This dissertation is a philosophical feminist account of the relationship between subjectivity and oppressive discourse. Feminists have rightly pointed out that philosophical accounts of the universal or neutral subject are untenable, and often hold that sexist, racist, heterosexist and classist speech and practices have negative consequences at the level of subjectivity for women and the other populations who are their objects. Yet, efforts to account for these consequences have been philosophically inadequate in virtue of their problematic ontologies of selfhood, agency and language, as well as their frequently question-begging approaches to proposing political change. Drawing on the philosophical work of Michel Foucault, Judith Butler and John Dewey, I argue that a better feminist account of situated subjectivity would conceive oppressive discourse as particularly entrenched patterns of interaction, which give rise to relationally-constituted meanings whose effects may be variously described as subjective, discursive, material or political. Using examples of contemporary popular political discourse about women political figures in the United States, I argue that the interactional and relational character of the patterns of meaning that are typically understood as simply oppressive of a particular group are in fact constitutive of a constellation of more and less privileged and oppressed subjects, and moreover, that these meanings and subjects are concomitantly shaped by their particular geo-political situations. Given this pragmatic and post-structuralist account of subjectivity and political discourse, I argue that feminist efforts to resist oppression by changing everyday interactions and meanings are legitimate and have the potential to effect widespread political change, though this is by no means guaranteed. However, because efforts to change meanings (sometimes called resignifications) may also be counterproductive, feminists must be able to adjudicate between such efforts, and may do so most effectively by using a pragmatic method.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VANDERBILT/oai:VANDERBILTETD:etd-03262011-211229 |
| Date | 14 April 2011 |
| Creators | Tarver, Erin C. |
| Contributors | Kelly Oliver |
| Publisher | VANDERBILT |
| Source Sets | Vanderbilt University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-03262011-211229/ |
| Rights | restricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Vanderbilt University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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