Andrea Long Chu at PSWIP’s Annual Colloquium
By Kathryn Gruszecki
Andrea Long Chu, writer, critic and doctoral candidate at New York University, was the featured speaker for the annual colloquium of People in Support of Women in Philosophy (PSWIP) on Thursday, March 14, 2019. Filling the room and partially the hallway, Chu read from her soon-to-be-published Verso book, Females.
Females obscures the division between comedy and tragedy, bringing philosophy to life with cultural relevancy and humorous references, while maintaining the seriousness of the content. Drawing from Valarie Salvanas’ SCUM Manifesto, Chu described the ontological state of femaleness. Chu made the claim, “We are all females.”
Chu said, “The worst books are all by females. All the great art heists of the past three hundred years were pulled off by a female working solo or with other females. There are no good female poets, simply because there are no good poets.” Chu went on to say, “Sex between females is no better or worse than any other kind of sex, because no other kind of sex is possible.” She continued, “All rapists are females. Females masterminded the Atlantic slave trade. All the dead are female. All the dying, too.” Chu concluded, “I am female. And you, dear reader, you are female, even—especially—if you are not a woman. Welcome. Sorry.”
Through Chu’s reading, she made two claims: First, everyone is female. Being female is not about gender, sex, or biology, but, ontology. Being female is a state of objectification and everyone experiences this state. Second, everyone hates it. It is a human condition that is constantly suppressed. Even through feminism, she said femaleness is not embraced, but rather, subdued. During the talk, Chu said, “Femaleness is not an anatomical or genetic characteristic of an organism, but rather a universal existential condition, a structure—the one and only structure—of human consciousness. To be is to be female; the two are identical.” She noted, “… human civilization represents a diverse array of attempts to suppress and mitigate femaleness; and that this is in fact the implicit purpose of all human activity, and most of all, that activity we call politics.”
Chu’s reading of Females was followed by responses from Jae Yoon Shin and Robert Cremins, MA philosophy students at NSSR. Jae Yoon Shin, who identifies as trans non-binary, stated, “The fact that I am read as female slips from everyone’s mouth.” Shin continued, “Do I make myself a spectacle by pointing out I am not a woman? Or, do I make myself unseen, unrecognized for who I am by pretending I am not a woman?” Cremins concluded the talk with his response to Chu. Cremins stated, “Chu’s argument deconstructs the naturalness of femininity and masculinity proceeding from sex by making us all into females.” Cremins concluded, “Gender is as much about structuring and imagining the desires of others as it is about identity and performance.”
Chu first book, Females, will be published Oct. 15 by Verso Books. Chu will also be speaking at KJCC NYU by Washington Square Park at 6 p.m. March 28.