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Completely apart from the essay I've just written on the history of the subject, or the class I'm contemplating next year, I've been ruminating a lot lately on the ideas--paradigms, tropes--of masculinity and femininity. Man and woman. Gender? Sex? Binary opposition? Is masculinity defined as being unfeminine, and vice versa, or are they merely differences?
I've never been particularly feminine. Even as a kid, I was scornful of the 'girly-girls'; femininity was pink and fluffy and high-pitched squealing, something to be avoided. Not that I was a 'tomboy' by any means--for although I mostly eschewed the trappings of femininity, neither did I take on the masculine. But just lately, more and more I've been wanting to blur my gender. Not even consciously, I find myself acting the 'masculine' role in the little everyday social interactions. But this has always been the case. Stephon may have been unsuccessful in trying to teach me to walk like a man, but according to Deborah Tannen, until a few years ago I certainly talked like one. I wonder, though, whether this acceptance of and even desire for masculinity stems from the fact that I feel insufficiently feminine. Because I know that I can't act the woman, I try to act the man as best I can.
But to what degree--if at all--should we understand masculinity and femininity as binary opposites? I heard somewhere that until [historical era - C19?], 'male' and 'female' were not considered opposites at all, they were just different sorts of people that one could be. Not like black and white, more like red and blue. This understanding is certainly supported (or at least not contradicted) by the mythology I have read, at least that I remember. And in the quasi-traditional systems of astrology, neopaganism, etc, 'masculine' and 'feminine' are merely 'qualities' which can be ascribed to inanimate objects or abstract concepts as easily as to humans beings. 'Water' and 'earth' are 'feminine', 'fire' and 'air' are masculine. And as ridiculous as this is when you think about it, it still makes sense subjectively.
But if you define 'masculinity' in terms of its lack of femininity, and 'femininity' in terms of its lack of 'masculinity', you seem to deny that any person could incorporate both elements. Because you can't be two opposites at once. You can only be one or the other, or neither. And then you get very worrying formulations like female professionals being a 'third sex': that is, sexless. Gender = neutral. Even though this concept seems to have arisen from feminism--from those elements of feminist thought that see sexuality as the basis of male oppression--ironically it reinforces one of the most insidious and far-reaching of the systematic oppressions of the 'patriarchy': it denies women their sexuality as a consequence of daring to show masculine traits, or enter traditionally masculine spheres.
I've never been particularly feminine. Even as a kid, I was scornful of the 'girly-girls'; femininity was pink and fluffy and high-pitched squealing, something to be avoided. Not that I was a 'tomboy' by any means--for although I mostly eschewed the trappings of femininity, neither did I take on the masculine. But just lately, more and more I've been wanting to blur my gender. Not even consciously, I find myself acting the 'masculine' role in the little everyday social interactions. But this has always been the case. Stephon may have been unsuccessful in trying to teach me to walk like a man, but according to Deborah Tannen, until a few years ago I certainly talked like one. I wonder, though, whether this acceptance of and even desire for masculinity stems from the fact that I feel insufficiently feminine. Because I know that I can't act the woman, I try to act the man as best I can.
But to what degree--if at all--should we understand masculinity and femininity as binary opposites? I heard somewhere that until [historical era - C19?], 'male' and 'female' were not considered opposites at all, they were just different sorts of people that one could be. Not like black and white, more like red and blue. This understanding is certainly supported (or at least not contradicted) by the mythology I have read, at least that I remember. And in the quasi-traditional systems of astrology, neopaganism, etc, 'masculine' and 'feminine' are merely 'qualities' which can be ascribed to inanimate objects or abstract concepts as easily as to humans beings. 'Water' and 'earth' are 'feminine', 'fire' and 'air' are masculine. And as ridiculous as this is when you think about it, it still makes sense subjectively.
But if you define 'masculinity' in terms of its lack of femininity, and 'femininity' in terms of its lack of 'masculinity', you seem to deny that any person could incorporate both elements. Because you can't be two opposites at once. You can only be one or the other, or neither. And then you get very worrying formulations like female professionals being a 'third sex': that is, sexless. Gender = neutral. Even though this concept seems to have arisen from feminism--from those elements of feminist thought that see sexuality as the basis of male oppression--ironically it reinforces one of the most insidious and far-reaching of the systematic oppressions of the 'patriarchy': it denies women their sexuality as a consequence of daring to show masculine traits, or enter traditionally masculine spheres.
