 2004: 37 – 38).”

Similarly, in this scene with her Doctor, Manon contemplates on the social norm of child bearing

for white women. Manon assumes that as a woman childbearing would be an inherent

responsibility for her to both fulfil and desire. As Manon states: “I had assumed I would have

children, the question of whether I wanted them had never occurred to me. What sort of woman

doesn’t want children? (Martin 2004: 37).” Manon concludes that she does not want to have

children, and understands this as the reason why she cannot become pregnant. This is a moment

of bodily disassociation. Manon actively rejects the biological “prescription” of the naturally

domestic and maternal woman. She subverts the naturalization of the female body based on

gender ideologies of the “domestic woman,” and physically rejects the act of procreation due to

an emotional, and psychological, rejection of her husband. I read this scene as a critique of the

gendered social spaces of capitalist production. Manon’s rejection of the “naturally” domestic

woman echoes white feminist critiques of hegemonic gender ideologies. These ideologies serve

to justify female subordination, and maintain the belief that women are both responsible for and

naturally designed to reproduce their husband’s children (Blunt and Rose, 1994:2). In contrast,

Manon’s character refuses to procreate physically as a result of her emotional dissociation from

her role as a “wife.”

This scene plays with the naturalization of the female body based on cultural notions of

femininity, and de-naturalizes the physicality of child birth within the female body of Manon.

This is done through a subversion of the dominate female-male relationship, which proposes a

wife’s automatic loyalty to her husband, and aims to problematize the “natural” domesticity of

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the feminine subject. This sentiment of rejecting the innate feminine body, and problematizing

the “domestic responsibilities” of the wife, appears again in the scene where Manon and her

husband have “sex”. Manon drugs herself so she can become “perfectly indifferent” to her

husband’s sexual and physical embrace (Martin 2004: 56). As a result, Manon is removed from

her body as a sexual instrument of pleasure for the dominant, male subject. This subverts the

ideal that a wife is inherently responsible for fulfilling her husband’s desires. This is an ideal

passionately criticized by white feminists, who challenge the patriarchal notion that “in the

bedroom [the woman] is not to be eloquent with her mind but only with her body, for there she

exists for her husband’s pleasure (Blunt and Rose, 1994: 2).” Instead, Manon rejects her body; a

gendered body. A body marked by ideologies of power, and steeped in the mythological conceit

of the relations of property. Similarly, Manon’s body becomes dead, and it is only through the

death of the body that she is able to escape her gendered social location. For example, Manon

states in the “sex” scene with her husband:

“Are you finished already?” I asked agreeably.

“I’ve not much interest in making love to a corpse,” he said.
I laughed. How wonderful that he would call what we were doing “making love,” how amusing
that he drew the line at corpse. “If I am dead,” I said, “it is because you have killed me (Martin,
2004: 56 – 57).”

The feminine body is a “dead” body. It is a body penetrated by the cultural ethos of capitalist

oppression and domination. Within capitalism the status of the body is based on one’s

relationship to property, or lack thereof. The white, female standpoint of Manon is situated

within the “totality of capital,” in which her gendered vantage is defined by an oppositional

status to property and ownership. This renders the feminine body as inferior and subordinate to

the masculine property owner.

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 I read this scene as embodying the political narrative of white feminism that aims to free

the “gendered” subject from social constructions of the body. A social construction of the body

that is, in turn, based on the relations of production, and the masculine public/feminine private

divide (Blunt and Rose, 1994: 4). Manon’s act of physical dissonance, in an effort to remove

herself from her sexual duties as a man’s “property,” illustrates the core political drive of white

feminism. That is, it evokes the axiom that it is only through the physical rejection of the

gendered body, as something “natural” and “essential” to the female body, that patriarchal

domination can be overcome (Carby, 1987: 18). By moving Manon through the gendered social

location of the white, feminine body Martin sets up the political agenda of white feminism. This

demonstrates the oppression and discrimination felt uniquely to white women as a result of their

specific standpoint in the relations of capital. It is from this standpoint of white feminism that the

experiences of the black, female slave body are dialogically read with, and against, in Martin’s

novel.

