Judith Butler's Theory of Gender Performativity, Explained

A video lecture about Judith Butler's theory of "gender performativity" as it's outlined in the section "Bodily Inscriptions, Performative Subversions" near the end of their book Gender Trouble.
Part 2 on the difference between performance and performativity: • Judith Butler's Gender...
My video essay that explores these ideas can be found here: • The Turing Test, Judit...
Some topics discussed in this lecture include the transition from feminism to queer theory, sex vs gender, performance vs performativity, and the distinction between gender expression and gender performativity.
The Philosophy Tube video on gender studies that I include in the video can be found here: • What is Gender? | Phil...
*Note: As of 2021, it has been made public that Judith Butler goes by they/them pronouns.
*Note: The creator of Philosophy Tube now goes by the name Abigail Thorn and uses she/her pronouns.

[@Joe-wq4mo]

I really liked this Zac character, he seemed genuinely intellectually curious about these subjects.

[@pengyanzhu]

u and i are thinking the exact same thing lmaooo

[@semikolondev]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/r6bWYZajrreNja8

[@Forestier1]

He should’ve shown us his penis to illustrate a point or two.

[@jamiejay7633]

The purpose of progressive propaganda is not to persuade or convince, not to inform - but to humiliate; and so the less it corresponds with reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves they lose their sense of integrity. To assent to obvious lies is to become evil oneself. One's standing to resist anything is eroded. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. Theodore Dalrymple

[@glysentte92]

You saved my life! Needed to do research on Judith Butler specifically on 'performativity' and can't seem to understand what I was reading. So thank you!

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

glad it was helpful!

[@FMEBAKERY100]

Performative ….Easier translation is “make believe”

[@kenfalloon3186]

Yep cos it's an exercise in obfuscation.

[@egapnala65]

At the end of the first part of "Gender Trouble" she pretty much declares it to be a political (rather than an objective) examination of sex vs. gender aimed at trashing "heteronormative binaries". You would be better off reading the essays of Virginia Prince the transGENDER pioneer instead. Butler is insane from start to finish and how she is taken seriously by anybody is a complete mystery. Anybody who on page 8 of their seminal work declares gamete based biological sex to be a social construct is obviously trolling. The broader aim of queer theory is the establishment of an age of consent free gender fluid pansexual paradise. This is outlined best in the writing of Mario Mieli. Its a movement that is riddled to an obssessive degree with Freud's Oedipus Complex theory leading it into some pretty revolting territory.

[@kenfalloon3186]

@@egapnala65 Very well articulated sir. In addition to the 'academic' wing of this global pusch, is the widespread colonisation of the counselling profession with political ideology being compulsorilly introduced to the course material of student counsellors. This flys in the face of the fundamental principles of psychotherapy. Gender affirmative 'therapy' as you ably nail it is the delivery of troubled children into the hands of predators, sexual and surgical.

[@ImaginaryMdA]

I feel like it's important to note that Judith Butler is very trans affirming, and not at all TERFy. And she does accept the criticism from the perspective of trans individuals.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Thanks for the comment. Right, Butler is absolutely trans affirming, and I really hope nothing I said suggested that Butler is "TERFy." My aim in bringing up the potential objection from trans experience was simply to anticipate an objection that students might have if they correctly follow the important argument about "gender expression," and to acknowledge the fact that such critiques exist in scholarship; but I equally wanted to show the objection itself might be mitigated, which I think the Philosophy Tube clip does a nice job. Julia Serano herself writes a really clarifying blog post that addresses critiques of Gender Trouble and Bodies that Matter from trans perspectives, as well as clarifies her own position on Butler (despite what others have claimed on her behalf), which is less about critiquing Butler's performativity than critiquing a popular misreading of Butler's performativity: juliaserano.blogspot.com/2015/09/julia-serano-on-judith-butler.html

[@Sentientmatter8]

What's more, they are themself trans. Judith Butler is legally nonbinary (state of California recognizes nonbinary genders), and uses uses they/them pronouns.

[@honeychurchgipsy6]

@@Sentientmatter8 - I wasn't aware that being non binary was the same as being trans. Be careful not to try and make everything 'trans' in an (admittedly laudable) attempt at solidarity for a maligned sector of society. Butler has always identified as a gay woman, now non binary as you point out. There is potential for negating a person's sense of themselves by declaring that they are trans. It's a bit like saying "You aren't gay you are a heterosexual transman". Also, as someone who largely agrees with Butler (although I doubt we can ever know exactly which traits are inherent and which societal), I would be considered a transphobic bigot by many transactivists: a terf if you like. A terf is the derogatory name given to feminists who thinks as Butler does - that gender identity is not a real/essential part of our identity, but largely the result of societal norms. Trans people who do not accept Butler's position would therefore be essentialists, seeing gender identity as immutable and something we are born with (the result of our biological make up). Of course, not all trans people think like, and many accept Butler's position: I have watched debates between trans people on both sides of the argument. The transwoman arguing that gender identity was inherent set out to destroy Butler's performativity argument and even made claims such as "Facial hair has always been seen as inherently strong and masculine". It seemed to me she was trying to muddle biological sex (it is mostly the biological male who grows facial hair) with gender (some cultures at some times have seen facial hair as a masculine trait). Hope this helps because your comment that Butler is trans seems a bit confused to me. Of course, if she has recently altered her position on this then I apologise.

[@lennymclean.]

Yeah she's proved herself a total coward by cow-towing to the absolute twaddle that is Gender ideology. In fact she's gone so far as changing her legal status to Non-binary - probably because she has failed entirely to define what a woman is - again, a complete submissive to the gender ideology lunacy prevelant in some countries...

