Meltdown Bhāṣya: Verse 1.1.1 (Part 8)

Vulvocosmic dissolution: a materialist śāktism - Part 2: Becoming woman: the gendering of philosophy & the motor of the cosmic economy.

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Becoming woman: the gendering of philosophy & the motor of the cosmic economy

In his discourse on Nietzsche in the first chapter of TFA Land (1992b) makes much use of what we may term ‘gendered and gendering language’ to characterize the various philosophical doctrines he discusses. Specifically, he disparages the concept of ‘masculinity’ while elevating ‘becoming woman’, likely as a result of his reading of D&G and their emphasis on flows. Masculinity is seen as accumulating, solidifying, and repressing — perhaps not unlike Nietzsche’s idea of the ‘Apollonian’ as described in his work The Birth of Tragedy. Femininity is less a coherent or concrete object in Land’s reading as it seems to be more a process of ‘becoming’. Understanding Land’s use of gendered language is integral to even begin to slide into its shadowy depths. Let us first mark each time he uses this language before we analyze and critique it.

1. The first usage of ‘gendered and gendering language’ by Land (1995b) is in his explanation of how Derrida’s reading of Nietzsche ‘feminizes’ and ‘lesbianizes’ the latter’s work, something which stands in stark contrast to Heidegger’s masculinist reading of the same. No doubt it must sound odd that there could be a ‘feminine’ and ‘lesbian’ reading of such a stereotypically masculine vitalist thinker, but as Land explains: