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“produce” the public space and transgress into the private space. The domination of the public urban shows the representations of space in these physical locations. Under the controls of city planners, representations of Gileadean space grounds Offred’s steps at public locations from Red Center, the Walls, Milk and Honey, the hospitals, the Particicution ground. The government wages theocratic political controls over domestic domains. In the Commander’s house, Offred, Marthas, and Serena Joy are not allowed to offend men’s fields. Offred is limited in kitchen, the ceremony room, and “the room.” Spatial domination constrains everyday life of Offred, as well as all the other inhabitants of Gilead.
2.5 Conclusion
As the “product” of Gileadean public urban space, spatial practices of the nation embody the space within everyday life of Gileadean inhabitants, the
construction of the public space, and the restrained and limited privacy in domestic space. That is, the authorities who dominate the conceptualized abstraction exercise power to determine the space of social practices. Offred’s record provides the visual state of the Early Gilead Period that epitomizes Gilead’s spatial practice. On the one hand, the record reveals the urban space perceived and “serves, thus produces, as a tool of thought and of action” of Offred as well as Gilead’s civilians (Lefebvre 26).
On the other hand, representations of Gileadean society that Offred reveals in her record “have taken on a sort of reality” on the basis of everyday life. The urban space dominated by Gilead’s government is represented as a set of spatial characteristics in the record. Offred’s narratives show the dominant spatial concept on top of the visual
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state of the country.
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Chapter III
Representational Spaces of Gilead 3.1 Representational spaces in Lefebvre’s Triad
Applying Lefebvre’s spatial triad, I examine the space of Gilead and decipher the urban space as a product of the authorities. The focus of this chapter shifts from the space conceived to the space lived that is represented in everyday life of
Gileadean inhabitants. The Handmaid’s Tale shows not only subservience of women but also female resistance. Based on Lefebvre’s theory, the thesis regards the urban space of a society as a given totality, including the physical landscapes, the
conceptualized signs and symbols, and the space of the inhabitants. With the focus on the individuals of Gilead’s urban space, this chapter brings out Offred’s uncontrolled autonomy and conflicting struggles by interpreting Offred’s interior monologue so as to represent the space Offred lives. To this end, I develop the research question in this chapter: to what extent is Gileadean urban space “lived?”
Applying Lefebvre’s spatial triad, the discussions advance the articulated and acted space that is “directly lived through its associated images and symbols, and hence the space of ‘inhabitants’ and ‘users’” (Lefebvre 39). In the “making” of space, the spatial practice of Gileadean political power “seeks, but fail to master” space completely around the country and mental space of its civilians (26). The Gileadean dwellers are being controlled under the bailiwick of power politics; that is,
representations of spaces show the way power of Gilead’s government work to construct and control the space. Apart from the double state of being controlled and
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controlling, Lefebvre offers a possibility out of the binary opposition, the state of being uncontrolled; that is, the state of representational Gileadean spaces that
epitomizes the space in which Offred lives and creates the record of her everyday life.
Gilead’s government embodies representations of Gileadean spaces.
Representations of Gilead’s spaces combine “ideology and knowledge within a social spatial practice” under the “bailiwick” of totalitarian government (Lefebvre 45). In accordance with Lefebvre’s second concept, representations of spaces refer to the space created and constructed by city planner, architects, and authorities in the conceived phase; representations of spaces show the frontal, legal, and official relations connected within the social space. In comparison with the second state, I provide the third concept, “representational spaces” by denying the totalitarian control and surveillance of representations of Gilead’s spaces. In this chapter, I aim at the everyday life that civilians create and construct as opposed to the society space made by Gilead’s government in previous chapter.
Besides the dwellers of the social space, representational spaces are associated with “some artists and perhaps of those, such as a few writers and philosophers” who describe with verbal language and aspires with non-verbal symbols and signs
(Lefebvre 39). Lefebvre defines the third concept that refers to “clandestine or underground side of social life” in comparison with frontal and official side of space embodied by representations of spaces (33). Lefebvre links the third concept of spatial triad with the second concept, showing the double interaction and binary opposition between the second and third spatial elements. Representational spaces embody
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complex symbolism and carry coded spatial signs as well as non-coded symbols. In The Handmaid’s Tale, not only the Gilead’s government but also the civilians construct the Gilead’s society. To further the discussion on Gileadean citizens, I include the frontal as well as clandestine, official as well as hidden and underground social network of human relations. Representations of Gilead’s spaces are on the one hand “a means of control, and hence of domination of power;” on the other hand, the political state of control “forces […] to seek, but [fails] to master space completely”
(Lefebvre 26). The uncontrolled autonomy runs into the ground of the lived space of the civilians’ everyday life. Thus, in this chapter, on the basis of Lefebvre’s spatial theory, I aim to show the “dominated” social space that is described in Offred’s tape, coded and revealed in her imagined symbols and signs, and experienced in Offred’s everyday life (39).