Hypatia, Inc.

"Imperfect Discretion": Interventions into the History of Philosophy by Twentieth-Century French Women Philosophers Author(s): Penelope Deutscher Reviewed work(s): Source: Hypatia, Vol. 15, No. 2, Going Australian: Reconfiguring Feminism and Philosophy (Spring, 2000), pp. 160-180 Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of Hypatia, Inc. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3810662 . Accessed: 13/02/2012 05:51
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Discretion": "Imperfect Interventions the History into of by Philosophy Twentieth-Century French WomenPhilosophers
PENELOPE DEUTSCHER

as How mightwe locateoriginality emerging workof from withinthe "discrete" in with Becausemanywomenhaveengaged philosophy forms(includcommentary? their work seenas properly that frombeing "original,"this ingcommentary) preclude Frenchwomen questionis a feministissue. Via the workof selectedcontemporary the can the philosophers, authorshowshow commentary reconfigure philosophical in tradition innovative ways, as well as in ways thatchangewhatcountsas philoinnovation. sophical

... there is one area where women today have completely free access-that of classic works on the history of philosophy. At the moment all of us remain more or less imprisonedin of the phantasmagoria the commentary-the commentary between the alternativesof violation and fidelity. trapped When what bearsthe name of commentaryhas been decoded, and the phantasmagorical representationof the has been dismantled, it will perhapsbe possible activity to stop assigningsuch a "subordinate" position to women in the distributionof theoretical tasks. (Michele Le Doeuff,"LongHair, Short Ideas"[1989]) At a 1998 conference honoring the work of Clemence Ramnoux, an eminent classicist mocked the attitudes he once held as a young man. One day, earlyin his career,Ramnouxhad appearedat a seminarhe attended:"Oneday,
Hypatia vol. 15, no. 2 (Spring 2000) by Penelope Deutscher

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we saw a lady, that's how I saw her.""What'sshe doing here?"... "I said to myself,it'sbizarre... I said, it'sone of these ladies interestedin the Greekswho has come to follow along a bit" (Verant 1998).' 1997 saw the death of Ramnoux, a specialist in pre-Socraticphilosophy, and the author of at least six works in the area (see Ramnoux 1959a, 1959b, 1959c, 1970, 1983, 1989). She, Simone Petrement, and, one year later, Simone Weil were the firstthree women admittedto the philosophyprogram of one of France'smost prestigiouseducation institutions, the Ecole Normale Superieure,rue d'Ulm, between 1927 and 1928. Of these figures,only Ramnoux took a post in a French universitydepartmentand remainedin the university system throughout her career in addition to publishing a substantial corpus. Justas happened in 1995 after the death of SarahKofman,a one-day "homage"to Ramnoux was organizedby the College Interationale de Philosophie in Parison January17, 1998. The conference organizerdescribedher as having markedFrench philosophical life profoundly-although, she added, discretely.Introducingthe colloquium, the then Presidentof the College referredto the importanceof this very "discrete" body of work.Throughoutthe conference presentations,Ramnoux'sdiscretionwas again recalled.The reminiscences of a philosopher of Ramnoux'sgeneration were similarlyrespectful. Ramnoux, we learnt again, had always been "d'uneparfaitediscretion"; she hadn't placed a high value on herself;she had been adaptable,accommodating.2 Fromthe floor,an audience membercountered this descriptionby suggesting that Ramnoux'sposition had been that of a "face-a-faceaux hommes," someone whose work was undertaken in a masculine philosophical milieu, sometimes indifferent,sometimes hostile.3 What did one learn about Ramnoux that day?Largelybiographicalinformation and anecdotes. She had been an intellectuallyveryopen thinker,a student of Gaston Bachelard,a readerof Sigmund Freud;various speakersdescribedher writingas influencedby Freud,JacquesLacan,Friedrich Nietzsche, structuralism, phenomenology,and later by Jean-Fran9ois Lyotardand Gilles Deleuze. As a scholar of the pre-Socratics,she had cultivated an intriguingor sounding methodology describedas a pluri-disciplinary "two-foldor double formof reading."4 Among the anecdotes, that she once advisedone of her women studentsto generateas many hypothesesas one possiblycould. Even if most of them were wrong, one or two would be right. Almost all the male scholarswho spoke respectfullyabout her work made elliptic referencesto the reservesone had about aspects of her methodology. Some praisedher fordiscourCertainlyno one spokeas a Ramnouxspecialist.5 aging fidelity and followers. But for those who agreedthat one could not endorseeclectic aspectsof her methodology (the pluridisciplinarity, appealto the Freud),she was a genial figure,but an intellectual who had failed to inspirea strong following.

