Luce Irigaray Overview

According to Luce Irigaray, Western civilization is "without any female philosophy or linguistics, any female religion or politics. All of these disciplines have been set up in accordance with a male object." This kind of basic feminist observation might sound obvious... [more]

According to Luce Irigaray, Western civilization is "without any female philosophy or linguistics, any female religion or politics. All of these disciplines have been set up in accordance with a male object." This kind of basic feminist observation might sound obvious now, but when Irigaray first uttered the claim, it cost her her job. Born in Belgium in the 1930s, Irigaray quickly gravitated to Paris, where Jacques Lacan was propagating his revisionist psychoanalytic theories. Soon she was participating in his seminars and training as an analyst. In part through her analysis of prominent French feminist Antoinette Fouque, she formulated her theory of culture as phallocentric. In a world which enshrines the symbol of male potency, the difference which is represented by female subjectivity cannot be tolerated. For such proposals, Irigaray was ejected from her post at the University of Vincennes -- ironically, this event illustrated the very point she was making. In the '60s and '70s, she went on to philosophize that social order determines sexual order, and that our cultural economy is based upon the commodification of the female. Along with Julia Kristeva and other French Deconstructionist feminists, she demanded that society revise its linguistic and cultural systems in order to more adequately represent women. Another of Irigaray's major theoretical contributions is the idea that sexual difference exists only in nature -- not in culture. According to Irigaray, "man" does not mean the same thing as "male," "woman" is distinct from "female." The latter terms are inescapable qualities of being, while the former involve the cultural qualities we assume after birth. Inevitably, women will remain faithful to their biological sex (female), but should question those gender identities that exist in society (including "woman"), for these constructions originate with men. Women's cultural loyalty should gravitate solely to those new definitions created by women themselves. Many Feminists and philosophers have taken the foundation of Irigaray's ideas and developed their own paradigms for women. She remains a crucial figure in sparking this very important cultural movement. [show less]