Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Essentialist feminism'

Although feminists resist accounts that define women as having certain features that are essential to their being women, feminists are also guilty of giving essentialist definitions. Because women are extremely diverse in their experiences, the essentialist critics question whether a universal (non-essentialist) account of women can be given. I argue that it is possible to formulate a valuable category of woman, despite potential essentialist challenges. Even with diversity among women, women are oppressed as women by patriarchal structures such as rape, pornography, and sexual harassment that regulate women’s sexuality and construct women as beings whose main role is to service men’s sexual needs.

This paper presents the lives and early feminist works of two modernist era poets, Laura Riding Jackson and Muriel Rukeyser. Despite differences of style, the two poets shared a common theme of essentialist feminism before its popularization by 1950s and 60s second wave feminists. The two poets also endured periods of poetic silence or self censorship which can be attributed to modernism, McCarthyism, and rising conservatism. Analysis of their poems helps to remedy their exclusion from the common canon.

Thesis (M.A.)--Georgia State University, 2008.
Title from file title page. Christie J. Hartley, Andrew I. Cohen, committee co-chairs; Andrew Altman, committee member. Electronic text (70 p.) : digital, PDF file. Description based on contents viewed August 1, 2008. Includes bibliographical references (p. 68-70).

The polemical debate, within feminist theory in North America, in the 1980s, around essentialism is the central focus of this thesis.
In particular, this work attempts to critically examine the notion of essentialism, the resistance to accepting a feminine "essence," and the loosely defined and employed terminology surrounding this field of inquiry. In accomplishing these objectives I draw upon, and critique, the more recent work elaborated around theorizing with/through the "body."
Aspects of feminist theory which are examined as contributive towards the above aim are an analysis of the explicit, and implicit, dangers of accepting or discarding essentialism, and an analysis of the inherent ontological and philosophical tenets that function within this present discourse.
It is maintained that by addressing the issue of essentialism, the relationship between subjectivity, identity, and gender, within feminist theory, will be liberated from further constraining propositions.

Artist Ana Mendieta frequently conjoined the female body with nature to express her search for personal identity and support for feminist topics. Her last intended and least scholarly examined work, La Maja de Yerba (Grass Goddess), continues specific visual and thematic elements of her previous Silueta Series (Silhouette) yet also presents an aesthetically unique creation. Despite its incompletion as a result of her premature death, the preserved maquette directly stipulates a female form to be planted in grass on the Bard College campus grounds. This alignment of women and nature garners criticism for its reliance on universalism and categorizations of women’s experiences; however, Mendieta’s use of essentialism in public art contributes to circulating feminist discourse to a wider audience. This paper considers the artistic influences, thematic concepts, and employment of strategic essentialism in Mendieta’s La Maja de Yerba.

This dissertation concerns how activists preserve particular feminisms in everyday life, particularly in this postmodern moment as advances in technology create virtual spaces, as feminism experiences generational shifts, and as notions about gender and bodies influence the discursive and political construction of contemporary activism and communities. The particular feminists at the center of this study are self-described radical feminists. While original theories allowed members to question the essentialism of bodies (i.e., sex class), this study focuses on the movement trajectory in which members critique how people assigned male at birth learn masculinity as inextricably tied to the oppression of women (i.e., sex caste). Using data from a historical newsletter and two current micro-blogs, I provide a textual analysis to understand how public narratives of gender and essentialism circulate in and are challenged by feminist (cyber)spaces. The results of this project suggest four important findings. First, in print and online, people use imagined and essential understandings of bodies where actual bodies are not present in order to exclude. Second, when text reflects the personal, lived experiences of community members, logic and emotion are better connected in the everyday. On the other hand, when lived actuality is abstracted, storytellers rely almost exclusively on logic to make claims. Third, while lesbian newsletter-writers of the past constructed a sexual identity, they did not take on the radical-feminist mandate to talk about sexual desire. Online, only the radical identity of the movement’s predecessor’s has persisted, while any discussions of sexual identity or pleasure are missing. Lastly, while radical and trans-identified feminists often find themselves at odds, this study suggests that perhaps their consciousness-raising practices are more similar than can be seen from the everyday. Both groups use poetry and creative writing as a way to make sense of their coming-out and being-out experiences amid cis- and hetero-normativity.

