Changes in Gender Studies Today?
• Weston, Real Time. Preface, chaps. 1, 2, 3
• Due: Summary paper #3 (Weston)
Why does Weston use the idea of "Starship Gender"? What sort of "time machine" is this book?
Some of the key concepts are "time claims" and "a zero concept of gender." What do terms like this make you think about? Why is she using them? Zero1, Zero2, Zero3, Zero4,
What do we do when we encounter unfamiliar knowledge? How do we cultivate curiosity rather than be intimidated?
What resources do we bring to understanding feminist conversations we suddenly find ourselves in the middle of?
And what about the cover? Who is this artist? Why does her work, and this image in particular, add to the intellectual issues Weston raises?
Why UNSEXED? p25
- 0 = meta-sign: a sign about signs, a sign for absence of other signs p39
- call of the third? binary => multiples p41
- zero origins of ordering p48
- global enumeration's specific sites p54
Called OUT of Classification p57
- butch/femme denaturalizations? p74
- are you in control of your gender performance? p76
- interval between as one determinism loosens before another takes hold? p83
- zeroing effects forever passing from the scene p89
15 comments:
In “Gender in Real Time”, Weston parallels history and discovery within mathematics and space-time theory to gender and queer-theory. This parallel allows the reader to see how temporal human bodies, sexualities, and genders are in the grand scheme of things, and how becoming “un-gendered”, or “zeroing” ones gender might allow us to transcend the roles and labels of what will be considered the past. This book itself severs as a time machine that travels through the present state of gender as it is dictated by the past. By using this “time machine”, one is led to understand that in the context of time and space, there has not been very much progress in the feminist view of class, gender, race, et cetera. While this is easily said in the theories of intersectionality, Weston complicates the issue by bringing it into a space-time context. This background forces the reader to search the past and the present, and to try to look at the future. This style of writing acts as a social critique of activists, who have allowed context to slip away.
As a student, I found this concept difficult to deconstruct, especially trudging through Weston’s academic language. Her background of social science and economy is very apparent, and it is clear that she is a skilled researcher. I was not very familiar with this background and style within my experience in Gender Studies, and so had a bit of trouble understanding the key concepts the first few times I read through them. My experience has been more relatable and tangible, rather than theoretical. However, the idea of “a zero concept of gender” really struck me. The “zero”, while it represents nothingness, also represents an endless possibility of things. If one chooses to zero their gender, they are not just androgynous, or “nothing”, they are without a gender at all. Any indication of gender could be utilized by this person, without meaning. For example, wearing make-up, walking a certain way, hairstyle- all of these things can be de-gendered by zeroing that concept of “male” versus “female”. To process this unfamiliar idea, I tried to shed my preconceptions and opinions, and read into what Weston was writing, to try to find a way to relate and feel comfortable and curious.
“How to Read”:
Background- Weston has written multiple books on gender theory and sexuality, and uses her background in social science theory, politics, and economics, in order to reinforce her gender theory concepts.
Diction- Kath Weston uses highly academic language. The structure of the writing makes it a dense read that is at first pretty hard to follow. This is largely in part due to her background as a student, researcher, and writer.
Violated Assumptions:
The main science that gender relates to is biology.
All activism needs to be direct and social only.
I would never be interested in or need math and science.
Topics to Discuss in Class:
-the importance of studying theory
-how to apply complex theory
-the concept of “zero”
-historical perspective on gender (Egyptian, Greek, Roman, et cetera)
Summary:
Kath Weston argues that there is a problem with the study of gender and that it is becoming weak. The problem is that time is taking its toll. Weston introduces new ideas that will lead the field of gender studies into a new bright future. She argues that publications on gender are flourishing yet there is a certain weakening in the study of gender. “To study gender relations today is to work in the shadow of paradox.” Activism and insight in gender studies is almost becoming nonexistent and that is a very big problem. She emphasizes that time is a big issue in the study of gender. Weston introduces three paradoxes that contribute to the intellectual weakening of gender discussions. All these paradoxes intertwine with each other and are related to the problems with time. “Time travels through the study of gender.” Her main goal is help get gender moving again in to a more productive path. In the first couple of chapters she introduces the concept of unsexed and “zero gender”
Biography of Kath Weston:
She is a Director of Studies for the Committee on Degrees in Women Studies. She has been researching the surveillance practices and what it means to live poor in a rich country. She also researched political economy; “intersections” of gender with race, class, and other aspects of identity.
Mood of the book:
The mood of this book is passionate about making gender studies better.
Words and sentences:
-She makes a lot of references to other writers and their stance on the issue. (how are argument is made)
-She uses questions to get the point across.
- There are a lot of words that are in quotation marks.
Person:
She writes in the first person to get her message across (page 3)
Things to discuss in class:
-How did gender studies become what is today?
- Is the problem the reason why we aren’t getting far?
- The idea of “zero gender” (clarify)
-Gender policing.
