Berkeley professor explains gender theory | Judith Butler

Sex, gender, and the debate over identity explained by Berkeley professor Judith Butler.

Subscribe to Big Think on YouTube ► https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvQECJukTDE2i6aCoMnS-Vg?sub_confirmation=1
Up next, Judith Butler: Your behavior creates your Gender ► https://youtu.be/Bo7o2LYATDc

What if gender wasn't a predetermined reality, but a fluid construct formed by culture, history, and individual identity? This is a question that drives the work of Judith Butler, a gender theorist and distinguished professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

While acknowledging the biological realities of sex, Butler promotes the concept of gender as performative — something that is enacted and shaped through our actions and interactions. This view, although challenging to traditional perspectives, is instrumental in the discourse on queer, trans, and women's rights. Butler encourages a shift in societal conversation to include diverse gender identities.

This transformation, she believes, allows us to work toward a society where equality, freedom, and justice are at the forefront, reinforcing the foundations of our democratic society.

0:00 What is gender theory?
1:34 Sex and gender: What’s the difference?
2:29 Learning from genocide
3:34 Queer theory in the 1970s & ’80s
4:56 Big ideas in gender theory’s evolution
7:06 Gender is “performative”: What that means
9:04 The resistance to trans rights
10:37 Countering the attack on gender

Read the video transcript ► https://bigthink.com/series/legends/gender-theory/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=video&utm_campaign=youtube_description

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About Judith Butler:
Judith Butler is a post-structuralist philosopher and queer theorist. She is most famous for her notion of gender performativity, but her work ranges from literary theory, modern philosophical fiction, feminist and sexuality studies, to 19th- and 20th-century European literature and philosophy, Kafka and loss, mourning and war.

She has received countless awards for her teaching and scholarship, including a Guggenheim fellowship, a Rockefeller fellowship, Yale's Brudner Prize, and an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Distinguished Achievement Award.

Her books include "Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity," "Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex," "Undoing Gender," and "Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable?"

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About Big Think | Smarter Faster™
► Big Think
Our mission is to make you smarter, faster. Watch interviews with the world’s biggest thinkers on science, philosophy, business, and more.
► Big Think+
Looking to ignite a learning culture at your company? Prepare your workforce for the future with educational courses from the world’s biggest thinkers. Trusted by Ford, Marriot, Bank of America, and many more. Learn how Big Think+ can empower your people today: https://bigthink.com/plus/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=video&utm_campaign=youtube_description

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Want more Big Think?
► Daily editorial features: https://bigthink.com/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=video&utm_campaign=youtube_description
► Get the best of Big Think right to your inbox: https://bigthink.com/subscribe/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=video&utm_campaign=youtube_description
► Facebook: https://bigth.ink/facebook/
► Instagram: https://bigth.ink/Instagram/
► Twitter: https://bigth.ink/twitter/