A morning with Judith Butler

Judith Butler has been constructing her philosophical oeuvre, starting out from the ethical and political premise that living is, inescapably, living together. This means that vulnerability is the condition shared by all human beings since their social and political communities are founded on interdependence. Nevertheless, Butler points out that every political community is governed by a complex set of social norms which demarcate the sphere of liveable lives or, in other words, there are subjectivities which, unrecognised, are also unprotected, as if they cannot exist within the framework of what is deemed possible. Butler’s analysis has been particularly relevant in the field of gender studies from which she has comprehensively criticised the structures that regulate and condition sexuality and gender, thereby imposing normative sexuality and a binary—male and female—gender scheme conceiving sex as a “natural” fact on the basis of which gender is culturally constructed.

Judith Butler’s philosophy has therefore opened up the possibility of recognising other lives and ways of living—bodies, kinds of sexuality, and so on—frequently excluded from or opposing the norm, and which need to be liveable although without being assimilated within the parameters of existent norms.

This activity is for secondary school students. Prior registration is required.