Violated Assumptions:
- How can a person become unsexed?
- Isn’t the publication on gender a ways of activism, spreading the knowledge?
The book “Gender in Real Time” by Kath Weston describes gender theory and how it has changed over time throughout different movements. The first chapter of this book discusses the three paradoxes that Weston believes led to the gender movement losing “steam.” The first paradox describes the problem in how individuals today can see the change that has occurred with gender and can easily point out problems of the past but can not see problems of today. Due to this notion that we have done all we can do activists look to third world oppression to help redefine gender there, but forget to look at the institutions in place around them. The second paradox involves the relationship with time and space and the idea of when change is going to occur and be done. Weston suggests we look at history and see who has been affected and look on a more personal level. The third paradox is defining what gender studies need to accomplish. Some believe equal representation is the ultimate goal while others view the ability to survive to be a better target. The second chapter describes consequences such as violence that comes with being gendered, and more often unidentifiable. In many cases unisex does not work and that person becomes marked like a zero with no value and without purpose or a place. The third chapter states that gendered appearance is not natural and gender is a performance. Performance can be seen in lesbians who feel pressure to conform to a “butch” or “femme” role. Weston describes this especially in the 1980s ad 1990s. Events such as prom can become stages for full out productions of gendered performance through the clothing, language, and posture exhibited. Often the performance individuals put on is judged by someone such as an employer. In the fourth chapter Weston suggests we look back to understand the now. To be able to understand gender today one must look at gender in terms of race, class, culture, sexuality, and nation of the past and present. Through this one can see the progress of time and how gender itself has evolved. The fifth chapter describes gender as always changing and suggests one look at their life and how it affects others. Weston states that the US has a history of promoting change and gender “progress” in other areas of the world but has not done much to change its gendered systems of power. She calls for action and challenges the reader to get involved and connect the dots between different movements and events happening around them.
I found this book to be very interesting in describe how movements change over time and the purpose of their evolution. The most interesting part of the book was the fourth chapter to me. I found the authors analogy with the amoeba to be very mind provoking. The author states that due to the fact that the amoeba is perfects adapt to its environment how can we say we are more evolved or advanced than it. The author challenges Darwin’s idea of survival of the fittest and redefines it because the individual that survives is not always better. Weston approaches the issues surrounding gender analytically, but her tone lets the reader know she is challenging them to make a difference.
Topics to discuss:
1)How can being gendered work in your favor? Can being unisex work in your favor?
2)What do you think needs to happen for gender studies to regain steam? Is it possible or necessary?
3)Is it appropriate for feminist of the US to travel to third world countries and promote gender equality or should women of that culture learn to demand it for themselves?
Violated Assumptions:
1)Lesbians do not struggle with gender identity within their subculture.
2)What I individually do has very limited affects on gender studies.
3)Lesbians do not feel the need to perform.
SUMMARY:
“Gender in Real Time” is a highly conceptual book about gender studies. Author Kath Weston utilizes numerous concepts in order to present gender studies in a completely new way. This new form of gender study moves away from the visual and attempts to (re)introduce the temporal. Weston herself explains this as the book’s objective, prefacing, “History may enter by way of background, but seeing remains the privileged metaphor for what the analyst of gender knows”(xi). In order to accomplish this objective, Weston uses a wide array of concepts, referencing everything from mathematics to Darwinism.
The book consists of five chapters, one of which is deemed introductory. Unlike some books, in this book the introduction “What the Cat Dragged In” introduces ideas that are critical to the main argument. The introduction familiarizes the reader with various paradoxes in gender studies, as well as the very central “space-time” concept. The second chapter, “Unsexed” discusses the concept of ambiguity in the United States in the late twentieth century, both in an academic arena as well as in social ones. The chapter also devotes significant attention to Mathematics in Arabic history, specifically the development of zero. Zero is explained as a way to reconceptualize gender as something other than a continuum or hierarchy. The third chapter entitled “Do Clothes Make the Woman” discusses gender in North America during the 80’s. The focus of the chapter is on gender performance, making the critical point that gendering all social relations, rather than just male-female relations, does not free gender study from its visual preoccupation. Furthermore, the chapter explains the industrial investment that exists in genderizing. The fourth chapter, “The Ghosts of Gender Past” addresses the historical memory of gender. Through personal stories, larger historical stories, photographs, monuments, and other similar sources, the chapter attempts to present historical memory, both what it remembers and what is has forgotten. Critical to this chapter is the idea that historical memory is selective and often inaccurate, and therefore often misrepresents gender history. Lastly, the fifth chapter, “The Global Economy Next Time” relates the ideas of change and the global economy. The chapter warns against the façade of progress that the global economy depends on to thrive. In this warning the chapter ultimately works as a call to action for groups working on gender issues, advising them to question globalization and all social constructs for that matter.
