In the two prefaces, Butler gives an overview of her aim and method of

investigation. She states she will use the method of critical genealogy—tracing the
history of thought on a subject—to discover the ways in which the identity
categories of sex and gender, as well as the subject itself, are constituted
through discourse. She also reveals how her own experiences gave rise to the
inquiry that is Gender Trouble, and she speaks to the ways that the ideas in the
text have been developed, criticized, and implemented since its publication.

Part 1: Subjects of Sex/Gender/Desire

Butler opens her investigation by stating that the problem of defining the category
of "women" is threatening to undermine feminism from within. Besides the issue of
defining "women," the subject for which it seeks political representation, feminism
is also troubled by defining the nature of the subject itself. She introduces the
idea of the heterosexual matrix, an alternate term for what is often referred to as
patriarchy. Butler explores the ways that gender and sexuality are constructed and
regulated by the norms of compulsory heterosexuality. Compulsory heterosexuality
defines the discourse around sex and gender. Discourses give rise to, enforce, and
limit the possibilities of gender configuration, while presenting these
configurations as natural or authentic states. She also explores the perspective
that social discourse is phallogocentric—it creates meaning through a linguistic
"signifying economy" that privileges the masculine. The linguistic "signifying
economy" is the process of the creation and usage of words, whose function is to
represent or signify ideas, concepts, and things. Because something can only be
described and communicated through language, the feminine experience is
misrepresented, hidden, discounted, or even erased from discourse when there exist
no words that can be used to adequately describe it. Butler, following the claims
of Luce Irigaray (b. 1932), suggests this is in fact the case.

Part 2: Prohibition, Psychoanalysis, and the Production of the Heterosexual Matrix

Butler begins Part 2 with a caution against employing "origin" narratives,
sometimes used to demonstrate that the gender hierarchy is historical and
contingent rather than natural. These narratives are compromised because they are
structured by the biases of the present. Butler also rejects the nature/culture
distinction of structuralist anthropology and its corollary, which holds that sex
is natural and gender is cultural.

Next, Butler focuses on structural anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss's (1908–2009)

theory of universal kinship structure and its attendant rules, the law of exogamy—
marrying outside of one's group—and the repressive taboos against incest and
homosexuality. She moves to psychoanalyst and philosopher Jacques Lacan's (1901–81)
theory of the incest taboo as the mechanism by which the speaking subject comes
into existence. This prohibition against incestuous relations with the mother
creates the first separation between mother and child. The child, thus frustrated,
is moved to express their dissatisfaction through speech, an act that initiates the
child's being as a separate subject. Lacan's account of masquerade, the masking
that is the essence of femininity, is presented along with psychoanalyst Joan
Riviere's (1883–1962) take on masquerade. Like Lacan and Lévi-Strauss,
psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) posited that the incest taboo creates
identity, but his account turns on the mechanism of melancholic identification.

All three accounts of identity formation are based on descriptions of a

prediscursive natural state. Butler rejects them, as it is impossible to make
claims about what lies beyond discourse from within it. She then examines these
accounts to see if an alternate interpretation can account for the subversive and
discontinuous gender configurations characteristic of gay and lesbian identities.

After exploring how the body itself is a "naturalized" product of discourse, Butler
concludes with Foucault's critique of the repressive incest taboo. In forbidding
desire, the taboo gives rise to what it forbids. The nature of juridical (relating
to a judge or the law) power is to generate what it prohibits. Therefore, the
prohibitive law that discursively creates the heterosexual configuration of sex,
gender, and desire is also capable of creating alternative "forbidden"
configurations of these identity elements.

Part 3: Subversive Bodily Acts

Butler critiques Julia Kristeva's (b. 1941) claims about the construction of
identity and the subversion of the paternal law through the semiotic—the study of
language as signs. Subversion of the paternal law, which regulates all discourse,
is accomplished when one bypasses it by accessing the semiotic—a realm that exists
prior to and outside of discourse—where language connects sound to sense, and
multiple meanings proliferate. Kristeva's analysis is founded on the idea of the
maternal body and the multiplicity of drives existing prior to discourse.

Next, Butler considers the existence of persons whose physical and genetic features
do not fit neatly into the sex binary. Such cases make the idea of sex and gender
unintelligible, thereby exposing them as dully constructed categories. Butler then
explores feminist author and theorist Monique Wittig's (1935–2003) conception of
language as the means by which the body is violently fragmented into the artificial
category of sex. Butler disagrees with Wittig's assertion that the de-gendering of
language will dissolve sex.

Subversion of heterosexist discourse cannot be accomplished by the institution of a

new, counter-discourse. Instead, the task is to reveal the hidden functioning of
this discourse, exposing how it creates and enforces identity within the binary
categories of heterosexuality. Using Foucault's account of history as "corporeal
destruction" and Kristeva's conception of the abjection (low, looked-down upon
state) that distinguishes self from other, Butler describes how the illusion of an
internal identity is constructed on the body's surface.

The part closes with Butler's famous theory of gender performativity. This theory
holds that gender is constituted in the performance of repeated acts. This
repetition, regulated by cultural norms, creates the illusion of internal gender
identity. The impossibility of complying fully with cultural gender norms
invariably gives rise to acts that are discontinuous with the norm. Therein lies
the potential for a repetition that will use mimic to overthrow the gender binary,
exposing the concepts of gender and authenticity as fabrications of discourse. An
example of such parodic repetition is the performance of drag, which confuses and
exposes as illusory the categories of masculine and feminine, interior and
exterior, and authentic and imitative.

Conclusion: From Parody to Politics

In the conclusion, Butler rejects the validity of identity politics. Identity is an
unstable foundation for political action, because the subject has no solid
existence apart from the acts it performs repeatedly. Parodic practices of
repetition illustrate this. Such practices also expose the fictitious nature of
gender categories. Butler's investigations throughout the text have radical
implications. Her findings suggest the possibility of new gender configurations as
well as an entirely new configuration for politics itself.