[@mutantfaith508]

@@honeychurchgipsy6 non binary is trans because nobody is assigned non binary at birth, therefore a transition is made into a new identity/ understanding of oneself. Transgender is an umbrella term and refers to many different queer experiences of gender

[@MaritMarzipan]

I am writing an essay about gender performativity and music videos. This video really saved me. When reading Gender Trouble I kind of lost track of the key highlights of Butler's theory so thank you!

[@gazzamc1255]

I'm writing an essay about gender performaity and plumbers and electricians videos because I wish to understand the intersectionality between a circle and a triangle because even thou a circle and a triangle share similar geometric properties I can't tell the difference between a circle and a triangle because I can self identify myself as either because I'm not really stable. Why did I bother reading Plato's Republic??????????

[@jillfryer6699]

God help you. How about you drop the course and switch to nursing, plumbing or engineering?

[@TinaKGreene]

Thank you so much for this video! I need to write an essay about gender performativity in 2 hours and I just don't have the time to read the book. Also, it's written in a way that makes it hard to get through. Your explanation has helped so much! I just stopped at some of the points and wrote a paragraph with key concepts and my reflections. By the time I've finished the video, the essay is basically done :)

[@jamiejay7633]

It's a pack of lies. Pure trash.

[@Kendenka]

the layers to this video because philosophy tube now lives her truthful gender. She is performing masculinity here. *head explodes*

[@QueertyUCR]

And I would argue that she is now performing feminity (as most cis women are), which is completely valid. One should get to live as one wishes.

[@Kendenka]

@@QueertyUCR true true

[@Sentientmatter8]

Abigail Thorn sourced in an essay about Judith Butler. She's making her Philosophy tutor proud.

[@Culturerism]

Great video :) the fictional dialogue between the two characters really helped!

[@electriksheep1508]

thank you for this video, it is very informative and well-made. i cannot express my gratitude enough. i hope your channel gets the recognition it deserves.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

thank you for the kind words! glad it was helpful.

[@jamiejay7633]

This is bad philosophy. It's a way to open doors for pedophilia.

[@sloanefrances1189]

My question is….if gender in not linked to things like blue vs pink or dress vs pants or penis vs vagina. Then why physically transition to “other gender” why not just stay intact and perform as you feel your gender is in whatever body you live in.

[@vilukisu]

Because transition is not a matter of "pink and blue" or gender roles and stereotypes. On one hand you can look at medical transition from the point of view of bodily autonomy. You ask "why transition?" and a counter question could be "why not?" Requiring justification contains a value judgement that gender affirming care is not a valid choice for an individual to make just because they so wish. On another, Butler's theory is not incompatible with us having an internal sense of ourselves that can defy the gender-sex dictated on us socially. Furthermore, Butler does not deny that we are embodied beings and there is merit to the idea that we have a sense of our bodies than can be misaligned, either inherently or by alterations our bodies undergo (e.g. amputations)

[@evesapple]

@@vilukisuif gender has nothing to do with pink and blue, then it’s an odd colour choice for the trans flag. Gender ideology asserts that manhood and womanhood is defined by the roles interests and norms that society expects from men and women. It’s the masculine and feminine. I realise that we want to deny that because it sounds sexist as fuck. That’s because it is. The only way to differentiate between men and women that actually doesn’t deal with these stereotypes is how we defined them before this nonsense- based on sex.

[@rocksparadox]

@@vilukisu ''Because transition is not a matter of "pink and blue" or gender roles and stereotypes. On one hand you can look at medical transition from the point of view of bodily autonomy. You ask "why transition?" and a counter question could be "why not?" Requiring justification contains a value judgement that gender affirming care is not a valid choice for an individual to make just because they so wish. On another, Butler's theory is not incompatible with us having an internal sense of ourselves that can defy the gender-sex dictated on us socially.'' Oh oh, you ''went full woketard'' drinking the postmodern Koolaid. Butler's BATSHIT useless IDEA SOLD AS ''theory'' is incompatible with any moral, scientific or actual philosophical worldview.

[@goodgrief888]

@@evesapplebasically gender norms are ok as long as you’re born in the opposite gender body.

[@eb3222]

@@vilukisu "You ask "why transition?" and a counter question could be "why not?"": Because a doctor wouldn't prescribe a diet to a person who suffers from anorexia. For example. "Butler does not deny that we are embodied beings": She does. She denies that biology is a fact.

[@MrTheo747]

This is the best video I have watched on gender performativity. Thank you for sharing :)

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

thanks much!

[@isaacmwaura8244]

I am so grateful to have come across this video. Thank you for your very important work.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Glad it was helpful!

[@jamiejay7633]

There is no such thing as gender. There are 2 sexes and infinite personalities.

[@zarawiseman105]

thankyou so much for this video. currently taking a feminist and queer perspectives in literature class and this was super helpful!

[@egapnala65]

The further you delve into queer theory the more you see that the two perspectives are totally antithetical. Suffragettes like Christabel Pankhurst declared prostitution to be an evil degredation of females that only remains because society is run by males. Queer theory declares sex work is work and that males should have the absolute right to bang whoever and whatever they want irrespective of age, species or even lifesigns (according to Mario Mieli).

[@thoranorak5226]

Huge fan of your socratic dialogues in these videos

[@jingyuanli3775]

Thank you for this vedio, the examples you use are vivid and easy to understand.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

thanks!

[@vikifernandez2778]

Amazing video! Very informative, love the format!

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Great to hear - thanks!

[@inoita11]

What is Judith Butler's stance on pedophilia and incest?

[@johnsmith7140]

What do you think? 😂

[@inoita11]

@@johnsmith7140 I assume she is open to both.

[@4651adri]

She is.

[@revdope1]

Supports it. She's particularly cool with incest and child porn.

[@mohammadnor768]

Thank you sooo much for the video. very well made and that part with zac was very funny.

[@matiscatt5162]

wonderfully explained, so so helpful!!

