Lecture: Basic Introduction to Critical
Theory of Gender
To begin, I want to explain that I will be
discussing critical theory of gender primarily in contrast with
commonsense, and for the following reason. Critical theory
in gender virtually always poses sharp challenges–philosophically,
sociologically, and politically–to commonsense, regardless of its
particular focus. Commonsense represents a leading edge of the
dominant ideology within the everyday of the cultural mainstream;
critical theory–which has by far the greatest influence over how gender
is understood within serious, scholarly film study--questions,
challenges, and works to disrupt, subvert, and transform the ways of
thinking, feeling, believing, understanding, acting, interacting, and
communicating that commonsense tends to accept as natural and eternal,
as obvious and beyond question, as inexorable and
unalterable. And the commonsense exercises often
enormous sway over how most people, within a culture, tend to live
their lives the most often. I think therefore that you can begin
to grasp what difference a specific critical theory represents, poses,
and seeks to make all the more quickly by coming to grips with it in
contrast with commonsense. At the same time, for the
purposes of drawing out this contrast I will simplify considerably,
focusing to a great degree on what diverse critical theories share in
common rather than finely differentiating among them.
Commonsensically “gender” and “sex” are often used
loosely as interchangeable, virtually identical terms. However,
in critical theory “gender” has been most often used as a term to
denote the attributes culturally ascribed to men and women.
“Sex,” in contrast, has been most often used to refer to the sum of the
physical characteristics that make us biologically male or
female. “Sex” refers to what nature provides, while
“gender” refers to what culture makes of “sex.” Different
cultures make sense of biological sex differences differently and
construct different kinds of gender categories in relation to– that is,
in association with–these biological sexes. In other words,
different cultures can construct different kinds and ranges of
identities in relation to how they make sense of biological differences
between “males” and “females.”
Even this conventional sex/gender distinction is
generally regarded as at least somewhat problematic today, as critical
theory now tends, at least more recently, to argue that our perceptions
of sex distinctions, and sex differences (i.e., differences between
“male” and “female” human beings), especially as supposedly “innately
natural,” are themselves cultural constructs–and that therefore even
the boundaries we draw between “what is male” and “what is female” are
not at all as simple, or as obvious, as many have long
believed. At the least, critical theory of gender today
tends to give considerable weight to the growing recognition that
“intersex” individuals–those who maintain physical features
characteristically defined as distinctly, or definitively, male as well
as physical features characteristically defined as distinctly, or
definitively, female–is considerably more common than most have
previously believed (or wanted to believe).
Nonetheless, in sum, it is crucial, in beginning to
work with critical theory of gender, to recognize that “femininity” and
“masculinity” are regarded, within critical theory, as cultural
constructs, not natural emanations, and that, since gender is
culturally acquired (or imposed), it becomes open to change–potentially
considerable change. In fact, according to historical and
anthropological investigation that critical theory of gender draws
heavily upon, gender has varied widely across (social) space and
changed considerably across (historical) time. “Femininity”
refers therefore to a culturally constructed range of appearances and
behaviors, and so does “masculinity.” What counts as “feminine”
and what counts as “masculine” changes over time and varies from place
to place. Likewise, the boundaries between the two
(feminine/masculine) are by no means hard and fast.
Another way of thinking about femininity and
masculinity that many contemporary critical theorists also find useful
is to conceive of these as modes of, or directions for, performing
gender. Femininities and masculinities can be usefully
conceived of, in other words, as social styles, social roles, or social
scripts; femininity and masculinity do not, in short, emanate from our
innate physiology, or biochemistry, but rather emerge and develop in
the context of our formation as subjects within society, according to
the prescriptions and proscriptions our society’s culture(s)
manifest–and this is true of normative, dominant, and mainstream as
well as marginal, fringe, alternative, critical, and oppositional
varieties of both masculinity and femininity. N.b. that
last list indicates a plethora of possible masculinities and
femininities existing within a given society at a given historical
moment in time; critical theory of gender strongly emphasizes the
importance of recognizing and working with this notion of the plurality
of masculinities and of femininities rather than the commonsensical
notion of masculinity and femininity meaning, in each case, essentially
only one kind of thing.
