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double-signification containing both macho male âsexualityâ via the unseen penis and female sexuality indexed by costume. This potential is most evident in a contemporary figuration in popular culture that contests the traditional conditions and compromises of crossdressing in mass media. This figuration, which I term the Sheman, occurs when a male performer appropriates female imagery as a straightforward empowering device rather than as an emasculating comic ploy. Through a performance art aesthetic that compounds character with body, the She-manâs costume incarnates the female body. Gender rebellions by the transvestite are replaced with rebellions against assigned sex. The She-man is glaringly bi-sexed rather than obscurely androgynous or merely bisexual. Hisher power is expressly sexual. This article suggests possible origins of the She-manâs power in two earlier figurations of powerful female imagery. The first is the phallic femme which evolves from manipulation of the feminine persona; the second is the medusan femme which evolves from the female body. The intersection of these two figurations marks phallic power in the feminine. Instead of undergoing a downward gender mobility, the She-man has enlarged himself with feminine gender and female sexuality. He/ she takes advantage of the common collapse of sex and gender
Camera Obscura – Duke University Press
Published: Jan 1, 1989
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