gaga, gender, performativity, and identity

Judith Butler coined the phrase "gender performativity," and I can confidently bet all of my net-worth on the assumption that she'd never in a million years predict that someone like Lady Gaga could even begin to encapsulate its many implications.  Primarily, as I understand it, gender performativity refers to the illusion of gender.  Gender is not something real.  Gender, in fact, is an idea that is constantly revised over time, over culture, over location, etc.  Because gender is not inherent, it is constantly performed by those who observe it.  In this way, gender is often tied to our genitalia, at least that's the way traditional society likes it, as our society generally combines the idea of sex and gender to mean the same thing.  In reality, this is not so much the case.

The performance aspect is defined as such:  we are all complicit in this construction of gender, as we perform our understanding of our gender (and the expectations that we observe of us) all the time.  We're always performing in our gender, we're always aware of the consequences that await if we break gender norms, and we're very rarely cognizant of this performance.  In other words, gender is not something we are born with - it is something we learn along the way.  And while I'm not entirely sure Judith Butler endorses or even makes this point, the exciting part about gender performativity is that if gender is, in fact, a performance, as soon as one becomes aware of that, they are empowered to revise and construct their gender as such.  Which I think is pretty fucking cool.

Lady Gaga, in my eyes, is one such person who has done more to showcase gender and performativity on a mainstream, commercial level than others before her.  Let's begin by defining what "Lady Gaga" is: a pop star.  The expectations on her in being this require her to a) sell records; b) look beautiful; c) have longevity - to sell more records.  More than that, Lady Gaga is doing more to challenge any expectations on her as a pop star and as a woman than any pop star in recent memory.

First of all, she's constructed an entire identity for herself.  Lady Gaga was not born Lady Gaga.  She was born someone else, and perhaps as a buffer, perhaps as a defense mechanism, perhaps as a creative outlet, or perhaps because of a devotion to an idea, she created a persona which in turn became a personality.  She left behind Stefani, and most things that accompanied Stefani (minus her family), and became Gaga.  In this act, she freed herself of "normalcy" and opted for a life of fame.

This was a brilliant move.  Lady Gaga would never be subject to the US Weekly feature "Stars: They're Just Like Us" photos of celebrities pumping their own gas, or doing things that normal human beings do.  Lady Gaga would not be caught dead looking "just like us," which is part of the reason why her love for couture and outrageous fashion serve her well in separating her from the mainstream.  Lady Gaga, in one person, shouldered all of the adoring/loathing public's expectations of a celebrity to be otherworldly, superhuman, magical, mysterious, and not-of-our-kind.  In many ways, she is immune to our criticism and gossip, because she is truly not on our level.  It is harder to believe that she is a regular Joe Schmo, because we've barely ever seen her as that.  It takes the fun out of talking shit about something you can't touch.

Lady Gaga became a 24/7 performance.  Gender is a 24/7 performance.  And this is how the idea of Lady Gaga captures the idea of gender performativity.  "Lady Gaga, the person" is a devotion to performance of an idea, as is gender.  Furthermore, she routinely challenges what it means to be a female, what it means to be a pop star, and what it means to be both.

Of course, there are the rumors of her penis.  I don't find it even the least bit surprising that a woman with the balls that Gaga has is rumored to be hiding a penis.  Rather than issuing a statement, or officially confirming one way or another, she continues to play with the public's perception of her.  She is not conventionally beautiful, which as a statement, in and of itself points to the very problem of the idea of beauty and also represents how powerful having a woman like her to confront beauty norms on a worldwide level is.  She regularly distorts and disfigures herself while simultaneously juxtaposing the ugly with the beautiful, the dirty with the rich.  She took the ultra-tan Paris Hilton image and pushed it to it's limits.  She covered herself messily in powder.  She lifted her shoulders high enough to give the illusion of a hunchback.  She made herself so thin that her spine poked out of her back.  Each and every day, she wears a different look - some beautiful, some grotesque, none expected.

Say what you will about Lady Gaga, and I'm not even quite so sure that when she abandoned her former identity that she had any idea it would have such implications, but she provides an incredibly mainstream, easy-to-swallow example of identity construction, and that can only provide positivity for the gaggles of youth going gaga over her.  To be a living, breathing, example of the freedom that identity construction and ownership represents and the success it can bring is sending a huge message to youth who are inundated with more messages than ever encouraging conformity.

The very little that I've studied about Butler and her idea of gender performativity made me feel empowered. Empowered in the way that I understood gender not as something I necessarily needed to abide by, but as something that I performed.  In a way, this gave me validation that I wasn't letting anyone, or any timeless, inherent institution down - in fact, I was shaping the future idea of my gender through my construction of my identity.  Gender, as we know it, is only an image.  It's an image we're persistently projecting onto others in hopes that they believe the lie.  I think Gaga gets this.  After all, she does have this to say about the construction of our identities:

"So, the real truth about lady gaga fans lies in this sentiment: They are Kings. They are the Queens. They write the history of the kingdom, while I am something of a devoted Jester.

It is in the theory of perception that we have established our bond. Or, the lie, I should say, for which we kill. We are nothing without our image. Without our projection. Without the spiritual hologram of who we percieve ourselves to be, or to become rather, in the future."