French Feminism

Background

Neither distinctively French nor precisely feminist, French feminism is a neologism resulting from the reception, by U.S. American scholars, of Luce Irigaray's, Julia Kristeva's, and Hélène Cixous' work. Although identified with French feminism, none of the three are themselves French nationals: the psychoanalyst, linguistic theorist, and continental philosopher, Irigaray, is Belgian, with a name of Basque origin; the Marxist linguist, novelist, literary critic, and psychoanalyst, Kristeva, is Bulgarian; and the novelist, dramatist, and English literature theorist, Cixous, is a German-speaking Algerian. In addition, none of them self-identify as feminist with respect to French politics.

However, as some of the most formidable contemporary intellectuals (such as Gayatri Spivak, Judith Butler, Kelly Oliver, and Elizabeth Grosz) have engaged Irigaray, Kristeva, and Cixous, moving beyond their initial insights and limits to develop new understandings of the feminine, French feminism has come to refer less to them and more to a kind of theory that most often takes the intersection between language, psychoanalysis, and philosophy as its point of departure. Although its scope has since expanded to include other French intellectuals (such as Simon de Beauvoir, Michèle Le Doeuff, Catherine Clément, Monique Wittig, and Sarah Kofman), this entry will focus only on the work of Irigaray, Kristeva, and Cixous, underscoring a few of the important similarities and differences between them.

Major Concerns