HOW TO READ EXERCISES:
-Biographical Information-
Kath Weston is considered a sociocultural anthropologist. She is also a member of the National Writers Union and the director of the committee on “Degrees in Women’s Studies.” Some of her other works include, “Families We Choose,” “Render Me, Gender Me,” and “Long Slow Burn.” Weston’s most recent research has focused on poverty in countries of wealth, however, some of her previous research has addressed political economy, intersections of race, class, and gender, temporality, sexuality, and social sciences
-Form-
The book most closely fits the form of an essay. The book has an overarching argument regarding gender studies, and provides different sources of evidence in each chapter. However, because of the diverse sources used, it is hard to classify the actual genre of this book. The book covers cultural, sociological, philosophical, and mathematical subjects, just to name a few. Thus, while the book takes on a loose form, it does not seem to belong to a distinct or classifiable genre.
Discussion Topics:
-How does Weston’s complicated writing affect her reader?
-Do Weston’s diverse sources enrich her argument or confuse it?
-Weston discusses the bathroom, what are some other examples of highly gendered
spaces?
-Do you consider the term “unsexed” a future goal or a theoretical concept?
-Does industry dictate gender or gender dictate industry?
VIOLATED ASSUMPTIONS:
1.The creation of gender choices other than male and female marked a step towards
gender liberation.
2.Gendered bathrooms are necessary.
3. Fighting for women’s rights in third world countries is self-less and an admirable
cause.
SUMMARY PART I
Gender in Real Time
By: Kath Weston
Kath Weston provides a deep analysis of gender movement measured through time and space. There are formulas that Weston provides for this gender movement in mathematical equations. Weston states, that where there is space there is time and temporal aspects can go unexplored if gender is limited in focusing strictly on vision and space. Starship Gender is an anthropological study of gender through time.
Weston provides an analysis of past and present improvements for women but explores the skepticism of what truly has progressed for women and gender studies throughout time; she believes time is the liberation paradox. All the efforts made by women through time to improve the lives of other women globally have not sufficed to end the suffering of women globally; therefore, liberation has not occurred for all women but for others it has been liberating in a different context.
A zero concept of gender is when zero represents an absence but later it may be occupied making this relational to time and also to absence of gender. According to Weston gender theory requires presence, temporal sequence and position of absence and zero is ambiguity. Zero is the corner stone of where gender actually begins from absence to present thus taking you on a gender time travel.
PART II
FOCUSED EXERCISE
I focused on the time travel through the history of the various social movements specified by Weston.
The form of the text was mathematically complex, confusing elaborations of terminology.
LIST OF TOPICS
1) Has time liberated some women in a capitalist society?
2) How to use the tools given by Weston to analyze gender studies
VIOLATED ASSUMTION
Time equates to progress for women
Gender does not have a mathematical beginning
Liberation is the same for all women
Economics is not essential to liberation
Gender in Real Time
Summary
Perceptions of gender are often based on what people see and we are socialized to believe what constitutes femininity and masculinity, but Weston’s book Gender in Real Time examines the perceptions of how the body is viewed in society and attempts to explore different method for how we approach gender studies. The idea of time and how it relates to gender is critical to Weston’s arguments in which she explains that “unsexed is what you become in a moment of doubt before reclassification” and it is this short but very critical “spaced time” that a person can be without gender. In the chapter two of Weston’s book she gives a story of a passport officer checking the passport of a Japanese woman and emphasizes the officer’s dependence on physical characteristics to determine the gender of this woman. In this instance for a short, but important period of time it is this time span that Weston focuses her argument. She explains that people have a tendency to want to classify either by race, class or gender and often when encountering things we cannot classify it tends to interrupt our thought process of what is perceived as normal. By the application of mathematics, physics, and Darwinism in evolution Weston integrates these ideas into an analysis of what is called “zero gender”.
Violated Assumptions
• When looking at the cover of the book before even reading it, I really didn’t know what to expect. I figured it would be about theories presented about gender studies throughout history, but it also seemed to capture my attention in which the style it was written. I felt like I was actually about to embark on a journey through time.
• Another assumption that the book would be very cut and dry as far as stating its theories about gender and problems in gender studies , the book actually relates it to situations that many people encounter daily. For example the Japanese woman and the passport officer/ or the cashier and the women in line buying groceries.
How to Read: analysis
•In the book Weston states “ nothing like gender really exists at least until performance makes it so, performing gender over and over creates an illusion that gender is somehow basic to the person I know myself to be”. I agree with her statement in that gender is something that is socially constructed; it is something that many of us have been socialized to believe, and I feel that often we use the terms gender and sex interchangeably when really they are two separate things.
•There is also this emphasis on “performance” in which masculinity and femininity is something that is repeatedly perform and as a result of these repetitive performances people perceive these behaviors fundamental to perceptions of masculinity and femininity.
