The Theory that Gender is Sustained Through Social Performances

 In an article, Performance Acts and Gender Constitution, Judith Butler discusses how gender is formed through a series of acts that are renewed, revised, and consolidated through time. She mentions Beavoir's claim that woman is a "historical situation" that the body undergoes a cultural construction through conventions that proscribe one's acts or performances. To make these theories easier to comprehend, Butler compares it to theatrical versus reality. I found this comparison helpful when analyzing her text because it was easier for me to understand how her theory fully lays out. According to Butler, in the theatre, one can claim that it is "just an act" or that they are "playing pretend", and by claiming this they separate the act from reality. However, in reality, there are no claims or conventions that delimit the act causing some to be fearful or view the reality dangerous. She gives an example of a transvestite because on a stage, a transvestite is "playing a character' and is not real; people would react to a transvestite normally and casually. If the transvestite was in real life, people would be forced to view the challenges of distinction between appearance and reality, which can be uncomfortable to many. People want to be able to assimilate genders into pre-existing categories, so when assimilation is difficult or unclear, people tend to try to pass it off as female or male. Society is quick to try to pass gender off as a choice, but Butler argues that it is neither a choice nor is it imposed or inscribed upon the individual. 

I mostly agree with Butler's claims, theories, and arguments because it is natural for humans to assimilate something into a category when it is unknown to them. In psychology, we discussed assimilation mostly within in children because when children learn about new topics or objects, they categorize it with something that they already know before they can realize the difference. For example, a child could get a new toy truck and assimilate it with a toy car because they have never seen a truck before. With children it is mostly seen within learning, however, in adults assimilation is partially used in learning and partially because they do not want to accept something for a different category, such as gender. I also agree with her statement that gender attributes and acts are performative because if these acts are performative, then there are no preexisting identities or categories that an act could be measured by or assimilated to. Therefore, gender reality is created through a sustained pattern of social performances.

I believe that this is very accurate in our own community because when people are uncomfortable by someone that does not identify with their assigned sex, they tend to assimilate those people into the female and male categories. They want to describe everything as either masculine or feminine. Gender is a topic and category that was created by society's repetitive behavior of assimilating into only two categories. However, I believe that there are no preexisting identities to measure or compare because society made the categories. The categories never preexisted. Trying to change society's point of view can be very difficult, yet possible in the long run. I believe that we will slowly et to a point when everyone is comfortable, or at least the majority, with eliminating categories or at least expanding the number of categories. People do not perfectly mold into feminine or masculine.