Analysing the evolution of the myth of the Amazons that has survived in our imagination for millenia.
For more than 3,000 years, the Amazons have been a recognised symbol that transcends mythology and has influenced history itself. The image of the powerful warrior woman who defied the established patriarchal order proved so compelling that it became permanently enshrined in the collective imagination-first through oral tradition and later through texts and images. The contributions in this volume explore how this image has endured through the lens of classical reception. From Wonder Woman to the war in Ukraine, and across diverse genres such as video games, fashion, warfare and documentary film, the Amazonian archetype has evolved beyond anything once imagined. Today, however, we are witnessing a true transformation. No longer embodying the negative traits the Greeks once ascribed to them, the Amazons have become a symbol of strength, resilience and empowerment-a model for women's rights in a global society and an icon of feminism and the LGBTQIA+ community.
Divided into three parts, this book analyses how the image of the Amazon has, at different times and in different contexts, been marginalised, put on a pedestal and globalised. For the first time, media case studies and lived histories are examined to compare and contrast modern frameworks with each other and with the 'original' Amazonian iconography. What emerges is a concept of the 'Amazon' as a modern paradigm that speaks as strongly to contemporary society as it did to the ancients, but with a very different meaning.
Papildus informācija
Analysing the evolution of the myth of the Amazons that has survived in our imagination for millenia.
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
List of Contributors
Introduction. Viral Amazons: The first Influencers in History, Arturo Sanchez
Sanz (Complutense University of Madrid, Spain)
Part One: Marginalisation and Hypersexualisation
1. Amazon Creation Across Female and Male Centred Texts, Connie Skibinski
(Newcastle University, Australia) and Anneka Rene (Auckland University, New
Zealand)
2. The Sexual Katabasis of a 90s Amazon: Sex-Positivity and the Male Gaze in
Artemis: Requiem (1996), Carly Maris (Wilmington College, USA)
3. Where are the Amazons? Absences and Othering of Female and Feminine Agency
in Audiovisual Adaptations of the Trojan War Narrative, Christine Lehnen
(University of Manchester, UK)
4. The Myth of the Amazons is Always in Fashion, Giulia Corrente (Universita
degli studi Roma Tre, Italy)
5. Controllers and Chainmail: Amazon' Costuming in Contemporary Video Games,
Freya Fenton (University of Leicester, UK)
6. Artbook Muses: Hypersexualised Amazons through the Francophone bande
dessiné, Arturo Sanchez Sanz (Isabel I de Castilla University and Complutense
University of Madrid, Spain)
Part Two: Heroic Warrior Women
7. Playing the Amazons and Warrior Women in Tabletop Games, Amy Norgard
(Truman State University, USA)
8. Wonder Women: Searching for Amazons in Myth, Archaeology and Contemporary
Media, Martine Diepenbroek (Johannesburg University, South Africa)
9. The Coloniality of Power in the Reception of the Amazons in the Brazilian
Wonder Woman, Carlos Eduardo da Costa Campos (Federal University of Mato
Grosso do Sul, Brazil) and Luis Filipe Bantim de Assumpēćo (University of
Vassouras, Brazil)
10. Native American Amazons: Indigenizing Wonder Woman and Beyond, Kendall
Lovely (University of California Santa Barbara, USA)
11. Amazons in Wonderland: The Persistence of Memory in Dalķ's Dreams, Arturo
Sanchez Sanz (Isabel I de Castilla University and Complutense University of
Madrid, Spain)
12. Surviving a World of Men: Indigenous African Resistance and the Legacy of
Amazonian Reception in The Woman King (2022), Natalie Swain (University of
Winnipeg, Canada) and Evelyn N. Mayanja (Carleton University, Canada)
Part Three: LGBTQIA+ and Feminist Icons
13. 'Badass Babes' in Pop Culture - A New Embodiment?, Kay Buttfield
(University of the Sunshine Coast and University of Tasmania, Australia)
14. The Documentary Genre as a Social Shaper: The Representation of Amazon
Women as Feminist Icons in Contemporary Documentary Films, Almudena Muńoz
Gallego (Complutense University of Madrid, Spain)
15. "Amazons" for War and Peace: XXI Centuries Movements for Women's Rights
in Ukraine, Arturo Sanchez Sanz (Isabel I de Castilla University and
Complutense University of Madrid, Spain)
16. The New Ukrainian Amazons: Fighting From Herakles to Putin, Arturo
Sanchez Sanz (Isabel I de Castilla University and Complutense University of
Madrid, Spain)
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Arturo Sįnchez Sanz is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Classics at Complutense University of Madrid, Spain, and Lecturer in Humanities and Social Sciences at International University of La Rioja, Spain, and International University Isabel I de Castilla, Spain.