[@thrishalakaumadi370]

damn, this is so helpful..... thank you so much for this video... I have been struggling to figure out this theory for weeks and finally found this.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

awesome - thank you!

[@idefixsheep]

omg! thank you so much! You have helped so many people, including me! Thank you from across the ocean!

[@Jenny-nz8fb]

We don’t need to define gender as it’s subjective. Biological sex matters.

[@Sentientmatter8]

matters in which way? that is a vague statement.

[@legalgig3480]

Biological sex not only matters, it is the most important issue. Cultural construction makes up for a tiny part of the whole. Gender is sexual biology, no matter how much these people want to change its definition and differentiate one from the other.

[@egapnala65]

Except Butler declares that it doesnt exist and is just as much a social construct as gender is.

[@meatrackgames]

gender correlates strongly with sex. it is not entirely subjective.

[@vilukisu]

If you understood Butler, you'd find that "biological sex" is not an objective fact separated from social ideas of gender/sex.

[@JonesTheSecond]

▪︎This is a great conflation of personality & gender. ▪︎This is also an attempt to redefine what gender is, as well as an attempt to prime people's minds as to what the purpose of gender is. ▪︎There is a constant tendency for certain people to want to transcend the "matrix" because they don't want to be bound by rules. ▪︎The problem with them is that they don't seem to understand that transcendence still requires rules, and that if it's possible, to transcend would still means to live within another set of rules. In other words, you're back to square one. ▪︎The main premise of separate locker rooms is so that adult human females are as safe as possible from adult human males' urges. ▪︎You cannot simply explain away the fact that males produce more testosterone and females produce more estrogen, and that each hormone affects the brain and body differently than the other. ▪︎Also, I want to note that if gender isn't directly associated with sex, then there would be no need for "gender‐affirming" surgeries. >>>BOTTOM LINE: stop being modern-day "useful idiots" on behalf of Neo-Marxists and modern-day Cultural Communist sympathizers.

[@vilukisu]

the actual bottom line is that you are a conspiracy theory whack.

[@clizbot]

I get what you mean. This transcendence thing makes no sense either, I would’ve assumed that if there is a non physical conscious within us it would be genderless because sex and gender are things to do with a physical body. I was to super into this “transcendental and spiritual” stuff leading to many “spiritual journeys” which eventually ended with me having severe amnesia and brain damage. That was fun.

[@ayobabalola9647]

Thanks, this helped me a lot for one of my classes and presentation :D

[@minapavlovic9254]

this is a really great video! it helped so much, thank you💜💜💜

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

thanks!

[@sezan7589]

Reading a Drama form the 18th century. And need to study Gender Performativity on that. Thank you for the video.

[@egapnala65]

Eve Sedgwick might be a better source for that. Her first volume is an examination of how women are treated as part of a male society as objects of barter and she is good at literary criticism.

[@adrianoroyorkshire]

Excellent, thanks for sharing.

[@mercynitya1808]

So well explained. Thanks a lot for this :)

[@shreeyapaul9764]

Wow Sir you teach so perfectly and with crisp and clear ideas...please keep up the good work...staying connected

[@binojaevanora1743]

Thankyou for this amazing explanation.

[@c.l.bailey3256]

Thank you!! This was so helpful

[@lightbluedev]

Excellent video. I really learned a lot. Ty.

[@stuffedXcucambor]

Excellent video, thank you!

[@kipwonder2233]

Fascinating presentation👏

[@paulthomas281]

This was excellent. Thank you.

[@eric144144]

These ideas were fine as part of abstract French philosophical debate. When they arrived in America, where things are often taken literally, they became weapons in the horrifying endless culture wars of the New World. The nadir of this came a few years ago when individuals might become apoplectic at gender specific toys for young children.

[@kk-om5zm]

The...Butler reminds me of an uncle of mine...Question! Why do they have the same face? They look like old men and they scare me.

[@Ultrainfinitesimal]

Loved this video! Thanks!

[@maisieknight4729]

this is such a helpful video thankyou!

[@jacobnettleship]

Great video thank you!

[@johart9994]

Really enjoyed this !

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

thanks!

[@jyotibikashbora9232]

Informative video

[@mittaltushant]

Great video!

[@fcouperin]

fascinating, so many words for such an inane subject

[@civulaskolowe5393]

>ou were explaining the theory wonderfully. Thank you so much fpr this!

[@Patricia-bo2oc]

On which page in the book can I find this sentence: "Gender is the stylized repition of acts through time."?

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

because book editions vary, i always recommend books.google.com to find citations

[@spargelschaeler8092]

Imaging being Zac Efron trying to understand the theory of gender performativity and stumbling across this video

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

LOL now this is my dream

[@amykoorn8861]

Thank you!!!!!

[@meatrackgames]

After watching this video I find it hard to wrap my head around how JB is even considered an intellectual. These claims of hers are inherently preposterous, built on fallacious assumptions about sex, gender, a warped notion of masculinity and femininity (and oddly no mention of personality whatsoever). Another huge dimension is how emotions influences men and women's "performativity". And what about the stages of human development? My goodness, so many things wrong here, like way, way, off. This is just bad. Should not be taught in academia. There are other simpler, common sense explanations for why men and women "perform" the way they do. This is a specious philosophy based on fallacious assumptions about human nature at the cultural and subjective level.

[@revdope1]

Keep in mind this is the fourth version of what started as moronic. Post-modernism - feminism - sex positive feminism - queer theory. All meant to go against every social norm including supporting and defending pedophilia. All using Marxist tools to achieve their goal.

[@gazzamc1255]

I'm writing an essay about gender performaity and plumbers and electricians videos because I wish to understand the intersectionality between a circle and a triangle because even thou a circle and a triangle share similar geometric properties I can't tell the difference between a circle and a triangle because I can self identify myself as either because I'm not really stable. Why did I bother reading Plato's Republic??????????