This paper analyses Mr. Scogan and his treatment of women with the use of Althusser’s Marxist theory which (supposedly and in this case successfully) reveals the ideology which infuses every State and every larger social group. Feminist theory is then used to analyse his philosophy which influences both his utopia, “the Rational State”, as well as his treatment of women – the conclusion drawn after analysing several events or discussions in Crome Yellow, such as on the Home Farm, the Rational State and the Charity Fair was that Mr. Scogan is perhaps not representative of all men and certainly not of men (and men’s notions) at the timeof Crome Yellow’s publication, but he is representative of a stereotypical man who oppress women based on their femininity. The worst case scenario drawn was that Mr. Scogan could be a rapist of young virgins.

This feminist study examines women's use of improvisation in discovering, creating, and articulating various self-identities. To create a theory of identity formation, two feminist theoretical position, essentialism and poststructuralism, are analyzed and merged. This hybrid theory addresses the interplay between the self and society that women must recognize in order to form satisfying identities. Improvisational practices, involving bodily awareness and movement, are demonstrated to have the potential for helping women to actualize themselves in these various identities. For this study, the writer uses her experience as an improviser and interviews three women who use improvisation in their choreographic processes. She also discusses performers whom she has seen and performers about whom feminist performance critics have written. This study examines improvisation in dance and performance art from a feminist perspective. I clarify what improvisation entails and, by doing so, illustrate how improvisational movement in dance and performance art can enhance the lives of women as viewers and performers. Through exploring improvisation from this feminist perspective, I demonstrate the psychological insights I have gained from practicing improvisation and document performances that have been improvisationally inspired by women who feel dissatisfied with the manner in which this society shapes and limits their identities.

The aim of this study is to examine which notions of women exist within three different nationalist parties by analyzing how women are visually represented for political purposes. The aim is also to examine how these notions relate to a nationalist cultural policy. A semiotic analysis as well as a contextual idea analysis using ideal types was implemented in order to distinguish different notions of women in the material. The result shows five different representations of women, which can be summarized as two dominant notions. “The good woman” represents the nation and is depicted as natural, attractive, domesticated, warm, feminine, heterosexual and in need of protection. “The bad woman” does not represent the nation and is depicted as unattractive, cold, selfish, rebellious and queer. Given the nation-building purpose of the nationalist culture policy, these notions of women could entail a restriction of women’s cultural expressions as a consequence.

As a critical theory, feminisms and feminist legal theory challenge existing norms. Of necessity, the values behind this methodology must in turn be critiqued. Feminist methodology, essentialism is dependent on the experience of women, distilled into a particular type of woman for academic ease. Gender is only one of the defining traits of a woman. Depending on the specificities of the context, other traits will impact on the life experiences of a woman and how she experiences discriminatory practices. In a context where a particular racial group do not form the dominant culture, race will be an important defining trait. Therefore to be a Black woman in the Western world will shape a woman's experience of discrimination. To be a Black African woman in the West will also further determine the types of discrimination suffered in addition to gender discrimination which must be differentiated from the experiences of Black Western women and White Western woman. These experiences affect the realisation of women's human rights. Discrimination suffered by an African woman as a woman in Africa is contextually specific. It is identified as culturally specific. Yet, culturally identified or determined gender discrimination is arguably no more than the location of institutionalised gender discrimination in the private sphere. It is considered a cultural problem because the positionality of the dominant theory of feminism, which is Western, locates alien cultures as other and separates the experiences of women in that culture. The location of such gender based institutional discrimination primarily within a cultural sphere places it firmly within the cultural relativist paradigm which challenges the universality of human rights, including women's human rights, and further detaches gender based discrimination from the rights discourse. Therefore, not only is race peripheral to feminisms, culture, or the manifestation of culturally identified gender discrimination, is also marginalised. The separation of women from each other based on factors such as race, class and ethnicity limits the potential of feminist legal approaches to the promotion and protection of women's human rights. Feminist legal theory can promote, protect and assure all women's human rights if it is inclusive and if it is representative. To be representative, the manifestations of racial and cultural discrimination must form an integral part of the theory.

