Reading Butler's "Gender Trouble", I was intrigued by her trace of "sex" and how the term is structured to appear in a dominant relation to "gender" but in fact is constructed by "gender." Early on, Butler presents the idea of a discourse using a theory of determinism to disguise its true intentions of creating a subject, thereby placing itself in a dominant position over the subject: "Judicially power inevitably 'produces' what it claims merely to represent" (3).
In her argument on "gender" and "sex", similarly, the terms' relationship is constructed through determinism, but instead of being a disguised hierarchical relationship such as "subject" and "representative", the supposed hierarchical relationship existing between "sex" and "gender" are presented openly.This open hierarchy, however, becomes the disguise for a possibly more complex relationship underlying the terms: "This production of sex as the prediscursive ought to be understood as the effect of the apparatus of cultural construction designated by gender" (10). Butler explains that "sex" is presented as the physical canvas upon which the conceptual gender may be inscribed. Since "gender" is the "cultural interpretation of sex", "sex" must predate culture (10). As Burke might say, however, since man is the symbol-using animal and his understanding of reality is not based on a physical Truth but is construction of symbols, our understanding of "sex" must have been created through our use of symbols (language) constructed by culture.
The open hierarchical positions in which "sex" and "gender" are sometimes structured, depending on the discourse, disguises the true relationship between the terms, which is not mutually exclusive. Butler's asks, "how, then, does gender need to be reformulated to encompass the power relations that produce the effect of a prediscursive sex and so conceal that very operation of discursive production?" Gender appears to function as an instrument of orientation or entry point to understand a complex structure of relations between sex and culture disguised by binaries. Butler explains that Western language in itself is phallogocentric and therefor the symbols we use to understand femininity or masculinity will always be projected through male dominance. Since we cannot simply reconstruct our language, we cannot completely upend the binary structure in which "gender" and "sex" are placed. Situating "gender" into a single definition which reveals the structures it creates would be impossible, since language in itself relies on the male/female binary. It may be better to define it as a flexible orientation or vehicle which can take into itself the characteristics attributed to sex as culture continues to shift. "Gender" should become a tool for organizing traces of structures; a term which does not represent a set meaning but calls forth a method of thought.
2 comments:
The phrase "[s]ince we cannot simple reconstruct our language" disheartens me a bit. Isn't language being altered and reconstructed all the time? Mustn't a goal for the future be to "upend the binary structure in which 'gender' and 'sex' are placed"? There are hundreds of thousands of people squirming around in the binary. They feel choked by a language which constrains them and yet they must use to communicate. To be complacent with the binary is almost to be a part of the problem, because it actively harms people. Language currently "relies on the male/female binary" but it does not have to! Why can't language by molded into a fluid system which functions on a spectrum rather than a binary? Maybe I've misunderstood your conclusions about gender, and I apologize if I have.
I like the idea of gender being a "method of thought" because that helps to de-naturalize gender by making it more conscious, but I think that it's more than that even. If J.Bu has taught me anything, it's that gender is performative (not to be confused with performance). This means that gender is far more than thought.
While I was writing this, I was thinking of language as being knowingly constructed. As if some league of gentlemen sat down and decided to construct a language, but without language in the first place, that would be impossible...
I think I'm making assumptions that the very existence of language is derived from a patriarchy, but I see now that a patriarchy couldn't exist without a language to define itself with. I suppose, what I'm wondering then is where is language patriarchal? Is grammar constructed through a male/female binary?
I think, now that we've discussed in class, I think gender is similar to a terministic screen. It "directs the attention to one field rather than the other", which does imply that gender is performative. If gender is "a relative point of convergence among culturally and historically specific sets of relations," then gender shifts meanings of sex while simultaneously containing upended implications from the past. It acts on identity in marking its possible attributes. It actually kind of reminds me of Foucault's episteme.
I suppose, how I might change my argument now, is to say that perhaps Butler is arguing for gender to be defined as shiftable so that governing binaries may be upended. This definition, instead of calling forth a singular meaning, would call forth an orientation which asks readers to trace the multiple pathways implicit in terms seemingly structured through binaries.
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