The Racial Tensions of White Feminism

The experiences of the black, female slave are read through, and against, the political

agenda of white feminism that is embodied within the narrative of Manon. For example, in the

previously mention scene of the doctor’s office, Manon engages in a critique of the male-female

relations that exist within the family structure; however, she also touches on Sarah’s diverging

role within these “universalized” gendered subjectivities. Manon claims that her emotional

disregard for her husband is based on his sexual relationship with Sarah, and their resulting son

Walter. For example, she says to the Doctor: “would the fact that the servant I brought to the

marriage has borne him a son, and that this creature is allowed to run loose in the house, like a

wild animal, would that be, in your view, sufficient cause for a wife to despise her husband?

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(Martin 2004: 38).” This comment is read dialogically with the rest of the scene; Manon’s bodily

rejection of procreation, and subversion of the domestic female figure within the family, are

contrasted with the position of the female slave within the family. As a white woman, Manon’s

oppression is based on her domestic role within the private space of consumption, in which her

“femininity” is defined by her role as a wife and a mother. In contrast, Sarah’s sexual

exploitation is based on her role as a slave, not as a woman. The female-male relationship

between Sarah and Manon’s husband is framed within a larger relationship of master and slave.

Within this relationship the master has a right to the slave’s body as a form of property and as an

instrument of labour (Newman, 1999: 9). Similarly, unlike Manon, who can reject her body

through sleeping pills, Sarah cannot escape her body, since her body is not hers to reject.

Manon’s oppression is based on her relationship to capital as a “domestic housewife,”

who is bound by marriage and a dependency on the “masculine” property owner. In contrast,

Sarah, as a slave, cannot legally get married, and has no legal rights of her children. The scene at

the doctor’s office dialogically reads Manon’s role within the family with that of Sarah’s. This

problematizes the family dynamic criticized by white feminists, since such criticisms are framed

within the historical context of the public/private divide, which obscures the standpoint of the

female, slave body. While Manon criticizes the ideology of the “maternal woman” as the site of

gender oppression, this is a criticism inaccessible to the female slave. This is because the slave’s

role as a mother is a commoditized process of procreation that is only valued for the purpose of

producing more slaves. Similarly, as a form of property, the sexual exploitation of the black,

female slave is not framed within the same context of “wifely duties” that Manon’s sexual

exploitation is. It is framed within the context of the master/slave relationship, wherein, the slave

is solely known as the master’s property, and therefore, the master has the right to use the slave’s

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body in any way they desire. The gender oppression felt by Manon, as a white woman, is then

dialogically read with Sarah’s experience as a slave.

Sarah cannot claim female subordination within patriarchy as a result of the domestic,

feminine figure. The black, slave body, unlike the white body of the mistress, does not have the

legal or cultural right to claim motherhood, femininity and domesticity in the first place

(Newman, 1999:6). The racialized, feminine body is therefore subordinate to both the masculine

property owner, and the“feminine” white body, since the latter is viewed as the idealized

gendered subject (Newman, 1999: 9). Unlike the solely gendered body of Manon, the standpoint

of the female slave is situated within the “totality of capital” on the basis of the slave’s

oppositional status to property as an instrument of capitalist production. The scene at the doctor’s

office frames white feminism’s critique of the family, and the public/private divide, with a

dialogical discussion between the white, female body and the black, female body. Manon’s

illumination and critique of female subordination within the family is undercut by the subject of

the female slave. The female slave, compared to the white mistress, is a diverging standpoint

within the “totality of capital.” This is because the slave body is a body marked by property

relations that are uniquely distinct from the property relations that dominant the body of the

white mistress. Martin problematizes the universal notion of gender conceptualization posed by

white feminists by reading the oppression felt by “white women” in contradictory terms with the

oppression felt by black, slave women.

The Intimacies between Racism and Sexism

The standpoints of the female slave and the white mistress are posed as diverging standpoints

in Martin’s Property. This is in an effort to undercut gender universalism within white feminism,

since the experiences of the white mistress are read in contradiction to the experiences of the

15
female slave. However, Property’s dialogical appropriation of the slave experience, through the

voice of Manon, allows Martin to also draw on the commonalities between racial and gender

domination. Both the standpoints of the white woman and the black woman are contextualized

within the “totality of capital” relations. Both white and black female subjects are defined by

their oppositional status to property ownership, and are dominated by the masculinized material

force of capitalist production. Similarly, just as Manon’s critique of the family is undercut by

