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Reading Notes: Sedgwick, _Epistemology of the Closet_, part 1
I've read this book before, but I need to write an 8-10 page review of this book for a class this weekend, so I am re-reading it and taking notes. My current plan is a summary that contextualizes it with some other work (in particular Fear of a Queer Planet), two pages on the introduction, one page on each of the chapters, and then a conclusion that suggests where it influenced future work and might influence work yet to be done. I think this will work out pretty well, and should land me solidly in 8-10 pages. So these notes may not be terribly useful if you haven't read the book, but I do recommend this book, especially the introduction, which is solidly grounded in real life and the real problems of real people. Also this sort of reading is going to take me ages and I am going to write more than one post.
PREFACE TO 2008 EDITION
Bowers v. Hardwick was beaten down by Lawrence v Texas since the book was written; Sedgwick points out that politics can be instantaneous or can take thousands of years.
"Another aspect of EotC that stands out on reading is its insistent perspectivism. Along wiht the ready use of the first person, this may have been something learned from 1970s feminist writing: that concerning social relation, the questions of Who's speaking, to whom? Who wants to know, and what for? What do these answers do?" (What can a body [of knowledge] do?) If I use anything from the preface in my review, it will probably be this.
Butler's Gender Trouble also never uses the word queer, interesting. I didn't know that (I've still not read the whole thing).
INTRODUCTION
"[This] book will argue that an understanding of virtually any aspect of modern Western culture must be, not merely incomplete, but damaged in its central substance to the degree that it does not incorporate a critical analysis of modern homo/heterosexual definition; and it will assume that the appopriate place for that critical analysis to begin is from the relatively decentered perspective of modern gay and antihomophobic theory." So of course this sentence is amazing and is one of the reasons I love Sedgwick. But re-reading this I should also look for its limitations; for example, why must it be "homo/heterosexual definition," and are there other places to begin. Where's intersectionality?
Minoritizing versus universalizing view of important of homo/heterosexual definition. Same-sex attraction as simultaneously "transitivity between genders" and "Reflecting an impulse of seperatism." These are two core conflicts --- "no epistemological grounding now exists from which to" say if either is right. But want to say that these issues are crucial to "Western culture as a whole."
same-sex bonds act as "a site of intensive regulation that intersects virtually every issue of power and gender"
takes Foucault as axiomatic
What counts as a speech act? Closetedness comes out of silence --- "not a particular silence, but a silence that accrues particularity by fits and starts, in relation to the discourse that surrounds and differentially constitutes it. The speech acts that coming out, in turn, can comprise are as strangely specific."
Page 7 talks about Bowers/Hardwick: "There is a satisfaction in dwelling on the degree to which the power of our enemies over us is implicated, not in their command of knowledge, but precisely in their ignorance." But it's more complicated than that and it's an awful lot like how "they" try to pass of ignorance as "innocence." She says we should try "to pluralize and specify it." (Rhizomes!)
Of all the "very many dimensions along which the genital activity of one person can be differentiated," only gender of object choice is "sexual orientation." She doesn't know why, and doesn't speculate, and is more interested in "its unpredictably varied and acute implications and consequences."
page 10 has a "how to deconstruct!" And also a critique of Barthe's utopian vision of a post-deconstruction sexuality.
page 11 has a ton of binarizations interdependent with hetero/homo.
page 13 --- she talks about her goals in trying to make her work useful even to people who disagree with her, and to make her literature/social history methodology useful more broadly. Limitations continue on page 14.
In review, pages 15-16, tries to take a gay rather than feminist perspective when they diverge because gay perspective is less entrenched. Would that still be the move to make today? What other moves might be available? Does this line up with the death of feminist theory that some author was talking about and I was kind of skeptical about and I think that's in my notes somewhere but I am not sure oh right Freccero?
Feminist response to homosexual panic, in my opinion, on page 19. Not a bad response --- I like it --- but I don't know if it lines up with the statement above. If I can find a few examples along those lines I can draw a pattern and describe it in my paper.
And now, some axioms!
Axiom 1: "People are different from each other."
Here she is discussing nonce-taxonomy, and refers to Proust and James, who she discusses more later. This section is very psychoanalytic until page 25, which is downright approachable, and even in list format. She's very skeptical of authenticity policing and says that if people in a homophobic environment are willing to describe themselves as gay, we should listen to them. (This could be applied outward to all sorts of self-identifications.)
