10 December 2015 "Heteronormativity As The Unfortunately Still Dominant Discourse Surrounding Sex"
Written for a Sociological Theory class I took while studying at Loyola University Maryland.
Abstract: This paper examines the connection between Michel
Foucault, Judith Butler, and several other contemporary authors as they explain
sex, sexuality, and gender. First identifying the discourse and then
questioning why it has developed the way that it has, this essay attempts to
question the barriers surrounding sexuality in modern society. It examines
several points in history at which the discourse surrounding sex and sexuality
have previously been questioned, and attempts to identify sex and gender as
wholly socially constructed. This paper addresses questions regarding the
current discourse surrounding sexuality, how it has changed, and how it should
change in the future. It questions why a discourse supporting negativity and
avoiding acceptance still remains the most dominant one, while a separate
discourse that supports acceptance of gender and sexual identities that fall
outside the norm is available and growing. Overall, it attempts to highlight
factors of and seek a unique explanation for why the discourse surrounding
sexuality remains in such a stagnant state.
Heteronormativity
As The Unfortunately Still Dominant Discourse Surrounding Sex
INTRODUCTION
Adopting a Foucaultian perspective of
sexuality having several types of discourse, I have identified a few points in
history at which I believe the discourse surrounding gender/sexuality was
significantly changed: the late 19th century, after the first
published use of the word “homosexual”; the mid-20th century, when
human sexuality was studied significantly within medical disciplines; the late
20th century, when opinions surrounding human sexuality began to
visibly change; and the present day (21st century after 2009), a
time in which I believe the barriers of heteronormativity and the binary system
of have begun to be reorganized. Though I still believe there is immense
inequality surrounding the discourse of sexuality, I hope in this paper to
identify the irrationality of the dominant discourse through close comprehension
of study from social theorists, and through my own interpretation of the
current discourses.
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
Sexuality and sexual norms have often
been hotly debated. Although today’s society has begun to find a place of
acceptance within itself for sexual identities that fall outside the
heterosexual norm—and not longer so widely adopts a mindset that these sexual
identities require “curing”, there is still a dominant discourse arguing that
certain sexuality and gender identities are unnatural. This somewhat
significant population adamantly claims that a binary system of sexuality and
gender identity is “true” and “natural”.
Gender and sexual identity have been
common themes of study throughout history. Though some claim otherwise, it is
fairly easy to identify exceptions to the widely accepted binary system of
gender and sexuality (Yon-Leau and Muńez-Laboy) (Rideway) (University of West
England). I hope to identify that sexual and gender identities are created
socially, and do not occur naturally. I believe that pinpointing as closely as
possible the time and location of certain norms’ emergence into society will
sufficiently introduce the idea that there have been multiple discourses
surrounding sexuality, and that the currently dominant one should not be
considered the truest and most natural. All discourses should be recognized and
examined, and perhaps if this does happen, the currently dominant discourse
will be reconsidered as the one that “makes the most sense”. I would like to
pose the following questions: what factors explain the emergence of beliefs
that certain sexual norms are universal throughout time and space? Why is it
that in current society the different discourses of sexuality appear so
contested—even sometimes to the point of violence? With such a developed
recognition of a more positive, acceptance-based discourse surrounding
non-binary gender and sexuality, why is it that the not accepting and
heteronormative-based discourse appears to fight even harder to maintain its
dominance? And in this fighting, somewhat succeed? Especially when considering
the irrationality of assuming any one discourse surrounding a concept like
sexuality, how has it become the dominant thought in our society to believe
that an easily proven historical formation like sexuality occurs naturally in
one variety? And finally, when considering the obviously different sexualities
around the world, the observed and proven different approaches to “doing
sexuality”, what maintains the firmly held belief that one culture’s adaptation
of sex, gender, and sexuality is the completely correct one?
