The Joy of Suffering: Nietzsche, theodicy and women's

Abstract

I use Nietzsche's work on theodicy to explore gendered valuation systems
around women's bodies. The notion of theodicy provides a different entry
point to questions of ideology, as it begins with an account of people's attempts
to find meaning in their lives. Nietzsche traced humans' propensity to
look for and create stories that give meaning to their lives, even when this
meaning is one that may ultimately oppress them or celebrate something negative,
such as suffering. For him it is not the suffering that torments humans,
but rather its meaninglessness. In the slums of Northeast Brazil, Afro-Brazilian
women invest in the Christian glorification of suffering in a context
where they experience their bodies in terms of loss, shame and alienation. I
explore how, through a process of creative deception, this suffering comes to
be experienced as pleasure. That is, the women reconstruct their bodies using
two dominant stories to which they have access: Christianity and glamorous
Brazilian soap operas.

South African Journal of Philosophy Vol. 26 (1) 2007: pp. 31-43