Axiom 2: Sexuality and gender aren't the same, but we can't know in advance where their studies will converge or diverge.
She makes this point later about gay/lesbian as well. (In fact, that's axiom 3.) It's a good point and well-made; this section cites Rubin and has some interesting discussions about construction versus difference feminism. This section has a little bit of race intersectionality but doesn't touch on trans or intersex at all and limits discussion to XY.
Axiom 3: mentioned
Separatism had feminism/lesbianism combination. Stuff on s/m and sex wars means another possible Rubin connection. Page 38 definitely pulls away from traditional feminism into gay/lesbian studies; James Dean as icon for lesbians. She feels her main limitation here is contributing to the eclipse of women's sexuality by men's.
Axiom 4: nature vs/ nurture debates have overfull vbox bogosity 10000
Constructivist versus essentialist views of homosexuality. I think Sedgwick's take here is one of the more important things in her book honestly. These ideas also show up in Fear of a Queer Planet and it is worth comparing her take here to her take there in light of Warner's introduction. I mean, really, there's a page in that at least.
Axiom 5: "The historical search for a Great Paradigm Shift may obscure the present conditions of sexual identity."
She reads Foucault and Halperin here, but I'd actually like to situate her next to Karma Lochrie's Heterosyncracies and ask if there are ways our culture today is heterosyncratic that Lochrie ignores in her (nonetheless valuable) explication of heteronormativity. Lochrie critiques the finding of a monolithic queerness historically; Sedgwick reminds us that we do not have one today, either, and while she doesn't explicitly say this, I believe we can also extrapolate to a non-monolithic heterosexuality.
Axiom 6: "The relation of gay studies to debates on the literary canon is, and had best be, tortuous."
Page 50 on conceptual anonymity is worth mentioning. Dismissals on page 52 --- great list. We had a gay Shakespeare --- his name was Shakespeare.
Also, we should consider queerness intersectionally across minority canons as well.
Axiom 7: "The paths of allo-identification are likely to be strange and recalcitrant. So are the paths of auto-identification."
Sedgwick is a feminist woman writing about gay men. "I don't speak here of anyone's 'right' to think or write about the subjects on which they feel they have a contribution to make: to the degree that rights can be measured at all, I suppose this one can be measured best by what contribution the work does make, and to whom." Compare with admisison of straightness in prologue.
PREFACE TO 2008 EDITION
Bowers v. Hardwick was beaten down by Lawrence v Texas since the book was written; Sedgwick points out that politics can be instantaneous or can take thousands of years.
"Another aspect of EotC that stands out on reading is its insistent perspectivism. Along wiht the ready use of the first person, this may have been something learned from 1970s feminist writing: that concerning social relation, the questions of Who's speaking, to whom? Who wants to know, and what for? What do these answers do?" (What can a body [of knowledge] do?) If I use anything from the preface in my review, it will probably be this.
Butler's Gender Trouble also never uses the word queer, interesting. I didn't know that (I've still not read the whole thing).
INTRODUCTION
"[This] book will argue that an understanding of virtually any aspect of modern Western culture must be, not merely incomplete, but damaged in its central substance to the degree that it does not incorporate a critical analysis of modern homo/heterosexual definition; and it will assume that the appopriate place for that critical analysis to begin is from the relatively decentered perspective of modern gay and antihomophobic theory." So of course this sentence is amazing and is one of the reasons I love Sedgwick. But re-reading this I should also look for its limitations; for example, why must it be "homo/heterosexual definition," and are there other places to begin. Where's intersectionality?
Minoritizing versus universalizing view of important of homo/heterosexual definition. Same-sex attraction as simultaneously "transitivity between genders" and "Reflecting an impulse of seperatism." These are two core conflicts --- "no epistemological grounding now exists from which to" say if either is right. But want to say that these issues are crucial to "Western culture as a whole."
same-sex bonds act as "a site of intensive regulation that intersects virtually every issue of power and gender"
takes Foucault as axiomatic
What counts as a speech act? Closetedness comes out of silence --- "not a particular silence, but a silence that accrues particularity by fits and starts, in relation to the discourse that surrounds and differentially constitutes it. The speech acts that coming out, in turn, can comprise are as strangely specific."