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The respect for Ramnoux and her discretion was distancing, neutralizing, a failure to engage seriouslywith her work. She was not seen as an original philosopher,this student of Bachelardwho incorporatedpoetry,Freudianpsychoanalysis, and structuralisminto her multiple studies of pre-Socraticsand Ancient Greek myth, despite the fact that one was repeatedlytold how unorthodox she had been as a commentator.The forgettingof Ramnouxwas staged right there at her own commemorativehomage.6 To returnto those three women admittedto the Ecole Normale after 1927, Weil is barely studied, although Petrement produced a study of Weil in addition to her study of the Gnostics.7 Ramnoux was apparentlytoo eclectic. Like the very different and comparativelyindiscrete Sarah Kofman,8the discrete yet maverick Ramnoux had been both too dutiful and not sufficiently dutiful. These daysmy earsprickup when I hear about female figureswho were not when one originalphilosophersbecausethey were commentators;particularly were genial, but too hears they were not good commentators because they maverick, unorthodox, in fact they didn't really understandsuch and such a figure,in fact one wouldn'treallyrely on their commentary.Apparently,then, they did at least write something that might be called original:those elements which weremaverick,unorthodox,genial. Apparently,momentsof philosophical creation, innovation, and originalitywere folded into the flapsand weave of their commentary. In no way was Ramnoux a feminist philosopheror a philosopherof gender. But Ramnouxas a womanphilosopherwasconfrontedwith a male philosophical domain. One can interpretin termsof the play of genderpolitics both the reception of her work (a doubly bladed respect which made it possiblefor her to be eminent yet marginal)and perhapsthe very methodologyshe developed in her work.A feminist perspectivemight be interested in re-evaluatingphilosophical stances of discretion,being dutiful,prudent,accommodatingas well and as flexibledemonstrationsof plasticity,eclecticism, pluridisciplinarity, the mode of being two-faced in one's readingpractice, interfacingbetween different approachesand philosophical styles, and in so doing achieving an innovative approach. While the remarksthat follow do not engage directly with the work of Ramnoux, they reflect on the methodology and frameworkwithin which a strongerreadingof her workmight become possible.I reflecton the conditions that might be prerequisiteto such a reading,conditions that are also discussed in relation to the work of contemporarywomen philosophers.
DROPOUT OFVIEW WHEN THEWOMENMYSTERIOUSLY

It is disturbingto ask who will be consideredthe majorphilosophersof the late twentieth century (John Rawls, RichardRorty,JiirgenHabermas,Hans-

