62 pages • 2 hours read
Judith ButlerBodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex
Nonfiction | Essay Collection | Adult | Published in 1993A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 1, Chapters 3-4Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary: “Phantasmatic Identification and the Assumption of Sex”
In the third chapter, Butler explores the construction of sexual identities and the implicit questions surrounding their essentialism. Essentialism refers to the belief that there are inherent and fixed qualities that define what it means to be male or female. However, Butler argues that constructivism should not signify absolute freedom because constraints and societal rules are integral to the constitution of sexuality. Butler challenges the binary thinking of sexuality as either constructed or determined, emphasizing the performative nature of construction and the role of constraint as a condition of performativity. Performativity, defined here as ritualized repetition under constraints, shapes the subjects through the threat of social consequences. Butler then develops their analysis of the relationship between sexuality, law, and power, observing how the law both represses and generates sexuality. This analysis focuses on the complex interplay of constraints, performativity, and regulatory power in the formation of sexual identities.
Turning to Lacan’s work on sexual difference, which has been taken up by some feminist scholars, Butler discusses the concept of constraints as limits on what can be constructed in the domain of sexuality. Butler questions the heteronormative aspects of Lacan’s notion of sexual difference, challenging the stability of gender development. Instead, Butler proposes that sexual identifications and desires are varied and often opposed to traditional identities.
To further their point, Butler challenges the grammatical fiction of the pronouns “I” or “we” as preexisting subjects, emphasizing that the “I” always involves the assumption of sexuality. Identification, in Lacanian psychoanalysis, involves the subject’s desire, while sexual desire combines the fantasy (often of a forbidden act, such as Oedipal desire) with the fear of punishment by society. Based on these facts, identification becomes the site for negotiating prohibitions and desire. Butler explores how male and female identifications are produced, questioning what the refusal of heterosexual normative impositions means. The heteronormative frame creates punishments for refusal or resistance and introduces misogynistic constructions that associate femininity with destructive phallicism. The text suggests that symbolic positions are stabilized through a hierarchized and differentiated specular relation, limiting complex identifications and desires. The binary frame of male/female identification restricts individuals’ forms of resistance to this frame and creates an abjected realm for queer desire. Heterosexuality establishes itself by consigning non-heterosexual identities to an abjected realm. Butler explores the link between heterosexuality and abjection, suggesting that identification with an abject queer sexuality underpins normative heterosexual identification. They argue for the recognition of the abjected positions within society, advocating for acts that disrupt the symbolic arrangement of identifications.
In addition, Butler argues that with identity politics and the strong affirmation of certain identities (e.g., those of women), other categories become excluded, such as those determined by race or class. At the end of the chapter, Butler calls for a democratic configuration of society based on recognizing identities in their multiple and different expressions.
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary: “Gender Is Burning: Questions of Appropriation and Subversion”
The fourth chapter starts with a discussion of Louis Althusser’s concept of interpellation. Interpellation is the process by which individuals are hailed, or questioned, by ideological mechanisms, which is an important component of the process of developing subjectivity. Thus, ideologies, discourses, and other socio-cultural acts have the power to shape individuals’ identities within particular social frameworks. Butler extends this idea of interpellation by introducing the notion of performativity. For Butler, gender identity is not just a result of external interpellation; it is actively performed by individuals in society. In this sense, individuals are not passive recipients of interpellation but are actively involved in the ongoing process of constituting their identities, which involves reprimanding and excluding nonconforming individuals. Butler explores whether the violation of the norm can be framed as an act of subversion.
Butler then discusses the 1980s film Paris Is Burning, directed by Jennie Livingston, which explores the various acts of production and suppression of subjects. Butler questions whether the parody and misrepresentation of dominant norms are sufficient to displace them. Butler focuses their analysis on how drag, as represented in the film, reflects on the mimetic complexity of normative gender roles. Butler notes that drag is ambivalent concerning heterosexual roles, playing both a subversive and a reinforcing role. However, they are critical of the feminist analysis that reduces drag to a misogynistic performance of gender roles, arguing that such perspectives are reductionist and oversimplify complex processes of identification, desire, and love.
Furthermore, Butler introduces an intersectional aspect in their analysis, looking at how Paris Is Burning uses elements of race to transcend the issues of racism, anti-queer bias, and poverty. Butler emphasizes the tragic consequences of these elements, exemplified by Venus Xtravaganza’s vulnerability to violence, culminating in her death. Venus Xtravaganza was a real transgender performer, as well as a character in Livingston’s film. She was killed during filming.
