Title: | The Invisible (S)eld: Identity in House Elves and Harry Potter |
Author(s): | Montesinos, Gary |
Subject(s): | House Elves, Humility, Identity, Ontology, Phenomenology, Self-Suppression, Space |
Abstract: | Maurice Merleau-Ponty, a French phenomenological philosopher, argues in The Phenomenology of Perception (1945) for the creation of identity through the use of the body. Subjects are born into a world with coded rules and traditions. The subject constructs their identity through a space that they have no say in. The use of servile creatures, the House Elves, in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series in relation to Merleau-Ponty’s ideas on identity display how even constricted beings can create a space for themselves. The House Elves operate in a position beneath the wizards. They become ontologically suppressed but are able to traverse spaces that the wizards cannot and gain the ability to create identity within their confined servile positions. |
Issue Date: | 2015 |
Genre: | Article |
Type: | Text |
Language: | English |
URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/2142/78004 |
Rights Information: | Copyright 2015, Gary Montesinos |
Date Available in IDEALS: | 2015-06-05 |