It’s time: Generation and temporality in psychoanalytic feminism

Abstract

In this paper I examine some key aspects of defining one's generation: transmitting values to younger generations in a way that makes sense to them; cultivating a psychic flexibility that allows us to welcome the future and be prepared for the unexpected whilst not succumbing to the fear of social, political and economic precarity; thinking of generation as both our It's time: generation and temporality in psychoanalytic feminismAngie Voela University of East LondonAt a recent Sociology conference in London the keynote speaker urged her audience to revisit Kristeva's "Women's Time" (1981), arguing that it was still very relevant today. In "Women's time" Kristeva explains that the first generation of feminists were primarily concerned with negotiating the social contract (e.g. basic rights, equality, dignity, freedom), while the second generation focused on the symbolic contract, exploring the dynamics of signification and disrupting linear time. She also announced the advent of a third generation, which was 'not a movement but a signifying space', both a corporeal and a desiring mental space (1981, p. 33).As I was reaching for the text among my books, I remembered reading it in the late eighties, thinking 'what is my generation?' As I write these words, still thinking if I ever managed to arrive at a satisfactory answer, my female students come to mind. They are mostly non-traditional students from a working class background. Many of them are second generation immigrants from African countries. Their

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“…A weakness of psychoanalytic feminism is that female sexuality overshadows male sexuality. Psychoanalytic feminism has taught us something very important: no one can speak for all women, and sometimes no one said (Voela, 2016).…”