From my paper, presented at an American Conference for Irish Studies Southern Regional Meeting, held in Atlanta, Georgia:
The substance of my second book aligns my semiotic theory of iconic realism with the philosophical framework of the 19th century Irish author and poet, Sydney Owenson (Lady Morgan). Regarding creative expression, writers such as Sydney Owenson have had the opportunity to incorporate human experience in their art by tapping into the consciousness of humanity on multiple sensory levels. In her 1840 book, Woman and Her Master, Owenson makes the following observation:
The acquirement of a physical elevation, in expanding the sphere of vision, and opening new and vast regions to the sense, obscures and diminishes the individual details comprehended in its grasp; so that intellectual and moral elevation, which has opened to the mind’s eye the wider fields of scientific research and of social combination, has caused the relative value of the smaller facts presented to its apprehension to be either overlooked, or mistaken. (WHM, p. 15)
Owenson’s writing demonstrates my semiotic theory of iconic realism in the following three ways:
1. She juxtaposes the Romantic concept of nature’s influence on humanity’s intellectual actions with the reality of political and societal constraints through her characters’ struggles with self-awareness.
2. Through this conflict, Owenson personifies the dichotomous nature of glory in which her birth nation struggles with true autonomy and its native glór [1] to be heard.
3. She enlightens her readers to the possibilities of making positive change happen with their own lives and possibly those within their communities by linking the sensory paths of consciousness with appropriate and positive action.
[1] Glor is the Irish term for sound, voice.
