Creation of Identity in Proust and Genet

由于朱迪思·巴特勒在性别方面的工作，近年来在身份认同方面取得了很大进展。但是，如果同一性是表现出来的，而不是天生的，那么这种表现的某些部分就是有意的。然而，巴特勒并没有解释我们在创造我们的“自我”时有多少能动性，也没有根据今天对性别和性的粗略讨论来解决意向性的含义。我的研究集中在比较马塞尔·普鲁斯特和让·热内的作品，以讨论阅读这两位20世纪法国文学巨匠的作品，可能会揭示这种意向性。GillesDeleuze在Proust and Signs中写道，“在现实中，差异和声誉是本质上的两种创造力，不可分割且相互关联，”在巴特勒之前几十年，将差异和重复视为身份构建的关键力量。我关注的是两位作者是如何在他们的角色的多元和有时相互矛盾的表演中暗示某种程度的能动性的。令人惊讶的是，迄今为止，很少有人对两位作者进行持续的比较。我的项目不仅在这方面是独一无二的，而且我将结合Vanessa Ewan的工作，她是英国最重要的运动教练之一，我在Central接受过培训，讨论在表演环境中有意识地构建角色。这种实践和理论的结合将导致对普鲁斯特的戏剧描述和热内的dragperformance的描述（以及他的实际戏剧）的新评估，以及这对我们在非戏剧背景下有意识（或半意识）的身份建构的启示

Thanks to Judith Butler's work on gender, much has been made in recent years of identityas performance. But if identity is performed rather than innate, it follows that some partof that performance is intentional. Yet Butler does not explain how much agency we havein the creation of our 'selves' or address the implications of intentionality in light of today'scaustic discussion of gender and sexuality. My research focuses on comparing the workof Marcel Proust and Jean Genet to discuss what reading these two giants of 20thcentury French literature together might reveal about this very intentionality. GillesDeleuze writes in Proust and Signs, "In reality, difference and reputation are the twocreative forces of essence, inseparable and interrelated," positing difference andrepetition as key forces of identity construction decades before Butler. I focus on howboth authors suggest a certain level of agency in their characters' plural and sometimescontradictory performances. Surprisingly, there have been few sustained comparisons ofthe two authors to date. My project is unique not only in this respect, but also in that I willbe incorporating the work of Vanessa Ewan, one of the foremost movement instructors inthe UK, with whom I trained at Central to discuss intentional construction of character in aperformance context. This practical and theoretical combination will lead to a newassessment of Proust's descriptions of the theatre and Genet's description of dragperformance (as well as his actual plays) and what this suggests about our conscious (orsemi-conscious) construction of identity in a non-theatrical context