Sarah’s role within the family, it is also simultaneously complimented by it. Manon’s husband

subjects both Sarah and Manon to economic and sexual domination on the basis of their common

oppositional social locations to property ownership. For example, Manon tells the doctor that the

reason she does not get a new slave is because: “he would only find another. And this one suits

me. She hates him as much as I do.” A comment the doctor responds to with sympathy for her

husband, as a man “trapped between two furies (Martin 2004: 38).” This moment touches on the

common experiences between racism and sexism, since both are ideologies forged in the interest

of capital. That is, Sarah’s position as a slave and Manon’s position as a wife are “two furies”

subjected to domination and exploitation by virtue of the white, masculine body. In other words,

the oppressions Sarah and Manon experience are both situated within the “imagine concrete” of

capitalism and private property. However, their epistemological conceptualizations of oppression

are based on diverging standpoints within the relations of capital. Hence, while racial and gender

ideologies are ontologically conceptualized based on economic premises, such as the

private/public divide and the institution of slavery, racial and gender identities are still

experienced based on unique relations to property. This produces diverse racial and gendered

social experiences, which are based on the complex relations of capital (Marx, 1939: 287).

16
 The relationship between the oppression felt by black women and that felt by white women

is arguably a relationship of both tension and intimacy. The intimate ties between the racialized

and gendered body are based on their subordinate relations to capital and property. However, this

common social position is undercut by the diverging power relations between white and black

bodies. Similarly, white feminists attempt to make claims to “sisterhood” based on common

experiences of oppression. However, this is done within a rhetoric that attempts to universalize

the gendered subject, despite race and class, and without, in turn, identifying the privileged

position white women have over women of colour (Newman 1990: 17). In Martin’s Property the

complex social ties between racism and sexism are dialogically developed in the scene where

Manon drinks Sarah’s breast milk. On the one hand, this is a scene of domination. Manon’s

position of power over Sarah allows her to objectify her body, and sexually assault her. Because

Manon’s sense of identity is rooted in her gendered standpoint of the “domestic housewife,”

subdued and subsumed by her dominant male counterpart, she forms her own subjectivity

through domination and the relations of property. As a result, in the breast milk scene, Manon

gets pleasure from her ability to dominant Sarah the same way a white man does. This gives her a

sense of empowerment and freedom, she states:

“I could see myself, kneeling there, and beyond me the room where my mother’s body
lay…and beyond that I could see my husband in his office, lifting his head from his books with
an uncomfortable suspicion that something important was not adding up. This vision made me
smile…how wonderful I felt, how entirely free. My headache disappeared, my chest seemed to
expand, there was a complementary tingling in my own breasts (Martin 2004: 76).”

In this scene, Manon’s pleasure is derived from her ability to dominate Sarah the same way her

husband does. That is, her ability to perform an act of domination symbolic of the master’s

domination of the slave; the property owner‘s claiming of his property. This allows Manon to

identify with the subjectivity of the dominant, male body, and feel “entirely free” within the

17
experience of a free, white man. This scene is dialogically read with regards to Manon’s

epistemological standpoint; Manon empowers herself by subjecting Sarah to the same sexual

oppression she criticizes her husband for. This both evokes and illustrates the racial tensions

within white feminism, wherein, the oppression felt by white women is read separately from the

oppression they impose onto women of colour. This is in an effort to “free” the white woman

from male domination, without regards to the racial oppression white women objectify black

women too. Moreover, is illustrates how “universal” notions of gender oppression are

problematized by the internal divisions of capital. In other words, this scene illustrates the

intersectional component of gender conceptualization, and problematizes a notion of “sisterhood”

by freeing the white, female subject through her domination of the black, female body.

