Luce irigaray Also available in English THIS SEX WHICH IS NOT ONE by the same authe An Ethics of Sexual Difference Speculum of the Other Woman Translated by CATHERINE POrter with CAROLYN BURKE ORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS York
Contents The publisher gratefully acknowledges the Financial assistance of the 1. The Looking Glass, from the Other Side 9 Originally published in French under the title Ce Sexe qui n'en est pa Copyright 0 1977 by Editions de minuit 2. This Sex Which Is Not One English translation copyright e 1985 by Cornell University All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review. this book, 3. Psychoanalytic Theory: Another Look be reproduced in any form without permission address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850. 4. The Power of Discourse and the Subordination of the Feminine First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 1985 5. Cosi Fan Tutti 点 Printed in the United States of America ibrary of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 6. The"Mechanics""of Fluids ues 15533338423013 8. Women on the Market ISBN 0-8014-9331-5(pbk.: alk. paper) Cornell University Press strives entally responsible suppliers and materiak to among based, low-VOC inks, and acid-free pape composed of nonwood fibers. Books that bear( 10.Frenchwomen, Stop Trying 198 otmcil) use paper taken fio forests that Have highest standards for environmental and social responsibility. For further information, visit 11. When Our Lips Speak Together 205 Paperback printing 15 14 13 12 10987 Publisher's Note and Notes on Selected Terms
Women on the market Are men all equally desirable? Do women have no tendency toward polygamy? The good anthropologist does not rai questions. A fortiori: why are men not objects of exchange among women? It is because womens bodies-through their de for the condition Women on the market making social life and culture possible, although they remain an unknown"infrastructure"of the elaboration of that social life The society we know, our own culture, is based upon the and culture. The exploitation of the matter that has been sexu- exchange of women. Without the exchange of women, we are alized female is so integral a part of our sociocultural horizon told, we would fall back into the anarchy (?)of the natural that there is no way to interpret it except within this horizon. world, the randomness(? )of the animal kingdom. The passage ito the social order, into the symbolic order, into order as In still other words: all the systems of exchange that or such, is assured by the fact that men, or groups of men, circu- triarchal societies and all the modalities of productive work late women among themselves, according to a rule known as that are recognized, valued, and rewarded in these societies are the incest taboo mens business. The production of women, signs, and com- Whatever familial form this prohibition may take in a giver modities is always referred back to men(when a man buys state of society, its signification has a much br oader impact girl, he"pays"the father or the brother, not the mother..) assures the foundation of the economic, social, and cultural and they always pass from one man to another, from one group order that has been ours for centuries f men to another. The work force is thus always assumed to be Why exchange women? Because they are "scarce[commod- masculine, and" products"are objects to be used, objects of ities]., essential to the life of the group, "the anthropologist transaction among men alone. tells us. 'Why this characteristic of scarcity, given the biological equilibrium between male and female births? Because the"deep Which r t the possibility of our social life, of our polygamous tenden culture. d e on a ho(m)mo-sexual monopoly? The law makes the number of available women seem insufficient. Let us that order ety is the exclusive valorization of men's add that, even if there were as many women as men, these needs/desires, UI CHanges among men. What the anthropolo- women would not all be equally desirable. and that, by gist calls the passage from nature to culture thus amounts to the definit the most desirable women must form a institution of the reign of hom (m)o-sexuality. Not in an"im- mediate” practice, but in its“ social” mediation. From this This text was originally published as"Le marche des femmes, "in Sessualita point on, patriarchal societies might be interpreted as societies functioning in the mode of "semblance. "The value of sym- ship(Les Structures bolic and imaginary production superimposed upon, and elementaires de la parente, 1949, rev. 1967), trans. James Harle Bell, John Rich- even substituted for, the value of relations of mater ard von Sturmer, and Rodney Needham(Boston, 1969), p and p In this new matrix of History, in which man begets man as 171
Women on the market ly desirable? Do women have no ter toward polygamy? The good anthropologist does not raise such 8 questions. A fortiori: why are men not objects of exchange among women? It is because womens bodies-through their Women on the market use,consumption,and circulation--provide for the condition making social life and culture possible, although they remain an unknown"infrastructure"of the elaboration of that social life The society we know, our own culture, is based upon the and culture. The exploitation of the matter that has been sexu- exchange of women. Without the exchange of women, we are alized female is so integral a part of our sociocultural horizon old, we would fall back into the anarchy (?)of the natural hat there is no way to interpret it except within this horizon world, the randomness (?)of the animal kingdom. The passage to the social order, into the symbolic order, into order as In still other words: all the systems of exchange that organize such, is assured by the fact