I strongly get the feeling like I'm the only one that has a hard time understand the readings in the book for class. Again I started this reading with the same puzzled President Bush expression.
Ok well now to my blog. Hopefully it has to do with what I think I read... I think it does...
From the beginning of From Gender Trouble: Frminism and the Subversion of Identity I read the first two 3 pages four times over and over trying to make sense of what it was talking about. Still not necessarily knowing if I have a clear understanding of the article I stumbled upon when the author Judith Butler refers to Freud's "civilization" as the "destruction of the body" She then goes on to say that "forces and impulses with multiple directionalities are precisely that which hisotry both destroys and preserves through the entsehung (historical event) of inscription." From this Ms. Butler says "as 'a volume in perpetual disintegration.' the body is always under siege, suggering destruction by the very terms of history. And hisotry is the creation of values and meanings by a signifying practice that requires the subjection of the body." While reading this I instantly thought of how either my sophomore or junior year when FMLA took quotes from songs demaning women and posted them all over campus raising the awareness. When Ms. Butler said that the body is always under siege I referred to the black female body interpreted in rap and hip hop songs and how the songs are demaning, degrading, and almost in a sense putting the black female body in danger.
I strongly appreciated the part on "inner" and "outer" worlds pertaining to other forms of identity-differentiation. Ms. Butler stated that "for inner and outer worlds to remain utterly distinct, the entire surface of the body would have to achieve an impossible impermeability." Therefore, almost having the body explode from the inside due to the filth "it' fears.
Through out this reading I almost kept fading in and out it almost seems based upon the fact that there were part I understood and parts that I didn't that. I thought if I kept reading then it would all tie itself together in the end. For the most part it did and many issues were not. From this one question I had was on the first page Ms. Butler says "This 'body' often appears to be a passive medium that is signified by an inscription from a cultural source figured as 'external' to that body".... didn't quite understand that... anyone know what it means?!?
2 comments:
You definately aren't the only one who is puzzled by the readings. I just take it slowly and try to grasp it little by little.
To answer your question, I am not sure what the quote meant. I didn't understand the reading until about the second column of the second page. From this reading I focused on the aspect of the body and the boundaries. Hopefully the readings will become clearer or we will eventually begin to understand.
FMLA's lyrics effort does seem to speak more material to what Butler is talking about. Hopefully we can break through the rest of this pomo confusion in class.
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