The Feminization of Demons
The Feminization of Demons
This chapter examines the depiction of female demons and the idea of women sharing things in common with demons in setsuwa tales. It analyzes four tales with female demons, and suggests that the associations of women with demons are not mainly attacks on women because the so-called female demons are often other than female and even gender-less, despite their impersonations. The chapter also argues that demonized women served to challenge the assumptions of the Heian elite and others, and that the narratives show that foolish pride and misdirected energy doom the man.
Keywords: female demons, setsuwa, demonized women, Heian elite, narratives, foolish pride, misdirected energy
Stanford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.