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Georg Gadamer,JacquesDerrida,Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault?)and to ask how many women are among them, despite the large numbersof women working in philosophy.Yet the question itself redeploysa potentially debilitating languageused in a recent call for papers in Hypatiafor a conference session on the absence of great women philosophers,9 by Sarah Kofmanto or announce that there weren't any greatwomen philosopherswho had a corpus you could study sustainedly,except perhapsHannah Arendt (Kofman 1993, 18). The question is, how can we usefullyinterrogatethe conditions of debate and commentaryabout contemporarywomen philosophers,and politicize or problematizethose conditions, without endorsing questions like: "Who are the great women philosophersof the late twentieth century?" In the content of many of the coursestaught on social, political, and continental philosophyand appliedethics, no smallnumberof contemporary women philosophersareto be found in the syllabus.But a distinction is often maintained between core and elective subjects.When it comes to the content of the philosophical canon, the women often drop out of view (except, of course, as studentsand commentators),rarelyfiguringon the list of majorhistorical and contemporaryphilosophersone must studyto acquaintoneself with the discipline. A traditionof the pre-Socratics,Greek philosophy,earlyChristianphilosophy,medieval, rationalist,empiricist,realist, idealist, phenomenological, and twentieth-centuryanalytic philosophy is usuallyrepresentedas a history of male authors,althoughwomen have, as numerousanthologiesdemonstrate, A always,in differentmodes,practicedphilosophy.10 courseon the rationalists tends not to direct attention at Elisabethof Palatine (see Nye 1999) as a philosopher in her own right and a contributorto the rationalist tradition, nor does it discussthe writingsof Ann Conway (1982). Coursesin medieval philosophy and earlypolitical philosophy tend not to include Christine de Pizan's The Bookof theBodyPolitic(1994). Coursesin the pre-Socraticsmake no particular effort to include fragmentsfrom women Pythagoreans(see Tredaniel 1980). Courseson John Locke do not include a discussionof his eighteenthcenturyapologist,CatharineCockbum (Trotter1992), and a typicalcourseon phenomenology, even French phenomenology, makes no particulareffort to include Simone de Beauvoir'swriting in the area.1' Affirmative action could usefully address the curricula of philosophy those in the history of philosophy.But becausethis is not courses,particularly part of the politics surroundingthe devising of most history of philosophy courses,women take up a "face-a-faceaux hommes"position in relation to the discipline and its history. While many would disagree, I think that this introduces a particularrelation to gender into one's philosophical work. Even when not overtly about gender, the work of women philosophersare "gestes des femmes,"gesturesas women in philosophy,remembering that one of these manygesturesmight be the familiardeclarationthat being a woman has nothing to do with one's work, or even the stance of anti-feminism.

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How to reformulatethe identification of original and innovative philososo dropout phers"worthyof commentary" that the women don't mysteriously of view, leaving the structureof philosophy as the "face-a-faceaux hommes"? Many different strategiesare called for. In the case of Elisabeth, it might be a matter of actively identifying as philosophical production a mode of writing restrictedto one half of an epistolaryexchange.'2In the case of Hildegardof Bingen, it might be a matter of findingphilosophical production in theologiWith regardto writerssuch as MaryAstell and MaryWollstonecal writing.13 craft, it might be a matter of identifying such production in certain forms of polemic-in particular,apologies for women'seducation. One possible strategy is also to considerthat the originaland innovative philosopher"worthyof maysometimeshave been the commentatorherself,or the figure commentary" identified as the commentator. This proposal constitutes a response to Michele Le Doeuff'swell-known position, formulatedin her essay"LongHair,Short Ideas"(1989). As Le Doeuff argues,the issue is not (only) whether women are present, and in how many numbers,but also how they are present, and with what philosophical modes and status. She arguesthat women have often occupied the role of commentator in the history of philosophy. Many such figuresare respected, but also of This formof "admission" women into philosophy is, Le Dceuff marginalized. form of exclusion. As she jokes, "Who better than a woman to argues,a sly show fidelity, respect and remembrance[towardthe history of philosophy]?" (Le Doeuff1989, 125). To undermine the marginalstatus attributedto the woman commentator, we could ask what women have achieved as creation and innovation within readthe comWe the crevices of philosophicalcommentary. can, strategically, mentator in more interesting ways. Perhapsit is impossibleto be successfully dutiful,reallyfaithful,reallyreproductive,not distorting?In writing,as in life, acts of fidelityareoften acts of passiveaggressionand resistance.If dutifulcommentary often displaces that to which it is ostensibly faithful, we might renegotiate our understandingof the texts of figureswho are coded as "faithful." Hence my interest in this maverickfigure,the woman commentatorwho is deemed not really a philosopher in her own right, not really an original phiwhen it is saidsottovocethat she is not reallya very good losopher,particularly commentator either, not a properhistorian of philosophy. What I hear is a lapse in duty,in discretion,which is usuallyfigured(tactfully) as failure.What if we were to look for the originaland creative folded into philosophical commentaryby women?What elements, flickers,gestures,displacementsoccur in the space of the not quite (great or truly original) philosopher?What expansion of our resourcesof originalitymight we derive from those flickers? Of course, not only women practice commentary.France is, for example, a country with a strong tradition of philosophical historians and commentators,which includesEtienne Gilson as much as MarieDelcourtand Genevieve