In this thesis the Swedish author Elin Wägner’s debate book Alarm clock and the American author Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s novel Herland are analysed and compared from an ecofeminist perspective. Since the use of an ecofeminist perspective can be perceived as anachronistic as the term ecofeminism was drafted far later than the literary works in question I have chosen to distinguish between empirical and analytical concepts to approach their texts. In order to interpret their texts in their intellectual and historical contexts, concepts such as ecofeminism, matriarchy, utopia, vision and science have been of significance. This as the authors’ theoretical approaches in matriarchal theories, utopic perception, vision and science shaped their literary point of departure. The sociologist Lester Frank Ward’s theories on social planning had a huge impact on Gilman’s ideas as had the influence of the Darwinian movement focusing on evolution and eugenic, theories that at the time around the turn of the 19th century influenced social science, history and psychology. Elin Wägner found her inspiration in works by Johan Jakob Bachofen, Rosa Mayreder and Mathilde Vaerting, anchored in the Central European literacy discourse of her time; ideas significant for her civilization-critical thinking focusing on the relationship between women’s subordination and the environment, where the ruling of the earth is understood by the same logic that drives men’s dominion over women. Wägner and Gilman follows a line in the eco-feminist theorem, based on the statement that women are more responsive than men to nature and environmental issues, a biological determinism, conceptual essentialism and universalism, based on women’s different experiences in a gender society.

