Language, Women and the Duality of Discourse in Rousseau's Political Thought

Abstract

Since the 18th century, Rousseau has been often credited with egalitarian and liberal views worldwide; however, his potent pen in shaping ideas has led to women’s extreme suppression. It seems that Rousseau had been suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder to the extent that through one of his personality states he leads women to utter subservience, and through the other one he gives them an aura of holiness. The present paper depicts such dualities through the analysis of Rousseau’s three books, Emile, Social Contract and Confessions. In Emile, women are pictured as subservient to men. In the Social Contract, the most important book by Rousseau and an early work on the discourse of equality in the modern era, women are largely ignored, while in Confessions they are worshipped. In order to analyze and interpret these three perennial works, the author-based hermeneutic approach of Quentin Skinner was utilized in an attempt to unpick Rousseau’s intentions. Moreover, the theoretical and conceptual categorization of Luce Irigaray, the post-modern feminist who believes that the method of oppression of women by men on women is used in elaborating Rousseau’s unfair judgments. In this interdisciplinary study of women, Rousseau’s discourse and political thought on gender inequality are intermingled. In short, under the influence of psychological complexities, Rousseau gives women a subservient, far-from-human status through his use of language.

Keywords

• rousseau
• women
• skinner
• post-modern feminism
• irigaray