Spatial Constructs and Subject Formation in Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own: an Analytical Inquiry

Autores

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2025.e103769

Palavras-chave:

Spatial Constructs, Subject Formation, Gender Dynamics, Virginia Woolf, Feminist Literary Analysis

Resumo

This article explores the relationship between spatiality and the formation of feminine subjectivity in Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own. By tracing the protagonist Mary’s intellectual journey, the study examines how space — material and symbolic — shapes agency, autonomy, and visibility within gendered constraints. Drawing on theoretical perspectives from Michel de Certeau, Henri Lefebvre, Victoria Rosner, and Mark Wigley, the analysis foregrounds the role of spatial practices in negotiating identity under Victorian social norms. The article contributes to feminist literary criticism by offering a spatial reading of Woolf’s essay and reaffirming its relevance to contemporary debates on gender and space.

Biografia do Autor

Everton Rocha Vecchi, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora

Everton Rocha Vecchi is a master's student in the Graduate Program in Literary Studies at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF), Brazil, with a CAPES scholarship. He holds degrees in Law (UFJF), Business Administration and Human Resources (Estácio de Sá University), as well as teaching degrees in Portuguese, English, Spanish, and Pedagogy. A member of the research group Travessias e Feminismo, his research focuses on Virginia Woolf and her translations in Brazil.

Humberto Fois-Braga , Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora

Prof. Dr. Humberto Fois-Braga - Professor-pesquisador vinculado ao Departamento de Turismo e ao Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras: Estudos Literários, ambos da Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora (MG). Possui graduação em Turismo pela UFJF (2004), especialização em "Estudos Literários" (2010), master II em "Industries du Tourisme", pela Université de Toulouse II (Jean Jaurès) (2005), mestrado em "Comunicação e Sociedade", pela Faculdade de Comunicação da Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora (2009) e doutorado em "Letras: Estudos Literários", pela Faculdade de Letras (UFJF, 2017). É fundador e coordenador do Grupo de Pesquisa autenticado pelo CNPq e intitulado "Performances e Narrativas de Viagem" (PeNaVia).

Guilherme Augusto Pereira Malta, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora

Guilherme Augusto Pereira Malta holds a PhD in Geography from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG). He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Tourism and a permanent faculty member of the Graduate Program in Geography at UFJF. His research interests include tourism, innovation, cultural landscapes, literary geography, and public tourism policy.

Referências

Bloom, Harold. A Map of Misreading. Oxford UP, 1975.

Certeau, Michel de. The Practice of Everyday Life. Translated by Steven Rendall, U of California P, 1992.

Flint, Kate. “Virginia Woolf and the Victorian Aesthetics.” The Edinburgh Companion to Virginia Woolf and the Arts, edited by Maggie Humm, Edinburgh UP, 2010, p. 9.

Lee, Hermione. Virginia Woolf. Chatto & Windus, 1996.

Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space. Blackwell, 1991.

Low, Lisa. “Refusing to Hit Back: Virginia Woolf and the Impressionality Question.” Virginia Woolf and the Essay, edited by Beth Carol Rosenberg and Jeanne Dubino, St. Martin's Press, 1997, pp. 257–73.

Marcus, Laura. Virginia Woolf. Northcote House, 2004.

Moi, Toril. Sexual/Textual Politics: Feminist Literary Theory. Methuen, 1985.

Mulvey, Laura. “Pandora: Topographies of the Mask and Curiosity.” Sexuality and Space, edited by Beatriz Colomina, Princeton Architectural Press, 1996, pp. 53–72.

Reed, Christopher. Bloomsbury Rooms: Modernism, Subculture, and Domesticity. Yale UP, 2004.

Rosner, Victoria. Modernism and the Architecture of Private Life: Gender and Culture. Columbia UP, 2005.

Showalter, Elaine. A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Brontë to Lessing. Princeton UP, 2005.

Seeley, Tracy. Locating Woolf: The Politics of Space and Place, edited by Anna Snaith and Michael Whitworth, Palgrave MacMillan, 2007, p. 32.

Soja, Edward W. Postmodern Geographies: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory. Verso, 1989.

Solomon, Julie Robin. “Staking Ground: The Politics of Space in Virginia Woolf's A Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas.” Women’s Studies, vol. 16, no. 3–4, 1989, p. 335.

Stevenson, Christina. “Here Was One Room, There Another: The Room, Authorship, and Feminine Desire in A Room of One’s Own and Mrs. Dalloway.” Pacific Coast Philology, vol. 49, no. 1, 2014.

White, Hayden. Tropics of Discourse. Johns Hopkins UP, 1978.

Wigley, Mark. “Untitled: The Unhousing of Gender.” Sexuality and Space, edited by Beatriz Colomina, Princeton Architectural Press, 1992.

Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas. Collins Classics, 2014.

Woolf, Virginia. Collected Essays. Vol. 2, Hogarth Press, 1967.

Woolf, Virginia. Moments of Being. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985.

Woolf, Virginia. The Letters of Virginia Woolf. Vol. 4, edited by Nigel Nicolson and Joanne Trautmann Banks, Hogarth Press, 1975.

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Publicado

2025-06-16

Edição

v. 78 n. 1 (2025):

Seção

Dossiê em Estudos Literários e Culturais

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Copyright (c) 2025 Everton Rocha Vecchi, Humberto Fois-Braga , Guilherme Augusto Pereira Malta

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A revista Ilha do Desterro publica artigos e resenhas inéditos, referentes as áreas de Inglês, Literaturas em Língua Inglesa e Estudos Culturais. Publica volumes mistos e/ou temáticos, com artigos e resenhas em inglês e português. 

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Creative Commons Licence
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.