Page 7 talks about Bowers/Hardwick: "There is a satisfaction in dwelling on the degree to which the power of our enemies over us is implicated, not in their command of knowledge, but precisely in their ignorance." But it's more complicated than that and it's an awful lot like how "they" try to pass of ignorance as "innocence." She says we should try "to pluralize and specify it." (Rhizomes!)
Of all the "very many dimensions along which the genital activity of one person can be differentiated," only gender of object choice is "sexual orientation." She doesn't know why, and doesn't speculate, and is more interested in "its unpredictably varied and acute implications and consequences."
page 10 has a "how to deconstruct!" And also a critique of Barthe's utopian vision of a post-deconstruction sexuality.
page 11 has a ton of binarizations interdependent with hetero/homo.
page 13 --- she talks about her goals in trying to make her work useful even to people who disagree with her, and to make her literature/social history methodology useful more broadly. Limitations continue on page 14.
In review, pages 15-16, tries to take a gay rather than feminist perspective when they diverge because gay perspective is less entrenched. Would that still be the move to make today? What other moves might be available? Does this line up with the death of feminist theory that some author was talking about and I was kind of skeptical about and I think that's in my notes somewhere but I am not sure oh right Freccero?
Feminist response to homosexual panic, in my opinion, on page 19. Not a bad response --- I like it --- but I don't know if it lines up with the statement above. If I can find a few examples along those lines I can draw a pattern and describe it in my paper.
And now, some axioms!
Axiom 1: "People are different from each other."
Here she is discussing nonce-taxonomy, and refers to Proust and James, who she discusses more later. This section is very psychoanalytic until page 25, which is downright approachable, and even in list format. She's very skeptical of authenticity policing and says that if people in a homophobic environment are willing to describe themselves as gay, we should listen to them. (This could be applied outward to all sorts of self-identifications.)
Axiom 2: Sexuality and gender aren't the same, but we can't know in advance where their studies will converge or diverge.
She makes this point later about gay/lesbian as well. (In fact, that's axiom 3.) It's a good point and well-made; this section cites Rubin and has some interesting discussions about construction versus difference feminism. This section has a little bit of race intersectionality but doesn't touch on trans or intersex at all and limits discussion to XY.
Axiom 3: mentioned
Separatism had feminism/lesbianism combination. Stuff on s/m and sex wars means another possible Rubin connection. Page 38 definitely pulls away from traditional feminism into gay/lesbian studies; James Dean as icon for lesbians. She feels her main limitation here is contributing to the eclipse of women's sexuality by men's.
Axiom 4: nature vs/ nurture debates have overfull vbox bogosity 10000
Constructivist versus essentialist views of homosexuality. I think Sedgwick's take here is one of the more important things in her book honestly. These ideas also show up in Fear of a Queer Planet and it is worth comparing her take here to her take there in light of Warner's introduction. I mean, really, there's a page in that at least.
Axiom 5: "The historical search for a Great Paradigm Shift may obscure the present conditions of sexual identity."
She reads Foucault and Halperin here, but I'd actually like to situate her next to Karma Lochrie's Heterosyncracies and ask if there are ways our culture today is heterosyncratic that Lochrie ignores in her (nonetheless valuable) explication of heteronormativity. Lochrie critiques the finding of a monolithic queerness historically; Sedgwick reminds us that we do not have one today, either, and while she doesn't explicitly say this, I believe we can also extrapolate to a non-monolithic heterosexuality.
Axiom 6: "The relation of gay studies to debates on the literary canon is, and had best be, tortuous."
Page 50 on conceptual anonymity is worth mentioning. Dismissals on page 52 --- great list. We had a gay Shakespeare --- his name was Shakespeare.
Also, we should consider queerness intersectionally across minority canons as well.
Axiom 7: "The paths of allo-identification are likely to be strange and recalcitrant. So are the paths of auto-identification."
Sedgwick is a feminist woman writing about gay men. "I don't speak here of anyone's 'right' to think or write about the subjects on which they feel they have a contribution to make: to the degree that rights can be measured at all, I suppose this one can be measured best by what contribution the work does make, and to whom." Compare with admisison of straightness in prologue.