[@vilgott8268]

Great video! I have a question though. While butler emphasises the fragility of gender and point out it’s correlation to social constructions.. Why worry about gender at all? Why put weight in behaving in a way that will through action create your own gender through typically manly or female actions? If these are all social constructions and norms changing over time? What drives a person to become a certain gender from a culturally created perspective, if it’s all a construction? Unless it’s biological in which you mentioned nicely, creates the question of a subconscious sex, which in its way categorises men and women. I hope you understand my question, not my first language✋🏼

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Thanks for the question! If I'm understanding you correctly, what seems to be the main point of your question is something like, "if a biological essentialist model of gender clearly explains what drives a person to take on a certain gender identity or gender characteristics (what drives them are biological forces, e.g. chromosomes, etc.), how does a social constructivist account of gender explain what drives a person to take on a certain gender identity or gender characteristics?" I think Butler's answer (the Butler of Gender Trouble) would be something like "1. the social world largely drives a person's gender (consider every concrete social interaction a person has since infancy as constituting how 'the social world' affects you)"" but also "2. nobody can know the answer to that question." Part of Butler's goal is to sidestep a kind of scientific thinking that implies that to understand a phenomenon in the world we must understand how it came to be, i.e. its cause or origin. The biological essentialist model is the kind of model that simply has a satisfying answer to this question. Butler might say that 'gender' might be the kind of phenomenon that simply doesn't have such an explanation, and that the history of gender as a concept has tried really hard to make such an explanation seem natural and obvious. But, keep in mind that the Butler of Gender Trouble isn't the only theorist who offers a social constructivist account of gender or that critiques a biological essentialist model. Serrano's account that is summarized by Philosophy Tube is opposed to Butler's but is not a straightforward biology-determines-gender model either. Serrano simply thinks that the brain, independent of the social world, has *some* role in driving gender identity, so Serrano's account might be a more satisfying model given your question.

[@vilgott8268]

@@filmandmediastudieschannel perfect, thank you.

[@QueertyUCR]

Vilgot. We worry about gender because it's inescapable. From the moment we are born we are forced to perform a part (femininity or masculinity) depemding on the shape of our genitals. It's not exactly we as individuals that make the choice to perform it. In fact, we're mostly not aware we're performing because whatever we learn in infancy kind of becomes second nature to us. It's like children from remote Indian tribes don't wonder why they live the lifestyle they do, they just accept it. We've been made to accept, from birth, that because of our genitals we are supposed to move and behave a certain way. I was saying on a different comment that my toddler used to move in a very neutral fashion until she started watching Fairies and Barbies on Netflix... After which she started moving like a very tiny drag queen! So it's not that easy to dismantle a system like this. Maybe one day we will be free of gender roles but it will take a lot of deprogramming over many generations :/

[@bath_neon_classical]

Thanks a lot for this..i have watched a lot of videos on this subject and this is the first time i have understood the thinking behind this thinking. I have permanent pituitary damage and can't produce any testosterone and i didn't get any replacemet for six years, so my understanding of gender has become very confused. I feel from my experience that something about gender changes when you take testosterone. 2022 is a fairly confusing time to have a testosterone disorder. There's one question that have regarding gender performativity that i have been unable to get an answer to. I am interested in the when of the societal influences. Is this a feature of our society in historic times, or is it a trait that we evolved further back, maybe before we became homo sapiens?

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Thanks a lot, Simon. So glad to hear the video was helpful. Regarding your question, which "societal influences" are you referring to? Are you asking when, for Butler, there became such a thing as collectively understood identifiable traits that we came to associate with men and women? Or are you asking when *particular* traits, say the ones that we might collectively agree upon today, came to be? As for the latter question, it's pretty important for Butler that the traits themselves, at least in some respects, are subject to historical change. As for the former question, if indeed this is close to what you might be asking, it's tough to answer. Butler sort of asks some rhetorical questions to this effect in their intro to Gender Trouble: "Does sex have a history? Does each sex have a different history, or histories? Is there a history of how the duality of sex was established, a genealogy that might expose the binary options as a variable construction?" (9). These questions aren't answered, but it seems the implied answer "yes," but that it's not really the aim of the book to provide that history. Certainly, Butler is influenced by Foucault's History of Sexuality, which might very well be described as giving a "genealogy [of sexuality, sex, and gender] that might expose the binary options as a variable construction." Butler's doing less of that genealogy, i.e. history, in Gender Trouble, but it does seem to matter to Butler that things we tend to hold as immutable or natural (say, the binary of sex, the binary of gender), are subject to historical change. But I wonder if there's another puzzle to your question, because once you start asking when a core aspect of human culture is established, and you go back really far, say all the way to "before we became homo sapiens," you start getting into a logical trap. Because if we want to pinpoint *when* something unique to human beings emerged - say, the fact of this thing called human gender - then we already run the risk of treating that unique something as more immutable than it might be. At least this is something I imagine Butler might think about.

[@bath_neon_classical]

@@filmandmediastudieschannel thank you so much for taking the time to give me a great answer. It was Butler who got me thinking about gender performativity, the idea if i remember correctly was that as we grow up we semi consciously adopt certain traits which our culture's men and women have themselves adopted. My experience has led me to believe that the endocrine system plays a more significant part than i have heard mentioned in any Gender Theory. There were many masculne traits that disapeared with no testosterone, some things are only possible with testosterone. How much of our external display of gender is linked directly to the endocrine system. If gender performativity is linked to which hormones you are running on that would I think support the idea that it is indeed possible to switch to the optimal "operating system." With regards the history, i agree how far back do you go? I imagine society and gender roles evolved together. But yes I also would like to ask about the traits we would agree on today..its the theory of social construction that I am unsure of. When I hear, for example that "gender is a social construct," I get the impression that they are talking about something that has happened in the last couple of hundred years, possibly since the Enlightenment. What does this mean please? My understanding of the history of the way people think comes to me from the humanities. Recently I have been reading Pope's Iliad while trying to work out what people in England in the 1700s would have understood by the term "race" (don't need to get into this subject) and as I was investigating social construction theory I had a little think about gender and the conclusion I came to was that wherever you have a significantly advanced civilisation, the way gender roles play a part in society was not that different in the recent past to how it was a thousand or three thousand years ago. Thank you

