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    Mariana Olivares
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    Wittig, - One Is Not Born A Woman

    Uploaded by

    Mariana Olivares

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
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    may who vies, old FL, edie ter es i oe One Is Not Born a Woman Moniqus Wittig silleres (1969; English trans, 1985) and aon van Doody (1975; Le corp lesbian 1973) amangothos—and shot lois wll “ie Straight Mind” (1981). She has Monique Wiig isthe author of novels—Les ga splay and esp, tncuding the inflenil sey iment of French and Tinian at ser nord the Prix Medicis end is Profesor in the Dept Te ea Arzoa, Fr pblhes 198, hs ey oer alleging eee se nr expenatns fr the aril enss of ede pean, TW AA the a armen atti etry ard the Bolg erin of Bh genders mri, egg tha women or cll sage ed ot or ane, i ee seca ig tgeder ste, etna wot, Al i aa at ht mening within Win anaes wot ines in tems tha describe leis’ bility fo ede etre onnection between gender and sesuaiy. Isbians, in terms of the eri insistene oa frm ‘A materialist feminist approach vo women’s oppression destroys the idea that omen sve a "natural group”? "a racial group of a special kind, 2 grO¥P, perceived as waa group of men considered as materially specific in their odies.”* What the Malis accomplishes on the level of ideas, practice mates ‘actual at the level of facts: by is very existence lesbian society destroys the artifical (Gocial) fact constituting women by ro Cr group A lesbian sciety®pragmatically seveals cat the vision from men aceaarrlceaenhave been the object is 2 political one and shows eat We have been Gleologieally rebuilt inno a natural group.” In the case of womens ideology goes fat sae oY des a8 well a5 oat minds are the product of eis manipalaions ‘We have sae cainplled in our bodies and in our minds to coresponds fears by feature, with, the idea of nature that has dv such an extent that uF s been established for us. Distorte deformed body is what they cal sed to exist a5 such before 1 “natural,” what is suppos tppression. Distorted to such an extent that im the end oppression St to be a con sequence of this “nature” within ourselves ( fr nature which is only an idea). What 2 sane fet analysis does by reasoning a lesbian society accomplishes practically: not only a al group “women” (we lesbians are living proof off) bus a5 individuals fas well we question “woman,” which for us, is for Simone de Beauvoir, is only a myth. She said: “One is not born, but becomes 2 woman. ‘No biological, psychological, o* se i ee vecemings the fgare thar the human female presents in soviet Civilization a8 a whole that produces thi diate hetween male and et rach, which is described as feminine.” ‘However, most of the feminists and lesbian-feminist sell believe thot the basis of women’s oppression is biological ax wl creature, interme ts in America and clsewhere as historical. Some 104 MONIQUE WiTTiG of them even claim to find right and in a “prehistory” when women ereated civilisation Presabesision) while the coarse and brutal men hunted (because of» bislogieal predis. position) is symmetrical with the biologizing Row, by the clas of men. It is sill the same method of finding in women sad ‘men 3 biological explanation of cir division, outside of socal as, or we tha cen never Sonstitute a lesbian approach to women's oppression, since it assumes that the Refs (the words are used interchangeably): men are biologically inferior te women; ‘male violence i a biological inevitability..." By doing this by admitcing that there ten aig division between women and men, we natsalize history, we sssume fee wenin, itd "women have always exited and will always exist. Nov ely dover en Bralize history, but also consequently we naturalize the social phenowaess hace express ae presen, making change impossible. For example, instead of secing 2s. forced production, we see it at a “natural” “iological” process, forget Gur Societies births are planned (demography), forgetting that we ourelves 22 pro- Sramined te produce children, while chs i the only social activity “short of war” they Pree uah 3 Stet danger of death. Thus, as long as we will be “unable to abana by will or impulse a lifelong and centuries-old commiemont te childbearing as che female the ree, Saining control ofthe production of children will mean mach more thas i production: women will have to abstract Shemmclves from the definition “woman” which is imposed upon them, A materialist feminist approach shows that what we take for the cause of origin oy aboresion isin fact only the mrkt imposed by the oppressor: the “myth ‘of woman," is i material eflecs and manifestations inthe appropriated cotscio wren vol Lei, of women. Thus, this mark does not predate oppresion: Coletic Guilkentn be shown However, oow, race, exactly like sex is taken a8 an “immediate pee “oni Bivens” “phoyrical features,” belonging to a natural ordet. But whatewe beline tog physical and direct perception is only a sophisticated and mythic construction, an “imag inaty formation, "** which reinteprets physical fearures (in themacives w ecto any others but marked by the social system) through the network of relationships in which they are perccived, (They ate scen as Bach, therefore they are blacks they are seen as mn ae tteore, they are women, But before being se that way, they Fes had ce Ce Imad that way) Letbacs should always remember ad acknowledge how “unnatural,” Spelling, torally oppressive, and destructive being “woman” was for ae need ays before the women's liberation movement, It was 2 politieal constraint, and those who resisted it were acused of