Topics to Discuss
• Idea of being “Unsexed”
• Gender being “racialized”
• Idea of “Spaced time”
• Zero Gender
• Gender Benders
Molly Jang
WMST 300
Summary # 3 “Gender in Real Time” by Kath Weston
The book “Gender in Real Time” talks about how gender has changed over the years. Weston who is a profound researcher has mentioned that time is the one problem that gender has struggled with. From the 80’s to the 90’s, time was always precious. It was from the 80’s until now that gender studies have been fixated on the visual personification. In her book, she quotes, “In overturning the 'politics of silence' the goal cannot be merely to be seen: visibility in and of itself does not erase a history of silence nor does it challenge the structure of power and domination, symbolic and material, that determines what can...”. Weston focuses on seeking gender studies into the future by relating gender to Darwinism, the history of mathematics, the political economy and some physics.
One aspect of gender that Weston focuses on is performance. How lesbians are judged to be “butch” or act lady-like. Judgment is seen all around through the outward appearance or intellectually. Today gender needs to be seen through the lens of the social class, racially and sexuality. Furthermore, the history of gender has always been hidden and out of the light. Looking at photographs, monuments, historical data, gender has been seen and forgotten. Gender history is frequently misled because history is always forgotten and unstable.
Weston comes up with the zero concept of gender which basically says that a person has no value or place. A person can be classified within a short period of time. She links “time and space” together and reveals that in a short period of time, a classification can be made. Today, Weston encourages globalization to more apparent through connections and teaching one another about gender. She mentions that groups promoting gender issues need to criticize globalization and bring it into a whole new light.
How to Read
About the Author
-Kath Weston is a sociocultural anthropologist. She serves as the Director of the Committee on Degrees in Women Studies. She is famous for various books such as Render Me, Gender Me, Long Slow Burn, and her newest release Gender in Real Time. Weston is a profound researcher in which she studies gender, the political economy, race, class, and many aspects of identity.
Form of text-
Weston writes as to promote gender studies. Her writing is very strong and aggressive encouraging people to speak out on gender and make it known. She tells groups that promote gender studies to question globalization and make connections within one another. She brings out gender historically and links it to theories of time and space.
Topics
-How have you experienced gender as to who you are today?
-Do you see everyday gender discrimination?
-zero concept of Gender
-Weston’s style of writing
Violated Assumptions
-How gender can be connected towards the political economy, Darwinism, and mathematics
-Performance is vital in judgment
-As time passes, gender studies is brought to light
Part I: Summary
Gender studies has emphasized the visual, rather than historical, implications of gender. The preface argues that it is time to explore gender more deeply, as it is rooted in historical contexts. In order to develop a critical analysis of gender, it argues, we first need to put gender into a historical context of power and commodity. Chapter 1 goes on to define three paradoxes of gender study. The first paradox is that gender liberation is simultaneously achieved and denied. Secondly, “gender theory exalts the visual at the expense of the temporal” (page 2). That is, gender theory excels at understanding visual aspects of gender but this costs the price of understanding gender within a context of time. Finally, the third paradox of gender study is that it pits survival against representation.
Weston goes on to give anecdotal evidence of the “unsexing” of individuals. Weston explains that in liminal spaces (between when an individual is able to visualize another and when s/he pinpoints his or her sex), that individual may temporarily be “unsexed.” According to these authors, we then go on to reclassify individuals into either the male or female sex, because we cannot view someone as genderless or sexless.
Part II: How to Read
I did some background research on the author, Kath Weston, to get a better understanding of where her perspective on gender studies is coming from. She is a sociocultural anthropologist, and is the Director of Studies for the Committee on Degrees in Women’s Studies at Harvard University. Her anthropology background leads me to believe that she has a solid understanding of gender as it has shifted meanings throughout cultures, times, and spaces. Weston researches the intersection of gender with other aspects of identity.
Part III: Topics to Discuss
1. What does it mean for equality to proclaim itself vanquished even as it demands to be sustained? (3)
2. What feels like inequality, and to whom? (4) Is inequality subjective? Do people who are privileged believe that we have achieved social equality?
3. Why not value some of the ways that gender can come together with race, class, religion, nation, and other aspects of latter day identity to give texture to everyday encounters? (4) How is gender positive? Who does it work for? Who does it work against?
4. The author looks at gender “not as a thing to be understood, …but as a product of social relations imbued with time” (xi). Gender as a product sounds different to me than gender as performance, but this quote still makes me look back at Judith Butler’s work. It seems like a stronger articulation of gender. Performance can have the connotation of being unconstrained, but defining gender as a product implies that it is created by cultural influences throughout time and space.
This book very explicitly places the evolution of gender on a historical continuum across time and place. This spherical analysis of gender was comprised of the various ways in which it’s performance is executed, ways in which it is viewed and also the maintenance that has gone into such representations. The specific portions that we read first brought the reader through a triad of gender paradoxes that have taken gender fluidity and progression on a somewhat circular path. This concept was an ideal segway into the discussion of the following chapters as it provided somewhat of a lexicon for us to examine the further topics that we were to uncover.
