Heterotopic Homes: Restructured Domestic Spaces in Joyce Carol Oates’s We Were the Mulvaneys

Abstract

This paper offers a spatial reading of Joyce Carol Oates’s We Were the Mulvaneys (1996). It argues that restructured domestic spaces depicted in the novel underscore the possibility of alternate homesteads that celebrate female choice and autonomy. Since We Were the Mulvaneys presents various models of domesticity coupled with a variety of domestic spaces that range from stifling to empowering, this paper engages specifically with architectural and symbolic connotations of suburban American homes depicted in the novel. In doing so, it argues that We Were the Mulvaneys critiques hegemonic social forces that create oppressive homes fettering womanhood, and how while seeking freedom and agency women can convert them to felicitous spaces. Using the concept of heterotopia, this paper asserts that the novel presents in-between zones wherein the patriarchal home is challenged and countered to produce hybrid homesteads that uncritically accommodate multifarious female identities.

Keywords:

• autonomy
• domestic space
• female agency
• heterotopia
• Joyce Carol Oates
• patriarchy