THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

3.1 Shoes and Mirrors: Images of Doubling The Avatar in Panamafinancial spectrum while somebody ‘down at heel’ was his or hereconomic opposite. In the first instance the shoe is affiliated with wealthand status but in the second its wearer is without financial means orrecognisable status. 14 For the less fortunate, footwear was ofteninherited from family as the cost of purchasing new shoes wasprohibitive. Children then literally followed in their father's footsteps.Shoe wearing was a privilege extended to few and barefootedness remained in the domain of prisoners, penitents, theimpoverished and the humble. Contrastingly, the absence of the symbolitself is in its own right, a notion with which to contend. The naked foothas largely been the consequence of deprivation and poverty. Membersof lowest social order went unshod and it was highly significant whenthey bared their feet. According to the Holy Scriptures, walking barefootsupposed a lack of social status, the manifestation of humility, or areference to the Divine which usually consisted of an acknowledgmentof God’s presence at a given time and place which made the locale holyand therefore required recognition of that fact. In many biblical citationsthis was revealed as the dispensing with footwear. 15Footloose and Fancy Free: Sexual IdentityAccording to William A. Rossi’s The Sex Life of the Foot andShoe, there are four motives to sport any kind of footwear: modesty,protection, status, and sexual attraction, with the latter outweighing theothers. These motives are all reflected through various means whenthey are used as a literary accessory in the fiction of the double.Establishment of a sexual identity is the sole purpose for the differentstyling of footwear between sexes. Shoes are worn to consciously orsubconsciously transmit sexual messages; there is no functional reasonfor the distinct characteristics in colour, height, and fabric of women'sand men's shoes (99). From the psychoanalytic symbolism of the footand shoe as male and female genitals respectively, to the state of beingunshod as synonymous with the emasculated or castrated, shoe typesare considered emblematic of psychosexual categories. Rossi14 Kaite Berkeley, “The Shoe”, Pornography and Difference (Bloomington: Indiana UP,1995) 100.15 When mourning, David does so barefooted: “And David went up by the ascent ofmount Olivet, and went as he went up, and had his head covered, and he wentbarefoot.' 2 Sam 15:30. Going barefoot in respect for holy ground is well referencedwith barefoot worship considered the will of God. Moses was reminded of this by theburning bush: 'And he said, Draw not nigh hither; put off thy shoes from off thy feet, forthe place where on thou standest is holy ground.” Exodus 3:5. Cameron Kippen, “TheHistory of Shoes: Feet in the Bible”, Curtin University of Technology, Perth WA..146