Sex, Culture, and Justice: The Limits of Choice (9 page)

47. Ibid.
,
98.

bodied form of the relation of domination,’’
48
MacKinnon’s account asserts that it is precisely
because
women’s consciousnesses are formed by patriarchal social structures that women have access to and can un- derstand the nature of patriarchy. Far from entrenching women’s infe- riority, consciousness-raising ‘‘shows women their situation in a way that affirms they can act to change it.’’
49

What MacKinnon’s approach shows is that consciousness-raising as a method of change is
particularly
suited to analysis in terms of habitus. Because habitus ties together social structures of domination and the lived experiences, actions, and thoughts of individuals, it follows that individuals can understand those social structures by looking inward, at themselves, as well as outward, at the world. If we start to think about the way we act and the preferences we have, the wider institu- tions of gender inequality begin to be revealed. As MacKinnon puts it, ‘‘Consciousness means a good deal more than a set of ideas. It consti- tutes a lived knowing of the social reality of being female. . . . [Con- sciousness-raising] built an experienced sense of how it came to be this way and that it can be changed.’’
50
Consciousness-raising complements habitus since habitus forges the link between individual experience and social structure that consciousness-raising investigates.

Indeed, feminist consciousness-raising often did inquire into the minutiae of women’s lives, the repeated daily activities that form the habitus. As MacKinnon reports, ‘‘Extensive attention was paid to small situations and denigrated pursuits that made up the common life of women in terms of energy, time, intensity, and definition— prominently, housework and sexuality.’’
51
Attention was also paid to the habitualization of appearance and deportment norms, as a 1971 feminist consciousness-raising exercise for men demonstrates. It di- rects men to ‘‘run a short distance, keeping your knees together. You’ll find you have to take short, high steps if you run this way. Women have been taught it is unfeminine to run like a man with long, free strides. See how far you get running this way for 30 seconds.’’
52
Such exercises aimed to make the gendered habitus explicit and thus open to change. Consciousness-raising thus paved the way for Bourdieu’s

1. Bourdieu,
   Masculine Domination
   , 35.
   

2. MacKinnon,
   Toward a Feminist Theory of the State,
   101. 50. Ibid.
   ,
   90–91.
   

51. Ibid.
,
87.

1. Cited in Susan Bordo, ‘‘Feminism, Foucault and the Politics of the Body,’’ 186.
   

   assertion that the smallest everyday actions of individuals result from, and thus can give insight into, overarching social rules and patterns.
   

   Despite this apparent harmony between consciousness-raising and analysis in terms of habitus, Bourdieu is ambivalent about conscious- ness-raising. Indeed, at times, he explicitly rejects it: ‘‘The symbolic revolution called for by the feminist movement cannot be reduced to a simple conversion of consciousness and wills . . . the relation of com- plicity that the victims of symbolic domination grant to the dominant can only be broken through a radical transformation of the social con- ditions of production of the dispositions that lead the dominated to take on the point of view of the dominant on the dominant and on themselves.’’
   53
   Bourdieu’s stand on this point echoes his Marxist belief that radical change must be at least institutional and at best economic. This belief cannot be applied to gender without some qualifications, however. Although symbolic violence is perpetuated through social and state institutions, and thus cannot be completely overthrown without institutional change, its symbolic nature isolates it to some degree from the larger economic order. As Nancy Fraser persuasively argues, it would be mistaken to attempt to remedy recognitional disadvantage with (purely) redistributive measures.
   54
   At times, it seems as though Bourdieu is prey to such confusion.
   

   On the other hand, some of the methods for change Bourdieu does endorse bear a resemblance to consciousness-raising. First, Bourdieu exhorts women to ‘‘invent and impose forms of collective organization and action and effective weapons,
   especially symbolic ones,
   capable of shaking the political and legal institutions which play a part in perpetu- ating their subordination.’’
   55
   This
   invention
   of new
   symbolic
   weapons looks very like the consciousness-raising commended in the Manifesto of the Redstockings, the radical feminist group founded by Shulamith Firestone and Ellen Willis in 1969: ‘‘Our chief task at present is to develop a female class consciousness through sharing experience and publicly exposing the sexist foundation of all our institutions. Con- sciousness-raising . . . is the only method by which we can ensure that our program for liberation is based on the concrete realities of our lives.’’
   56
   Moreover, Bourdieu’s theory of reflexive sociology demands
   