Thesis (MA)--University of Stellenbosch, 1998.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In this thesis an inquiry is made into the contributions that cultural ecofeminism, critical-transformative ecofeminism and cyber-(eco)feminism make towards the articulation of an ecological feminist notion of the self that can generate or promote an ethical relation with nature from a position beyond dualism and essentialism. In the first chapter, titled Cultural ecofeminism, different aspects of patriarchal Western culture are identified that are responsible for the twin dominations of women and nature. In the light of their critique of patriarchal culture and the alienated masculinist self that lies central to it, cultural ecofeminists endorse two alternative notions of the self, namely a female self and a feminine self. In both cases the notion of relationality between self and nature is stressed, and alternative "feminine" values such as care and nurturing are put forward as providing us with alternative ecological values. The contribution that this position makes towards the articulation of an ecological feminist self lies in its emphasis on a notion of relationality between self and nature, so as to establish an ethical relation between self and nature. From both a feminist and an ecological perspective however, this position is flawed given its inability to (adequately) overcome the problems of dualism and essentialism. In the second chapter, titled Critical-transformative ecofeminism, the dualist conceptual framework of the rationalist philosophical tradition is identified as grounding the domination of women, nature and others. By employing the notions of continuity and difference, a strategy is proposed to move beyond dualism and by implication, essentialism. In this chapter, the notion of a pluralist feminine self is proposed and in the context of a critical-transformative ethics, the notion of the mutual self is endorsed that allows for continuity and difference between different selves and self and nature. The ecological values that are endorsed by this position include respect, care, and trust, therefore coinciding, but also diverging from cultural ecofeminism. Critical-transformative ecofeminism's contribution towards the articulation of an ecofeminist self beyond dualism and essentialism, lies in its successful movement beyond dualism, especially with regard to the notion of the mutual self as a feminist notion of an ecological self. The shortcoming of this position is however that the pluralist feminine self which is proposed as an ecological notion of a feminist self, is unsuccessful in its attempt to address the problem of universalising female gender identity. In the third chapter, titled Cyber-(eco)feminism, the notions of the cyborg, the situated self and the lnappropriate/d Other are discussed as alternative feminist subjectivities. In the discussion of a politics of articulation, an environmental politics that emphasises the social and artifactual dimensions of nature, is articulated. Through the figuration of nature as Coyote Trickster, an ecological dimension to these selves comes to the fore and together these notions are positively received from an ecological and feminist perspective as adequately overcoming the problems of dualism and essentialism. From an ecological perspective, it is however argued that the technophilic character of the cyborg is problematic and doubt is cast on its ability to forge significant ethical relations. The politics of articulation proposed by cyber-(eco)feminism is commended for its inclusivity, but in the final analysis, it is argued that to establish an ethical relation with nature, care must be taken not to overlook nature's difference, that is, that nature is an independent entity with needs and ends of its own.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie tesis behels 'n ondersoek na die bydraes van kulturele ekofeminisme, kritiestransformatiewe ekofeminisme en cyber-(eko)feminisme tot die artikulering van 'n ekologies-feministiese self wat 'n etiese verhouding met die natuur kan voortbring vanuit 'n posisie wat die probleme van dualisme en essensialisme oorskry. In die eerste hoofstuk getiteld Cultural ecofeminism, word verskillende aspekte van patriargale Westerse kultuur ge"identifiseer as onderliggend aan die dominasie van be ide vroue en die natuur. In die lig van hul kritiek op patriargale kultuur en die vervreemding van die "masculinist self" wat sentraal staan daarin, onderskryf kulturele feministe twee alternatiewe konsepsies van die self, naamlik 'n "female self' en 'n "feminine self'. In beide gevalle word die konsep van relasionaliteit tussen self an natuur beklemtoon, en alternatiewe "vroulike" waardes soos sorg en koestering word voorgestel as ekologiese waardes. Die bydrae wat hierdie posisie lewer tot die konsepsualisering van 'n ekologies-feministiese self, le in die beklemtoning van 'n konsep van relasionaliteit ten einde 'n etiese verhouding tussen self en natuur tot stand te bring. Hierdie posisie skiet egter te kort vanuit beide 'n ekologiese en feministiese perspektief aangesien dit nie in staat is om die probleme van dualisme en essensialisme (toereikend) te oorkom nie. In die tweede hoofstuk getiteld Critical-transformative ecofeminism, word die dualistiese konseptuele raamwerk van die rasionalistiese filosofiese tradisie ge"identifiseer as onderliggend aan die dominasie van vroue, die natuur en andere. Met behulp van die konsepte "continuity" en "difference" word 'n strategie voorgestel waarvolgens dualisme, en by implikasie essensialisme, oorskry kan word. In hierdie hoofstuk word 'n konsep van 'n "pluralist feminine self' voorgestel en 'n konsep van die "mutual self' word in die konteks van krities-transformatiewe ekofeministiese etiek voorgestel, wat ruimte laat vir beide kontunu"iteit en verskille tussen selwe en tussen self en natuur. Die ekologiese waardes wat deur hierdie posisie onderskryf word, sluit respek, sorg en vertroue in. Dit sluit dus aan, maar verskil ook van kulturele ekofeminisme. Die bydrae van krities-transformatiewe ekofeminisme tot die artikulering van 'n ekologies-feministiese self wat dualisme en essensialisme oorskry, le in die suksesvolle oorskryding van dualisme. Dit is spesifiek die geval met die konsep van die "mutual self' as feministiese konsep van 'n ekologiese self. Die tekortkoming van hierdie posisie is egter dat die "pluralist feminine self' wat as 'n ekologiese konsep van 'n feministiese self voorgestel word, onsuksesvol is as 'n paging om die probleem van universalisme ten opsigte van vroulike identiteit aan te spreek. In die derde hoofstuk getiteld Cyber-(eco)feminism, word die konsepte van die cyborg, die "situated self', en die "lnappropriate/d Other" bespreek as alternatiewe feministiese subjektiwiteite. In die bespreking van 'n "politics of articulation", word 'n omgewingspolitiek geartikuleer wat die sosiale en artefaktiese dimensies van die natuur beklemtoon. Deur middel van die figurering van die natuur as "Coyote Trickster", kom 'n ekologiese dimensie tot die verskillende konsepte van die self na vore. Gepaardgaande met die konsep van die natuur as "Coyote Trickster", word hierdie konsepte positief evalueer weens hul oorskryding van die probleme van dualisme en essensialisme. Vanuit 'n ekologiese perspektief word daar egter geargumenteer dat die tegnofiliese karakter van die cyborg problematies is, en dit word betwyfel of die cyborg in staat is om betekenisvolle etiese verhoudings aan te gaan. Die "politics of articulation" wat voorgestel word deur cyber-(eko)feminisme, word as prysenswaardig geag weens die inklusiewe karakter daarvan. In die finale analise word daar egter geargumenteer dat ten einde 'n etiese verhouding met die natuur tot stand te bring spesiale voorsorg getref moet word om die anders-heid van die natuur in ag te neem. Dit is dat die natuur 'n onafhanklike entiteit is met doelwitte en behoeftes van haar eie.
Center for Science Development

