So after a week of shopping classes I’ve decided to go for a Foucault seminar in the performance studies department, not only because of the chance to get to move through his entire body of work, but also because I want to move away from the dude-iness in my own department. I have recently sort of figured out my thesis topic and it has to do with feminism, activism, aesthetics and teen identity. One teacher gave me positive feedback, but his dude-iness probably cancels out his advice (this is a person who thought it was a pity that Lisbeth Salander reacted with such violence to systematic abuse, and argued that the story would’ve been better if she had run for office and created legislation that would help women. At the time I didn’t have a good response, and the conversation has been ringing in my head, because of course he, a white, straight man from a privileged country, can’t see the value of being able to rage against your oppressor - when I saw The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo in the theatre, several women clapped and cheered as Lisbeth was tattooing Bjurman).

So maybe my idea is only solid in my male dominated department, where no one really gets feminist or queer theory? Maybe it will fail to get me into the kind of Phd program I want, and instead have me stuck in communications-level gender theory, which is basically “men and women are treated differently, the end.” Is it possible to practice feminist theory in a department whose focus isn’t that? My initial thought behind breaching out of my own theoretical comfort zone (gender studies) was to get some of that ‘neutral’ knowledge and bring my own feminist stance into it, but what if I end up just in the middle for ever? What if I have to explain the most basic component over and over again? I do understand the value of making academic discourse available and understandable to non-academics (which the faculty I know in my department definitely prioritize), but what if that means never to be able to advance intellectually?

One of my other classes is a Lacan/Derrida seminar, heavily centered around psychoanalysis. In it is this guy who is a true Lacan buff, and who’s deeply into Hegel and OG philosophy stuff, and granted, really smart. When I told him I would be taking a Foucault seminar he said “but you can’t read Foucault and Lacan at the same time, there was a point in Foucault’s career when he completely denounced psychoanalysis.” And I’m like really? So either it’s intellectual masturbation or complete denouncement of theory? Also, I think I saw a disapproving flinch in his face when I talked about my thesis project, which was probably me, projecting the patriarchal devaluing of all things feminist, feminine and girl centered onto this one guy. But still, there are just too many white, straight men in my professional life and I cant motivate why I should give them the benefit of the doubt.