This Sex Which Is Not One

This is Irigaray's best known book. Although at times her linguistic approach is difficult (namely when she discusses Lacan), I found these essays & interviews fascinating and meaningful. Essentially she presents a critique of Freud's conclusions on feminine sexuality; in his view, women exist only in relation to men; pretty much to provide pleasure and birth (hopefully male) babies. Irigaray describes how this notion came to be--not because women are intrinsically passive and masochistic, but because historical, linguistic, and social conditions construct this situation. She asks how women can be defined/seen/thought of just as women, not because of sexual capabilities. How can phallogocentric structures of language and commerce (basically our whole worldview) be revised or destroyed to allow women to exist without being objectified and commodified? It is unclear how optimisitc Irigaray is about this possibility, but her questioning has proved significant for many fields of study. In my opinion chapter 4, The Power of Discourse and the Subordination of the Feminine, is the most succinct summary of her main ideas.

I disagree with the previous review, although I agree that this is an excellent book. Personally, I was glad to have studied Irigaray under the tutelage of an excellent professor, otherwise I would have, and I think many readers could, misread her drastically. Irigaray is simply not a clear and easy writer. Simply put, Irigaray's writing falls under the category of "difference feminism", rather than egalitarian feminism, like most of the liberal feminists we, particularly in North America, are used to. Instead of trying to subsume male and female experience under the same account, Irigaray plays up the differences between the embodied experiences of men and women-- she is not an essentialist, it is more that she doesn't attempt to separate gender from sex in lived experience. Her work is provocative-- some find it sexy, some off-putting. She attempts, for example, to redefine the ways males and females experience their sexuality, by challenging the central position of the phallus as an organ of domination. Her psychoanalytic language can be difficult to get through if you aren't, as I'm not, well-versed in that particular method.

A must read for those interested in Femenist Theory. Travelling across Freudian and Lacanian perspectives, this book seriously explains, with accesible language, the female sexuality. It simply expresses very difficult theories, and guides the reader with accesible terminology from the outset. In my opinion, after reading this text, one can be said to be fluent in femenist issues. I also think it is an extraordinary and seamless translation.