Social psychology researchers have become increasingly interested in the role of essentialist beliefs in predicting attitudes toward social groups. However, there is little agreement about what the term actually means, whether it means different things for different groups, what endorsement of essentialism (or its sub-components) means for attitudes, and how much this varies depending on the relevant social context. This underlying lack of clarity helps to explain some of the difficulty in understanding the relationships between essentialist beliefs about sexual orientation and attitudes toward gay men and lesbians. In the current project, I suggest a fundamental shift in the approach to this issue. Specifically, I examine the effects of essentialist beliefs related to gender (rather than essentialist beliefs related to sexual orientation) on heterosexist attitudes. In study one, I explore the interrelationships among gender- and sexual orientation-related beliefs and attitudes toward gays, revealing that essentialist beliefs about gender are more consistent and unitary in their relationship to heterosexism than the sexual-orientation related analogues. In my second study, I demonstrate a causal link by manipulating essentialist beliefs about gender. Increasing the salience of gender essentialist beliefs produced higher heterosexism scores relative to decreasing the salience of such beliefs. Taken together, these studies demonstrate the interconnectedness of sexism and the gender hierarchy with heterosexism and discrimination against gays. More importantly, study two forecasts a possible intervention strategy for reducing anti-gay prejudice.

This essay examines the performance artworks Action Pants: Genital Panic (1969), Interior Scroll (1975) and S.O.S Starification Object Series (1974-82) by artists VALIE EXPORT, Carolee Schneemann and Hannah Wilke. The objective is to analyse the expressions of these artworks, from a theoretical viewpoint of feminist art-theoreticians and their critique regarding the female body in representation. Performance- and body-art have been the subject of discussion with respect to the female nude in the history of art, and the patriarchal structures that surround it. These eminent theories about the female body in art differ from one another, leaving this study to investigate given works and the explicit body-language that unites them, with the aim to identify a favourable representation of the female body in 1960sand 70s performance art with the vantage point of these artworks. The present essay has demonstrated that vaginal iconology exists in all works and can be presented in various ways. It becomes clear that the work of VALIE EXPORT provides a framework most suitable as a feminist, critical strategy to counteract the notion of the male gaze, framing, and representation of the body as commodity in capitalist-society. However, the works of Schneemann and Wilke, with more essentialist themes, can through ambiguity contribute to a positive representation of woman in representation. There is no simple answer to which way 2 of using the body is the most beneficial for feminism, however, a critical representation of the female body in performance and body art, in relation to the artists’ own intentions, creates positive ambiguity, thus these artworks do not only reinforce patriarchal conventions regarding the female body.

The thesis examines how sex/gender and sexuality are represented through text and images within the Internet community Sylvia whose primary target group is girls. Through an examination of the aesthetics, the member rules and the choices that constitute the framework for the site, the study observes Sylvia as a cultural context. In relation to this setting, the ten most visited member profiles at the time for the study are more closely examined. These profiles are studied from a constructivist view of sex/gender and are analysed from the perspective of feminist and quee r theory as well as in the light of feministic debates concerning sexuality and erotica. The thesis shows how Internet as a forum and the non-heterosexual context Sylvia open up for a constructivist understanding of sex/gender and also leads to a questioning of "masculinity" and "femininity". But the biological sex remains important since the community implies an explicit discussion about biological sex when targeting girls who should feel secure when practicing their sexuality. The result is that the sex/gender structures within the community often keep to a binary and essential segregation of the sexes. Sylvia becomes a free zone of solidarity in between women. This opens up for sexual experimentation beyond the heterosexual erotification of the female body. The user profiles also contain subversive gender expressions which are questioning the hetero norm. Even though there is a possibility of choosing from a variety of alternative sex/genders, the majority of the users keeps defining themselves as "girls" and "boys" . The study shows that Sylvia remains to relate to the world "outside" and this leads to an increase of Internet's possibility of deconstruction of identities online.

