Thursday, November 17, 2005
(12:27 AM) | Old - Doug Johnson:
On Butler's 'Performativity as Citationality'
When I asked a few weeks back about the best American philosopher under sixty-five, the only name that even came up was Judith Butler. I remained a bit skeptical, but had planned to check into her work a bit anyway since Jodie has to read her for a Cultural History, Cultural Theory class. I still suspect that there are good Foucauldian reasons for questioning the overdetermination of sexuality in her writings. Nevertheless, if my initial reading of Butler is anything like indicative (and I've only just read the 22 pp. intro to Bodies That Matter , making the mistake of reading it before bed last night), then not only is she the best young philosopher in America, but also quite original and, more importantly, onto something that nobody I've come across on the European scene really gets. Law matters. And it is inescapable, thought it may very well be 'cited', 'iterated', or echoed in quite subversive ways.To be brief since many in this crowd are far more familiar with Butler: the section on 'Performativity as Citationality' really caught my attention. Butler understands that Law (constituted) is not simply prohibitive or restrictive. It is also educative, in her words it is capable of 'mobilizing' individuals. In fact, this is its main function. A law that simply commands without mobilizing is for all intents and purposes dead. Actors are caught up in the mobilization of legal regimes and cannot disentangle themselves from such regimes. There is, however, much that can be done to resist by way of iterating or citing Law in subversive ways. In other words, there is a way to perform the functions mobilized by the law in a way that repeats its grammar (as one always must), but in a way that undermines that very telos of such mobilizations. Brilliant. She turns such insights quickly against some of the very folks she is learning from, particularly Lacan-Zizek. Again brilliant.
So it is that I must read much more of Butler. Indeed law matters, it is inescapable, and citing or reiterating or echoing or recapitulating it subversively holds a good deal of political potential. Revolutionary obedience in Yoder's words. It must also be added, of course, that constitutive legal power from below, or allegiance to an alternative law, possesses at least as much potential.
