{"id":2774,"date":"2025-04-02T23:47:52","date_gmt":"2025-04-03T03:47:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/?p=2774"},"modified":"2025-04-03T01:41:15","modified_gmt":"2025-04-03T05:41:15","slug":"queering-time-in-a-queer-world-deconstructing-chrononormativity-in-alices-adventures-in-wonderland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/2025\/04\/02\/queering-time-in-a-queer-world-deconstructing-chrononormativity-in-alices-adventures-in-wonderland\/","title":{"rendered":"Queering Time in a Queer World: Deconstructing Chrononormativity in “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0In <\/span>Time Binds<\/span><\/i>, Elizabeth Freeman emphasizes the effects of \u201c<\/span>chrononormativity<\/span><\/i>, or the use of time to organize individual human bodies toward maximum productivity\u201d (3). By and large, society operates upon the assumption that everyone follows the same timeline; \u201cmarriage, accumulation of health and wealth for the future, reproduction, childrearing, and death and its attendant rituals\u201d all occur in roughly chronological order (4). If an individual\u2019s life does <\/span>not<\/span><\/i> follow this \u201csequence of socioeconomically \u2018productive\u2019 moments,\u201d they are deemed a societal outcast (5). But what happens when no one\u2019s<\/em> life follows a rigid timeline? What happens when time stands still, folds in upon itself, or collapses? What happens when the chrononormative individual steps into a strange, unfamiliar world where queer time is the norm? Such is the case in Lewis Carroll\u2019s <\/span>Alice\u2019s Adventures in Wonderland <\/span><\/i>(1865). Though Alice attempts to impose chrononormativity upon the unusual inhabitants of Wonderland, they resist her inflexibility and seriousness. In a world where everyone is mad, time goes mad, too.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Alice\u2019s story begins on the shore of a lake when she notices a peculiar White Rabbit with pink eyes. When the Rabbit begins talking to itself, Alice does not find it \u201cso <\/span>very<\/span><\/i> remarkable\u201d or \u201cso <\/span>very <\/span><\/i>much out of the way\u201d (Carroll 7-8). It is only after the Rabbit takes \u201c<\/span>a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket<\/span><\/i>\u201d that \u201cAlice start[s] to her feet\u201d (8). As critic Gillian Beer points out, \u201c[i]t\u2019s the watch that startles Alice;\u201d she does not find \u201can animal that speaks\u201d all that remarkable, but she <\/span>is<\/span><\/i> roused by \u201cthe accoutrements of adult business, busy-ness\u201d (xxviii). Alice\u2019s violent reaction to the watch implicitly suggests that she has already become aware of the ticking clock of chrononormativity. By the mid-nineteenth century, the watch had become a \u201ctoken of human respectability and worth\u201d (xxix). Parents, teachers, and bosses all gave watches as gifts to the young to help usher them from immaturity to adulthood. Becoming an adult meant regulating yourself within a \u201cstate-sanctioned\u201d timeline that served \u201cthe nation\u2019s economic interests\u201d (Freeman 4-5). When Alice hears the Rabbit fret that it will be \u201clate,\u201d she undoubtedly recognizes the fears of a society determined to regulate time (8). As a child inching toward adolescence, she understands that she must soon regulate herself in the same way. However, she soon finds that Wonderland is not as chrononormative as the Rabbit would suggest.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0As Alice falls down the rabbit-hole to Wonderland, she finds that she has \u201cplenty of time\u2026to look about her, and to wonder what [is] going to happen next\u201d (8). When time operates on a nonindustrial clock, individuals have more time to reflect on their surroundings, contemplate their situation, and enjoy the peculiarities of life. Still, Alice cannot discard the ideas she internalized growing up in a chrononormative world. When in Wonderland, she attempts to impose chrononormativity upon the residents. At the Mad Hatter\u2019s tea-party, for instance, Alice tells the Hatter that he has \u201ca funny watch\u201d (60). After the March Hare fiddles with the mechanisms of the Hatter\u2019s timepiece, it only \u201ctells the day of the month\u201d rather than \u201cwhat o\u2019clock it is\u201d (60). Alice cannot fathom such a queer way of telling time. \u201c\u2018I don\u2019t quite understand you,\u2019\u201d Alice, feeling \u201cutterly puzzled,\u201d says to the Hatter (60). In response, the Hatter tells Alice that she does not know \u201cTime\u201d as well as he does (61). Outside of the confines of an industrial society, the Hatter can recognize time as a construct. \u201c\u2018For instance,\u201d the Hatter says, \u201c\u2018suppose it were nine o\u2019clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons: you\u2019d only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for dinner!\u201d (61) As the Queen of Hearts realizes, the Hatter is capable of \u201cmurdering the time\u201d (62). When one steps out of a chrononormative timeline, one can see time for what it is: something to be manipulated, rearranged, and disregarded at will. The Hatter can throw a tea-party whenever he wants because he moves to his own rhythm. Not regulated by an industrial or reproductive clock, the Hatter makes what he wants out of life. He represents the positive potentialities of queering time. He represents an alternative “to the sped-up and hyperregulated time of industry” (Freeman 7). He represents freedom masquerading as madness.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Unfortunately for Alice, she must leave Wonderland and step back into the world of chrononormativity. As her sister realizes, Alice will one day become a \u201cgrown woman\u201d surrounded by \u201clittle children\u201d (109). Once she leaves childhood, Alice will be expected to adhere to a chrononormative, state-sanctioned timeline. First, she will marry and then have children to share her stories with. Her childhood fantasies will become nothing more than entertainment for the next generation. In Wonderland, however, these rules do not apply, and these destinies are not prewritten. Time moves according to the residents\u2019 whims. The Dormouse sleeps when it wants. The Queen of Hearts lets her croquet match last indefinitely. The Duchess even rewrites astronomy so it agrees with her peculiar perspectives: \u201c\u2018If everyone minded their own business\u2026the world would go round a great deal faster than it does\u2019\u201d (52). Alice initially recoils at such an idea, explaining that \u201cthe earth takes twenty-four hours to turn round on its axis\u201d (52). Any alteration to this clock would surely be fatal. However, after spending so much time in Wonderland, Alice is not so sure of herself anymore. \u201cTwenty-four hours, I <\/span>think<\/span><\/i>; or is it twelve?\u201d she asks herself (52). She, too, realizes that time can bend without breaking, shift without shattering, and queer without quibbling. The clock is merely a tool, and often a faulty one at that. The earth moves to its own rhythm, regardless of human measurements. By keeping its own time, it always maintains the right time. Perhaps humans can (and should) do the very same.<\/span><\/p>\n

