Tuesday, March 3, 2009

3*3=9

I'm reading part of Feminist Interpretations of Theodor Adorno.

This bit made me think a bit, and I think I can briefly sum up: "In Patriarchy, women are conceptually interchangeable. Concretely [?], they are not. Conceptually, woman refers to an object of inquiry. Concretely, that object comes diffusely apart as critical attention is paid to the terms of its existence and its particularity." (2)

My now-canned response to this line is "same with men." The difference is, I think--if you'll let me oversimplify--, that men are allotted a dual role: an object of inquiry, and a subject inquiring. As liberal society embraces feminist ethics, this becomes increasingly true for women as well (bear in mind that this is a critique of theory more than practice), but the "object of inquiry" part will remain problematic for all genders.

No comments: