The motifs of eyes and feet in Irish and Lebanese poetry, dance, and caricature. (c2010)

Abstract

In both Irish and Lebanese war poetry, pain, suppression, and destruction are prominent themes. As in any other occupied country, a segment of this poetry speaks about suffering and oppression experienced during and after the period of occupation and wars. However, the expression of rejection to the occupying power is not stated directly most of the time. Resistance is expressed indirectly and rebellion surfaces through the use of several motifs. This thesis claims that such indirections result directly from oppression. As in the case of both Ireland and Lebanon which share similar history with oppression and nothing else, their poetry, dance, and caricatures state a message of rebellion through images of eyes and feet and relevant motifs. This thesis examines the cultural representation of traumatic memory. It assumes the existence of a "traumatic unsaid" that seeks expression by indirect means in art. In the case of the Irish and Lebanese cultural productions examined, this thesis argues that artists repress painful emotions which find expression through displacement-a psychological defense mechanism in which there is an unconscious shift of emotions, affect, or desires from the original object to a more acceptable or immediate substitute-in the form of different motifs or symbols. This approach casts into relief how the rebellious Irish and Lebanese voice in poetry, dance, and caricature is created through repression and conveyed through the different motifs. By means of observation alone, I have found eyes and feet to be prominent motifs in these poems. Curiously enough, these motifs are often channeled aurally and not orally. That is to say, eyes in these poems "speak" and function in conjunction with the stomping and beating of feet. This thesis argues that this aural stimulation ensures a presence of a resistance force thus linking it directly to powerful rebellion. In dance, this thesis will show how stomping motifs of Dabke represent an unviewed message of rebellion. Lebanese dance figurations are also done to the music and lyrics of sung poetry thus expressing better their rebelliousness as this thesis claims. Dance and poetry combined can better express this rebellious message. Irish dance, on the other hand, is done to music without lyrics. Whenever words are being recited, the Irish dance stops. Irish dances represent the resistance and rebellion that the Irish seek to expressed if not in the language of their oppressors, through dances done in secret. In Caricature, the Palestinian born cartoonist Naji el-Ali's drawings, which almost always show the oppressed as shoeless with broken or missing feet and the repressors or army men with heavy duty army boots, address a different kind of repressive control-that of the Israeli occupation of Lebanon. Even in randomly selected Irish caricatures, eyes and feet represent oppression and resistance. The visual representation of repression is transferred once again from stage back to paper, but this time in the graphic method of caricature. Juxtaposed with Irish and Lebanese poetry and dances, caricature highlights the importance of this overlooked motif in the poetry of the repressed.