Waugh, Robin. Misogyny, women's language, and love-language.

• Author: Waugh, Robin
• Title: Misogyny, women's language, and love-language: Yngvildr fagrkinn in Svarfdola saga
• Published in: Scandinavian Studies 70, 2
• Year: 1998
• Pages: 151-94
• E-text: ProQuest
• Reference: Waugh, Robin. "Misogyny, women's language, and love-language: Yngvildr fagrkinn in Svarfdola saga." Scandinavian Studies 70, 2 (Summer 1998): 151-194.

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Annotation

Waugh‘s article examines the extreme cases of misogyny perpetrated against Yngvildr, the main female character in Svarfdæla saga. Beginning with a summary of Yngvildr‘s fairly unknown saga, Waugh systematically identifies areas of misogyny and scorn for female sexuality and examines their underlying causes. Waugh also uses comparisons to Njáls saga to underline how different Svarfdæla Saga truly is from other sagas in terms of aggression and misogyny towards women; these comparisons show a male aggression towards powerful women that is unparalleled across the saga genre. Using the teachings of Foucault and Lacan, Waugh explains how Yngvildr‘s command of language, ultimately her only source of power, led her to being viewed as a threat by her male counterparts, accounting for her treatment and subsequent portrayal as a scapegoat character used to uphold a masculine-centric world-view. Waugh focuses on language as the playing field upon which this saga occurs, portraying it as a competition that is unfairly tilted in favor of the male party. Everything from Yngvildr‘s reduction from a person to an object to the multiple acts of violence committed against her is related to, and dependent on, the manipulation of language.

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References

Chapter 116: Hildigunnur lagði yfir Flosa skikkjuna : “One may take a famous episode from Njáls saga as typical. Hildigunnr goads Flosi into avenging the death of her husband Hǫskuldr by (rather implausibly) saving up Hǫskuldr‘s blood in a cloak [...]. On the surface, this incitement seems familiar to Yngvildr‘s, right down to Flosi‘s response: ‚worst ... cold are the counsels of women.‘ But Yngvildr accomplishes her task with words alone.” (p. 166)

Links

• Written by: Lynn Schoenbeck
• Icelandic/English translation: