Editing Performativity (section)

== Elaborations ==

=== John Searle ===
In ''[[A Taxonomy of Illocutionary Acts]]'', [[John Searle]] takes up and reformulates the ideas of his colleague [[J. L. Austin]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Searle |first=John |author-link=John Searle |title=Expression and meaning : studies in the theory of speech acts |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1979}}</ref> Though Searle largely supports and agrees with Austin's theory of speech acts, he has a number of critiques, which he outlines: "In sum, there are (at least) six related difficulties with Austin's taxonomy; in ascending order of importance: there is a persistent confusion between verbs and acts, not all the verbs are illocutionary verbs, there is too much overlap of the categories, too much heterogeneity within the categories, many of the verbs listed in the categories don't satisfy the definition given for the category and, most important, there is no consistent principle of classification."<ref>{{cite book |last=Searle |first=John |author-link=John Searle |title=Expression and meaning : studies in the theory of speech acts |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1979 |pages=12}}</ref>

His last key departure from Austin lies in Searle's claim that four of his universal 'acts' do not need 'extra-linguistic' contexts to succeed.<ref name="John1979">{{cite book |last=Searle |first=John |author-link=John Searle |title=Expression and meaning : studies in the theory of speech acts |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1979 |pages=7}}</ref> As opposed to Austin who thinks all illocutionary acts need extra-linguistic institutions, Searle disregards the necessity of context and replaces it with the "rules of language".<ref name="John1979" />

=== Jean-François Lyotard ===
In ''[[The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge]]'' (1979, English translation 1986), philosopher and cultural theorist [[Jean-François Lyotard]] defined performativity as the defining mode of [[legitimation]] of postmodern knowledge and social bonds, that is, power.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lyotard |first=Jean-Francois |url=https://archive.org/details/postmoderncondit00lyot |title=The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |year=1986 |isbn=978-0816611737 |location=Minneapolis |url-access=registration}}</ref> In contrast to the legitimation of modern knowledge through such grand narratives as Progress, Revolution, and Liberation, performativity operates by system optimization or the calculation of input and outputs. In a footnote, Lyotard aligns performativity with Austin's concept of performative speech act. Postmodern knowledge must not only report: it must do something and do it efficiently by maximizing input/output ratios.

Lyotard uses [[Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophy of mathematics|Wittgenstein's]] notion of language games to theorize how performativity governs the articulation, funding, and conduct of contemporary research and education, arguing that at bottom it involves the threat of terror: "be operational (that is commensurable) or disappear" (xxiv). While Lyotard is highly critical of performativity, he notes that it calls on researchers to explain not only the worth of their work but also the worth of that worth.

Lyotard associated performativity with the rise of digital computers in the post-World War II period. In ''Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945,'' historian [[Tony Judt]] cites Lyotard to argue that the Left has largely abandoned revolutionary politics for human rights advocacy. The widespread adoption of performance reviews, organizational assessments, and learning outcomes by different social institutions worldwide has led social researchers to theorize "audit culture" and "global performativity".

Against performativity and [[Jürgen Habermas]]' call for consensus, Lyotard argued for legitimation by ''paralogy'', or the destabilizing, often paradoxical, introduction of difference into language games

=== Jacques Derrida ===
Philosopher [[Jacques Derrida]] drew on Austin's theory of performative speech act while deconstructing its logocentric and phonocentric premises and reinscribing it within the operations of generalized writing. In contrast to structuralism's focus on linguistic form, Austin had introduced the ''force'' of speech acts, which Derrida aligns with [[Friedrich Nietzsche|Nietzsche's]] insights on language.

In "Signature, Event, Context," Derrida focused on Austin's privileging of speech and the accompanying presumptions of the presence of a speaker ("signature") and the bounding of a performative's force by an act or a context. In a passage that would become a touchstone of [[Post-structuralism|poststructuralist]] thought, Derrida stresses the citationality or iterability of any and all signs.<blockquote>Every sign, linguistic or nonlinguistic, spoken or written (in the current sense of this opposition), in a small or large unit, can be ''cited'', put between quotation marks; in doing so it can break with every given context, engendering an infinity of new contexts in a manner which is absolutely illimitable. This does not imply that the mark is valid outside of a context, but on the contrary that there are only contexts without any center or absolute anchorage [''ancrage'']. This citationality, this duplication or duplicity, this iterability of the mark is neither an accident nor an anomaly, it is that (normal/abnormal) without which a mark could not even have a function called "normal." What would a mark be that could not be cited? Or one whose origins would not get lost along the way?<ref>{{Cite book|title=Limited, Inc.|last=Derrida|first=Jacques|publisher=Northwestern University Press|year=1988|isbn=978-0810107885|location=Evanston|pages=12}}</ref></blockquote>Derrida's stress on the citational dimension of performativity would be taken up by Judith Butler and other theorists. While he addressed the performativity of individual subject formation, Derrida also raised such questions as whether we can mark when the event of the Russian revolution went awry, thus scaling up the field of performativity to historical dimensions.