The first paradox focuses on the façade of liberation, which Weston claims has been, “simultaneously achieved and denied” due to gender maintenance evolving with the era of liberation. Gender rigidity had not gone away, it had only, under the pressure of new movements, adapted itself into a more covert and possibly more powerfully engrained concept of traditional gender performance. The transformation that expressed gender norms underwent may have resulted in what is a more evasive and potentially more dangerous climate of gender enforcement. Now, the argument for “true” gender liberation must evolve itself in stride with operational gender enforcement because justification of the problem has become even more abstract with the evidence being less tangible.
The next paradox she explores is the something Weston refers to as the, “paradox of spacetime, in which gender theory exalts the visual at the expense of the temporal.” (Weston 2002) She goes into a rather in-depth explanation of this concept discussing the inefficiency of discussing gender in the context of solely space or solely time. Her theory elaborates on this spacetime idea as something that is indispensable to the analysis of gender across time because the space and time we are speaking of are always coexistent. This tactic Weston describes is necessary for her to examine particular places while also engaging the visions discussed by other gender theorists. (Weston 2002)
The third and final paradox is one that Weston says, “pits survival against representation.” with regards to gender performance versus gender discrimination. This section discusses the differing expressions of gender as means to survival while at the same time these expressions cue a specific treatment by society. This creates a paradox in that the analyst must address these circumstances from both angles simultaneously rather than as if they were of separate entities.
Weston’s next chapter begins by referencing ways in which gender is policed in society and who has the authority to do so. With this introduction, she goes on to say that ambiguity claimed in any initial moment is quickly repositioned between the lines of gender normality. Weston refers metaphorically to this process as a breaching of borders in which we are the border patrol so to speak. The temporary ambiguity that Weston talks about here is what she terms a moment of being unsexed.
She then goes on with the issue of relativity in regarding gender performance as well as gender ambiguity. One’s object may be distinguished quite clearly by an individual yet in another space and through another’s eyes this same being may be distinguished as something of an entirely separate nature. Weston goes on to ask the questions of why these observations compel any particular response especially the intention to deconstruct and violate these ambiguous representations. These insights bring to light the practice of people wanting to clearly define what it is they are not. Time is least wasted on the “what I am” and targeted directly at who “we” are not to be associated with, thus depicting the gravity of identity politics. The construction of identity politics then leads us into the territory of needing to identify to be included but then essentially commodified by the pulsating spread of globalization.
The next topic of lengthy discussion was the concept of zero and unsexed representing two similar roots of their respective subjects. The position of zero in mathematics, as with the term “unsexed” in gender studies, distinguish the basis for which all their various entities are referenced to. Zero and “unsexed” are essentially home base for their respective subjects and specifically to gender all other variations are of a specific construction off the base- a creation relative to time and place.
This second chapter concludes with a definitive journey through the development of identity terms as off-shoots of the binary originally established. Various labels are explored in this section as chronologically with there appearance in social identity. In my personal interpretation, this part engaged the image of a rolling ball set in motion with a binary and every distinction that we make off that binary is only a by-product of this dichotomous construction. There will not be gender liberation if it is to be founded in reference to this rolling binary as this freedom would be polluted in its foundations.
The final chapter dealt with the concept of gender performance as a construct rather than how it is sometimes perceived being a natural expression of inner associations. This concept is rooted in how we relate to one another and how we categorize ourselves in contrast and comparison. The majority of this chapter is approached in the context of a Prom Nite dance in that this framework is an epitome of gender relations especially with regards to how different expressions promote different performance. An individual expressing a particular gender norm then is empowered by its symbolism making the performance of it all the more possible and convincing. In this section an examination of butch/femme relations was a pillar for analysis.
Despite the difficulty of this piece, I greatly enjoyed Weston’s concepts. Her analytical style is very complex and manages to tackle each gender topic from all of it’s various angles. This thorough style was evident in all three chapters as substantiation was consistently overstated. Along with this depth Weston’s topic transitions were very smooth as each conclusion lead to a comparable introduction. With as much as she has already covered in these first chapters it will be interesting to see where else she goes in the concluding chapters.
Violated Assumptions
1. The author spoke of the false liberation that has been experienced in the post civil rights era and it seems as though she finds very little merit in what changes have been made. To some extent I agree that things are not that much better as gender enforcement has only evolved in order to stay politically correct, but I had and still do think there is some value in the “strides” that have been made in the wake of the liberation movement of the 70s and 80s.
2. I was surprised to see Weston use the construct of the butch/femme relationship as it is a clear manifestation of the traditional gender binary. Granted, it acknowledges gender performance other than that assigned by our sexual being however the context is still based on the original dichotomy.
3. I had never conceptualized using mathematics to understand the study of gender.
How to Read Exercises
1. One thing that I paid specific attention to was Weston’s emphasis on time and the transition of gender across moments, seconds, years, etc. I believe this understanding of time and space in a state of constant evolution was pivotal to her theory.