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Rodis-Lewis.14 What is a specificallyfeminist issue,however, is the location of innovative philosophical thinking by women in the history of philosophy, because this history includes few women. Similarly,neither epistolaryphilosophical writing, apologiesfor education, nor theological writingare confined to women. But given that women'sphilosophical productionhas in some instances been confined entirely to such forms,rethinkingthe failureto identify them as sites of original philosophy does become a feminist issue.15 for My proposal is not for a recuperationof the language of the "great," example, that one arguesthat figuressuch as Ramnoux and Kofmanwere unrecognized"great" philosophers.Instead,it is for a recuperationof the workof certain women philosophers from the opposition philosophy/not quite philosophy. Rather than asking why women haven't practiced philosophy, one would ask how women have practicedphilosophy and what they have generated with the forms they have adopted, particularlyin the space of the "not quite." In relation to twentieth-centuryphilosophical productionby women, particularlyin the firsthalf of the twentieth century,part of such a project could involve reinterpretingthe writing of figuressuch as Ramnoux and Delcourt.16 It is, furthermore,interesting to note that, while from a different area and epoch, Kofman is often considered an insufficientlyfaithful commentator.If Kofman, like Ramnoux, displaces the position of discipleship and commentary, it is not through the invention of big, original philosophy,or the grand system.Instead, it is througha device one could term complicatedor multiple fidelity (Deutscher 1999, 159, 172). Where Ramnoux'swork is filled with her homagesto Georges Dumezil,Claude Levi-Strauss,Henri Bergson,and Bachelard, Kofman'swork is filled with identifications with Nietzsche, E. T. A. Hoffmann,Freud,and Derrida.In the space of commentary, multiple fidelities can be a potent device of creativity. Such a reading would allow one to ask what some women philosophershave producedand generatedwiththe gestures of fidelity and multiple fidelity. In posing these questions, we leave unaddressed question of what phithe and ask only what practices preclude women from being identilosophy is, fied as original and innovative philosophers. I have arguedthat a more interventionist approach,morewilling and more ingenious, is needed to identify letters, novels, perhaps even the production of some forms of poetry as the possible sites of innovative philosophical thought by women in the history of The development of such interventionist readingscould allow philosophy.17 the cultivation of an enriched context for the studyof historical women philosophers.And, having posed the relation of commentaryand originalityas a feminist issue and introducedthe problemof how Kofman's workis perceived, I want also to consider philosophical productionby a groupof contemporary French women philosopherswho run the risk of being identified as improper philosophical commentators.