that men, or groups of men, circu- patriarchal societies and all the modalities of productive work te women among themselves, according to a rule known as that are recognized, valued, and rewarded in these societies the incest taboo men's business. The production of women, signs, and com- Whatever familial form this prohibition may take in a given modities is always referred back to men(when a man buys a state of society, its signification has a much broader impact. It girl, he"pays"the father or the brother, not the mother... ), assures the foundation of the economic. social. and cultural and they always pass from one man to another, from one group order that has been ours for centuries of men to another. The work force is thus always assumed to be Why exchange women? Because they are"scarce [com masculine, and"products"are objects to be used, objects of sential to the life of the group, " the anthrop transaction among men alone. lls us. Why this characteristic of scarcity, given the bio equilibrium between male and female births? Because the"deep Which means that the possibility of our social life, of our polygamous tendency, which exists among all men, always culture, depends upon a ho(m)mo-sexual monopoly? The law makes the number of available women seem insufficient. Let us that orders our society is the exclusive valor add that, even if there were as many women as m needs/desires, of exchanges among men. What the anthropolo- women would not all be equally desirable. . and that, by gist calls the passage from nature to culture thus amounts to the definition the most desirable women must forrm a Institution of the reign of hom(m)o-sexuality. Not in an"im minority. 2 mediate"practice, but in its"social"mediation. From this This text was originally published as"Le marche des femmes, ""in int on, patriarchal societies might be interpreted as societies pm functioning in the me e politica,(Milan: Felcrineli, 1978 deof“ semblance:” The value of sym Imaginary productions n Sturmer, and Rodney Needham 1969),p.36. even substituted for, the value of relations of material, natural, and corporal (re) roduction In this which 171
This Sex Which Is Not One Women on the market his own likeness, wives, daughters, and sisters have value only in that they serve as the possibility of, and potential benefit in ganization of such societies, and the operation of the symbolic relations among men. The use of and traffic in wormen subtend system on which this organization is based-a symbolic system and uphold the reign of masculine hom(m)o-sexuality, even whose instrument and representative is the proper name: the while they maintain that hom(m)o-sexuality in speculations, name of the father, the name of God--contain in a nuclear form mirror games, identifications, and more or less rivalrous appro- the developments that Marx defines as characteristic of a cap priations, which defer its real practice. Reigning italist regime: the submission of "nature"to a "labor" on the although prohibited in practice, hom(m)o-sexuality is played part of men who thus constitute"nature"as use value and out through the bodies of women, matter, or sign, and hetero- exchange value; the division of labor among private producer Whose"sociocultural endogamy excludes the, o e and hetero- exuality has been up to now just an alibi for the smooth work- owners who exchange their women-commodities among gs of mans relations with himself, of relati themselves, but also among producers and exploiters or ex- ploitees of the social order; the standardization of women ac that other, so foreign to the social order: woman. Exogamy cording to proper names that determine their equivalences; a doubtless requires that one leave one's family, tribe, or clan, in tendency to accumulate wealth, that is, a tendency for the rep order to make alliances. All the same, it does not tolerate mar- resentatives of the most"proper"names-the leaders-to cap riage with populations that are too far away, too far removed italie more women than the others; a progression of the social from the prevailing cultural rules.A cultural endogamy work of the symbolic toward greater and greater abstraction would thus forbid commerce with women. Men make com- and so forth merce of them, but they do not enter into any exchanges with To be sure, the means of production have evolved, new tech them. Is this perhaps all the more true because exogamy is an niques have been developed, but it does seem that as soon as the economic issue, perhaps even subtends economy as such? The father-man was assured of his reproductive power and had exchange of women as goods accompanies and stimulates marked his products with his name, that is, from the very anges of other "wealth"among of men. The econo- origin of private property and the patriarchal family, social ex- my-in both the narrow and the broad sense-that is in place in ploitation occurred. In other words, all the social regimes of our societies thus requires that women lend themselves to alie History"are based upon the exploitation of one"class"of ation in consumption, and to exchanges in which they do not producers,namely, women. Whose reproductive use value(re- articipate, and that men be exempt from being used and circu- productive of children and of the labor force)and whose con- lated like commodities stitution as exchange value underwrite the symbolic order as such, without any compensation in kind going to them for that work. For such sation would imply a double system of exchange, that is, a shattering of the monopolization of the proper name(and of what it signifies as appropriative power) Marx's analysis of commodities as the elementary form of capitalist wealth can thus be understood as an interpretation of Thus the social body would be redistributed into prodr subjects no longer functioning as commodities because 173