LITERATURE REVIEW
In Volume I of his History of Sexuality, Michel Foucault explores the discourses and
power structures surrounding sex in the nineteenth century. In chapter one,
“The Incitement to Discourse” of the second section, “The Repressive
Hypothesis”, Foucault claims that the discourses surrounding sex, instead of
being repressed like popular belief assumes, have actually been brought heavily
into Western society and culture. Referring first to the sexuality of children
and adolescents, he explains: “all this together enables us to link an
intensification of the interventions of power to a multiplication of discourse.
The sex of children and adolescents has become, since the eighteenth century,
an important area of contention around which immeasurable institutional devices
and discursive strategies had been deployed” (Foucault, 1976: 30). In other
words, the reason sex became such a controlled subject in Western society is because
it was so widely acknowledged, not because it was ignored. Child and adolescent
sexuality, which for the past few centuries had not been acknowledged, had now
been thrust into the spotlight, put under the scrutiny of society and made
subject to a variety of discursive strategies.
Sex in the nineteenth century, Foucault
explains, had been redefined, adopted by many different disciplines, and
discussed constantly—though it was only acceptable to discuss it under the
correct circumstances and in the correct manner. At the time, the adoption of sex
into disciplines such as medicine, psychiatry, and criminal justice highlighted
the “dangers” of sex as it applied to things like “nervous disorders”, “sexual
perversions”, and the like. Certain sexual behaviors, which had long existed in
society, became “heinous”, and as a result, “sites radiated discourses aimed at
sex, intensifying people’s awareness of it as a constant danger, and this in
turn created a further incentive to talk about it” (1976: 31). In order to
create this dominant discourse of sex, people had to talk constantly about it.
When sex became identified as this “heinous”, this dangerous thing that could
not very well be controlled, the incentive to talk more, produce more discourse
increased.
Through this increased discourse came the
politicization of sex in a way it had not been politicized before. At the end
of the eighteenth century, “heterosexual monogamy” (1976: 38) moved out of the
light of juridical scrutiny, and was replaced by “irregular” sexuality.
Foucault explains, “what came under scrutiny was the sexuality of children, mad
men and women, and criminals; the sensuality of those who did not like the
opposite sex; reveries, obsessions, petty manias, or great transports of rage. It
was time for all these figures, scarcely noticed in the past, to step forward
and speak, to make the difficult confession of what they were” (1976: 38-39).
Heterosexual members of the “normal” majority were no longer highlighted in the
discourse on sex; if they were it was on a minimalized basis. Sexual minorities
gained more widespread recognition and increasingly were labeled—with names
like homosexual, etc—, in order to specify exactly what type of deviant they
were.
A perfect example of this labeling comes
in the form of homosexuality. The homosexual in the nineteenth century,
Foucault explains, “became a personage, a past, a case history, and a
childhood, in addition to being a type of life…Nothing that went into his total
composition was unaffected by his sexuality. It was everywhere present in him,
at the root of all his actions” (1976:43). Because the homosexual was a
deviant, he/she was therefore put at the center of the discourse surrounding
sex in the nineteenth century. It was believed at the time that because a
homosexual person identified his/her sexuality outside the heterosexual realm,
that his/her entire identity was dependent on this deviant sexual identity.
Being a homosexual was not just an identity, it was a “singular nature”
(1976:43). One could not be a homosexual and be something else.
Foucault credits the first usage of
homosexuality as a medical category to Carl Westphal’s 1870 article Archiv für Neurologie, in which newly
identified “contrary sexual sensations” (Westphal, 1870) are explained. Though
this is the first emergence of homosexuality as a category according to
Foucault, it certainly can be observed to mark the beginning of an enormous
amount of discourse centered on the sexuality of the homosexual.
In 1892, James Kiernan was the first
doctor in the United States to publish an medical journal officially utilizing the
word “homosexual”. It was a monumental publication for the discourse
surrounding homosexuality; this publication pushed the term farther into the
medical realm, labeling it as a medical condition that required doctoral
examination (Kiernan, 1892). Many medical journals followed in this public
usage of the term “homosexuality”, furthering the trend of labeling people outside
the sexual norm by their created sexual identifier.
