October 13, 2011
by Steph Herold
Comments Off on Dismantling Melancholia
This week’s essay made me think of power and politics. I’m not going to pretend that I understood all of it, but two pieces stick out to me: — Breaking news for homophobic, closeted politicians!: “The act of renouncing homosexuality … Continue reading
October 13, 2011
by Elly Truitt
Comments Off on Grief and Desire
In “Melancholy Gender/Refused Identification” Butler presents a “stark and hyperbolic construction of the relation between gender and sexuality” (p. 248) that turns on the necessity of the repression of same-sex desire in order to inhabit an unstable gender of “masculine” … Continue reading
October 13, 2011
by Mary Zaborskis
Comments Off on Queer Children: Losing What’s Been Lived?
I’ve found Judith Butler’s theory on melancholia and it’s relation to gender, sexuality, and gender performativity as outlined in “Melancholy Gender/Refused Identification” useful in some of my own research on queer children in literature. Bryn Mawr’s Hanna Holborn Gray Fellowship … Continue reading
October 13, 2011
by Sara Alcid
Comments Off on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and Masculinity as Repudiated Homosexuality
Many approaches to Gender and Sexuality Studies encourage us to divorce gender from sexuality, so while reading “Melancholy Gender/Refused Identification,” it felt somewhat “illegal” to be examining them in a way that considered them to be co-defining. Of course, throughout … Continue reading
October 13, 2011
by Vanessa Christman
Comments Off on Ask, Tell, Applaud
I spent the last week in a program comprised of participants from the Class of 2015 and sophomore, junior, and senior student facilitators. The program, Dimensions of Diversity, featured workshops on religion, race, country of origin, gender, and sexuality. With … Continue reading
September 30, 2011
by Elly Truitt
1 Comment
I have read “Burning Acts, Injurious Speech,” several times now, and I remain somewhat confused by the argument. Not unconvinced, but uncertain of how all the parts fit together. All speech is “excitable,” meaning that it is, at some level, … Continue reading
September 30, 2011
by Mary Zaborskis
Comments Off on Who’s Responsible When?
Who or what should be held accountable, if at all, for injurious speech? In Judith Butler’s “Burning Acts, Injurious Speech,” she explains that while we think that we are subjects who are responsible for everything we say, in actuality, “a … Continue reading
September 30, 2011
by Vanessa Christman
Comments Off on First Do No Harm
I have said many times in these blog entries that I am fortunate. Of course, being fortunate does not mean you never experience pain. Pain fades, however, and a little hurt you can get over. Harm, on the other hand, … Continue reading
September 30, 2011
by Sara Alcid
Comments Off on The Imperatives of Pornography: Realizable Fourteen Years Later?
Having previously read MacKinnon’s work on pornography in relation to how liberalism undermines women’s rights, I was pleased to see Butler address MacKinnon’s theories in “Burning Acts, Injurious Speech.” As far as we know, in 1997, Butler disagreed with MacKinnon’s … Continue reading
September 30, 2011
by Steph Herold
1 Comment
“I want to suggest that the court’s speech carries with it its own violence, and that the very institution that is invested with the authority to adjudicate the problem of hate speech recirculates and redirects that hatred in and as its own highly consequential … Continue reading