2. Bourdieu,
   Masculine Domination,
   41–42.
   

3. Nancy Fraser,
   Justice Interruptus.
   

4. Bourdieu,
   Masculine Domination,
   ix; emphasis added.
   

5. Cited in Miriam Schneir,
   The Vintage Book of Feminism
   , 128.
   

   that sociologists reflect on the social contexts that inform their work, and suggests that such reflection or ‘‘reflexivity’’ can be effective even without institutional change. As Lo¨ıc Wacquant argues, reflexivity en- tails ‘‘the systematic exploration of the ‘unthought categories of thought which delimit the unthinkable and predetermine the thought.’’’
   57
   Gendered symbolic violence is a paradigmatic example of an unthought category of thought, making reflexivity applicable to gen- der. If we attempt to identify our habitus, to bring it to consciousness, we can start to resist the social structures to which it corresponds. Bourdieu himself makes this argument when not discussing gender.
   58
   Of course, the symbolic transformation entailed by consciousness- raising is not enough. Institutions must also change in order to break the cycle of the development of the gendered habitus. The need for institutional change is a crucial feminist claim. But few feminists have claimed that consciousness-raising will, in itself, subvert the general system of masculine domination. The claim, rather, is that conscious- ness-raising is an important first step, one which prompts wider insti- tutional change—particularly when it is used to question and challenge public institutions such as media, politics, or the law.
   59
   Consciousness- raising is the means by which women come to understand both their oppression and the possible remedies for it. Women ‘‘know inequality because they have lived it, so they know what removing barriers to equality would be. Many of these barriers are legal; many of them are social; most of them exist at an interface between law and society.’’
   60
   In other words, we cannot change our institutions without first theorizing the need for change. Only once theorized can change go beyond con-
   

   sciousness and into institutions.
   

   Lisa Adkins argues, in contrast, that reflexivity has become a normal part of gender, such that its transformative and radical effects are lost. She argues that ‘‘for both men and women gender is increasingly tak- ing the form of a self-conscious artifice which can be managed, strate- gically deployed and performed,’’
   61
   but that this process does not guar- antee progressive change. The reason is that the sort of reflexivity that is becoming common is accompanied not by a radical questioning of
   

6. Bourdieu and Wacquant,
   Invitation to Reflexive Sociology,
   40. 58. Ibid., 136–37.
   

1. See Katherine T. Bartlett, ‘‘Feminist Legal Methods,’’ 864–65.
   

2. MacKinnon,
   Toward a Feminist Theory of the State,
   241.
   

3. Adkins, ‘‘Reflexivity,’’ 33.
   

   the role of gender, but rather by an increasing understanding of the
   proper
   roles that men and women must play, an understanding that masculinity and femininity are forms of capital that should be pre- served and deployed. Thus Adkins gives the example of a study of fe- male City workers who skillfully plan their appearance, shifting be- tween demure business dress and the ‘‘executive bimbo look,’’ depending on the audience.
   62
   Such manipulation of traditional female roles is not, Adkins suggests, indicative of a progressive transformation of gender but is rather indicative of the entrenchment of traditional gender difference. As a result, Adkins concludes that Bourdieu’s reli- ance on the disembodied, cerebral process of reflexivity represents his failure to apply the basic features of his theory to his account of change.
   63
   

   Feminist accounts of consciousness-raising can help to mitigate some of these criticisms since they entail not merely a reflexive aware- ness of the configurations of gender, but also a
   critical
   stance on those configurations. As Pamela Allen writes in her advocacy of conscious- ness-raising, ‘‘We believe that theory and analysis which are not rooted in concrete experience (practice) are useless, but we also maintain that for the concrete, everyday experiences to be understood, they must be subjected to the processes of analysis and abstraction.’’
   64
   This critical stance is aided by the facts that consciousness-raising is a group activ- ity—women
   share
   observations of injustice and ideas for change and encourage others to act radically; that consciousness-raising focuses not only on the thought consciousness but also on the embodied prac- tices of gender; and that consciousness-raising begins from a feminist perspective.
   65
   Kristin Henry and Marlene Derlet’s interviews with members of a consciousness-raising group provide many examples of the importance of the intersubjective elements of that particular form of reflexivity.
   66
   Group interaction provides the members with new ideas about the injustices of gender and with support for instigating change;
   

