A Critique of Normative Heterosexuality: Identity, Embodiment, and Sexual Difference in Beauvoir and Irigaray

Abstract

The distinction between heterosexuality and homosexuality does not allow for sufficient attention to be given to the question of non‐normative heterosexualities. This paper develops a feminist critique of normative sexuality, focusing on alternative readings of sex and/or gender offered by Beauvoir and Irigaray. Despite their differences, both accounts contribute significantly to dismantling the lure of normative sexuality in heterosexual relations—a dismantling necessary to the construction of a feminist social and political order.

Response to Alcoff, Ferguson, and Bergoffen

“…With regard to my paper on the critique of normative heterosexuality (Schutte 1997a), perhaps the main thing to emphasize is that (despite its title) the main objective of this paper was not, as Ferguson reads it, “to deconstruct normative heterosexuality.” (This surely is an effect of the paper, but not its main organizational content.) What I was arguing for was a distinctly different point: namely, that heterosexuality need not always be branded “normative” (as it is often assumed and represented to be, for example, by sectors of both the Right and the Left).…”

“…Since I was focusing primarily on French feminists (Beauvoir and Irigaray), for a lesbian position I referred to Monique Wittig. I did not think it was necessary to go into Butler except to acknowledge her contributions to the critique of gender and sexual normativity in recent years (Schutte 1997a, 43).…”

“…For the benefit of those who have not read the article, I argue against the assumption that “normative sexuality and heterosexuality are interchangeable terms” (Schutte 1997a, 41). I propose limiting “normative sexuality” to mean “that type or form of sexual activity that is marked by a coincidence between socially privileged sexual acts and privileged gender constructs” (42).…”

The Sex of Nature: A Reinterpretation of Irigaray's Metaphysics and Political Thought

“…21 21 Irigaray's interpreters have offered (at least) three defenses of her position here. Firstly, Pheng Cheah and Elizabeth Grosz (1998) and Ofelia Schutte (1997) stress that she is not lauding heterosexuality as currently practiced, which rests on a denial of sexual difference. The fact remains, though, that the sexuality Irigaray lauds remains a species of heterosexuality.…”

“…The fact remains, though, that the sexuality Irigaray lauds remains a species of heterosexuality. But Schutte claims (secondly) that the alternative heterosexual relations Irigaray envisages involve a blurring of the fixed identities of their participants, so that by implication this “heterosexuality” is not clearly distinguished from bi‐ or homosexuality anyway (Schutte 1997, 55–56). This implication does not follow, however, if—as appears to be Irigaray's position—heterosexuality has unique power to confound identities, due to the uniquely fundamental nature of the difference it involves.…”