2. Weston discusses several concepts that are the foundations of her work and I found it useful to take note when she explicitly explained these tools rather than analyzing her various metaphors.
Gender in Real Time: Power and Transience in a Visual Age
Summary
Kath Weston explores the impact of time on gender creation. Weston feels as if gender studies are becoming stale because they are missing a key variable – time. She develops this concept of the “unsexed”, where one literally has no sex or gender. It is a fleeting moment created from doubt before reclassification. She applies her ideas to performance theory to discuss the significance of how gender presentations shift over time. She grapples with modernity and memory to bring us to the present and the impact of our global economy on the formation of gender. Weston’s writing is pleasurable and interspersed with vignettes of old to demonstrate her points and capture attention. The book is not only innovative but a wonderful read.
Insights
• Kath Weston has a significantly larger vocabulary than I. By circling and highlighting words that I was not familiar with I was able to increase my vocabulary. Examples include “ontological”, “interpellated”, “timbre”, “chinos”, and lesbian categories like “bulldaggers”.
• The artwork for the cover is by Remedios Varo. Varo was a Spanish-Mexican surrealist painter who died in 1963 from a heart attack. She was interested in the creation of self-knowledge and the transformation of consciousness. The significance of using her artwork for the cover could be for several reasons. She was forced to move due to the politics around her multiple times making her certainly a product of her time and lending credence to Weston’s argument concerning the importance of the temporal. Furthermore, her enigmatic work, as displayed on the cover, brings to mind that of a spiritual journey; a journey that is necessary for all of us to undergo to really reconceptualize gender and the fundamental concepts discussed by Weston.
Discussion Questions
• Why does no one ever assume that you’re bisexual? Bisexuals are constantly outing themselves.
• What really is the difference between the zero concept and the nothing of performance theory? How can we identify these differences in out own lives?
• Weston mentions various categories or labels that are applied to lesbians. Do these descriptions enhance or demean her argument regarding performance theory?
• How would differentiate between using same-sex marriage and gay marriage?
• Do you think you could present yourself as the opposite gender in a binary system? What would it take for you to be able to do so?
Violated Assumptions
• Why is it that “gay” is the term used to encompass both sets of same-sex couples and used to identify males ones specifically? Does this usage not follow from “men” including both males specifically and all human beings? Is this not part of the patriarchal system? Shouldn’t the queer community be more actively working to come up with better alternatives? The assumption here is that a progressive community would be more cognizant of their diction.
Summary
The book "Gender in Real Time," by Kath Weston is five chapters and has 142 pages of text. Each chapter begins with a quote, which sets the tone of the chapter. The book underlining topic thus far is how feminism may be stuck in a rut, which I believe is what the diction “Zero” is being used for. This book is deeply rooted in concepts and feminist theories. The book also frequently asks you to put yourself in the event that is being discussed in order to personalize it which can change the perception and the interpretation of what is being discussed. The first chapter is, “What the Cat Dragged In: Gender Studies Today—An Elegy and Introduction.” It discusses the amount of writings about masculinity/femininity, raced/gendered bodies, and other feminist concepts. It discusses how the vision of gender equality has evolved over the past three decades. Also talks about conceptual problems with feminism such as improvement, liberation, and advancement, which definitions have evolved. The second chapter, “Unsexed: A Zero Concept for Gender Studies,” begins by telling a story with an artistic ending then the actual ending. It also discusses how lack of history and documentation of a groups’ history can cause invisibility, especially on the subject of violence towards or within a marginalized group. The third chapter, “Do Clothes Make the Woman?: Performing In and Out of Industrial Time” focuses on the “process of gender’s meaningful creation.” (Weston, 57). It further discusses what encompasses gender, from physical attributes to learned behaviors. It reinforces the notion that gender is learned through constant repetition behavior that is deemed either male or female, and is not biological.
Parts 2 & 3
About the Publisher: The publisher is Routledge and this is second book that we have read in this class that focuses on feminist/gender studies that has been published by them. This publishing company seems progressive and not afraid to publish books that may be controversial in nature. Also this book is available on every major online bookstore, demonstrating its availability to the masses. The book is also categorized under several topics including social science, gender identity, and feminist theory, which further demonstrates the intersectionality of the topic being discussed.
About the Author: Kath Weston is a sociocultural anthropologist . She has numerous books out on gender studies including Families We Choose, Render Me, Gender Me, and Long Slow Burn. All these books seem to have gotten praise as innovative because they demonstrate a cultural change in relationships such as kinship, race, gender and sexual identity. The numerous articles found during my research repeatedly state that she discuss the intersection of history, the social meaning and the politics in her work, which can be difficult to adequately express.
Topics to Discuss:
• Is feminism really stuck in a rut and not sure which direction to progress towards?
• Concept of zero gender and ungendered
• The jargon created to discuss concepts, does it make the book elitist?
Violated Assumptions:
• I assumed that unless the book was centered around prisoners, that quotes from people in jail would not be included in an academic book.
• I assumed that this book would focus on the lgbt community because the rest of the books have been centered on this topic in class.
• I also didn’t expect there to be stories or events to be retold though the writer, because usually women studies uses collective anthologies.
Kath Weston’s Gender in Real Time takes a look into where we have come from with gender studies and a glimpse into where we are going and where we need to go. There are five different chapters in the book and each has a specific purpose to Weston’s argument. In the first chapter, she discusses the three paradoxes that “shadow contemporary discussions of gender...” (1,2) The first is the paradox of liberation achieved and denied simultaneously. The second described the paradox of spacetime, where theory exalts the visual at the expense of the temporal.” (2) The third paradox describes where gender studies needs to go and puts survival against representation. These three paradoxes incorporate problematic assumptions.
The second chapter discusses the concept of being gendered and what it means to not fit into the categories brought on by society. Weston explains the violence that can come from being unidentifiable; people reject what they do not understand. People, in this case, are then judged by the society and become a zero, or a person with no value.
In Gender in Real Time, the third chapter introduces this idea of a performance and that people who are a certain gender are actually performing. Gender is looked at as a performance and not necessarily something that it a natural reaction, causing confusion for people who feel the need to perform a specific role.
The next two chapters look back into the past to show an idea of where we have been and where society needs to move to in the future. Weston’s book opens the lines up to many different ideas and ways to look at gender and the gender movement and calls to action those who can help it move further in the future.
Topics to discuss:
1) the zero concept
2) Gender as a performance. Is it?
3) The paradoxes and how they work
4) How does the difficulty of the read intrigue or deter readers?
How to Read
About the Author
Kath Weston is considered to be a sociocultural anthropologist. She is the author of a number of books including Render me, Gender me and Long Slow Burn. She also serves as Director of Studies for the Committee on Degrees in Women’s Studies. Her studies focus on "intersections" of gender with race, class, and other aspects of identity, sexuality, and science metaphors in the social sciences, just to name a few.
Violated Assumptions
1) People could be considered to be a zero, or to have no value because of gender
2) I haven’t read anything in any of my other classes dealing with gender that tied it into mathematics
3) Never thought about the gender movement slowing down since it is such a strong focus in many of my classes
Summary
Author Kath Weston explores a whole different perspective of feminist thought and theory in her book, “Gender in Real Time.” Weston takes a historical look at feminist movements to see how time has played a role in the fight for women’s equality. She feels that gender studies has too often only had a “visual orientation” when it should have been looking at time in relation to gender studies. In the preface, Weston explains that she wanted this book to “traverse time” in two different ways. One way she wanted to do this was by “emphasizing the importance of historical legacies and historical moment for understanding gender relations.” The second way that she wanted to traverse time was by “exploring the limitations of the visual emphasis incorporated into performativity theories of gender.” Weston uses different ways of understanding gender studies by using such tools as political economy, the history of mathematics, Darwinian evolution, and some physics. Ultimately, she wants her readers to look at this book as a voyage through time in search of understanding gender studies.
In the first chapter, Weston discusses three paradoxes that she feels all intertwine with each incorporating “problematic assumptions about time.” The first paradox is the paradox of “liberation simultaneously achieved and denied.” She feels that statistically, there have been some improvements for women in society. However, the gender gap between men and women is not closing anytime soon and women are almost giving up on the battle and feeling like they have achieved as much equality as they are going to get. The second paradox is the paradox of “space time, in which gender theory exalts the visual at the expense of the temporal.” In this paradox, she feels like we are constantly talking of social change in terms of when it will take place. For example, feminists have constantly asked when liberation or the abolition of gender would occur. The third paradox is the paradox “that pits survival against representation in an economy with an increasingly global reach.” In this paradox, Weston discusses the efforts to separate what issues our identity or representation causes us to care about. For example, “western feminists” are more concerned with concepts of gender and struggling with academic theory, whereas “African feminists” are struggling just to get an education, to get food and clear water, and to lower the infant-mortality rate. These are the three paradoxes that Weston outlines in the first chapter.
In the second chapter, Weston discusses the idea of being “unsexed” in society where you don’t have to classify yourself by any sexual orientation until you are truly sure what sexuality you identify with. Weston discusses the pressure of society in this chapter in never wanting to have to second-guess about a person’s gender or sexuality. If you are a lesbian, society wants you to have the typical short haircut with masculine-looking clothes and boots on. If you are straight, society wants you to be the blue-eyed blonde that dresses in a very feminine fashion. In other words, society does not want to have to deal with any ambiguities in deciding a person’s sexuality. Weston discusses the many sociological studies that have been done to understand how individuals learn to categorize others as “women” or “men.” In an “unsexed” society, no one would wonder or question your sexuality.
