Upon reading Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble and Elizabeth Grosz’s Space, Time and Perversion, I found myself drawing upon empathy during my attempt to grapple with the texts. Though I possess an idea of what feminism “is,” namely- the empowerment of women, these readings are my first exposure to real philosophical texts written by feminist thinkers expressing advanced ideas and theories. According to their own description, as when Butler suggests that we are in a period of “postfeminism,” these texts seem to be written in the wake of the popular feminist thought of the past.
Since I am unfamiliar with all feminist thought, I decided to approach the ideas within Butler and Grosz’s books as isolated ones, and took their word for it when they referenced past ideas or those of other theorists. As a male, I come from what Butler would likely call a “phallogocentric” frame of reference. Thus, my way of attempting to understand the reading relied upon empathizing with Butler’s position and thinking about “real world evidence” for the abstract concepts she defined.
This was not made easier by the academic’s penchant for using many polysyllabic words and the insertion of several clauses into her sentences, as she does with this gem: “The prevailing assumption of the ontological integrity of the subject before the law might be understood as the contemporary trace of the state of nature hypothesis, that foundationalist fable constitutive of the juridical structures of classical liberalism” (pg. 5). What?
In regards to the ideas themselves, I enjoyed the fundamentally deconstructive nature of Butler’s discourse. Take this thought for example, “When the constructed status of gender is theorized as radically independent of sex, gender itself becomes a free-floating artifice, with the consequence that man and masculine might just as easily signify a female body as a male one, and woman and feminine a male body as easily as a female one” (pg. 10).
I agree with this idea, if I am interpreting it correctly, because there is evidence for it in the real world. We attach gender to sex: males have one set of genitals, females another (or in the case of some theorists which Butler mentions, females “lack” a set of genitals). However, “Men” who identify as female and “women” who identify as male have, in the course of establishing their identities, detached their sex from their gender, which effectively detaches the limitation placed upon them by the sex-gender dichotomy, and adopted the identity that they feel is correct.
I also found Butler’s questions regarding the politics of feminism to be interesting. She asks if achieving political unity as “women” is possible when this category of identification may not exist. She also asks whether unity is even necessary for effective political action (pg. 21). This goes back to deconstruction, as well as the structuralist anthropology which Butler references. According to Butler’s interpretation of Claude Levi-Strauss, the biological female is subsequently transformed into the subordinated cultural woman (47).
I believe that as humans, we do have a natural tendency to place each other into such categories, and I think that were we to destroy all these constructed categories, we would look at ourselves as the organic pile of tissue and bones that we actually are. I also find to be correct Butler’s disagreement with feminists and anthropologists who look to cultures of the past in order to find “proof” of a female-dominated society (which Butler identifies as the “imaginary ‘before’”) that would contradict the notion that females are intended, biologically, to be subordinate. I don’t think that this is productive for feminism’s political goals, which I generally think of as an increase in the status of women within society.
Though I am not qualified or knowledgeable enough to theorize about what feminism should be, for the sake of reflecting upon my first exposure to feminist theory, I believe that in their discourse, feminists should keep their political goals in mind and resist abstractedly theorizing for theorizing’s sake. If the pursuit of a theory does not lead to a practical improvement, it should be dropped in favor of discussions that will. I am certain, of course, that many would be inclined to disagree.
Ziev,
ReplyDeleteInteresting and thoughtful posting here. I am particularly interested in your use of your own embodiment as a conscious lens through which you are viewing these texts. This is, indeed, something that certain of our critics and theorists will feel more comfortable doing (as you will see as we read on) and is something that is of interest within current literary criticism.
One issue, though, that I’d like to raise. You mention in paragraph 2 that Butler would likely think you’re from a phallogocentric frame of reference since you’re male. But I think she’d likely say that most of us, regardless of sex or gender, come from this same frame of reference. Indeed, language itself (which almost all of us use) is, for some theorists, phallogocentric. So I don’t know that you’re as bad off as you think you might be!
I wonder what would happen if we began to think of ourselves, as you put it, as “the organic pile of tissues and bones that we actually are.” Would this be better? Worse? In what ways? What would happen if we started to think of ourselves as elements? As particles? Are these different ways of breaking down the body getting closer to something or further away? Also, SHOULD philosophy be responsible for its political utility? That is, should Butler, as a philosopher, keep political goals in mind? Would we expect this of traditional philosophy? Or is there something particular about feminism and identity that we think shouldn’t ignore the politics? I’m interested in what you think about the combination of discourses here (and we can talk about a related question—what is the responsibility of literary criticism to political action, ethics, etc, if any—as the semester goes on).
Great, thoughtful, and enjoyable post, Ziev! Keep up the good work—and keep investigating!