4. Ibid.
   

63. Ibid., 35.

1. Pamela Allen, ‘‘The Small Group Process,’’ 277.
   

2. Adkins writes, ‘‘Why, when it comes to social change, does Bourdieu tend to disem- body actors and understand action as a matter of thinking consciousness?’’ (‘‘Reflexivity,’’ 35). While she is correct to say that Bourdieu does this, it is interesting to note that the reflexivity of the City workers who deploy alternative images of femininity (a reflexivity that Adkins considers insufficiently transformative) is not merely thought but is also embodied.
   

3. Kristin Henry and Marlene Derlet,
   Talking Up a Storm.
   

   as Allen points out, ‘‘The emphasis is on teaching one another through sharing experiences.’’
   67
   Similarly, Vivian Gornick cites the testimony of a member of a consciousness-raising group who also focuses on the importance of interaction:
   

   None of them have been through what I’ve been through if you look at our experience superficially. But when you look a little
   deeper
   —the way we’ve been doing at these meetings—you see they’ve
   all
   been through what I’ve been through, and they all feel pretty much the way I feel. God, when I saw
   that!
   When I saw that what I always felt was my own personal hangup was as true for every other woman in that room as it was for me! Well, that’s when my consciousness was raised.
   68
   

   Of course, it would be wrong to suggest that group interaction is always transformative. Traditional women’s groups foster conformity just as radical groups encourage revolution. Nonetheless, the combination of the group setting with the shared desire to act reflexively can be a po- tent force for change. As Susan Bruley notes of her own group, ‘‘The general feeling really was that CR had changed our lives.’’
   69
   

   Regulated Liberties
   

   It is important to consider consciousness-raising as a possible strategy for change not least because the strategies for resisting prevailing norms that Bourdieu suggests are problematic. Take, for example, the method Bourdieu calls ‘‘regulated liberties.’’ Regulated liberties are ac- tions that arise in the context of the existing social order, but which subvert or resignify it in some way. Bourdieu’s regulated liberties occur when the disadvantaged or oppressed subversively apply oppressive or unjust norms, questioning and resisting their dominant meaning. Bourdieu gives the example of the images used to characterize male and female genitals in the Kabyle society which he has studied. Al- though female genitals are described in derogatory terms, women can exercise a regulated liberty by applying those terms to male genitals:
   

4. Allen, ‘‘Small Group Process,’’ 279.
   

5. Vivian Gornick, ‘‘Consciousness,’’ 289.
   

6. Sue Bruley,
   Women Awake
   , 21.
   

   The partial indeterminacy of certain objects authorizes antago- nistic interpretations, offering the dominated a possibility of resistance to the effect of symbolic imposition. Thus women can draw on the dominant schemes of perception (top/bottom, hard/soft, straight/curved, dry/wet, etc.), which lead them to form a very negative view of their own genitals, in order to understand the male sexual attributes by analogy with things that hang limply, without vigour; . . . and they can even draw advantage from the diminished state of the male member to assert the superiority of the female sexual organ, as in the say- ing: ‘‘You, all your tackle (
   laaˆlaleq
   ) dangles, says the woman to the man, whereas I am a welded stone.’’
   70
   

   Even from the oppressed position, therefore, women can use the labels of their oppression to refer to their oppressors. Alternatively, the op- pressed can accept and ‘‘reclaim’’ the labels of their oppression, trans- forming them into positive descriptions, as when homosexuals reclaim the previously derogatory word ‘‘queer’’ and use it proudly to describe themselves.
   71
   

   Bourdieu does not, however, see performativity and other regulatory liberties as opportunities for genuine emancipation from structures of domination, for two main reasons. First, the regulated liberties are performed by individuals, and so lack the cohesive, collective character required for wide-ranging social change. Thus Bourdieu contrasts the ‘‘
   political
   mobilization’’ necessary for collective and thus effective resis- tance with a Butlerian individualist approach, arguing that the latter is insufficient.
   72
   

   The second limitation on the emancipatory potential of the regulated liberties is that they take place within the confines of the overall struc- tures of domination, and do not really subvert those structures. Be- cause a regulated liberty is an act that takes the dominant labels and applies them subversively, it follows that in doing so the dominant
   