The public use of the term “homosexual”
in differing medical journals around Europe and the United States easily proves
Foucault’s point about the transformation and rise of the discourse on sex in
the nineteenth century. Because the first public use of the term can be traced
back to that specific time period, and because the public use of the term increased
so exponentially following those first few publications in that time period, it
can be understood that the discourse surrounding sex underwent a significant
transformation at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth
century. The homosexual had become more than just a deviant, or an “aberration;
the homosexual [had become] a species” (Foucault, 1976:43).
Though homosexuality was heavily labeled
by nineteenth century discourse as a “medical condition” that needed to be
“treated”, Foucault highlights in part four of The History of Sexuality, “The Deployment of Sexuality” the fact
that during the same time period there existed a completely different discourse
regarding the homosexual identity. The “literature of a whole series of
discourses on the species and subspecies of homosexuality...made possible a
strong advance of social controls into this area of ‘perversity’; but it also
made possible the formation of a ‘reverse’ discourse: homosexuality began to
speak in its own behalf, to demand that its legitimacy or ‘naturality’ be
acknowledged, often in the same vocabulary, using the same categories by which
it was medically disqualified” (1976: 101). At the same time that journals in a
multitude of disciplines published literature centered on the recognition of
homosexuality as unnatural and deviant, members of the newly developed
“species” of homosexuality incited a new discourse centered on a different type
of recognition: recognition as a sexuality separate from the heterosexual norm,
yes, but also recognition as a sexual equal to the heterosexual norm.
Also highlighted in part four of The History of Sexuality is Foucault’s
exploration of the power structures inherent in twentieth century sexuality. He
explains: “Sexuality is not the most intractable element in power relations,
but rather one of those endowed with the greatest instrumentality: useful for
the greatest number of maneuvers and capable of serving as a point of support,
as a linchpin, for the most varied strategies” (1976: 103). In other words,
sexuality is not a difficult element to work with in power relations, but
instead is a malleable element; it is one capable of serving a variety of power
structures. Though the dominant discourses involving sex—as referenced
according to their influence on homosexuality above—often focused on
“treatment” of deviant forms of sexuality, sexuality as a whole was not limited
to this one discourse. It appears that there was no reason inherent in sexuality
as an element that made the dominant discourse most dominant. Power structures
and discursive strategies as developed through the realm of sexuality are
easily subject to change.
In the final section of The History of Sexuality, Foucault calls
the term “sex” into question. He highlights the varying definitions of the term,
then eventually explains the higher historical importance of sexuality over
sex. He claims sexuality to be a concrete historical formation, and sex to be a
thing of “confused ideas and illusions” (1976: 157). He concludes the book by
wondering at the future. Perhaps someday, he thinks, a new generation will look
back and question how a society could be so hung up on an entirely socially
constructed formation, when what they really were moved by was the power
mechanisms of sexuality. He highlights the naïveté of people believing they had
been liberated by the “genius” of Freud when in fact they were always under the
influence of a sexual power structure.
Phyllis Butler examines one aspect of the
discourse surrounding homosexuality (specifically in men) in her book Gender Shock: Exploding the Myths of Male
and Female. In one particular chapter, she examines “The Feminine Boy
Project at UCLA”, a project aimed at the “treatment” of young and adolescent
boys who were diagnosed with “Gender Identity Disorder” (GID). She conducts a
series of interviews with a Dr. Lovas, and with families of the boys Dr. Lovas “treated”
for GID. In these interviews, she makes a surprising series of revelations, but
what I wish to highlight here has to do with a boy named Kraig. Descriptions of
Kraig revealed very flamboyant, hyper-feminine behavior that doctors at the UCLA
GID clinic claimed to be a result of “irreversible neurological and biochemical
determinants” (Burke, 1996). But Burke has a different hypothesis: “If a
five-year-old girl were performing as Kraig did, she would not be diagnosed as
gender deviant…Perhaps these boys were treated because they frightened the
adults around them when they reflected an exaggerated and stylized female
gender role performance in such a devastatingly accurate manner” (Burke, 1996).
