Midterm Exam: 5 Most Common Problems
The theorists whose ideas we’re working through in this course are challenging thinkers. They’re
challenging because they are trying to restructure not only what we know, but how we know what we
know. So a seemingly simple question like “what is queer” asks you to think through complex and often
counter-intuitive ideas. What follows is a list of common stumbling blocks that many of you bumped
into when writing your answers, both with content and with composing an argument. For contentrelated questions, I also suggest that you consult reliable guides or secondary sources such as the Johns
Hopkins Guide to Critical Theory which you can access online through the library: Permalink: 1237052
1.
Foucault’s Repressive Hypothesis and theory of power. This is a tough one. Foucault does
such a good job at describing the repressive hypothesis, it’s easy to assume that this is his
argument. But while Foucault doesn’t argue that repression of sexuality didn’t happen, or
doesn’t continue to happen, he argues forcefully that this explanation is inadequate to describe
the phenomena he identifies. It can’t explain, for example, the immense flourishing of talk about
sexuality. The repressive hypothesis depicts power as though it were the “sovereign power” of
the pre-18th century: top-down, unidirectional, a dominant power to which all ordinary people
are subjected and powerless (a theory of power useful to both psychoanalysis and Marxism in
the period Foucault is writing). But is this really how power worked in the nineteenth century?
Is this really how it works now? The repressive hypothesis, he says, needs to be situated,
contextualized. Rather than continuing to assert (as the repression hypothesis does) that
during the Victorian period we were repressed, and now are increasingly liberated, Foucault
argues that what happened during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was not (or not
simply) a powerful repression, but a new mode of power which is powerfully productive. This
power proliferated discourses about sexuality, and we see those discourses in, for example, the
categories of perversion which many of you identified in your essays as well as in the very
architectures of institutions, which again many of you also identified in your essays. In other
words, it’s not (or not only) that sexuality was repressed in this period, but rather that sexuality
was produced and regulated. Likely because the “repressive hypothesis” remains such a
common and powerful explanation of sexuality in our culture, it’s very difficult to critique.
2. Butler’s theory of performativity. This theory has been difficult for readers ever since Butler
first proposed it in Gender Trouble. In fact, as we learned in class, the book that we read parts
of, Bodies That Matter, was Butler’s response to all the misunderstandings that arose from her
first attempt to articulate it. What critics said in response to Gender Trouble, and what many of
you, too, said in your answers, was that performativity means that gender is, in some sense,
volitional, that one can step into a closet, choose a gender, and appear again in that chosen
gender—like a drag queen arguably does in her performance. But in Bodies That Matter, she’s
trying very carefully to explain that’s not how it works. Gender is not (or not merely)
performance, but performative. Queer or straight, we don’t “choose” our genders; we are
interpellated into them and we continue throughout our lives to “become” our genders.
Performativity is in the again and again assertion of our gendered selves, the constant “I am girl”
or “I am boy” that we make whether we mean to or not. It’s not a conscious, willed
performative but is rather embedded in the discourse that makes us intelligible, and that we
reiterate. That said, we don’t all become our genders in the same way. In our constant
reiteration, our “citation” of gender ideals, we are inevitably mis-citing and it’s in these
imperfect repetitions that change can happen. To use a very clumsy analogy, think of it this
way. You’re born into language. You can’t at some point decide to throw off all human
language, and speak in the language of Martians, and still be intelligible. To be intelligible, your
language must adhere to some rules of some known language. Within that language, you can
say things that have never been said before, write poems never written. But you’re still using
the rules of the language in order to be understood. In a very, very simplistic way, this is similar
to Butler’s understanding of citation.
3. Contrast and Compare: Try to show how the differences and similarities between theorists are
pertinent to the question. For example, as we’ve learned in class, Butler and Sedgwick have
different views of psychoanalysis. This is possibly pertinent to their theories of “queer,” but
explain how.
4. Explain the key terms: The challenge of writing a theory essay is to grapple with both the
stakes of theorists’ arguments, and with the details of their arguments. The first step is
identifying, as many of you did very well, the basic tenets or key points. But what comes after
that is really the meat of the matter. What does it mean that Butler thinks that gender is
performative? Think about: What does this word mean to Butler? How does it work, this
relation between gender and performativity? Why is this argument important? What does it do
to the way theorists have previously conceived the relation between gender and sex? Keep
asking yourselves these questions until you think you’ve got it as clear and as detailed as you
can get it.
5. Connect your reading to the question: This is a simple thing, but really hard to do in the heat of
the exam moment, I know. But rather than saying everything there is to say about a particular
theorist, hone in on the pertinent pieces. Figure out why they’re pertinent. And don’t try to do
it all.
I’ve really enjoyed reading your work and I look forward to reading your essays. You’re doing some very
fine thinking, and obviously working hard to do what Sedgwick asks you to do, that is to universalize the
questions of queer.
Students wishing to discuss their examination should arrange to meet with me during my office hours,
Wednesdays 4:00-6:00 pm, CNH 403. My e-mail address is: kayac@mcmaster.ca
Students wishing to discuss their essay should meet with Dr. Clark in his office hours, Wednesdays 4:006:00 pm, CNH 210. His e-mail address is: dclark@mcmaster.ca