Morny Joy
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719055232
- eISBN:
- 9781781700792
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719055232.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
This book explores the work of Luce Irigaray, one of the most influential and controversial figures in feminist thought—although Irigaray herself disclaims the term ‘feminism’. Irigaray's work stands ...
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This book explores the work of Luce Irigaray, one of the most influential and controversial figures in feminist thought—although Irigaray herself disclaims the term ‘feminism’. Irigaray's work stands at the intersection of contemporary debates concerned with culture, gender and religion, but her ideas have not yet been presented in a comprehensive way from the perspective of religious studies. The book examines the development of religious themes from Irigaray's initial work, Speculum of the Other Woman, in which she rejects traditional forms of western religions, to her more recent explorations of eastern religions. Irigaray's ideas on love, the divine, an ethics of sexual difference and normative heterosexuality are analysed. These analyses are placed in the context of the reception of Irigaray's work by secular feminists such as Judith Butler, Drucilla Cornell and Elizabeth Grosz, as well as by feminists in religious studies such as Pamela Sue Anderson, Ellen Armour, Amy Hollywood and Grace Jantzen. Most of these thinkers reject Irigaray's proposals for women's adoption of gender-specific qualities as a form of gender essentialism. Finally, Irigaray's own spiritual path, which has been influenced by eastern religions, specifically the disciplines of yoga and tantra in Hinduism and Buddhism, is evaluated in the light of recent theoretical developments in orientalism and postcolonialism.Less
This book explores the work of Luce Irigaray, one of the most influential and controversial figures in feminist thought—although Irigaray herself disclaims the term ‘feminism’. Irigaray's work stands at the intersection of contemporary debates concerned with culture, gender and religion, but her ideas have not yet been presented in a comprehensive way from the perspective of religious studies. The book examines the development of religious themes from Irigaray's initial work, Speculum of the Other Woman, in which she rejects traditional forms of western religions, to her more recent explorations of eastern religions. Irigaray's ideas on love, the divine, an ethics of sexual difference and normative heterosexuality are analysed. These analyses are placed in the context of the reception of Irigaray's work by secular feminists such as Judith Butler, Drucilla Cornell and Elizabeth Grosz, as well as by feminists in religious studies such as Pamela Sue Anderson, Ellen Armour, Amy Hollywood and Grace Jantzen. Most of these thinkers reject Irigaray's proposals for women's adoption of gender-specific qualities as a form of gender essentialism. Finally, Irigaray's own spiritual path, which has been influenced by eastern religions, specifically the disciplines of yoga and tantra in Hinduism and Buddhism, is evaluated in the light of recent theoretical developments in orientalism and postcolonialism.
Rebecca Hill
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780823237241
- eISBN:
- 9780823240708
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823237241.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy
This book offers a sustained analysis of the concept grounding Irigaray's thought: the constitutive yet incalculable interval of sexual difference. In an extension of Irigaray's project, it takes up ...
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This book offers a sustained analysis of the concept grounding Irigaray's thought: the constitutive yet incalculable interval of sexual difference. In an extension of Irigaray's project, it takes up her formulation of the interval as a way of rereading Aristotle's concept of topos and Bergson's concept of duration. A sexed hierarchy is diagnosed at the heart of Aristotle's and Bergson's presentations. Yet beyond that phallocentrism, this book points out how Aristotle's theory of topos as a sensible relation between two bodies that differ in being and Bergson's intuition of duration as an incalculable threshold of becoming are indispensable to the feminist effort to think about sexual difference. Reading Irigaray with Aristotle and Bergson, it is argued that the interval cannot be grasped as a space between two identities; it must be characterized as the sensible threshold of becoming, constitutive of the very identity of beings. The interval is the place of the possibility of sexed subjectivity and intersubjectivity, and is also a threshold of the becoming of sexed forces.Less
This book offers a sustained analysis of the concept grounding Irigaray's thought: the constitutive yet incalculable interval of sexual difference. In an extension of Irigaray's project, it takes up her formulation of the interval as a way of rereading Aristotle's concept of topos and Bergson's concept of duration. A sexed hierarchy is diagnosed at the heart of Aristotle's and Bergson's presentations. Yet beyond that phallocentrism, this book points out how Aristotle's theory of topos as a sensible relation between two bodies that differ in being and Bergson's intuition of duration as an incalculable threshold of becoming are indispensable to the feminist effort to think about sexual difference. Reading Irigaray with Aristotle and Bergson, it is argued that the interval cannot be grasped as a space between two identities; it must be characterized as the sensible threshold of becoming, constitutive of the very identity of beings. The interval is the place of the possibility of sexed subjectivity and intersubjectivity, and is also a threshold of the becoming of sexed forces.