Uppsatsen undersöker hur kön/genus och sexualitet representeras i text och bild på Internet-communityt Sylvia, vars primära målgrupp är tjejer. Studien ger en överblick över den kulturella kontext som Sylvia utgör genom att undersöka den estetik, de regler och de valmöjligheter som sätter ramen för användarna. Med detta som bakgrund studeras de tio användarprofiler som vid tiden för studien var mest besökta. Profilerna undersöks utifrån en konstruktivistisk syn på kön/genus och analyseras utifrån såväl feministiska som queerteoretiska perspektiv samt i ljuset av feministiska debatter om sexualitet och erotik. Utifrån studien går det bland annat att se hur Internet som forum och den icke-heterosexuella kontexten Sylvia öppnar upp för en konstruktivistisk syn på kön och ett ifrågasättande av "manlighet" och "kvinnlighet". Men det biologiska könet bibehåller sin status eftersom sidan explicit för en diskussion om biologiskt kön i samband med att den riktar sig till tjejer som ska kunna känna sig trygga i utövandet av sin sexualitet. Därför faller kön/genusstrukturerna på communityt ofta tillbaka i en binär och essentialistisk könsuppdelning. Sylvia blir något av en frizon av kvinnlig gemenskap som öppnar upp för ett experimenterande med sexualitet som sträcker sig bortom den heterosexuella erotiseringen av kvinnokroppen. I användarprofilerna återfinns även subversiva genusuttryck som ifrågasätter heteronormen. Trots att det är möjligt att välja mellan ett flertal alternativa kön/genus fortsätter majoriteten av användarna att definiera sig själva som "tjejer" och "killar". Studien visar på att Sylvia hela tiden förhåller sig till världen "utanför" och härmed minskar Internets möjliga dekonstruerande effekt på identiteter online.

While the term sadomasochism might conjure cursory images of whips, chains, and leather-clad fetishists, this thesis delves deeper into sadomasochistic theory to analyze dynamics of power and powerlessness represented by a chosen sample of literary relationships. Using two contemporary works of vampire literature—Anne Rice's novel Interview with the Vampire and Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series—I examine how power is structured by and between male and female characters (and vampires and humans), and particularly emphasize the patriarchal messages these works' regressive sexual politics engender. Psychoanalysis and feminist theory are employed to support my overarching argument following the gendered dynamics of male sadism and female masochism (and vampire sadism and human masochism), as this dyad reflects men's and women's "normalized" roles of power and powerlessness, respectively, in today's society. Sadomasochistic relationships as depicted in this literature are created through mutual contracts or, what I refer to as, sociocultural sadomasochism to reflect the gendered power imbalances inherent in patriarchy. By concluding with readers' responses to these franchises, this thesis further attempts to determine why such unequal and oppressive relationships are desirable. Since vampires as Gothic figures embody what specific cultures dread yet desire, this literature possesses frightening implications—gender roles are conservative and masculinity is privileged in fiction and, by extension, in twenty-first-century American culture.
B.A.
Bachelors
English
Arts and Humanities

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak gilt als eine der Gründungsfiguren des postkolonialen Feminismus. Ihr Profil als postkoloniale Theoretikerin gewann sie mit der Veröffentlichung ihres Werkes In Other Worlds – Essays in Cultural Politics. In ihren Texten weist Spivak auf Widersprüche innerhalb der Nationen des Globalen Südens hin. Sie fokussiert, u. a. mit Hilfe der analytischen Konzepte Repräsentation (representation) und Subalternität (subaltern), insbesondere auf die problematische Rolle von Geschlechter- und Klassenverhältnissen in postkolonialen Widerstandsbewegungen, auf den Gegensatz zwischen den indischen Eliten und den unteren Bevölkerungsschichten und auf die gewaltsame Unterdrückung von Frauen des Südens.