not being “real” women But thon we ne proud of srowal by eg hcsation thete was already something like shadow of victory: the frowal by che oppressor that “woman” isnot something that goss withooy saying, since to be one, one has to be a “real” one. We were at the same rnae accused of wanting pe met Today this double accusation has heca taken ap agra with enthusiasm in the context of the women’s liberation movement by some for insts wo also, alas, by some It “femin provokt alienati and Tv escaped she can one wh imposs out of else, 2 1 of the ofam lesbian recent! into a potent the my back it oursel Beauve among rood ¢ Stat wm wh catego Te puts dor fo forcen thus, 1 to. fig “femin with ¢ many of this for th if itr not in the of and tc to fen for th ONE IS NOF-BORN A WOMAN 105 some lesbians whose political goal seems somehow to be becoming more and more “feminine.” To refuse to be a woman, however, does not mean that one has to become aman. Besides, if we take as an example the perfect “butch,” the classic example which provokes the most horror, whom Proust would have called a woman/man, how is her Slienation different from that of someone who wants to become a woman? Tweedledum and Tweedledee. At least for a woman, wanting to become a man proves that she has ‘xcaped her initial programming. But even if she would like to, with all her strength, She cannot become a man. For becoming a man would demand from a woman not only 4 man's external appearance but his consciousness as well, that is, the consciousness of ‘one who disposes by right of at least two “natural” slaves ducing his life span. This is impossible, and one feature of lesbian oppression consists precisely of making women tout of reach for us, since women belong to men. ‘Thus a lesbian has to be something tls, a not-womnan, a not-man, a product of society, not a product of nature, for there is no natare in society ‘The refusal to become (orto remain) heterosexual always meant to reese to become man or a woman, consciously of not. For a lesbian this goes further than the refusal of the role “woman.” It is the refusal of the economic, ideological, and political power of a man, This, we lesbians, and nonlesbians as well, knew before the beginning of the Jesbian and feminist movement. However, as Andrea Dworkin emphasizes, many lesbians recently “have increasingly tried to transform the very ideology that has enslaved us into a dynamic, religious, psychologically compelling celebration of female biological potential" ‘Thus, some avenues of the feminist and lesbian movement lead us back to fhe myth of woman which was created by men especially for us, and with it we sink back into a natural group. Having stood up to fight for a sexless society,” we now find ‘ourselves entrapped in the familiar deadlock of “woman is wonderful.” Simone de Beauvoir underlined particularly the false consciousness which consists of selecting among the features of the myth (that women are different from men) those which look good and using them as a definition for women, What the concept “woman is won- dlerful” accomplishes is that it retains for defining women the best features (best according to whom?) which oppression has granted us, and it does not radically question the categories “man” and “woman,” which are political categories and not natural givens. Te puts us in a position of fighting within the class “women” not as the other classes do, for the disappearance of our class, but for the defense of “woman’” and its reen- forcement. It leads us to develop with complacency “new” theories about our specificity: thus, we call our passivity “nonviolence,” when the main and emergent point for us is ito fight our passivity (our fear, rather, a justified one). The ambiguity of the-term “ferninist” sums up the whole situation. What does “feminist” mean’ Feminist is formed with the word “femme,” “woman,” and means: someone who fights for women. For any of us it means someone who fights for women as a class and for the disappearance (of this class. For many others it means someone who fights for woman and her defense— for the myth, then, and its rcenforcement. But why was the word “feminist” chosen if it retains the least ambiguity? We chose to call ourselves “feminists” ten years ago, not in order to support ot reenforce the myth of woman, nor to identify ourselves with, the oppressor’s definition of us, but rather to affirm that our movement had a history and to emphasize the political link with the old feminist movement. Teis, then, this movement that we can put in question for the meaning that it gave to feminism. It so happens that feminism in the last century could never resolve its contradictions on the subject of nature/culture, wornan/society. Women started to fight for themselves 2s a group and rightly considered that they shared common features as 106 2 MONIQUE WiTTiG a result of oppression, than socal. They yors_Bt* for them these features were al Se meso cme re tte SSS a Dahan sh oy fa a feminism was that je gay large reflected this polarization.” "The pales lations cracked the Darwinise charge of female inferioeiy ae Anu finally it was women tht charge—namely, the view of woman se wna ee theory. Bu the early fam thOlats—and not feminists who scicntfally hen to develops fom configs of had failed to regard history 26a dynsnic ane cause (origin) of their py Met. Furthermore, they still believed wv ee deh tonishing victories the ftssion lay within themselves. And theceiore shee en ference,” an idea now job, THY upheld the illogical principle of “creche nee us once again: the mye}, W"& born again. ‘They fell back fneo ake Bich teens

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