[@bath_neon_classical]

i should probably read focault's history

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

@@bath_neon_classical What you're describing - an account of gender that emphasizes the role of hormones - is something that you might find some writing on if you look in the right places. One place to look for is under the term 'phenomenology.' You're describing this not quite in terms of a phenomenology - an account of the structure of an experience - since you're emphasizing "external display of gender," but my sense is the experience of HRT would find its way into work in gender theory that is more explicitly phenomenological. There's especially a lot that's come out since Butler that emphasizes trans experience, for example. Now, if you're more interested in proposing a theory that is less phenomenological but insists that gender expression is more tied to hormones than it is to social constructs, then I'd say there are plenty of scientific accounts of gender expression that would agree with this, no? As I understand it, this is more or less part of the big cultural assumption that the social constructivists (e.g. Butler) are trying to question. I suppose what you're suggesting, though, is not simply to assert the biological essentialist position that Butler is trying to refute, but maybe to break apart the nexus of characteristics that usually go together in a biological essentialist account: genitalia, hormones, chromosomes. I've seen particular argumentative moves like this done, emphasizing that, because some of those biological characteristics are in fact changeable through things like HRT and surgery, then we need an account of gender and sex that acknowledges this fluidity, not just fluidity of gender expression. Again, I'm no expert on gender studies - not my field. These are just my thoughts as somebody who is in academia and encounters this stuff. As to your second question about history and the social construction of gender, I actually really do feel that your curiosity might partly be sated by reading (or reading about) Foucault's The History of Sexuality. My sense is that the questions that you're interested in along these lines are very similar to the ones that he is interested in within those books. It's also a major touchstone for most social constructivist theories of gender, Butler very much included.

[@asseyavargas9649]

Hello guys, I need your help. pleaaasssseeeeee. thank uu

[@rastim8952]

Thanks for better insight into this new philosophy. If I can philosophy. It supports the sex.pleasure-based culture but otherwise utterly useless and damaging thing for society. Life is not on sex.pleasure alone.

[@fluffymcdeath]

Theory doesn't seem to mean much in philosophy beyond "I think ...". How exactly did Judith propose we test this "theory"?

[@HectorSousa]

Thanks!

[@dreadqueenquinn]

As someone who was AMAB and lived for 30yrs presenting male, I can’t really understand how gender performativity can explain my experience. I was born burdened with the social expectations of manhood, surrounded by and specifically taught to be a man, sometimes against my will with physical violence. Everything about my life was designed to lead me to accept the masculine gender and perform it in a socially acceptable fashion. Yet deep inside I always felt like masculinity wasn’t an appropriate expression for me. At no point did anything external push me towards transition, it was entirely an internal process of self understanding. So if I was never externally motivated to be a woman, does that take away my womanhood?

[@CreativeCache101]

meh, gait is aligned to skeletal and muscular mechanisms, therefore informed by biology, therefore there is an 'essential' way of male and females walking, hip rotation, femur angle, stride length etc can all be linked to biology.

[@apieceofschmitt]

Such a "walk" isn't gendered, it's sexed. There's a fundamental biologically difference between males and females (categorical) that causes such a difference in "strut". This is then observed and reinforced which guides our perceptions to envision those dots as a MALE. I would agree that "gender" as applicable to masculinity/femininity is an ACT, not who one IS, but why does Butler attach the language of man and woman to such? That's where there is so much disconnect. A male may have a "feminine gender", but why should that be interpreted as them expressing "woman-ness"? Did women, who worked while men went to war, or sought a right to vote, display "man-ness", or we're they liberating themselves to change what "woman-ness" actually can consist of? How does Butler identify "reinforcing" versus "challenging" such aspects of man/woman especially with the focus on "through time"?

[@dr.phil.pepper3325]

Ok, so Buttler describes pretty perfectly how the cultural aspects of gender identity are performed. But isn't one of her core hypothesis that sex and gender are the same and that the biological sex is also shaped through this cultural and linguistic performance?

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Yes, exactly! Sort of been waiting for somebody to say this. This is exactly the aspect of Butler--the notion that for Butler sex and gender are not so distinct, that sex is also shaped by discourse --that I want to cover in a third video, which I announce in my second video on Butler here (kzbin.info/www/bejne/ZpCni5qthsiIopo); I just haven't gotten around to making it yet.

[@dr.phil.pepper3325]

@@filmandmediastudieschannel Ok, cool. Then I'm looking forward to your third video. ^^

[@HkFinn83]

Wait what, how can biological sex be shaped by culture? I thought that’s what gender was? This sounds very strange to me. Is animal sex formed by culture then?🤨

[@TheSapphire51]

If she does in fact argue that biology is culturally shaped on what grounds does she argue that?

[@lorenzobonomi9487]

I just don't get why at 21.39 it's said that physical sex is also a spectrum. Is it? 🙄

[@aidanchapman8548]

Yes but not in the same way that gender is.

[@4651adri]

It's not. S ex is binary.

[@inathi1329]

It's so interesting to see how Judith Butler's thinking intersects with Buddhist ideas about our essential nature...

[@kunikloy477]

Great video of explaining her theory, which i do not agree. My biggest problem is, if gender is boiled down into performativity or social construct, it loses its function in a legal term. Things that were segregated based on gender will now be sex based, which still held some practical meaning.

[@jmo9207]

I would suggest anyone interested in this topic to read Monique wittig's essays !