The breast milk scene can also be said to be a moment of intimacy between Sarah and

Manon, a scene that, in turn, symbolizes the intimacy between racial and sexual domination. For

one, the scene alludes to a sexual imagery that is juxtaposed with Manon’s sexual objectification

of Sarah. For example, Manon states: “I took it more deeply into my mouth and sucked from my

cheeks. This is what he does, I thought. At once a sharp, warm jet hit my throat and I swallowed

to keep from choking (Martin 2004: 76).” For one, such sexually charged language creates an

aura of sexual tension; moreover, the language used to describe Sarah’s breast milk is also

connotative of the male orgasm. This arguably alludes to Manon’s disempowered position within

this scene as well. It is only through Sarah that Manon can become empowered. That is, it is only

through her use of the slave body that Manon is able to consume the sensation of masculinity

from that of her gendered standpoint. Manon’s domination of Sarah re-establishes her own

subordinate position because it is only through the affirmation of the masculine, through the

claiming of property and domination, that the female subject is able to feel free. Therefore, I read

18
this scene as a demonstration of the intimacies between sexism and racism. Martin alludes to the

fact that at the core of racial domination is the relationship between race and property.

Simultaneously, she also illustrates how at the core of sexual domination is the relationship

between gender and property. Through her sexual objectification of Sarah Manon illustrates their

common social location as “property.” Moreover, this act of sexual objectification illuminates the

racial tensions within a universalized, gender identity, and dialogically engages in the complex

relations of property, race and gender.

Gender, Race and Capital

In Martin’s Property the complex social ties between racism and sexism are most evident

when Manon becomes a property owner herself. One particular scene occurs near the end of the

novel when Manon confronts the death of her father, and realizes that he killed himself due to the

fact that “he was obsessed by the Negros (Martin 2004: 182).” This obsession was arguably an

obsession of capital. Manon realizes that her father’s life revolved around his role as a producer,

a property owner, and not as a father and a husband. She even states that: “he didn’t bother to

leave me…anything that I might have clung to as evidence that he regretted abandoning me, that

I figured in his life more important than his hoe or a sick field hand, which, after all, received a

mention in his journal” (Martin 2004: 182). In this moment, Manon realizes that her father, just

as her husband, valued her in terms of property and ownership. That is, he valued his own life in

terms of property and ownership, and therefore, did not value her at all, or at least not as much as

he valued a “hoe or a sick field hand.” Manon identifies that the “masculine” and property are

one in the same, in which the former always exists in relation to the latter, and vice versa. This

subverts her new position as a property owner, and problematizes the idea of property and

ownership as independent from the masculine figure. For example, in this same scene, Manon

19
confronts her father’s portrait, and calls him a “hypocrite.” She then goes on to describe her

headache: “My head was bursting. It felt as if an iron collar, such as I have seen used to

discipline field women, were fastened about my skull (Martin 2004:182).” This evokes the breast

milk scene when Manon drinks Sarah’s milk, and her headache “disappears” as she becomes

“entirely free.” Here, Martin problematizes the concept of “ownership” by recognizing that an

affirmation of property is, at the same time, an affirmation of the masculine. Despite the fact that

Manon now owns property she is still a gendered subject, and as a result, she can never

completely escape gender subordination within capitalism. Gender ideologies, and gender

domination, are products of capitalist production and the relations of property. Therefore,

Manon’s claim to property merely re-establishes her subordinate position as a woman, i.e., as an

abstract form of property. Similarly, her headache comes back when she confronts her father,

since her notion of “freedom” within capitalism is problematized, as the gendered subject is

inherently unfree.

Manon claims power through property ownership. This is by virtue of the power relations

that initially subordinated her as a woman. Moreover, in the breast milk scene, Manon dominants

the slave body of Sarah in order to empower herself as a woman. This is despite the intimacies

between racism and sexism in capitalist domination. This hypocritical tension is mirrored in the

scene with Manon’s father’s portrait when Manon states that she felt as if she was trapped in an

“iron collar.” Here, Manon’s character dialogically engages the experience of the black, female

slave by metaphorically representing her own feelings of gender oppression with an image

symbolic of slave domination. This alludes to the intimacies between racism and sexism, and

illustrates the hypocrisy of racism within white feminism. Racism within white feminism serves

to re-establish the racialized power relations that developed within the institution of slavery.

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These power relations are based on relations of property and capital that, in turn, also dominate

white women as a form of property themselves. White feminism also proposes a

conceptualization of gender inequality that is based on a Eurocentric paradigm of social

knowledge. This threatens to bifurcate the social realities of black women who are understood as

either “black,” or as “women,” since the latter is seen as contradictory to the former. This divides

the feminist movement, and negates a unified criticism of the relations of capital. These are the

relations of capital that produce, reproduce and maintain both racist and sexist ideologies.