7. Bourdieu,
   Masculine Domination,
   14.
   

8. Judith Butler also points out that Bourdieu’s work allows for the effects of repeated yet unofficial interpellations on an individual and her habitus, such as when a child is repeatedly called a ‘‘girl’’ and so takes on ‘‘girlishness.’’ This fact, Butler argues, allows alternative inter- pellations and performatives to have a transformative effect: ‘‘The social performative is a crucial part not only of subject
   formation,
   but of the ongoing political contestation and re- formulation of the subject as well’’ (‘‘Performativity’s Social Magic,’’ 125).
   

9. Bourdieu,
   Masculine Domination,
   viii; emphasis in the original.
   

   labels are in some sense affirmed. Bourdieu’s example of Kabyle geni- tal labeling demonstrates this affirmation. The women exercising the regulated liberties do not question the division of genitals into two groups of hard versus soft, dry versus wet. For example, they do not argue that male and female genitals are more similar than different, as the Gerai do.
   73
   Perhaps more important, they do not question the value judgments attached to these characteristics (top, hard, straight, dry
   =
   good, powerful, superior; bottom, soft, curved, wet
   =
   bad, weak, infe- rior). In fact, the success of the regulated liberty relies on an affirma- tion of the dominant value system: labeling male genitals as ‘‘soft’’ has no discursive effect if softness des not imply inferiority. In this way, the regulated liberties might even serve to entrench the dominant structures. The slight shifts in representation and small victories of empowerment that the regulated liberties achieve tend, in the long run, to reinforce structural inequalities.
   

   MacKinnon makes a similar point in relation to sexuality: ‘‘The ca- pacity of gender reversals (dominatrixes) and inversions (homosexual- ity) to stimulate sexual excitement [in pornography] is derived precisely from their mimicry or parody or negation or reversal of the standard arrangement. This affirms rather than undermines or qualifies the standard sexual arrangement as the standard sexual arrangement.’’
   74
   Sometimes, as this example suggests, the regulated liberties might be reactionary. A case from the United States, the fathers’ movement, subverts both traditional gendered parenting norms, which assert that fathers need play only a limited role in parenting, and modified, femi- nist-influenced parenting norms, which assert that mothers’ rights must be paramount after a divorce or that both parents are equal within the home. The fathers’ movement subverts these traditionally domi- nant conceptions but remains within them, by asserting that families need fathers and that fathers need to dominate.
   75
   The shift that may result from this regulated liberty is a reactionary one because it reas- serts male dominance within the home, and emphasizes different roles for men and women in parenting. Although the fathers’ movement uses regulated liberties to bring about social change, this change is
   

10. The Gerai, discussed above, conceptualize the penis and the vagina as the same organ, and differentiate them only according to their placement inside or outside of the body. Simi- larly, the Gerai think of semen and vaginal fluid as identical (Helliwell, ‘‘It’s Only a Penis’’).
    

11. MacKinnon,
    Toward a Feminist Theory of the State,
    144.
    

12. Cornell,
    At the Heart of Freedom,
    133–34.
    

    not progressive. Bourdieu’s regulated liberties thus guarantee neither extensive nor emancipatory social change.
    

    Disjunction Between Field and Habitus
    

    Bourdieu suggests an alternative opportunity for change. If an individ- ual’s position in a hierarchy is reinforced by the fit between her habitus and the field within which she operates, this reinforcement can be weakened by a disjunction between habitus and field. When people move between fields, or when communities encounter each other and their norms collide, there will be a disjunction between habitus and field. In multicultural societies, the norms of different groups, or the logics of different fields, provide constant cross-challenges. As people are increasingly mobile, interaction between groups increases, and complacency over the dispositions that make up the habitus is les- sened. One way of encouraging changes in habitus that open up greater options for people, then, is to encourage interaction between fields, between communities or ways of life, so that individuals become aware of new options.
    

