Historicizing as a feminist practice : The places of history in Judith Butler’s constructivist theories

The dissertation explores feminist uses of history and historicity. It discusses the way historicity is used in feminist constructivist arguments and it uses Judith Butler’s work as an example. The dissertation elaborates on the predominant theoretical requirement to historicize. It is a contribution to the current feminist attempts to problematize some of the prevailing practices of constructivist thinking. As constructivist arguments for the most part build on the idea of the historicity of phenomena my historico-philosophical perspective brings valuable new insights into the problematization of constructivism. My dissertation discusses the consequences that the predominance of historicism has for feminist constructivist theories, especially Judith Butler’s theories of materialization and performativity. My work is an attempt at crafting spaces where the necessity of historicizing could be questioned. I think up spaces where a "virtual non-historicity" or a "strategic forgetting of history" would be viable options for feminist thought. I do this by showing where and how historicity becomes a foundational and universalized idea in Judith Butler’s theories of materialization and performativity. Chapter 1 "Historicity in Question" situates my work within feminist theories of corporeality and discusses the relevance and background of a philosophy of history. Chapter 2 "Historicity - Temporality" elaborates on the presumed historicity of concrete objects through the work of Luce Irigaray and Martin Heidegger. I argue that the idea of a fundamental historicity of objects already implies a contextuality. This primary connection between historicity and contextuality is used in various ways and it enables certain kinds of historicizing within feminist theories. I also explore the interconnectedness of historicity and temporality. I present a reading of the various temporalities that have been discussed within feminism. I problematize temporality through a discussion of the notion "event" in relation to the idea of "contingency". I analyze Judith Butler’s use of the phrase "always already" and connect the temporal logic of her constructivist "always already" to chronology. I show that the universalistic necessities connected to chronology come to limit constructivist thinking. Chapter 3"Social constructivism and historicity" discusses the relationship between constructivist thinking and historicist thinking. This is done by an analysis of how "the constitutive outside" is connected to historicity in Judith Butler’s constructivist theory. Through an analysis of the connection between "history" and the "constitutive outside" I have wanted to render discernible the limits that this connection draws for thinking. If the "constitutive outside" is historicized, historicity becomes a priori in a foundationalist and universalizing way. I point at the necessity for thinking "virtual non-history" at these kinds of points. A strategic forgetting of history might open up a space where the form - matter distinction could be theorized without granting priority to the form by conceptualizing matter as an effect of historicity. Chapter 4 "Performativity" is a discussion of the place of history in Judith Butler’s theory of performativity. I discuss Jacques Derrida’s non-historicized notion of iterability in relation to Butler’s historicized iterability. I argue that if iterability is read as historically contingent, as Butler does, one cannot ask whether not "historical contingency" is enabled by a general iterability. If iterability is thought of as historically contingent the space for a strategic forgetting of history is foreclosed. If historicity defines the constitution of meaning in general there is no space for thinking "virtual non-historicity". With a reference to Luce Irigaray’s work I argue that this is one of the main consequences of an unquestioned repetition of the homosocial bond between language and history. This repetition is done by reducing meaning to its historicity. I suggest that feminists start practicing a strategic forgetting of history. I think that a space of virtual non-historicity can be opened. It is a space to think in. History should be cited subversively, that is, it should be cited incorrectly. In forgetting history we need an explicated remembrance of what power history is invested with. This remembrance is needed whenever the language of history is used - to avoid being used by its universalizing and foundationalist aspects