Women\'s Issues - Feminism Literary

Women's Issues - Feminism

Literary Theory - Judith Butler

From Judith Butler's perspective, feminist theory is going through some changes. Some of those changes are based on the language used by feminists and language used to describe what feminism - in political terms - has become or is becoming. Butler explains that the "subject" of women has been going through a defining process. She suggests, in esoteric phrases and paragraphs, that the word "women" has become "troublesome." Why? Because merely to say that a person is "a woman" does not go far enough in describing that human, and saying someone is "a woman" conjures up gender issues and stereotypes that are incomplete.

Just going by gender, Butler insists, is vague and incomplete because the concept of gender "intersects" with social class, racial and ethic issues, and sexual identities. All of these images tend to muddy the water for those attempting to understand the feminine person. She writes (p. 99) that there is a "political assumption" that feminism is universal, and that somehow in any culture feminism represents a battle against "patriarchy" and "masculine domination." What a reader gets out of Butler's scholarly narrative is that all these language issues associated with feminism and woman only lead to confusion.

One has to read this essay carefully, and go back over some of Butler's discussion more than twice, to gain a good grasp of her theses. But by paying close attention to her carefully constructed arguments, Butler's philosophy comes clear. She (p. 101) takes aim at the difference between "gender" and "sex." Her point is that "gender" is cultural, and needs to be defined in that context, and "sex" is something else entirely. Butler doesn't know how do define sex: is it "natural, anatomical, chromosomal, or hormonal"? Her narrative at times is like she is having her own debate inside her thoughts. Is gender something a person is believe "...to have" or is gender "an essential attribute that a person is said to be?" she asks (p. 101). A reader could easily accuse Butler of splitting hairs, but her points are interesting enough and provocative enough to urge the reader on towards a better understanding of the feminine issues she is dissecting.

It is clear that Butler is challenging the narrow definition of the female gender ("women") in several senses; one is that that the masculine power structure wants to stay in control by keeping women in "oppression" (of lesser importance in society than men). Another is that while feminists debate the question of "the universality of female identity" those feminists seem to seek to put together a "coalition" (p. 103) of women. But even that idea has problems, according to Butler, because despite the fact that putting together a coalition of several feminine cultures is a nice democratic exercise, the leader or leaders ("coalitional theorists") who try to put together that coalition may "inadvertently reinsert" themselves as "sovereign of the process."

What she means by that is that forcing unity on women's cultures makes it less than a natural evolution. Butler agrees that in order to put together a political coalition, there must be a goal ahead of the coalition-building process (p. 103). To make life better for women everywhere, some believe that "unity" among women's various cultures is necessary. But typically, Butler challenges that notion, as she indeed challenges most notions related to feminist ideas. Maybe unity is a good thing in some circumstances, she explains, but when women insist on a "premature...goal of unity" that may be followed by an "...ever more bitter fragmentation among the ranks..."