Works Cited<\/span><\/p>\n

Beer, Gillian. \u201c<\/span>Alice<\/span><\/i> in Time.\u201d <\/span>The Modern Language Review<\/span><\/i>, vol. 106, no. 4, 2011, pp. xxvii\u2013xxxviii. <\/span>JSTOR<\/span><\/i>, https:\/\/doi.org\/10.5699\/modelangrevi.106.4.xxvii. Accessed 2 Apr. 2025.<\/span><\/p>\n

Carroll, Lewis. <\/span>Alice\u2019s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. <\/span><\/i>Penguin Classics, 2015.<\/span><\/p>\n

Freeman, Elizabeth. <\/span>Time Binds: Queer Temporalities, Queer Histories<\/span><\/i>. Duke University Press, 2010.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0In Time Binds, Elizabeth Freeman emphasizes the effects of \u201cchrononormativity, or the use of time to organize individual human bodies toward maximum productivity\u201d (3). By and large, society operates upon the assumption that everyone follows the same timeline; \u201cmarriage, accumulation of health and wealth for the future, reproduction, childrearing, and death and its … Continue reading Queering Time in a Queer World: Deconstructing Chrononormativity in “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5596,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[346812],"tags":[346839,346841,346842,346843,346840,93554,346845,346844],"class_list":["post-2774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2025-class-post","tag-alice-in-wonderland","tag-alices-adventures-in-wonderland","tag-chrononormativity","tag-elizabeth-freeman","tag-lewis-carroll","tag-queer-time","tag-victorian-era","tag-victorianism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5596"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2774\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}