Although I have been seriously slacking, the past few days have seen some hardcore catching up…or at least trying to, which leads me to this post. In the last week, I have read the second half of Jean-Franscois Lyotard’s Just Gaming, Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble, and the first half of an anthology called PoMoSexuals: Challenging Assumptions about Gender and Sexuality, edited by Carol Queen and Lawrence Schimel. And several hundred pages later I am left with far more questions then I found answers, but one inquiry that stands out: Is individual, creative thought even a possibility?
As some of you might know, I have been working on an independent study and several courses geared toward writing my undergraduate thesis. In this process, I have been bombarded with works of gender theory, philosophy of the mind, political philosophy, and almost anything else that could be construed as having to do with the gender binary, hegemony and silencing. Just like any other student with too much on my plate, boys, sorority life and generally anything other than my work seems far more pressing at any given moment than actually being productive.
When I do buckle down and get something done, though, I keep coming up with the same dilemma again and again: Why is it every time I get excited, thinking that I finally figured something out, that I finally have something of note to contribute to the field, I find out someone else already wrote it?
I am not sure if it is because I am but a young student, who is just starting out in academia, or just because everything has been said, but I have been finding it hard to keep up hope that I am going to have anything to say that has not already been said and published by someone far more qualified than myself, in a far more eloquent manner. So, what is there left for us…this newest generation to add?
It’s interesting how so many people have theorized answers to our gender problems, yet they have yet to be solved. There is still homophobia. There is still transphobia. There are still people both straight and gay who will not accept bisexuals, and there are still millions who have been “fixed” at birth because they did not exhibit the “acceptable” and “definite” sexes.
What is it that we’re missing?Well, I guess if I knew, we’d be living in some all-accepting, poly-gendered (or ungendered) utopia by now. I guess all I can offer at this point is encouragement. All those who are trying to figure out societal problems far bigger than themselves, those trying to find their niche and see how they can contribute to this chaotic mess of a world, keep trying. There have to be answers somewhere, and if we stop looking, we’ll never find them. Thank heavens for those who have come before us and read as much as you can, because only by knowing the ideas of the past can we move passed them and be of any additional help.
I know it’s a hard job, but somebody has to do it, right?