Similarly, in the concluding remarks of the scene with her father’s image, Manon imagines her

husband coming back from the dead, and states: “it was as if he was there, leaning over me,

turning the screw of the hot iron collar tighter and tighter until my skull almost cracked from the

pressure (Martin 2004:183).” This scene simultaneously poses racial and sexual domination in

opposition to private property. The white woman, symbolically subjected to the experience of the

female slave vis-à-vis the iron collar, is dominated and over powered by the masculine symbol of

property. That is, the white, male property owner.

Conclusion

Critique of White Feminism

Based on my reading of Valarie Martin’s Property as a literary text of sociological

standpoint, this paper concludes by arguing that Martin’s novel ends with one major premise; a

critique of white feminism. The final pages of the novel end with a conversation between Sarah

and Manon. In this scene, the two women discuss Sarah’s experience as a free, white man. As

Manon states:

“I considered this image of Sarah. She was dressed in borrowed clothes, sitting stiffly at a bare
wooden table while a colourless yankee woman, her thin hair pulled into a tight bun, served her

21
tea in a china cup, The righteous husband fetched a cushion to make their guest more
comfortable. It struck me as perfectly ridiculous. What on earth did they think they were doing?”
(Martin 2004: 193).
In this scene, Manon imagines Sarah in a position of power, the position of the white male, and

bids this notion “perfectly ridiculous” due to the fact that Sarah is a slave. The hypocrisy of this

moment is that Manon maintains that Sarah should be rejected a position of power by virtue of

her “race,” and social location as a slave. Throughout the novel, however, Manon grapples with

her own subordination as a “wife,” and problematizes the notion that she should be rejected a

position of power by virtue of her sex. The novel, therefore, ends on a moment that encapsulates

the racial tensions within white feminism, and concludes Manon’s narrative, one that embodies

the white feminist standpoint, on a scene of racist projection. Here, Martin problematizes the

gender universalism of white feminism, and criticizes the racist and Eurocentric ideologies of

mainstream, western feminists. Such “universal feminisms” ignore diverging standpoints of

oppression, such as race, which influence gender identity (Oldfield 2013: 10). This highlights the

racial tensions within white feminism. White feminists actively participate in practices of

hegemonic racism with their male counterparts and against their non-white, female counterparts.

This sentiment is further alluded to when Sarah claims that her experience of freedom, her

experience as a white male, “appealed” to her. While Manon denounces this claim at the time,

her rejection of Sarah’s affirmation of her right to power is undercut by a claim made by Manon

previously in the book, in which she states: “It is one of the annoying things about [Sarah]; on

those occasions when she bothers to speak, she makes sense (Martin 2004: 6).” This touches on

the intimate relationship between racial and sexual oppression, and undercuts the racist

ideologies of mainstream, white feminism. That is, Martin recognizes that it “make senses” to

understand racism and sexism together, opposed to separately, or against one another. This is

because racism and sexism are forged in the matrix of capitalist domination, and seek to

22
subordinate both the racialized and the gendered body to the dominant, white male property

owner.

Universal claims to gender oppression, made by white feminists, merely re-establish the

power dynamics between white and racialized bodies that are based on abstract notions of

property. This not only affirms the power relations within capitalist production, since it re-

establishes hegemonic racism, it also proposes an “idealized” notion of gender that is based on a

specific cultural, geographic, economic, historical and social context. This obscures the diversity

and complexity of gender oppression. As a result, white feminism challenges the power

dynamics between white men and women, while simultaneously, reproducing the power

dynamics between black and white subjects. Therefore, western feminism embodies the

exclusionary politics of difference, and subordination, that they seek to disrupt. They define a

notion or idea of “woman” that is based on an epistemologically privileged standpoint, which

negates a large segment of the female population. If any attempt at a collective feminist

movement is to be made, it should be a movement founded not on what a woman is, that is, a

woman is domesticated; a woman is sexualized; a woman is the private sphere. Instead, it should

be founded on what a woman is not, or even more so, what the marginalized body is not, that is:

the marginalized body is not white; it is not rich; it is not male; it is not straight; it is not

European, and so on. In this sense, what the marginalized body is, it not something one can pin

point, define and construct; however, it is an imagined body that is based on the “rich totality” of

social existence; it is, property.

23
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