[@jvanputten9669]

perhaps also a good addition to the mention that Butler now goes by They/Them. Thorne has come out as trans with She/her pronouns :)

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

good point! added. :-)

[@Mr.T360]

Thank God this is just theory.

[@eb3222]

Unfortunatly this theory has a big inpact on the lives of many people.

[@leafsounds8263]

Gender cannot be separated from biological determinism, as a product of reason. Intellect is an instrument of nature's will, gender is simply a combination of what we have historically expected from gender, what things we are most attracted to, and in this we can still see with the greatest certainty the power of nature's will and evolution. Lust speaks for itself, we can see the same patterns of beauty throughout the ages that were related to the sign of genetic health and strength, if we are not talking about the gluttonous baroque nobility. See what's still in the spotlight. Intellect does not stand at the pinnacle of existence, but blind will. We cannot think of the intellect and its products apart from the motive power of everything. Lies and sophistry are not opinions and must be condemned as such. This is not philosophy, but politics.

[@briggs5534]

interesting to note that Ollie Thorne the youtube commenter is now Abby Thorne, trans woman...

[@alexislou9404]

Is "masculinity" socially constructed?

[@karimkimmu549]

but why zac on the picture XD

[@user-kz3nq9js5q]

19:17: Oh, Hi Abbey! XD

[@markrussell3428]

4:00 Why does Simone de Beauvoir's quote get twisted by a social constructivist slight of hand? "One is not born, but rather, becomes, a women". Yes the social influences are omnipresent; however, perhaps the truth here is this quote deals more with biology. Using the biological paradigm de Beauvoir' herself traces "becoming" and "womanhood" as the natural changes faced by all women: menstruation, pregnancy, giving birth and menopause. Not sure how any of that is socially constructed; however, today through outside medical intervention the natural biological process can be suppressed and some hail this as progress. None of this is consistent with Butler's notion of "performative". Sure de Beauvoir goes into objectification and "flesh" as part of the external pressures. Sadly, de Beauvoir's missed the point that "manness" is just as much a burden for boys as becoming a women is for females. Interesting given the timeframe (1949) manness meant going to war. I would love to know Butler's thoughts on MENstruation - this is another interesting term. I am sure this "less than gender perfect term" must drive her bonkers.

[@gtwilhelm]

Because the course for which this video was made is in the social sciences, not the physical sciences. Taking the perspective of another discipline would be strange for students studying this one. One perspective does not negate the other. One must shed black and white thinking to be an academic.

[@leftifornian2066]

It doesn’t fit the narrative

[@markrussell3428]

@@gtwilhelm Intriguing supposition: "One must shed black and white thinking to be an academic." Sorry, to have any form of intellectual credibility one can't simply ignore the existence of the foundational truths in other disciplines in order to build a straw-person. You don't have to be a biologist ... but a basic understanding would be nice.

[@glitcharcing]

⁠@@markrussell3428hmm, it’s interesting for me to think about this because I can see where you both are coming from… it’s ideal to have an awareness of how certain terms are defined in other fields but the influence of those definitions on your field depends on a lot of factors. at the very least, I’d like to offer an example. Sex as it’s defined in reproductive biology may perhaps take on a new meaning in another part of biology, perhaps neuroscience. The idea of sex as defined in those two fields generally seem to correlate, but there are some… interesting findings. Some areas in the brain are sex-dimorphic: there is a strong correlation between the size, structure, and volume of those areas and that person being of a certain genetic or reproductive (not always specified) sex. So in the field of neuroscience you would then be able to identify someone’s sex based on brain structure… or so they thought. Once they started to analyze the brains of transgender people they found that those sex-dimorphic brain structures weren’t 100% sex-correlated after all… because many trans people have some (not all) brain structures that are actually more similar (in size, shape, volume, etc.) to their expressed gender… not their genetic or reproductive sex… and without hormone use (everyone brings up that point). So, how do you define the sex of the brain then? Transgender people seem to have a brain sex that is actually neither completely male nor female… but many areas of their brain are indeed more similar to the expressed gender… So, brain sex has the possibility of being non-binary, binary in two different ways (some areas female, other areas male), and deviating from the expectations you’d have of someone’s brain judging by their reproductive or genetic sex. Reproductive sex is pretty binary, from what I understand… I don’t know how being intersex works, however, so I don’t know what gametes are present. I’m mostly involved with psychology and neuroscience, so I don’t actually know that much about reproductive biology. I don’t know much of anything about gender theory either, for example. Nevertheless, that doesn’t really change my assertions in the context of the brain. Maybe these fields can and possibly have arrived at different, seemingly contradictory facts, which are nevertheless all true…

[@markrussell3428]

@@glitcharcing This is an really excellent reply, thank you for really making me think! This comment deserves a full and proper reply but let me first acknowledge how brilliant it is. Let me say this, the brain is a sensory influenced system, certainly there are certain aspects that are inate, BUT the external influences will shape its form and function. There is ZERO evidence to suggest being transgender is a biological predisposition. It is largely sociological - in a traditional sense (Pavlovian) it is a shaped/learned behaviour.

[@gulgutz90]

this baby style presentation should be at university! outstanding teaching! congrats.

[@adrianmargean3402]

I don't know why the algorithm decided that this video was for me but as soon as I saw it I knew I was gonna have a good laugh 😂 , thank you for that. I find Americans fascination with sex and gender the most hilarious fad in the last 10 years.