Rebecca Hill
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780823237241
- eISBN:
- 9780823240708
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823237241.003.0008
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy
This concluding chapter traces the relationship between the presentation of the interval as relation addressed in Part One of the book and the presentation of the interval as becoming sketched in ...
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This concluding chapter traces the relationship between the presentation of the interval as relation addressed in Part One of the book and the presentation of the interval as becoming sketched in Part Two of the book. It argues that the interval is difference, the threshold from which space and time and matter and form are engendered. While Irigaray tends to focus on the interval as the threshold that engenders a non-hierarchical relationship between woman and man, she also affirms the interval as difference itself, if she is read carefully. The concept of the interval is conceived, via a radicalization of Aristotle's account of place, as a sensible relation. This relational concept of difference cannot be presented as such, as Bergson's thinking of duration demonstrates that the interval remains in becoming as an open threshold of potentiality.Less
This concluding chapter traces the relationship between the presentation of the interval as relation addressed in Part One of the book and the presentation of the interval as becoming sketched in Part Two of the book. It argues that the interval is difference, the threshold from which space and time and matter and form are engendered. While Irigaray tends to focus on the interval as the threshold that engenders a non-hierarchical relationship between woman and man, she also affirms the interval as difference itself, if she is read carefully. The concept of the interval is conceived, via a radicalization of Aristotle's account of place, as a sensible relation. This relational concept of difference cannot be presented as such, as Bergson's thinking of duration demonstrates that the interval remains in becoming as an open threshold of potentiality.
Linda Martín Alcoff
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195137347
- eISBN:
- 9780199785773
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195137345.003.0006
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
This chapter focuses on women's specifically gendered identity and its basis in sexual difference. It argues that there are persuasive grounds for an objective rather than totally fluid account of ...
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This chapter focuses on women's specifically gendered identity and its basis in sexual difference. It argues that there are persuasive grounds for an objective rather than totally fluid account of sex categories, that objectivity does not require an escape from mediation in human knowledge or the ability to have “out of theory experiences”, and that the tendency for descriptive accounts to become prescriptive is a variable rather than uniform or absolute tendency and can be offset. The objective basis of sex categories is in the differential relationship to reproductive capacity between men and women, but a sexual categorization based on the biological division of reproductive labor does not establish a necessary link between reproduction beyond conception and heterosexuality.Less
This chapter focuses on women's specifically gendered identity and its basis in sexual difference. It argues that there are persuasive grounds for an objective rather than totally fluid account of sex categories, that objectivity does not require an escape from mediation in human knowledge or the ability to have “out of theory experiences”, and that the tendency for descriptive accounts to become prescriptive is a variable rather than uniform or absolute tendency and can be offset. The objective basis of sex categories is in the differential relationship to reproductive capacity between men and women, but a sexual categorization based on the biological division of reproductive labor does not establish a necessary link between reproduction beyond conception and heterosexuality.
Linda LeMoncheck
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195105568
- eISBN:
- 9780199852949
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195105568.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy
The “loose women” described in this book pose a threat to patriarchy by challenging the constraints of monogamy imposed on women by an androcentric heterosexuality. However, women in search of sexual ...
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The “loose women” described in this book pose a threat to patriarchy by challenging the constraints of monogamy imposed on women by an androcentric heterosexuality. However, women in search of sexual liberation may also challenge patriarchal appropriations of women's sexuality by challenging traditional heterosexuality's dominance over what constitutes “normal” sex. Along these lines, a feminist reclamation of sex for women would mean redefining and rediscovering so-called deviant or perverted sex as a way to subvert the patriarchal subordination of women that “normal” heterosexuality reinforces. This chapter uses the dialectical and contextual perspective of the “view from somewhere different” to negotiate the tensions between conflicting feminist perspectives with respect to sexual perversion. The chapter proposes to replace expressions such as “sexual perversion” and “sexual norm” with the less evaluatively charged expression of “sexual difference.” It then describes and evaluates the debate over three types of sexual difference of particular concern to both cultural feminists and sex radical feminists: man/boy love, butch/femme sexual role-playing, and lesbian sadomasochism.Less
The “loose women” described in this book pose a threat to patriarchy by challenging the constraints of monogamy imposed on women by an androcentric heterosexuality. However, women in search of sexual liberation may also challenge patriarchal appropriations of women's sexuality by challenging traditional heterosexuality's dominance over what constitutes “normal” sex. Along these lines, a feminist reclamation of sex for women would mean redefining and rediscovering so-called deviant or perverted sex as a way to subvert the patriarchal subordination of women that “normal” heterosexuality reinforces. This chapter uses the dialectical and contextual perspective of the “view from somewhere different” to negotiate the tensions between conflicting feminist perspectives with respect to sexual perversion. The chapter proposes to replace expressions such as “sexual perversion” and “sexual norm” with the less evaluatively charged expression of “sexual difference.” It then describes and evaluates the debate over three types of sexual difference of particular concern to both cultural feminists and sex radical feminists: man/boy love, butch/femme sexual role-playing, and lesbian sadomasochism.