Dans Trouble dans le genre, Judith Butler conteste l’aspect identitaire du féminisme, qui selon elle produirait de nouvelles possibilités d’exclusion, basées sur la catégorie même de « femme ». Je ne contesterai pas le mouvement qu’elle adopte, à savoir que la sexualité informe du genre, qui produit le sexe, bien que j’exposerai les difficultés que cela soulève. Mon intérêt se situe dans la vision que Butler a de la formation des sujets individuels et de leur rattachement à des identités collectives, via la performativité du genre. Sa position voulant que le genre soit un acte et l’identité une pratique, je vais expliquer comment elle conçoit l’humain constitué par ses actes et critiquer, avec deux auteures féministes, sa conception du genre. J’en conclurai que Butler doit admettre qu’une forme d’identité féminine soit nécessaire au féminisme tout en tenant compte de son plaidoyer d’inclusion des individus aux sexualités marginales.
In Gender Trouble, Judith Butler challenges feminism as identity politics, which, according to her, would produce a new set of potential exclusions, based on the category “woman”. I will not dispute how she articulates that sexuality gives sense to gender, which produces sex. My interest lies in how Butler understands the process of becoming a subject for an individual, and how people tend to belong to a collective identity, via gender performativity. She states that gender is an act and identity a form of practice. I will explain how she understands that human beings are constituted by their acts and criticize, according to two feminist authors, her conception of gender. I will conclude that Butler has to admit that some kind of feminine identity is necessary to feminism, even when we consider her plea for the inclusion of individuals sexually marginalized.

É possível afirmar que, desde a sua primeira vaga, o feminismo vem desafiando conceções essencialistas do que é ser mulher. Questionando as imposições de uma ordem patriarcal, teóricas e ativistas partiram da experiência de mulheres reais para perturbar uma «imagem do mundo» hegemónica. Nas últimas décadas, porém, o desenvolvimento de uma importante crítica interna revelou o modo como o próprio pensamento feminista nem sempre fora imune a uma forma de essencialismo metodológico, problematizando a aparente coerência do conceito de mulher. Os argumentos da particularidade e da normatividade criaram aquele que ficou conhecido como o «problema da diferença», colocando teoria e prática feminista num impasse: revelada a ausência de uma essência que defina o que é ser mulher, onde jaz a força da ação feminista? Esta dissertação serve-se da segunda filosofia de Wittgenstein para analisar um conceito simultaneamente problemático e central ao movimento feminista. Exploramos a forma como alguns autores descobriram no método anti-essencialista wittgensteiniano um convite ao reconhecimento do potencial emancipatório de uma linguagem tantas vezes usada para oprimir.
Feminism has arguably been defying essentializing claims about what it means to be a woman ever since its first wave. Calling into question the impositions of a patriarchal order, both theorists and activists have departed from real women’s experience aiming to disturb a hegemonic «picture of the world». However, the last decades saw the emergence of an important internal critique that revealed the way feminist thought had not itself been immune to a sort of methodological essentialism, thus problematizing the apparent coherence of the concept of woman. The so-called particularity and normativity arguments gave rise to the well-known «problem of difference», facing feminist theory and practice with a challenge: in the absence of an essence capable of accounting for what it means to be a woman, where does the strength of feminist organizing lay? This paper uses Wittgenstein’s later philosophy to analyse a simultaneously problematic and central concept to the feminist movement. Following the work of some contemporary authors, we argue that the Wittgensteinian anti-essentialist method invites us to recognise the emancipatory potential of a language too often used to oppress.

