Review!
Gender Trouble, Judith Butler
Wow...just wow. This book gives new meaning to the word dense. Seriously, it was barely 200 pages long, and it still took three dedicated days to read it. Butler is brilliant, but is NOT going for intelligibility with this book. You know that weird phenomenon that occurs when you say the same word over and over again, and it starts sounding nonsensical? Well, ddrpolaris and I have been talking about all the words in the book that are repeated enough to cause that effects: phallogocentric, juridical, cathexis, epistemological, ontological... You don't just have to know gender and queer theory to understand her work, it also helps to have a thorough grounding in linguistics and philosophy, too. Reading this is intense.
Wasn't kidding when I said intense. Basically, Gender Trouble was written because Butler had an axe to grind about the formalism and structuralism that was present in psychoanalysis (her theory of choice) and gender theory in general. The way this worked out was that she'd give an argument postulated by someone else (suck it Lacan!), smash it to smithereens, and then explain why the theory was DUMB and the theorist DUMBER. I have to respect Butler, if for no other reason than because she can infuse nigh-impenetrable academic text with truckloads of snark. Of course, she does go out of her way to make those bits clearer: "This rather astonishing statement provides insight not only into Levi-Strauss's apparent powers of denial...", "But we can understand this conclusion [that female homosexuality issues from a disappointed heterosexuality] to be the necessary result of a heterosexualized and masculinize observational point of view that takes the lesbian sexuality to be a refusal of sexuality per se only because sexuality is presumed to be heterosexual, and the observer, here constructed as the heterosexual male, is clearly being refused", and "If the Symbolic guarantees the failure of the tasks it commands, perhaps its purposes, like those of the Old Testament God, are altogether unteleological--not an accomplishment of some goal, but obedience and suffering to enforce the 'subject's' sense of limitation 'before the law'."
Dreamy, no?
Butler also gets into the difference of performativity and performance. For Butler, gender isn't a noun, it's a verb. You don't have gender, you do it. You might not think you are, but the things you do to show masculinity or femininity are part of 'gender doing.' It's not even as obvious as the clothes you wear (which is part of it), but how you speak, what you say, when you speak, how you display body language, what body language you use, etc. Performativity is all the tiny little things you do that scream "I identify my gender as X!" that you don't even realize has meaning. You act your gender, the same way you can act race or class. Performativity is a fascinating subject which I'll probably devote an entire LJ post to at another time. Probably after the semester is over. In that post, I will crucify Deborah Tannen and burn her in effigy, even if only in words.
Reviewing non-fiction is actually much harder than reviewing fiction. I don't have characters to examine, a plot to discuss, or anything solid to cling to. I'm not well-read enough in the subject to be able to speak with great authority about how her theories: impacted gender studies (though the real answer to that is: A LOT), hold up against criticism, or interact with the works of other scholars. I can't even give a simple 'yes' or 'no' to the question "did you enjoy this book?" because it was painful to read and hard to digest, but I still feel glad to have read it. Not even because I have that special "I read a seminal text, which gives me +10 academic points" feeling, but because, in retrospect, the book is a good read. Like I said, she can tear a bitch up in a way that I truly appreciate. It's like (I assume) drinking Laphroaig--tastes terrible on the way down, but the aftertaste is quite enjoyable, and leaves a pleasant warmth in your belly.
Of course, I'm willing to believe that Laphroiag leaves a wretched aftertaste, too, but I am not a Scotch whisky girl.
I'm going to be honest; I didn't understand the entirety of the book. However, I find myself in good company, as my professor doesn't understand the entirety of the book. There's a lot going on here, and even peeling back the tissue, inch by inch, doesn't give you the whole idea. The theories she references, the allusions she makes, the language she uses, and the points she makes range from moderately obscure/obtuse to "where the fuck did she just go, cause I sure as hell can't follow!" There's a link between the incest taboo, linguistics, and Freud's theory of melancholy that I'm just not seeing. This book convinced me that while I enjoy sex and gender as an intellectual 'hobby' as it were, I am not going to follow down ddrpolaris's path of this as a possible academic field. I just don't have the passion (or the patience) for it. I also think I would have liked to read Undoing Gender, instead. This was a book about theory, which is my least favorite part of studying English, never mind other subjects. If we'd been able to read a book that actually discusses her ideas instead of blowing up theories, I might have enjoyed it more, incredibly dense language and all.
