Ward 1
Joshua Ward
Sexing Shakespeare
Mary Hamner
11/14/13
Anonymous
The sun shines a luminescent gold, reflecting its radiant visage upon a subtle blue canvas.
Late evening approaches amongst the naked, petrified oaks enclosing him and his lover, while
Mother Nature’s frigid breath began to weave in between the crackling branches of the open
clearing. Swirling daggers of ice-forged wind brushes against his open flesh, sending appalling
shivers down his spine, yet the warmth of a delicate hand and the foreign blades of the damp
earthen soil soothes him. A place secluded from their horrendous reality and free of all
misfortune, love’s sweet kiss revealing a glance into their perfect world.
Quickly refer back to the previous paragraph before answering this question; what sex
did you assume the male’s lover to be? The sentimental meaning should render unclear, however
that isn’t always the case. Society has tainted and brainwashed our unfortunate souls to blatantly
accept the ideals of gender performance. Did you assume the lover I wrote about was a woman
because of my masculine name at the top of the page, or was it the utilization of ‘feminine’
vernacular? It’s humorous how much words can display girlish and boyish consistencies such as:
delicate and sweet, that those adjectives convey an ultimatum of pompous and ignorant
misconceptions. This essay’s underlining meaning will try to connect gender roles, categories
and stereotypes, while referring to Judith Butler’s grandiosely discussed quote, “I’m permanently
troubled by identity categories” (Butler 14). Conclusively, it will also be correlated with Marvin
Gaye’s well known song, Let’s Get it On.
Ward 2
On the subject of gender performance in the usage of writing, human language exercises
feminine and masculine terminology. How does one create a sense of female or male identity
without the explicit utterance of an overt noun or pronoun? You can’t, however inhabitants of
society will always classify words affiliated with same or opposite sex. That being said, a lot of
other countries employ words constructed by feelings of dominance and submissiveness as well;
for example, the letters ‘o’ and ‘a’ in Spanish are there to reiterate my exclamation. Bonita and
guapo are two perfect illustrations of human usage of gender within language, one being pretty
and the later being handsome. On rare occasions would you ever call a male pretty and a woman
handsome, even more so for the female, but why doesn’t this occur? To put it bluntly, it goes
against the social norm we unhealthy rely on.
In response to what has been previously stated, there is an obvious social norm associated
with specific gender identities, which can be linked with Let’s Get it On. From what I’ve
gathered in Marvin Gaye’s song, the overall synopsis of it revolves around a one night stand. It’s
quite obvious that the viewer listening to the song would assume the lyrics were being spoken by
a male in order to swoon a female into performing intimate actions with him, however it isn’t
clarified and only is being hinted at by the use of the words ‘baby’ or ‘sugar.’ The inhabitants
within this society couldn’t possibly fathom the thought of a girl singing about a one night stand;
to us it seems unethical and indisputably wrong. “I’m permanently troubled by identity
categories” (14); there’s that quote again, this is where I tighten loose ties together and map lost
thoughts. Ask yourself this, how was Let’s Get it On and Judith Butler’s famous quote associated
with one another? We assume lots of insensible information about meaningless words, society
judges said descriptors in a negative or positive light based upon how they are performed. This is
what I believe Butler was hinting towards in her writings, that gruesome, incoherent word
Ward 3
‘judge.’ People believe that identity categories sketch an outline of one’s attitude, gender, and
life experiences. In Marvin Gaye’s work it was extremely difficult to visualize a woman
presenting this song, even if a female would’ve written it in the first place. Allow me to correct
myself; it was difficult to see a woman singing this song without being viewed as scandalous,
slutty, or ethically despicable.
In conclusion, society’s view regarding gender performance is demented and bias. You
cannot assume or categorize someone based upon race, religion, sex, and gender; everyone has
specific traits about their personality which you have possibly overlooked. Though this may be a
common truth, we all fall victim to stereotypical notions at times; it’s a part of our society and
most likely always will be if we keep the apparent denominations within our diction. Alas,
perhaps a perfect world can’t be achieved with love and love alone.
Ward 4
Works Cited
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/marvingaye/letsgetiton.html
Judith Butler, "Imitation and Gender Insubordination"