Andrea Hurst
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780823228744
- eISBN:
- 9780823235179
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fso/9780823228744.003.0009
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Language
A Lacanian account of sexual difference exemplifies the logic of différance. This chapter addresses a trouble that both Lacan and Derrida persistently grapple with: that ...
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A Lacanian account of sexual difference exemplifies the logic of différance. This chapter addresses a trouble that both Lacan and Derrida persistently grapple with: that of understanding difference in terms of binary oppositions. Some thinkers argue that this binary is a fundamental, undeconstructible bottom line that one cannot get beyond. The opposing view is that this binary opposition is as deconstructible as any other and should give way to an unregulated proliferation of differences. The former is assumed to be the Lacanian position (but not, of course, by Lacanians); the second is supposed to be the Derridean (but, again, not by Derrideans). There is, in other words, mutual misrecognition on both sides of this equation. Contrary to the aforementioned reading, it seems clear enough that Lacan's infamous claim concerning the sexual relation — namely, that it does not exist — offers a deconstruction of any conception of sexual difference as binary.Less
A Lacanian account of sexual difference exemplifies the logic of différance. This chapter addresses a trouble that both Lacan and Derrida persistently grapple with: that of understanding difference in terms of binary oppositions. Some thinkers argue that this binary is a fundamental, undeconstructible bottom line that one cannot get beyond. The opposing view is that this binary opposition is as deconstructible as any other and should give way to an unregulated proliferation of differences. The former is assumed to be the Lacanian position (but not, of course, by Lacanians); the second is supposed to be the Derridean (but, again, not by Derrideans). There is, in other words, mutual misrecognition on both sides of this equation. Contrary to the aforementioned reading, it seems clear enough that Lacan's infamous claim concerning the sexual relation — namely, that it does not exist — offers a deconstruction of any conception of sexual difference as binary.
Carl N. Degler
- Published in print:
- 1993
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195077070
- eISBN:
- 9780199853991
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195077070.003.0012
- Subject:
- History, History of Ideas
This chapter examines social scientists' study of the influence of biology and the nature of females in terms of differences in human behavior. One of those who took a look at how physiological ...
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This chapter examines social scientists' study of the influence of biology and the nature of females in terms of differences in human behavior. One of those who took a look at how physiological differences between men and women might affect behavior was Alice Rossi in 1965. Rossi measured the impact that biological ideas have had upon social scientists and suggested that though women and men were different physiologically they were interchangeable socially.Less
This chapter examines social scientists' study of the influence of biology and the nature of females in terms of differences in human behavior. One of those who took a look at how physiological differences between men and women might affect behavior was Alice Rossi in 1965. Rossi measured the impact that biological ideas have had upon social scientists and suggested that though women and men were different physiologically they were interchangeable socially.
RACHEL BOWLBY
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199566228
- eISBN:
- 9780191710407
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199566228.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter involves detailed readings of what Freud says about children's early questions about what they do not yet know as sexuality: Where do babies come from? What is the difference between ...
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This chapter involves detailed readings of what Freud says about children's early questions about what they do not yet know as sexuality: Where do babies come from? What is the difference between boys and girls? What is it that married people do together? There are some variations and inconsistencies in his view of which of these questions comes first, and this in turn is related to the development of his own theories or myths of sexual difference. Further, Freud assumes in children a curiosity which is always ultimately a sexual curiosity: sexual questions are the spur to and prototype of all research, and the theories or myths that children formulate to answer them are early versions of later scientific ones, including Freud's own.Less
This chapter involves detailed readings of what Freud says about children's early questions about what they do not yet know as sexuality: Where do babies come from? What is the difference between boys and girls? What is it that married people do together? There are some variations and inconsistencies in his view of which of these questions comes first, and this in turn is related to the development of his own theories or myths of sexual difference. Further, Freud assumes in children a curiosity which is always ultimately a sexual curiosity: sexual questions are the spur to and prototype of all research, and the theories or myths that children formulate to answer them are early versions of later scientific ones, including Freud's own.