    Such a disjunction between habitus and field is not, Bourdieu em- phasizes, a common occurrence. There is usually a fit between field and habitus, as most people remain within compatible fields most of the time. In such circumstances, the habitus is continually reinforced. When the individual encounters circumstances incompatible with her habitus, however, it is gradually weakened. In this way, the habitus can be changed, but more usually is not.
    76
    

    One of the ways in which change in the habitus might occur, McNay suggests, is via the disjunction that occurs when women move into the workforce.
    77
    The idea is that the gendered habitus will change when women enter spheres that were previously closed to them, such as the factory or the boardroom. However, this process is by no means guar- anteed, as Adkins points out.
    78
    In particular, we can identify two ques- tions. First, what would prompt such a move? Why do women move into nonfeminine spheres? Second, how would such a move alter the
    gendered
    nature of the habitus?
    

    First, consider why women move into nonfeminine spheres. If a
    

13. Bourdieu and Wacquant,
    Invitation to Reflexive Sociology,
    133.
    

14. McNay,
    Gender and Agency
    , 53.
    

15. Adkins, ‘‘Reflexivity,’’ 28–29.
    

    disjunction between habitus and field is to be the explanation or cause of a change in the habitus, it follows that the move itself cannot be the result of a changed habitus, or of action which contradicts the existing habitus. Such an account would be question-begging. For this argu- ment to be coherent, social change must result from changes in habi- tus that are caused by location in an unfamiliar field. The explanation cannot be that the individual decides, from within the confines of one habitus, to move toward another by entering a currently inappropriate field. Why, then, do women enter previously nonfeminine spheres, such as higher education or the workplace? What explains the change in social norms that makes such movements possible and appealing for individual women? If these movements are explained by the choices and campaigns of women, then those women have already engendered social change prior to the disjunction between habitus and field that is supposed to explain that social change.
    

    One option is that a vanguard, perhaps of feminist theorists, actively promotes new ideas or enters new spheres, with the result that non- vanguard women enter the newly opened fields before their habituses have adapted to fit. If this were the case, the disjunction between habi- tus and field might explain how social change grows in scope. In other words, theory is necessary but not sufficient: it can explain how an emancipatory movement starts, or why emancipatory change in social institutions is initiated, but it is a disjunction between field and habitus that provides the mechanism for altering the beliefs, preferences, and choices of the majority.
    

    An alternative interpretation is that the impetus for the social mobil- ity that creates a disjunction between habitus and field is not subjective but objective, not agent-directed but structural. If social mobility were caused by objective economic factors, for example, it might take place before change in habitus and thus before wide-reaching change in so- cial norms or symbolic structures. Thus the woman who starts to work in a factory may do so not because she believes that gendered employ- ment norms must be overthrown, but because her family is in need of extra resources. This need results from objective economic conditions, not subjective rebellion. However, even in this case some habitus-con- flicting reasoning must have taken place. Even in times of economic necessity, if women are to work in factories then a feeling must have arisen that, contrary to the prevailing norms, such work is conceivable or appropriate. Economic conditions cannot force a change in behavior,
    

    with no mediation by normative reasoning. A newly poor woman must decide that it is better for her to work in a factory than to work as a prostitute, to steal, or to remain at home to preserve her religious vir- tue.
    79
    Such decisions are likely to be implied by the general system of social norms, minimizing the autonomous decision-making that any individual must undergo. However, she must have decided that the existing taboo on entering the nonfeminine sphere can be broken (even if she feels she has little choice), and this very fact will cause a change in her prior to entering the sphere and experiencing the dis- junction between habitus and field that is supposed to be the source of social change. Indeed, the more the movement into a nonfeminine sphere is forced by the prevailing economic conditions and thus runs counter to her habitus, the more the woman about to enter the sphere is likely to think about her move and its implications, to steel herself for unfamiliar practices and to prepare to alter her mode of being. In other words, even mobility between fields caused by economic change prompts changes in consciousness prior to changes caused by disjunc- tion between habitus and field.
    80
    

    This analysis suggests that the most effective form of social change is the combination of an enforced, structural change together with ac- tive promotion of a new set of norms. For example, if large numbers of women are to move into the workplace when it has traditionally been a nonfeminine sphere, they may need both structural changes (be they advantageous, such as antidiscrimination legislation, childcare provi- sion, and education, or disadvantageous, such as economic necessity or war)
    and
    symbolic changes in social reasoning (such as consciousness- raising, the feminist movement campaigning for women’s rights, or positive media portrayals of working women).
    

    The second question that arises from the notion that a disjunction between habitus and field can cause social change is how and why