I. the End of Sexual Difference?

Anna Kosloski

Undoing Gender

Judith Butler

Judith Butler’s Undoing Gender is a theoretical critique of feminist theory, linguistic categories of sex & gender in conjunction with social power and an analysis of the binary category of gender. Her question then becomes: why does language exude so much power over one’s understanding of self and how can theory intervene in understanding the categorical social world.

I. The End of Sexual Difference?

Throughout this section Butler tackles modern feminist theory arguing that feminism is at a standstill when it comes to what it is trying to achieve. In addition feminism is lost when it cannot account for the multitude of experiences that exist in relation to gender, in other words feminism is lacking in understanding the global perspective (174-175; 178).

Butler argues that theory and action are intertwined, stating:
“Feminist theory is never fully distinct from feminism as a social movement,” (175)
“Theory is an activity that does not remain restrictive to the academy. It takesplace every time a possibility is imagined, a collective self-reflection takes place, a dispute over values, priorities and language emerges” (176).

Butler focuses this section on the key term sexual difference. She argues that sexual difference “is not a given, not a premise, not a basis to build feminism” rather it is “a question that prompts feminist inquiry” (178). The problem which Butler seeks to address is using “sexual difference” in place of gender because difference linguistically implies “a fundamental difference” whereas gender implies a difference in social construction of experience (181).

Gender is a term Butler also addresses. She says that gender has evolved over time and is differentiated from the word sex to express that men’s and women’s roles are socially constructed and vary throughout the life course (182).

Butler discusses the importance of language and breaking down the meaning behind language (180-181). In addition she comes back to this in The Question of Social Transformationwhen discussing oppression (218).

II. The Question of Social Transformation

This section is primarily a response to Butler’s earlier and widely read work Gender Trouble where she “tried to expose the pervasive heterosexism in feminist theory and challenged the exiting notion of gender norms” (207). She is most known for her discussion in Gender Trouble of this idea as gender as a performance. In Undoing Gender, she focuses her discussion critiques of her early work and examines the importance of theory in relation to gender.

The importance of theory emerges when Butler states that “theory is itself transformative” (204).

A central concept to this section is norms. Butler sees a tension between norms as a construct to survive, and maintaining a critical distance from them through normativity or normalization as norms provide a “certain criteria for normal men and women” (206).

Butler stresses that norms are not fixed in definition (207;

Butler ties her concept of norms to a discussion of social power. She says it is important to understand how terms such as gender are “instituted, naturalized, and established as presupposition but to trace the moments where the binary system of gender is disputed and challenged, where the coherence of the categories are put into question, and where the very social life of gender turns out to be malleable and transformable” (216).

She stresses understanding the recourse norms can exude

Her final point is to stress that theory can become a praxis for transforming the current crisis in feminist theory and understanding the importance of language and what is normalized in society. To do this Butler encourages extending the realm of universality and expanding categories to be more inclusive and understanding to the range of cultural experiences (223-225).

The Simplistic Feminist Theory of Understanding and its Consequences

Understanding Gender through a Praxis of Theory and Culture