Judith Butler and Gender As Performance
Judith Butler is one of the most well-known theorists regarding the idea that gender is something that is performed by individuals. Her concept of gender performativity is the idea that people choose to perform gender in a context in which we are given very little socially acceptable choices, but can be explained as being similar to what actors do in front of the camera. Due to the importance we place on the belief that men need to act like men and women need to behave like women, it is often believed that gender is an innate attribute and not a social construct. In her article Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory, Butler explains that if gender is something that sexed bodies assimilate to in order to follow the societal codes of what is appropriate behavior, then those actions can be conceptualized differently to allow more flexibility for individuals. In the same article, she asserts that in U.S. culture, the gender binary and its strict social repercussions against those that act against the "normal" script, this script is policed by harassment, parental pressures to fill expectations, and peer influence. All of which are a way to guarantee that the culture will repeat itself from generation to generation.
Judith Butler's theory about gender roles and their social implications and need for reconstruction is more fully developed in her book, Gender Trouble. She argues that the limited acceptance of variation in gender roles does great harm to individual expression. With the limited options for both men and women, there is little room for their combined forces, because men are constantly focused on becoming the financial supporters of their families which leaves women with the sole option of being the maternal expert she is expected to be. This idea excludes the masculine women or feminine men from being acceptable parental figures for their children because it may lead to a child growing up and conceptualizing the world differently.
Read more about this topic: Genderfuck
Famous quotes containing the words butler, gender and/or performance:
“Though I have many words,
What woman’s satisfied,
I am no longer faint
Because at her side?
O who could have foretold
That the heart grows old?”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“Most women of [the WW II] generation have but one image of good motherhood—the one their mothers embodied. . . . Anything done “for the sake of the children” justified, even ennobled the mother’s role. Motherhood was tantamount to martyrdom during that unique era when children were gods. Those who appeared to put their own needs first were castigated and shunned—the ultimate damnation for a gender trained to be wholly dependent on the acceptance and praise of others.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)
“So long as the source of our identity is external—vested in how others judge our performance at work, or how others judge our children’s performance, or how much money we make—we will find ourselves hopelessly flawed, forever short of the ideal.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)