In the third chapter, Weston discusses a new theory that arose in the late 20th century about the process of gender’s meaningful creation. She discusses the “performance theory” in how people come to perceive gender as “a collection of recognizable attributes or traits, individually possessed.” Weston writes about culturally gendered cues, such as eyeliner, thick-soled boots, or hands on hips, that people associate with a certain gender or sexuality. She also writes about a “Prom Nite” dance in looking at it as an event that “pumps up” images of gender identification. As I have only yet read the preface and three chapters of this book, I think that Weston’s arguments and perspectives are interesting as I have never before looked at gender in relation to time. However, looking at gender through time can give us much more insight as to what feminists and society as a whole have done wrong in the fight for gender equality as well as what feminists and society can improve on in the future for understanding gender relations.
Violated Assumptions
1. Assumption: The majority of feminists see a genderless world as their ultimate goal.
Kath Weston makes it very clear that she does not feel the ideal of a genderless world should be the ultimate goal of feminists and all people in general. She even questions as to whether or not a genderless world would even be possible. Weston writes that maybe we should start seeing gender as a “resource for play and for pleasure.” She writes that we should value the ways that gender can come together with race, class, and religion to give “texture to everyday encounters.” Weston goes so far as to ask the question, “What is a world without color, dalliance, and difference?” Her suggestion, instead of a genderless world, is to “reconfigure gender relations so that they need not entail hierarchy and oppression.”
2. Assumption: Most women realize the oppression that they face from a patriarchal society, even if they don’t admit to it or actively try to resist it.
Many women actually feel that they are living in a much different, much more liberated society than their mothers and grandmothers. They basically feel that the feminist movement and struggle for women’s equality have both already been fought and won. Weston writes that a typical response from an American young woman about whether or not she feels oppressed would be as follows, “a woman can do anything she wants as long as she tries, women can legally marry women in some state somewhere, and new technologies make women’s lives easier.” Weston begs to differ and says that statistics and evidence disproves these claims that women are much more liberated.
3. Assumption: Feminists promote actively using the different labels of what sex a person may identify with, such as calling yourself lesbian, gay, transgender, or bisexual.
Kath Weston seems to really promote the ideal of being “unsexed” in this book. She says that there are several fleeting moments in people’s lives where they are “unsexed” in not openly classifying what their sexuality is. Weston writes that being unsexed never lasts because “ambiguity resolves back into certainty, doubt into gendered absolutes.” I am still unsure of how exactly we could make this “unsexed” status last permanently. However, it is disappointing that people feel the need to declare what sex they are simply because of society constantly questioning them or making them uncomfortable by wondering what sex they actually are. It seems that each person should have this period of “unsexed” time to figure out what sexuality they actually identify with, as opposed to basically being dictated to by society as to what sexuality is socially acceptable to identify with.
Mehrnoush Karimian
WMST 300
Professor Katie King
SUMMARY PAPER #3
Summary
In Gender in Real Time, author Kath Weston uses concepts of time and space to explore gender and queer theory. Weston looks at gender theory on a time-based context, almost as a “time machine,” depicting what gender theory has developed into throughout history. Weston also describes the three paradoxes that she believes led gender theory to becoming what it is today and the downfalls of it thereof. One of the more interesting concepts that Weston refers to are the concept of becoming unsexed and ungendered, the idea of a “zero concept of gender.” Weston delves into the idea of abolishing the idea of gender, not merely neutralizing any such term, but erasing the notion of gender entirely. Weston uses this book as a “time machine” and explores, through a historical context, where the term gender has come from and based off the fact that it has come from a sociological standpoint, argues that it can, throughout time, come to be “zeroed.” Although her ideas were interesting, I originally found it difficult to read her work, in that I found it to be quite abstract, perhaps because I was not accustomed to gender theory being discussed in the context of space and time. Her style of writing was academic, definitely reflecting her academic background and depicting the amount of research that was put into this work. I found this work to be a bit challenging in the sense that I felt that it was a bit verbose and very theory-based as opposed to being more realistic. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the different vantage point that Weston offered in terms of gender theory, as she posed gender theory in the different context of space and time, which I found to be very interesting.
How to read
· Kath Weston “is a sociocultural anthropologist who serves as Director of Studies for the Committee on Degrees in Women’s Studies” at Harvard University
· Her works include: Families We Choose, Render Me, Gender Me, Long Slow Burn, Gender in Real Times
Topics to discuss/Violated Assumptions
· The idea of “a zero concept of gender” – is such a theory even possible?
· Is gender theory and the concept of gender in and of itself merely a product of socialization throughout history or does it have some sort of practical basis?
· How can we propel Weston’s theories into action? Is such a thing achievable or even practical?
· I had thought about gender being a performance before, in that I feel that it is such a socially constructed concept. However, I was surprised and interested to look at it from a different viewpoint e.g. space, time, mathematics, history, etc.
· I always felt that as time went on, gender movements were becoming increasingly stronger, not weaker; albeit, that is not to say that this work has changed my mind to that fact, but it is something that I now think about.
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