The
dominant discourse of sex at the time of the Feminine Boy Project at UCLA
obviously viewed children like Kraig as deviant, and therefore parents of
children like him were expected to “correct” this “unnatural” behavior. The
willingness of many parents to engage with projects like the one at UCLA
demonstrates just how dominant this discourse was in society in the nineteenth century.
However, as Burke’s comment highlights, the discourse surrounding the
sexualities of children that behaved out of the norm of the binary gender
system was just that: one branch of the discourse. As she explains, non-binary
behavior should not be attributed to the supposed “neurological” problems in a
child who acts out of the sexual norm. Instead, the ease with which a male
child was able to transform himself into the opposite sex should question the
dominant discourse, even though this might cause extreme discomfort. It is the
power structures of sexuality so strongly put in place that cause this
discomfort and lead one to question neurology, rather than question the
discourse itself.
Judith
Butler points out a problem with the somewhat more recent discourse on sex by
questioning the connection between sex and gender: “If gender is the cultural
meanings that the sexed body assumes, then a gender cannot be said to follow
from a sex in any one way. Taken to its logical limit, the sex/gender distinction
suggests a radical discontinuity between sexed bodies and culturally
constructed genders” (Butler, 1990: 6). In other words, how could gender
possibly follow such a binary system if it is considered cultural? It isn’t
possible for gender to have any one specific identification if cultural
interpretation of sex is the determinant factor. She continues: “The
presumption of a binary gender system implicitly retains the belief in a
mimetic relation of gender to sex whereby gender mirrors sex or is otherwise
restricted by it. When the constructed status of gender is theorized as
radically independent of sex, gender itself becomes a free-floating artifice,
with the consequence that man and masculine might just as easily signify a
female body as a male one” (1990: 6). When one separates sex from gender, it is
easy enough to see how gender has been socially constructed. The only reason
gender is considered binary is because society has put it together in a way
that mirrors the binary system of sex. When gender is separated from sex—what
we consider to be its counterpart—the idea of “man” and “woman” and “girl” and
“boy” lose all meaning. And yet the dominant discourse still insists that this
is untrue. The dominant discourse still insists the pairing of sex and gender.
DISCUSSION
Since I took my first Gender Studies
course and my first Sociology of Sexuality course last semester, I’ve found it
difficult to understand why the dominant discourse regarding gender and
sexuality has remained so dominant.
Since learning about cultural third sex identities, the wide spectrum of sexual
identities (Esterberg) (Sojka) (Rust), and the constant obvious reinforcement
of a very specific type of sexuality (heteronormativity), I’ve felt enlightened
about the outliers of a system I for so long assumed unshakeable. And for this
reason I’ve had so much trouble understanding the fact that despite the ease with
which our society could learn about the unnaturalness of the binary system of
gender and sexuality we appear to choose to believe in this binary system. Why
is it that this specific discourse surrounding sex is the most dominant one?
What factors could be to blame for the chosen ignorance of all the information
about sex and sexuality that clearly disproves the “naturality” of the binary
system of gender?
In attempt
to answer these questions, my first thought was to blame religion. Being
somewhat biased against it anyway, I felt that all the judgment and forcing of
one view onto others was typical of religion, and therefore the cause of
heteronormativity likely stemmed from the misinterpretation of religious
beliefs. After all, it’s been a bit easier to see the negatives of religion
from all sides in light of recent tragedies; the generalization of any one
group or type of people tends to go along with religion in times of turmoil. Why
wouldn’t religion be to blame?
