UCL Institute of Education Eventful Gender: An Ethnographic Exploration of Gender Knowledge Production at International Academic Conferences Emily Frascatore Henderson A thesis submitted to the UCL Institute of Education for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy January 2016 1 2 Declaration I, Emily Frascatore Henderson, confirm that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Where the information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been indicated in the thesis. This thesis may be made available to the general public for borrowing, photocopying, or consultation without the prior consent of the author. The copyright of the thesis rests with the author. Quotation from the thesis is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. The thesis was completed during a PhD studentship funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), UK. Word count: 99,921. 3 4 Abstract The concept of gender is both celebrated and maligned in academic discourse; gender is credited with opening up or closing down debates, including or excluding concepts and the groups they designate. But how does gender come to mean what it means? This thesis is a deconstructive study of gender, which explores the conceptual negotiations that establish ‘what counts’ as gender. I argue that conceptual work on gender is bound up in political contestations which affect how social identities and processes entailed in thinking about gender are expressed and understood. The study is located in the embodied ‘context’ of international academic knowledge production, where conceptual negotiations cannot rely on familiar understandings of gender. Three national women’s studies association conferences were researched, in the United Kingdom, United States and India. The study used an ethnographic approach which included pre- and post-conference interviews with c.10 participants per conference, and a group meeting; materials collected from the conferences; autoethnographic research on the conferences and my doctoral trajectory. The thesis moves through a cumulative theorisation, which involves four stages of deconstructive analysis derived from Derrida’s oeuvre. The first stage establishes gender as ‘critical concept’; I analyse participants’ conceptual negotiations around what gender is and does. The second stage entails ‘surrounding’ the concept of gender; I use autoethnographic research to explore participants’ and conference delegates’ performative ‘surrounding’ of gender with intersectionality. Thirdly, ‘marking out’ focuses on conference conventions, which are understood in the study as bearing their own performative and citational qualities for the conceptualisation of gender. Finally, in seeking the ‘chink/crevice’ in the concept of gender, I ask if something unexpected can ‘happen’ to gender: an event. The study as a whole theorises ‘eventful gender’ as conceptual work that is inextricable from embodied, situated and mobile analyses of academic practice and knowledge construction and production. 5 6 ‘Du moment qu’on est perdu et qu’on n’a donc plus rien à écrire, à perdre, on écrit.’ (Marguerite Duras, Ecrire, 1993, p. 22) 7 8 Table of contents Abstract.........................................................................................................5 Table of Contents..........................................................................................9 Acknowledgements.....................................................................................11 Abbreviations and notes on the text..........................................................13 Chapter 1 A ‘welcome’.........................................................................17 Definitional politics..............................................................18 Gender in motion..................................................................22 Deconstructive research........................................................27 Looking forward to eventful gender.....................................33 Chapter 2 Happens to gender..............................................................37 Happens to gender................................................................37 Happens to gender when they… ........................................38 Happens to gender when I… .............................................46 Happens to gender here and now..........................................55 Chapter 3 Gender here and now.........................................................59 Gender where and when?.....................................................59 Gender there and then...........................................................62 Gender in space and time......................................................69 Gender here(ness) and now(ness).........................................80 Chapter 4 Unfixing research................................................................93 Unfixing the research narrative............................................94 Unfixing how......................................................................101 Unfixing where and when...................................................109 Unfixing whom and what...................................................122 Chapter 5 Producing and negotiating the act of conceptualisation: gender as ‘critical concept’.............................................133 ‘Critical concept’................................................................133 Theorising the concept of gender........................................135 9 Producing the act of conceptualisation...............................141 Negotiating the act of conceptualisation.............................149 Chapter 6 Conceptual performativity: ‘surrounding’ gender with ‘names addressed from elsewhere’.................................169 ‘Surrounding’......................................................................169 Conceptual performativity and ‘names addressed from elsewhere’...............................................................184 Conceptual performativity and the citationality of ‘names addressed from elsewhere’.....................................192 Chapter 7 Appropriate circumstances: ‘marking out’ the performative conditions of conceptualisation................207 ‘Marking out’ appropriate circumstances...........................207 Producing conference ‘circumstances’...............................211 ‘Circumstances’ producing conferences.............................217 Conference ‘circumstances’ and conceptualisation............228 Chapter 8 Eventful gender: en/closure – ‘chink/crevice’ – en/closure...........................................................................245 From en/closure to ‘chink/crevice’ and back again............245 Eventful gender...................................................................255 Chapter 9 En/closing remarks...........................................................293 Appendices................................................................................................301 Appendix 1: Information for research participants.............301 Appendix 2: Interview guide..............................................303 Appendix 3: Conference reflection prompts for participants..............................................................304 Appendix 4: Interview dates...............................................305 References..................................................................................................307 10 Acknowledgements Thank you Elaine Unterhalter and Jenny Parkes for supporting and guiding me while also giving me your trust and the freedom to explore. You have provided a wonderful environment for me to flourish. I have learned so much from you both – in my work, of course, but, perhaps more importantly, in how to teach, supervise, and how to go about being the kind of feminist academic I hope to be. Annette Braun, Claudia Lapping, Charley Nussey, and Jenny Parkes, thank you for the ‘Feminisms, Gender and Sexuality’ seminar series, which provided such an important space of community and thinking for me, and thanks to all of you individually for the different ways we have worked together, all of which have been so rewarding. Thank you to Emma Jones and Sean Curran for the queer. And thank you to the feminist, queer and gender scholars at IOE and beyond, who have inspired me so much. Thank you to the fellow PhD students who have kept me company at various points on our respective journeys: Charley Nussey, Z Nicolazzo, Jamie Burford, Talita Calitz, Thandi Lewin, Ketaki Chowkhani, Euan Auld. I have been lucky to be part of your journeys, and to have you with me in mine. Thank you also to Rosie Peppin Vaughan, Maria do Mar Pereira and Genine Hook, who shared their experiences with me and gave me invaluable advice when it mattered most. Thank you to Andy Tolmie and Alison Freeman at the Bloomsbury Doctoral Training Centre for all your help and support. Dhanyavaad to Anchal Verma, my wonderful Hindi teacher, who made me laugh every single Thursday morning, come what may. Thank you to Vincent for introducing me to FG Radio, which proved bizarrely motivational in the early stages of writing, and, as those of you who have been close to me know only too well, I also owe Céline Dion a large thank you for being my talismanic soundtrack in the later stages. 11 Thank you to the 27 participants who shared their time and thoughts with me even in all the busyness that surrounds attending conferences. My concept of gender will never be the same