Ideology is Dead, Long Live Idea(l)s: Feminist Linguistics, Worldings and Non-linear Grammars

Abstract

Ideology is a fairly elusive term with broad usage from politics to media to literary studies and critical discourse, often having polarizing meanings. More often than not, however,  it carries a negative connotation, likely due to conflations with other concepts, such as doctrine, dogma or agendas. Theorists like James H. Kavanagh and Terry Eagleton analyze its many facets, look into its rise and demise in critical theory and offer comprehensive overviews of its reception and applicability to today’s society. This paper will look into one facet in particular, namely the performative aspect of ideology introduced by Kavanagh, which “has the function of producing an obvious ‘reality’ that social subjects can assume and accept, precisely as if it had not been socially produced and did not need to be ‘known’ at all” (Critical Terms for Literary Study, “Ideology” 311). Following the performative aspect, we will look closely into Judith Butler’s concept of gender as performance, combining it with ideological thought, as well as other approaches to gender and language by critics such as Deborah Cameron, Robin Lakoff and Donna Haraway establishing a framework that looks at all three aspects - ideology, language, gender - as a possible identity forming intersection, thus language itself may be seen as (per)formative, not merely a linear production of utterances.  

To help contextualize and conceptualize this framework, the paper will make use of Suzette Haden Elgin’s Native Tongue world and Ted Chiang’s The Story of Your Life approaches to language, including Haraway’s concept of worlding as not just world building but world shaping which invites a reshaping of perception: language itself ceases to be merely expressive and becomes ontological. Coupling both these speculative and metaphorical frameworks with the theoretical base above, we will attempt to step away from a dogmatic approach to either aspect and explore their worlding potential.