=== Judith Butler ===
{{Main|Gender performativity}}

Philosopher and [[feminist]] theorist [[Judith Butler]] offered a new, more [[Continental philosophy|Continental]] (specifically, [[Michel Foucault|Foucauldian]]) reading of the notion of performativity, which has its roots in [[linguistics]] and [[philosophy of language]]. They describe performativity as "that reiterative power of discourse to produce the phenomena that it regulates and constrains."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Butler |first=Judith |url=https://archive.org/details/bodiesthatmatter00butl |title=Bodies that Matter: On the Discursive Limits of "Sex" |publisher=Routledge |year=1993 |isbn=9780415903660 |location=New York |pages=xii |url-access=registration}}</ref> It is an [[non-essentialism|anti-essentialist]] theory of [[subjectification|subjectivity]] in which a performance of the self is repeated and dependent upon a social audience.  n this way, these unfixed and precarious performances come to have the appearance of substance and continuity.

A key theoretical point that was most radical in regards to theories of subjectivity and performance is that there is no performer behind the performance.  Butler derived this idea from [[Nietzsche|Nietzsche's]] concept of "no doer behind the deed." This is to say that there is no self before the performance of the self, but rather that the performance has constitutive powers. This is how categories of the self for Judith Butler, such as gender, are seen as something that one "does," rather than something one "is." They have largely used this concept in their analysis of [[gender]] development.<ref>This idea was first introduced in 1988 in an issue of ''[[Theatre Journal]]'' (Brickell, 2005).</ref>

Influenced by Austin, Butler argued that [[social construction of gender|gender is socially constructed]] through commonplace [[speech act]]s and [[nonverbal communication]] that are performative, in that they serve to define and maintain [[social identity|identities]].<ref name="Butler1990">{{cite book |last=Butler |first=Judith |title=Gender Trouble |publisher=Routledge |year=1990 |location=New York}}</ref> This view of performativity reverses the idea that a person's identity is the source of their secondary actions (speech, gestures). Instead, it views actions, behaviors, and gestures as both the result of an individual's identity as well as a source that contributes to the formation of one's identity which is continuously being redefined through speech acts and symbolic communication.<ref name="Cavanaugh" /> This view was also influenced by philosophers such as [[Michel Foucault]] and [[Louis Althusser]].<ref>Cultural Studies and Discourse Analysis – Barker & Galasinski</ref>

The concept places emphasis on the manners by which identity is passed or brought to life through discourse. Performative acts are types of authoritative speech. This can only happen and be enforced through the law or norms of the society. These statements, just by speaking them, carry out a certain action and exhibit a certain level of power. Examples of these types of statements are declarations of ownership, baptisms, inaugurations, and legal sentences. Something that is key to performativity is repetition.<ref>{{cite web |last=Halberstam |first=Jack |date=2014-05-16 |title=An audio overview of queer theory in English and Turkish by Jack Halberstam |url=https://archive.org/details/HalberstamQueerTheory-AnkaraTurkey |access-date=29 May 2014}}</ref> The statements are not singular in nature or use and must be used consistently in order to exert power.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hall |first=Stuart |title=Identity: a reader |date=2008 |publisher=Sage Publ. [u.a.] |isbn=978-0-7619-6916-7 |editor-last=Du Gay |editor-first=Paul |edition= |location=London |chapter=Who Needs Identity?}}</ref>

==== Theoretical criticisms ====
Several criticisms have been raised regarding Butler's reading of performativity. The first is that the theory is individual in nature and does not take into consideration such factors as the space within which the performance occurs, the others involved, and how others might see or interpret what they witness. It has also been argued that Butler overlooks the unplanned effects of the performance act and the contingencies surrounding it.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Lloyd |first=Moya |date=April 1999 |title=Performativity, Parody, Politics |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/02632769922050476 |journal=Theory, Culture & Society |language=en |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=195–213 |doi=10.1177/02632769922050476 |issn=0263-2764}}</ref>

Another criticism is that Butler is not clear about the concept of subject.  It has been said that in Butler's writings, the subject sometimes only exists tentatively, sometimes possesses a "real" existence, and other times is socially active.  Also, some observe that the theory might be better suited to literary analysis as opposed to social theory.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Brickell |first=Chris |date=July 2005 |title=Masculinities, Performativity, and Subversion: A Sociological Reappraisal |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1097184X03257515 |journal=Men and Masculinities |language=en |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=24–43 |doi=10.1177/1097184X03257515 |issn=1097-184X}}</ref>

Others criticize Butler for taking [[Ethnomethodology|ethnomethodological]] and [[Symbolic interactionism|symbolic interactionist]] sociological analyses of gender and merely reinventing them in the concept of performativity.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Dunn |first=Robert G. |date=1997-09-01 |title=Self, Identity, and Difference: Mead and the Poststructuralists |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1533-8525.1997.tb00760.x |journal=The Sociological Quarterly |language=en |volume=38 |issue=4 |pages=687–705 |doi=10.1111/j.1533-8525.1997.tb00760.x |issn=0038-0253}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Green |first=Adam Isaiah |date=March 2007 |title=Queer Theory and Sociology: Locating the Subject and the Self in Sexuality Studies |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9558.2007.00296.x |journal=Sociological Theory |language=en |volume=25 |issue=1 |pages=26–45 |doi=10.1111/j.1467-9558.2007.00296.x |issn=0735-2751}}</ref>  For example, A. I. Green<ref name=":1" /> argues that the work of Kessler and McKenna (1978) and West and Zimmerman (1987) builds directly from [[Harold Garfinkel|Garfinkel]] (1967) and [[Erving Goffman|Goffman]] (1959) to deconstruct gender into moments of attribution and iteration in a continual social process of "doing" [[masculinity]] and [[femininity]] in the [[performative interval]].  These latter works are premised on the notion that gender does not precede but, rather, follows from practice, instantiated in micro-interaction.