Luce Irigaray
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199559213
- eISBN:
- 9780191594403
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199559213.003.0012
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter explores the Antigone myth and its unveiling in history from the context of sexual difference. Sexual difference is the most basic and universal difference, starting from which we can ...
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This chapter explores the Antigone myth and its unveiling in history from the context of sexual difference. Sexual difference is the most basic and universal difference, starting from which we can reach a global democratic community and culture respectful of all our other differences. Antigone's respect for the unwritten laws—the laws of human nature and the gods—reveals her respect for living beings and the cosmic order. She sees Polynices as the ‘son of my mother’. To Antigone humanity is comprised of man and of woman and she respects this sexual difference just as she respects her brother as a brother and her duty to him as a sister before her marriage to Haemon. Antigone fights not solely for her brother's burial but also to maintain the cosmic harmony. She tries to maintain a delicate balance between the gods of the underworld, her world, and Zeus. Life is the supreme value for Antigone. She only asks to live, to be. Creon breaks the cosmic harmony. He does not take female sexual identity into consideration. Creon can be viewed as a eunuch due to his lack of differentiation from the maternal world. Irigaray questions how the maternal world that asserts itself as patriarchy has been established in an arbitrary way. She believes that the maternal world should not begin with function but with sexual difference. A woman is first and foremost a woman before she is a mother. A feminine order can help men provide for differentiation (not repression) and growth of identity.Less
This chapter explores the Antigone myth and its unveiling in history from the context of sexual difference. Sexual difference is the most basic and universal difference, starting from which we can reach a global democratic community and culture respectful of all our other differences. Antigone's respect for the unwritten laws—the laws of human nature and the gods—reveals her respect for living beings and the cosmic order. She sees Polynices as the ‘son of my mother’. To Antigone humanity is comprised of man and of woman and she respects this sexual difference just as she respects her brother as a brother and her duty to him as a sister before her marriage to Haemon. Antigone fights not solely for her brother's burial but also to maintain the cosmic harmony. She tries to maintain a delicate balance between the gods of the underworld, her world, and Zeus. Life is the supreme value for Antigone. She only asks to live, to be. Creon breaks the cosmic harmony. He does not take female sexual identity into consideration. Creon can be viewed as a eunuch due to his lack of differentiation from the maternal world. Irigaray questions how the maternal world that asserts itself as patriarchy has been established in an arbitrary way. She believes that the maternal world should not begin with function but with sexual difference. A woman is first and foremost a woman before she is a mother. A feminine order can help men provide for differentiation (not repression) and growth of identity.
Claire Colebrook
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748622276
- eISBN:
- 9780748671663
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748622276.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter discusses the philosophy of Irigaray. Like Heidegger, Irigaray's critique of Western metaphysics seems poised between an attempt to think the ground of thought — a ground that has always ...
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This chapter discusses the philosophy of Irigaray. Like Heidegger, Irigaray's critique of Western metaphysics seems poised between an attempt to think the ground of thought — a ground that has always been figured as feminine — and a refusal to posit that ground as a presence, being or essence to which thought might simply return. Irigaray's thought concerns the modality of transcendence: the way in which thought directs itself towards what is other than itself. If Heidegger's Destruktion of metaphysics can be understood as neither a simple return to thought's ground, nor a location of thought within a representational scheme, Irigaray's uptake of the question of transcendence can be seen to harbour a similar double strategy. This chapter discusses how to read Irigaray reading metaphysics; feminine metaphysics; the question of sexual difference; sensible transcendence; transcendence as sexual difference; the sensible transcendental; the time of sexual difference; beyond the location of the sexual transcendental; and autonomy.Less
This chapter discusses the philosophy of Irigaray. Like Heidegger, Irigaray's critique of Western metaphysics seems poised between an attempt to think the ground of thought — a ground that has always been figured as feminine — and a refusal to posit that ground as a presence, being or essence to which thought might simply return. Irigaray's thought concerns the modality of transcendence: the way in which thought directs itself towards what is other than itself. If Heidegger's Destruktion of metaphysics can be understood as neither a simple return to thought's ground, nor a location of thought within a representational scheme, Irigaray's uptake of the question of transcendence can be seen to harbour a similar double strategy. This chapter discusses how to read Irigaray reading metaphysics; feminine metaphysics; the question of sexual difference; sensible transcendence; transcendence as sexual difference; the sensible transcendental; the time of sexual difference; beyond the location of the sexual transcendental; and autonomy.