Cette thèse explore les connections entre la littérature canadienne contemporaine féminine et le féminisme transnational. Le « transnational » est une catégorie qui est de plus en plus importante dans la critique littéraire canadienne, mais elle n’est pas souvent evoquée en lien avec le féminisme. À travers cette thèse, je développe une méthodologie de lecture féministe basée sur le féminisme transnational. Cette méthodologie est appliquée à la littérature canadienne féminine; parallèlement, cette littérature participe à la définition et à l’élaboration des concepts féministes transnationaux tels que la complicité, la collaboration, le silence, et la différence. De plus, ma méthodologie participe à la recontextualisation de certains textes et moments dans l’histoire de la littérature canadienne, ce qui permet la conceptualisation d’une généalogie de l’expression féministe anti-essentialiste dans la littérature canadienne. J’étudie donc des textes de Daphne Marlatt, Dionne Brand, et Suzette Mayr, ainsi que le périodique Tessera et les actes du colloque intitulé Telling It, une conférence qui a eu lieu en 1988. Ces textes parlent de la critique du colonialisme et du nationalisme, des identités post-coloniales et diasporiques, et des possibilités de la collaboration féministe de traverser des frontières de toutes sortes. Dans le premier chapitre, j’explique ma méthodologie en démontrant que le périodique féministe bilingue Tessera peut être lu en lien avec le féminisme transnational. Le deuxième chapitre s’attarde à la publication editée par le collectif qui a été formé à la suite de la conférence Telling It. Je situe Telling It dans le contexte des discussions sur les différences qui ont eu lieu dans le féminisme nord-américan des dernières décennies. Notamment, mes recherches sur Telling It sont fondées sur des documents d’archives peu consultés qui permettent une réflexion sur les silences qui peuvent se cacher au centre du travail collaboratif. Le trosième chapitre est constitué d’une lecture proche du texte multi-genre « In the Month of Hungry Ghosts, » écrit par Daphne Marlatt en 1979. Ce texte explore les connexions complexes entre le colonialisme, le postcolonialisme, la complicité et la mondialisation. Le suject du quatrième chapitre est le film Listening for Something… (1994) qui découle d’une collaboration féministe transnationale entre Dionne Brand et Adrienne Rich. Pour terminer, le cinquième chapitre explore les liens entre le transnational et le national, la région – et le monstrueux, dans le contexte du roman Venous Hum (2004) de Suzette Mayr. Ces lectures textuelles critiques se penchent toutes sur la question de la représentation de la collaboration féministe à travers les différences – question essentielle à l’action féministe transnationale. Mes recherche se trouvent donc aux intersections de la littérature canadienne, la théorie féministe contemporaine, les études postcoloniales et la mondialisation. Les discussions fascinantes qui se passent au sein de la théorie transnationale féministe sont pertinentes à ces intersections et de plus, la littérature contemporaine féminine au Canada offre des interventions importantes permettant d’imaginer la collaboration féministe transnationale.
This dissertation explores connections between contemporary Canadian women’s writing and transnational feminism. The category of the transnational is increasingly important within Canadian literary criticism, but it is infrequently evoked in relation to feminism. Throughout this thesis, I develop a transnational feminist reading methodology that can be brought to bear on Canadian women’s writing, even as the literature itself participates in and nuances transnational feminist mobilizations of concepts such as complicity, collaboration, silence, and difference. Furthermore, my transnational feminist reading strategy provides a method for the rehistoricization of certain texts and moments in Canadian women’s writing that further allows scholars to trace a genealogy of anti-essentialist feminist expression in Canadian literature. To this end, I read texts by Daphne Marlatt, Dionne Brand, and Suzette Mayr, alongside Tessera, a collectively-edited journal, and conference proceedings from the 1988 Telling It conference; these texts speak to national and colonial critique, post-colonial and diasporic identities, and the potentials of feminist collaboration across various borders. In the first chapter, I situate my reading methodology by arguing for a transnational feminist understanding of Tessera, a bilingual feminist journal that began publishing in 1984. My second chapter examines the collectively-edited publication that emerged from Telling It in the context of North American feminist evocations of difference in recent decades. Notably, my research on Telling It benefits from rarely-accessed archival material that grounds my discussion of the gaps and silences of collective work. In my third chapter, I perform a close reading of Daphne Marlatt’s 1979 multi-genre text “In the Month of Hungry Ghosts” as it explores the complex connections between colonialism, post-colonialism, complicity and globalization. The subject of my fourth chapter is the 1994 film Listening for Something…, a transnational feminist collaboration between Dionne Brand and Adrienne Rich. Finally, my fifth chapter discusses the place of the transnational in relation to the regional, the national – and the monstrous in the context of Suzette Mayr’s Venous Hum. In all of these close textual readings, my dissertation asks how Canadian women writers represent, theorize, and critique the kinds of collaboration across differences that lie at the heart of transnational feminist action. My research is therefore located at the crossroads of Canadian literature, contemporary feminist theory, and postcolonial and globalization studies. The vibrant field of transnational feminist theory is relevant to this disciplinary intersection and, furthermore, contemporary Canadian women’s writing provides important interventions from which to imagine transnational feminist collaboration.