[@summaryadav5484]

My theory is that each male an female has 50 percent masculinity and 50 percent femininity, so there is a constant struggle and the dominant side decides the gender. 😉

[@x16881]

Here an extract of an article in The Economist about her last book "Who's afraid of gender": The problem is that pretty soon, the author leaves the path of gay-rights advocacy and disappears down an ideological rabbit hole. Soon after critiques of “the so-called facts of sex”, the tq+ overwhelms the lgb. The result is a stir-fry of disingenuous provocations, served up with a large portion of post-modern word salad. The reader is left wondering how Butler ever became so influential. Butler smears the growing army of liberal-minded women who oppose these views on sex and gender, including J.K. Rowling, as hysterical right-wingers allied with the pope, Mr Trump and Vladimir Putin. Soon the author descends into the quicksand of intersectionality, where all oppressions overlap, accusing people who criticise the Butler perspective of buttressing “white supremacy”. By the end, all opponents are extremists. The words “fascism” and “fascist” appear nearly 70 times. The book is a lesson in how well-meaning activism can overreach. The author has lent intellectual credibility to a theory that has, as recently revealed in the Cass Review commissioned about England’s youth-gender services, caused harm to many young people, some of whom are autistic, depressed or simply gay. Channelling Butler’s theories, some activists are labelling those who oppose giving minors cross-sex hormones as “bigots”."

[@revdope1]

There's has only been ONE valid study on nature versus nurture when it comes to gender done by John Money. The subjects "un-alived" themselves.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

Yup there is indeed an infamous experiment done by John Money about nature versus nurture when it comes to gender. For those interested, Butler actually discusses this case extensively in their other book, Undoing Gender.

[@revdope1]

I'm aware of her nonsense. Especially her defense of incest. This nonsense ruined the lives of those two boys and their family. There is no ideology on Earth more selfish and heartless than Queer Theory and all that it evolved from and to. @@filmandmediastudieschannel

[@Omicronthewiperofyouknow...]

Read somewhere that one can't have the concept of heterosexuality without the concept of homosexuality. That is a strange thing, mainly because one can have the concept of gravity without the concept of anti-gravity. And many concept don't have an opposite, because those concept don't necessarily refer to a quality of something. The concept of sky doesn't represent a quality. In the same way, heterosexuality is not necessarily a quality.

[@emmad4152]

I respect your perception and I am grateful to explain this topic. Personally, I do not agree with some statements but it was informative content. Thank you.

[@gtwilhelm]

When one is speaking about theory and academic perspective, there is no agree or disagree. It is not meant to be an all inclusive undeniable truth to be agreed with (the result of some source of power). Theory is about looking at something through a particular lens, framing the phenomenon and providing a selective representation filtered through a perspective. Like a photograph, it is a portion of the landscape the photographer chooses to place in a frame and provides a particular focus and filter so that we may see it through their perspective. Have you ever agreed or disagreed with a photograph?

[@emmad4152]

@@gtwilhelm I do. There is one picture from Ron Haviv taken in 1992. The Photograph is called Bosnia. He was ordered to do not to take violent photographs of the war in Bosnia. However, he consider it was important to take the moments that help others to visualize how terrible the war was. I personally find the war pictures disturbing since they do more than represent the horrible events some people are forced to live in; the pictures also preserve the image of people that died terribly, such as this picture of civilians on the floor while a soldier is kicking them after shooting them. The bodies are reduced to memories about the day of their deaths when they were more than "a death" prior to the war. I do not agree to take pictures and obtain fame based on the suffering of others. I do not agree about taking this picture yet I respect Haviv's point of view about what he did take it. Yet, I think we can inspire others to make positive changes without taking someone's image for their deaths to do so. In a photograph, there is not only a portion of the landscape, but it is also a story that is attached to it and that story is what completes the picture, even if its context is rough and violent. :)

[@brankonovak5740]

Well, take-home-message is J.Butler is hot for Z. Effron?

[@madalynbauman3525]

I am finally understanding gender more. Its not about she or he or they, thats more about your sex but gender is your display of masculinity and femininity. I don't think fem or masc should be wholly linked to man, woman, male, female, she, or he. If I identify as masculine as my gender I should still be able to represent my sex and still use pronouns that correlate with my sex. Gender doesn't define your sex and sex doesn't wholly define your gender.

[@clizbot]

I agree that it’s not about pronouns. But butler misses some important things. There are actually a lot of natural behaviors and natural roles that are more biological then socially influenced. They’re often still present even in the most “masculine” trans men. Some things you just can’t get rid of. What we perceive as “Gender” nowadays is just a miss mash of those natural behaviors, culture, and outright personality traits. The true meaning of “masculine and feminine” has been obscured ever since large societies began. But it’s not gone at all, it’s still very prominent today, it’s just overlooked. It’s even present in most animal species. Masculinity in its natural form is your your ability fight,protect, overcome and adapt. The less capable of this, the less the man you are, the less worthy to procreate. Sounds cruel but it’s the natural order in this world. Present in most of earths species. You can even see it reflected in todays Social structure. Femininity is pure sex appeal, your ability to nurse and birth healthy children. It does sound sexist I know but it’s also present in most other species and it’s continued in our modern society. You see things like women gaining social status by exhibiting their bodies all the time. Now more then ever. We’re seeing natural selection also, with taller men being largely favored over smaller men. Women have a natural instinct to choose a man that will protect her during her pregnancy. Men have a natural instinct of choosing a healthy woman that can safely give birth and nurse. Our society is built around this. We can’t get rid of it because it’s our natural call. And it’s more present now then ever.. look up “the patriarchy paradox”

[@PM-zw9xz]

Ella es una de las personas más desagradables dentro de esa decadente élite académica, separada de toda realidad.

[@pumpkingamebox]

In this case, what does gender even identify? What need is there to identify as a man, woman, something inbetweem, or something completely different? If gender only identifies with a vague set of actions that change interpretation every few decades (wearing heels, colored blue, etc) then what's the point of identifying as anything but yourself? What's my gender? Idk, I don't care, I'm just myself. If you want to put me in a box of expected actions that I'd take, sure, go ahead, if that will make it easier for you to talk to me. I meanwhile will perform any action I want regardless of what gender it's associated atm.

