Judith Butler's theory of gender performativity

Who is Judith Butler?

• American philosopher
• Gender theorist
• Played influential role in shaping modern feminism
• Wrote book 'Gender trouble' which develops her theory of gender performativity
• For more information on Judith Butler :http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-butl.htm

What is gender?

•  According to Judith Butler's theory 'A set of expectations that society defines for you'
• However according to Google 'the state of being male or female (typically used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones)'

But is gender really natural?

• Judith Butler disagrees, she says 'Gender is the repeated stylisation of the body, a set of repeated acts within a highly rigid regulatory frame that congeal over time to produce the appearance of substance' which simplifies to- Gender roles are constructed by society
• Not all boys and girls like what 'society' expects them to. Many girls like sport and many boys like makeup
• It is just that culture coerces you to conduct that gender performance
• According to Butler, gender is performative. We are not just acting it like in a play but rather actively constructing it as we act it out.
• If we don't follow our 'roles' gender will not exist

How does this link to media studies?

I think this links to media studies as in different forms of media text females and males are often portrayed in the way 'society'  wants them to. We rarely see women in sporting magazines and men in makeup magazines. This not only stops from normalising men and women to be any way they want but also shows no representation to the people who are brave enough to go against society and give support to those who want to also act in any way they want.


I collected this information from this video: