Look up and define in your own words the following terms:
Constituting/constitutive- be (a part) of a whole
Reified- make (something abstract) more concrete or real.
Causal/Causality- done or acting in a desultory way.
Taboo- a social or religious custom prohibiting or forbidding discussion of a particular practice or forbidding association with a particular person, place, or thing.
Physiological- the way in which a living organism or bodily part functions.
Facticity-the quality or condition of being fact.
Sedimentations- the tendency for particles in suspension to settle out of the fluid in which they are entrained and come to rest against a barrier.
Intersectionality- the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage
Patriarchy- a system of society or government in which men hold the power and women are largely excluded from it.
Status-quo- the existing state of affairs, especially regarding social or political issues.
Social construct- a social mechanism, phenomenon, or category created anddeveloped by society; a perception of an individual, group, or ideathat is ‘constructed’ through cultural or social practice
Gender norm- a behavior or attribute that society attributes to a particular sex
Normative Behavior- A system of norms elucidates what is acceptable behavior in a group of people.
What does Butler mean when she states that the body is “an historical idea”?
In Butler’s, “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution”, Butler discusses the differences between gender and sex based on current culture or history and biology. Sex is defined by the biology of a human, male or female. She states that the body is “a historical idea”, meaning the body’s importance is based on how society treats it, the behaviors and actions of the body all depend on what the times are like. Butler states the body, “a material reality which has already been located and defined within a social context”, social norms shape the normative behavior and define the gender construct. It is difficult to identify a concrete definition of gender due to the evolution of history and societal norms/status quo.
Pick out one sentence that you find interesting or provocative.
“Gender is what is put on, invariably, under constraint, daily and incessantly, with anxiety and pleasure, but if this continuous act is mistaken for a natural or linguistic given, power is relinquished to expand the cultural field bodily through subversive performances of various kinds.”
This concluding sentence strongly states Butler’s idea on the presence of gender in society through changing times. Butler states that gender changes and is acted through a person’s body in many different variables, through times of “anxiety and pleasure”, she also mentions that gender is not natural it is acted throughout society and culture. Growing up I was told what to wear and to act “lady-like”, because society and parenting trained me to act as a women, I identify as a women in this society, I have been trained since birth to follow the status quo.
Extra credit: When Judith Butler uses the word “natural” what does she mean? Use quotes from the text and your own words to describe.
The “natural” body is a person that has never been impressed by societal expectations, this is unachievable.
