Women and the Deployment of Sexuality in Nineteenth-Century Spain

The present study takes as its point of departure the premise that all conceptions of the material body and one's biological sex are cultural and linguistic constructs rather than material realities.' While many people are generally willing to concede that gender roles are determined by culture, the idea that one s understanding of the material body and its functions can also be shaped by such factors seems rather fanciful at first glance. After all, language and culture cannot alter physical reality. Judith Buder addresses precisely this issue in her book Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex. According to Butler, to claim that sex is a social and linguistic construct is not to deny the existence of a material body outside of language, but rather it is to recognize that there is no understanding of that body which is not in some way a construct of the knowledge and culture that interpret it. In other words, "there is no reference to a pure body which is not at the same time a further formation of that body" (Butler 10).