Despite the existence of multiple approaches to
critical theory of gender, virtually all agree, moreover, on the
following three basic points.
First, critical theory of gender rejects the idea
that anything necessarily naturally links any one particular biological
sex identity with any one particular cultural gender
identity. In other words, no necessary natural reason
exists why males will be more masculine than females or females more
feminine than males; links between males and masculinity and between
females and femininity are–always– cultural constructs.
What’s more, critical gender theorists often contend as well that
“masculinity” and “femininity” are themselves reductive (simplistic)
and coercive (oppressive) categories that tend to impose a rigid
dualism on a potentially much wider plurality of gender meanings and
gender identities. In short, some critical theorists
propose jettisoning the use of the words “masculinity” and
“femininity” altogether because use of these terms tends to create
expectations of binary oppositions between males and females, men and
women, and masculine and feminine modes of appearance and behavior,
etc. where such a binary is, in fact, unnatural, inaccurate,
unnecessary, and oppressively restrictive. Critical theory of
gender opposes this oppressive set of constraints, encouraging people
instead to imagine and explore the possibility of freely combining–and
mixing together–elements or traits commonly associated with one or the
other of these conventional gender “poles” (i.e., mixing elements of
‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’). At the least critical
theory of gender advocates that the latter–femininity--should be
rendered equally viable to the former–masculinity, and that in actual
fact our perception of binary oppositions is not necessarily by any
means an accurate reflection of what simply “truly happens to be the
case” “in reality.”
Second, critical theory of gender further rejects
the notion that masculinity must be dominant and femininity
subordinate, that authority and masculinity are necessarily linked, and
that subservience and femininity are necessarily linked. Again
these linkages, insofar as they do exist, are not (at all) natural
facts, but rather (always) cultural–and, for that matter, also
political– constructions. Masculinity and femininity need
not exist in a conventional hierarchical relationship with masculinity
always positioned “above” or “over” or “on top of” femininity–and, in
actual practice, human beings live in social relations that are, and
have been, far more complex than this. In many concrete
situations and circumstances, in other words, femininity has in fact
exercised greater power–and authority–than masculinity.
Third, critical theory of gender further rejects the
notion that “gender,” or “sex” for that matter, necessarily drives–in
the sense of determines–“sexuality.” In other words, males
can and do divide among themselves considerably in terms of whom (and
what) they sexually desire, as well as whom (and what) they find
sexually attractive and enjoyable. The same is true for
females. And, furthermore, the same is true for “masculine”
individuals (whether male or female) and for “feminine” individuals
(whether male or female). In short, “sexual orientation”
has no necessary natural connection at all with “gender
identification”; gay men are not naturally more feminine than straight
men, lesbian women are not naturally more masculine than straight
women, feminine men are not naturally more gay than masculine men, and
masculine women are not naturally more lesbian than straight
women. Insofar as these links do exist, once again, they
are cultural constructs–not biological emanations. At the
same time, recent critical theory also questions whether the notion of
“sexual orientation” makes the kind of sense commonly ascribed to it,
and, at the very least, problematizes the emphasis upon categorizing
sexualities primarily in terms of the biological sex of the preferred
object-choice involved in sexual practice, rather than, for instance, a
whole host of other potential ways of categorizing sexualities in terms
of particular kinds of attractions, desires, behaviors, practices, and
contexts. In short, why not classify sexualities according
to other features than the biological sex of the preferred sex
partner? For example: preferred times and places, intensity of
drive, areas of greatest stimulation, relations to fantasy, specific
kinds of positions and practices, what other kinds of aids are
desirable and useful for satisfaction, public versus private,
monogamous versus heterogamous, anonymous versus committed, casual and
recreational versus serious and restricted,
etc. But we’ll get to more about all that the next two weeks when
we focus on sexuality.