Page 41 - Cultural Studies Dictionary

DICTIONARY OF CULTURAL STUDIES

is a normative ‘regulatory ideal’ that produces the bodies it governs through citation
and reiteration of hegemonic discourses (the heterosexual imperative) to generate
a performativity that is always derivative. Butler’s project involves the
18 deconstruction of the compulsory gender matrix and she has cited drag as a parodic
form that can destabilize gender norms. Nevertheless, for Butler, all identity
categories are necessary fictions that must be interrogated.
• Associated concepts Discourse, gender, identity, performativity, power, sex,
subject position, subjectivity.
• Tradition(s) Feminism, poststructuralism, psychoanalysis, queer theory.
• Reading Butler, J. (1993) Bodies That Matter. London and New York: Routledge.