Wow...just wow. This book gives new meaning to the word dense. Seriously, it was barely 200 pages long, and it still took three dedicated days to read it. Butler is brilliant, but is NOT going for intelligibility with this book. You know that weird phenomenon that occurs when you say the same word over and over again, and it starts sounding nonsensical? Well, ddrpolaris and I have been talking about all the words in the book that are repeated enough to cause that effects: phallogocentric, juridical, cathexis, epistemological, ontological... You don't just have to know gender and queer theory to understand her work, it also helps to have a thorough grounding in linguistics and philosophy, too. Reading this is intense.
Wasn't kidding when I said intense. Basically, Gender Trouble was written because Butler had an axe to grind about the formalism and structuralism that was present in psychoanalysis (her theory of choice) and gender theory in general. The way this worked out was that she'd give an argument postulated by someone else (suck it Lacan!), smash it to smithereens, and then explain why the theory was DUMB and the theorist DUMBER. I have to respect Butler, if for no other reason than because she can infuse nigh-impenetrable academic text with truckloads of snark. Of course, she does go out of her way to make those bits clearer: "This rather astonishing statement provides insight not only into Levi-Strauss's apparent powers of denial...", "But we can understand this conclusion [that female homosexuality issues from a disappointed heterosexuality] to be the necessary result of a heterosexualized and masculinize observational point of view that takes the lesbian sexuality to be a refusal of sexuality per se only because sexuality is presumed to be heterosexual, and the observer, here constructed as the heterosexual male, is clearly being refused", and "If the Symbolic guarantees the failure of the tasks it commands, perhaps its purposes, like those of the Old Testament God, are altogether unteleological--not an accomplishment of some goal, but obedience and suffering to enforce the 'subject's' sense of limitation 'before the law'."
Dreamy, no?
Butler also gets into the difference of performativity and performance. For Butler, gender isn't a noun, it's a verb. You don't have gender, you do it. You might not think you are, but the things you do to show masculinity or femininity are part of 'gender doing.' It's not even as obvious as the clothes you wear (which is part of it), but how you speak, what you say, when you speak, how you display body language, what body language you use, etc. Performativity is all the tiny little things you do that scream "I identify my gender as X!" that you don't even realize has meaning. You act your gender, the same way you can act race or class. Performativity is a fascinating subject which I'll probably devote an entire LJ post to at another time. Probably after the semester is over. In that post, I will crucify Deborah Tannen and burn her in effigy, even if only in words.
Reviewing non-fiction is actually much harder than reviewing fiction. I don't have characters to examine, a plot to discuss, or anything solid to cling to. I'm not well-read enough in the subject to be able to speak with great authority about how her theories: impacted gender studies (though the real answer to that is: A LOT), hold up against criticism, or interact with the works of other scholars. I can't even give a simple 'yes' or 'no' to the question "did you enjoy this book?" because it was painful to read and hard to digest, but I still feel glad to have read it. Not even because I have that special "I read a seminal text, which gives me +10 academic points" feeling, but because, in retrospect, the book is a good read. Like I said, she can tear a bitch up in a way that I truly appreciate. It's like (I assume) drinking Laphroaig--tastes terrible on the way down, but the aftertaste is quite enjoyable, and leaves a pleasant warmth in your belly.
Of course, I'm willing to believe that Laphroiag leaves a wretched aftertaste, too, but I am not a Scotch whisky girl.
I'm going to be honest; I didn't understand the entirety of the book. However, I find myself in good company, as my professor doesn't understand the entirety of the book. There's a lot going on here, and even peeling back the tissue, inch by inch, doesn't give you the whole idea. The theories she references, the allusions she makes, the language she uses, and the points she makes range from moderately obscure/obtuse to "where the fuck did she just go, cause I sure as hell can't follow!" There's a link between the incest taboo, linguistics, and Freud's theory of melancholy that I'm just not seeing. This book convinced me that while I enjoy sex and gender as an intellectual 'hobby' as it were, I am not going to follow down ddrpolaris's path of this as a possible academic field. I just don't have the passion (or the patience) for it. I also think I would have liked to read Undoing Gender, instead. This was a book about theory, which is my least favorite part of studying English, never mind other subjects. If we'd been able to read a book that actually discusses her ideas instead of blowing up theories, I might have enjoyed it more, incredibly dense language and all.