[@filmandmediastudieschannel]

This is an interesting comment, and I think it gets at the spirit of what Butler is trying to say. Butler wants to show us that gender isn't grounded in as much a solid foundation as we might think it is, and yet most people treat it as a pretty essential aspect of human identity (arguably, some say, the most essential aspect, as it's often the first thing people want to know when a new human is born).

[@pumpkingamebox]

@@filmandmediastudieschannel I mean, what would a birth look like without exclamation of gender? Congratulations, it’s a Johnny! Or Congratulations, it’s alive! Or Congratulations, it’s human! As opposed to what? Lol I think specifically exclaiming the child’s gender at birth is more of a performative language action, rather than something more serious. People care about gender reveal parties more than at birth. Although, one could have caused or exasperated the other. Monkey see, monkey do, monkey think important.

[@Lily-Exclamation-Point]

Really interesting to see Philosophy Tube before she transitioned, in a video about gender

[@waterglas21]

I like how you try to express Butlers idea in a simple and concise way and I congratualate you for that! However I don't think Judith's ideas are very original or insightful: -Bf Skinner wrote years before Austin "verbal behaviour", where he stipulates that verbal behaviour has a function and should not be clasified by its form. In the same way, psychologist have known since the times of behaviourism that conducts have a function and that are changed by how the world works. I just don't think performative theory gives new insights on the topic of gender. Of course gender is not a performance in the way that no behaviour is performed as in stage. That's just obvious.

[@123ago]

Noise

[@madalynbauman3525]

I think everyone is oppressed and objectified by society not just by men

[@sandrorukhadze8707]

My takeaway from this is that Butler completely ignores in her theory biological factors and their potential influence on human behavior. Sure, social implications in human behavior are omnipresent but to imply that biology has nothing to do with it is a massive error. Studies around gender should be performed through interdisciplinary manners not relying on social sciences alone.

[@KlaireMurre]

Why should we use biology to look Into social constructs? That seems like a very roundabout way to go about something. Should we use color theory to learn how to write?

[@sandrorukhadze8707]

@@KlaireMurre Butler assumes that gender completely belongs to social constructs. that assumption is wrong.

[@francisp2131]

A lot of it is socially constructed - although those constructs are based in biological truths - for example more women being in maternal or nurturing job practices (day-care, school teacher, nurse) but many people lay outside of these constructs and they do not work for them. Butler is also coming from a place of non-conformity, which is often the case when one is gay. Being homosexual or queer, I believe, changes some of your biological inclinations, which could in turn make your biological gender role very restrictive, or perhaps just “not fit” hence why some people are transgender.

[@yeahiprotest]

The academia echo chamber

[@123ago]

Gobbledygook

[@cgpcgp3239]

What is a woman? An adult human female. Roles of women. Roles of women. It’s the societal roles of women that women rebelled against. Butler intentionally conflates roles of women with what is a woman.

[@misvideosaqui]

So, again, what is a woman?

[@kk-om5zm]

Let feminism be free from its judgement, since she simply declares herself a lesbian and of course that's what she cares about. Scientists are not subjective, madam professor...

[@johnsmith7140]

😂

[@angelofheaven199]

The electro imagining waking dots are not an example of "gender performance" people accurately predict which figure is male and female based on the movement of the skeletons, males walk with the shoulders and females with the hips thats where their center of balance is. Its bodily difference not a acting performance.

[@legalgig3480]

Exactly. I do think there are some social constructed ways and manners of walking, depending for example on status. But the great majority of reasons why men and women differ in the way of walking is biological. Difference in hips, bones, organs, muscular mass, etc. And if there are men who walk like women or women who walk like men, it is because they are forcing it for whatever reason.

[@angelofheaven199]

@@legalgig3480 I was struck by how that person mistook performative femininity for reality and then citated that as "gender" & the reason they dislike being a woman, this sort of taking the distortion for the reality is upsetting cause it affirms Simon Beauvais assertion that performative feminity is more real to people then actual biological woman are.

[@youngwillis63]

gender is privaledged at the cost of sex as gender is not completely a social construct but still treated as such. Interesting theory but of very limited utility.

[@stationarywanderer7910]

Even the "male" and "female" categories are constructed. Because there are "males" who are XX and "females" who are XY. There are people who are XXY and XYY. There is variation. And in terms of physical characteristics, there are people born intersex, who have sexual characteristics that are both "male and "female". There are people are have chromosomal variations who have some non-genital physical characteristics that are "male" and "female" in the same body. There are females who have high levels of testosterone, despite being genitally and chromosomally "female". And "males" with high estrogen levels. The more we learn about ourselves, the more we learn that human beings have variation in biological sex as well.

[@4651adri]

They're still women and men, genius.

[@stationarywanderer7910]

They're intersex, a-hole. @@4651adri

[@lovelyp8765]

Judith Butler she is wrong for trying to prove something that is not true..

[@777Rowen]

This is ridiculous! This is not direct towards you, it’s towards her discussion/ideas. They’re muddling everything. Sex is real, gender is part of sex, based on sex, our our gendered roles and due to these expectations, people, men & women are expected to live up to those roles. However, not everyone expresses themselves into these harmful stereotypical categories of boys and girls; meaning the person is usually homosexual or enjoys cross dressing. There sex is still there, and I can’t support queer theory.

[@conorpodonoghue]

My friend, you are way out of your depth! You know all the buzzwords and are obviously familiar with the lingo but you clearly have no appreciation of the philosophical origins of the ideas that you claim to be able to explain. "Useful diagrams circulating on the internet" do not really cut it. If you support such a radical re-interpretation of sex/gender you really need to provide more evidence than diagrams taken from people who support this new ideology. Or is it the case that you just expect us to believe what you are saying without any evidence despite the fact that it contradicts the reality that most people encounter in their daily lives?

[@mlungisizondi2937]

CRAP.