Butler’s examination extends to the film’s broader sociocultural implications, questioning whether it challenges or reinforces prevailing norms. Throughout, Butler maintains a keen focus on the ambivalence inherent in the film’s portrayal of marginalized communities, prompting reflection on the audience’s engagement with the narrative. The film is a lens through which Butler unpacks the dimensions of gender performativity, analyzing its implications for individuals seeking liberation from societal marginalization. Drawing on Lacanian and Freudian psychoanalysis, Butler questions the stability of the distinction between the symbolic and the imaginary, especially when language fails to represent the fictive aspects of gendered bodies.
At the end of the chapter, Butler turns to Willa Cather’s works of fiction, starting with an analysis that continues in the following chapter. Butler argues that Cather’s work demonstrates how disruptive repetitions can subvert heterosexual norms.
Part 1, Chapters 3-4 Analysis
Abjection is a central concept in Bodies That Matter. Butler borrows this term from Julia Kristeva’s book Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (1980). For Kristeva, abjection refers to the social and psychological state that results from the blurring of boundaries between the self and what is considered taboo in society. Abjection involves a sense of repulsion and discomfort triggered by experiences that challenge established categories in society and threaten the stability of one’s identity.
In Chapter 3 of Bodies That Matter, Judith Butler engages with Kristeva’s notion of abjection as part of her analysis of the gendered processes of identification. Butler extends Kristeva’s abjection to the formation of sexual identities within a heteronormative framework. They argue that binary thinking of sexuality as either constructed or determined—inborn or chosen—relegates entire groups of people outside the bounds of social engagement and into sites of abjection. More specifically, Butler argues that normative heterosexual identification establishes itself by relegating non-heterosexual identities to an abjected realm. Abjection becomes a foundational element of normative heterosexual identification. Butler advocates for the recognition of abjected positions within society and calls for disruptive acts that challenge the symbolic arrangement of identification, or Queer Subversion as Critical Practice.
In Bodies That Still Matter, a volume of contemporary engagements with Butler’s work, philosopher Eyo Ewara acknowledges the importance of Bodies That Matter regarding the formation of the subject in relation to abjection. However, Ewara also criticizes Butler for their reticence to delve into the psychic life of those cast in the place of the abject, focusing instead on the constitution and coherence of proper subjects:
Butler rarely asks how the abjection of certain peoples and populations for the sake of a realm of intelligible subjects […] shapes and forms the experiences of the people thus abjected. Butler works to show how subjection is a condition of inclusion and one that always presupposes and creates forms of exclusion. Significantly, Butler’s emphasis on the conditions of subjection and inclusion means that exclusion is presented as just that; as rejection, privation, non-life. (Ewara, Eyo. “The Psychic Life of Horror: Abjection and Racialization in Butler’s Thought.” Bodies That Still Matter: Resonances of the Work of Judith Butler. Ed. Annemie Halsema, Katja Kwastek, and Roel van den Oever. Amsterdam UP, 2021, pp. 32-33).
Ewara points out that Butler’s emphasis on white subjection in particular leaves unanswered questions about the consequences of abjection on people of color. Ewara then suggests that exploring how abjection shapes those people could nuance Butler’s account of racialization and shed light on the ways racialized subjection through abjection—i.e., defining whiteness in its relationship to oppressing people of color—operates as a key strategy in maintaining dominance.
Butler does attempt to address the psychic lives of abjected others in Chapters 4 and 6, using an intersectional mode of analysis. Intersectionality is a concept that acknowledges the interconnectedness of various social categories, such as race, gender, class, and sexuality, and emphasizes how these intersecting identities can shape an individual’s experiences of oppression and privilege. It recognizes that individuals may experience multiple forms of discrimination simultaneously, and the interplay of these factors contributes to complex and unique social positions. In Chapter 4, they explore how the film Paris Is Burning incorporates elements of race to address issues of racism, anti-LGBTQ+ bias, and poverty that intersect with gender identity and sexual orientation. This intersectional lens allows Butler to highlight the compounded vulnerabilities faced by individuals at the intersections of various marginalized identities. Thus, Butler expands the analysis beyond gender performativity to consider how multiple axes of identity intersect and contribute to the experiences of individuals within marginalized communities. Intersectionality enables a more nuanced understanding of how various forms of social categorization intersect and interact, shaping the experiences and vulnerabilities of individuals. This approach also allows for ways of rearticulating those experiences to appropriate and subvert the norms that keep such communities in vulnerable situations.
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