Having the knowledge
about social theory that I have now, I still can suppose that religion might be
a factor responsible for the spread of popularity and prevalence of a certain
belief system. Perhaps sexuality, like capitalism, was just a byproduct of
religious ideals. Similar to the way the Protestant ethic developed into the
spirit of capitalism, perhaps the discourse surrounding sexuality stemmed from
some religion-based origin. Perhaps the reason a certain discourse gained such
popularity was because it was the secularization of a popular religion’s values.
But sexuality appears to me too complex to attempt to simplify in this way. Even
if sexuality as a historical formation were reducible to the spread of a branch
of religion itself, I cannot identify one specific religion from which I
believe this current dominant belief about sexuality to have stemmed. Each
religion has its own aspects that might serve as contributions to the current
dominant discourse, but I don’t believe there is one that has specifically
popularized all the ideals of the current dominant discourse surrounding
sexuality.
Perhaps, like the social constructionists
and structuralists thought, the popularization of the binary system of gender
and sexuality could be simply what is popularly internalized. If what society
reproduces is what we understand and learn to externalize, then it would make a
great deal of sense to assume that the popular discourse was simply one idea of
sexuality reproducing itself. This would therefore explain why a certain
discourse is so popular even in a society as seemingly forward-thinking as the
current one. But that still does not explain the emergence of the discourse in
the first place. This opinion surrounding sexuality had to have stemmed from
somewhere, and the structuralist perspective does not provide an answer for
this question.
It is tempting to adopt a historical
materialist perspective, and assume that the way the current dominant discourse
on sexuality emerged was a direct result of a certain time in society. It is
tempting to explain that the development of the currently dominant discourse
occurred because of the nineteenth century’s modes of production. I find it
easily believable to assume that certain technologies encouraged certain
developments, and way in which certain historical events occurred explains the
emergence of a certain belief system regarding sexuality. But somehow this
explanation doesn’t appear complete either.
I believe
the reasoning behind the development of the current discourse on sexuality takes
a small piece from each of these schools of thought. I find it important to
examine the emergence of this discourse in the same place Foucault chose to
highlight: the nineteenth century. With the emergence of the Protestant ethic
and bourgeoisie capitalism, came several dominant discourses, not just the
discourse surrounding sexuality. Circumstances surrounding travel, development
of technologies, and the spread of art and literature caused it to become
easier than it had ever been for one specific discourse to spread itself among
vast distances. I believe this directly explains what happened with sexuality.
A binary system of gender is clearly not a natural occurrence; if that were
true there would be no proof of systems that fall outside this binary. And yet,
there are many. But, because this system of gender and sexuality emerged as the
ideal in the right place at the right time, it was able to spread quickly and
effectively.
This binary
system of gender is clearly socially reproduced. Where it is reproduced it is certainly
internalized, and then as a result, externalized—put back into society. Though this
internalization and externalization do not identify an origin of the current
discourse surrounding sexuality’s being internalized and externalized, the
importance of including the structuralist perspective in explanation of the
spread of sexuality is to more successfully explain how the continued
reproduction of the dominant discourses surrounding sexuality has been
accomplished.
CONCLUSION
Sexuality has been studied throughout
history, but during the nineteenth century the discourse surrounding sexuality
underwent a significant transformation. Regarding the first official uses of
the term “homosexuality”, the difficulty in defining the terms “gender” and
“sex”, and Foucault observation of the power structures imminent in sexuality,
it is easy, I believe to realize the irrationality of our current binary system
of sex and gender. Even though there is a significant population that still
believes in the fundamental “unnatural” state of any sexualities that fall
outside this binary, I believe it much easier to disregard these beliefs and
understand sexuality as fluid. Cultural adaptations of sex should be left out
of the current Western perspective, and it should not be considered anyone’s
responsibility to “correct” sex or gender. As a society, we should select the
discourse centered on acceptance, and push that into the forefront. With the
acceptance of this discourse, perhaps we as a society can give up the
irrationality of a binary system once and for all.
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