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WOMENPHILOSOPHERS GRAFTING ONTOTHE"OTHER" PHILOSOPHY OF

I have askedhow practicesof interventionist interpretationmight engage more creatively with the philosophical production of women in the history of philosophy. By contrast, a series of diverse contemporaryFrench women philosophersare of interest becauseof their attempts to alter our understandingsof the philosophicaltraditionin which they might take a place. This is not a project that one could ascribe to a figuresuch as Ramnoux. But the contemporaryphilosophersmentioned here do risk incurringsome of the problems of perception that Ramnoux faced. Like Ramnoux, none in this more recent clusterattemptsto write the grandmastersystem.All take on the mantle of the commentator,though verydifferentlyfroma figuresuch as Ramnoux. They do so with an ostensive, rather than a discrete, work of displacement. and distort the traditionalmantle of the female commentaThey appropriate tor. This conventional stance is adopted so as to undertakeprojects that undermine received narrativesabout the history of philosophy. The gesturesmade by these contemporarywomen philosophersin analyzing this history can be characterizedby the figureof the graft. In the words of Genevieve Fraisse,"woman is rarely . . . a lone figure in a philosophical or political text.... [T]his opens up to women the path of finding relations and contiguities with other exclusions, other differences"(Fraisse1992, 24).J8 Workingin a seriesof differenthistoricaldomains, each of the women philosophers I will mention here analyzesfiguresof alterity in the history of philosophy, sometimes graftingthemselves in differentways onto historically "othsuch as the sophist, or the exiled Byzantian. ered figures," Becauseshe is the only figureI will discussall of whose majorworksalready exist in English translation, I will focus primarilyon the writingsof the classicist Nicole Loraux.However,the questionsI direct at Loraux's writingwould in a furtherdiscussion of the other French women philosophersmenapply for tioned below, as well as serving as a potential framework a more extensive examination of her own work.
NICOLELORAUX

and The Feminine the Greek Loraux's of project in The Experiences Tiresias: relevance to those interestedin new methodologies Man (1995) is of particular It for interpretingrepresentationsof masculinityin the historyof philosophy.19 is often saidthat the Ancient Greekcity is foundedon the exclusion of women and femininity. But for Loraux,Greek masculinityshould also be understood as a cultivation of femininity at the heart of masculinity.Ultra-virility,she argues, harborsfemininity.This is an importantargumentboth in its substance

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and, more generally,in its methodology for thinking about the history of philosophy. Loraux'sapproachto the status of the feminine in Greek thought can be stylizedinto a seriesof gestures.First,Lorauxdeliberatelyprivileges,in her inAncient Greek masculine/feminineoppositerpretations,that which troubles She tions, ratherthan only readingfor what consolidates those oppositions.20 overtly resists the approachto such oppositions taken in standardcommentary,which, she argues,highlights the rigidityof these binaryoppositions,rather than the plasticity of their configurations: By selecting and organizingthe sourcesin the appropriate way, the investigator wishing to sort out these roles will alwaysbe able to detect the dominance of the masculine .... This insistence on the principleof separationas an open-and-shutcase offersthe advantageof reaching the obvious by avoiding trouble-a risky intellectual business, for then the most edifying discoursesmaybe taken at their word:for example,Xenophon's Oikonomikos that, by duly allotting each sex its position, has fuelled so many discussionsabout Greek women or about the aner. (Loraux 1995, 6) Second, Lorauxrendersthe stance to be taken by contemporarycommentatorsto Ancient Greektexts a political issue;this is verymuch a featurefound in the women philosophersI will discusshere, in relation to commentaryon the history of philosophy.We should, Lorauxmaintains, be locating textual elements which trouble upheld refrainsabout sexual opposition. Third, and this is again a feature common to the other contemporary French women philosophersI will discuss,Lorauxis committed to interdisciplinarity,and to resistingnormative practices accordingto which the proper study of a discipline involves a demarcationof boundaries,such as those between philosophy and literature,or history and mythology.In her earlywork, such as TheChildren Athena(1993) and Mothers Mourning in (1998), as well of as the earlierTragic a Woman(1987), Lorauxchallenges a conWaysof Killing ventional disciplinarydivide between the studyof mythsand serioushistorical research (Loraux 1993, 3-7). Historians concerned with reconstructinghistorical events have been as waryof myth as Thucydides:"InFrenchuniversities . . . the subject of 'Ancient Greece' suffersfrom an imperiousset of restrictions whereby myth scarcely has a place, at least not among historians, infatuatedas they are with 'reality"'(Loraux1993, 4). But the historian who does undertakea reading of myth will, she argues, be led to ask "whethermyth is not alwaysalreadythere withinthe city; woven into the multitude of its manifestationsand into its web of discourses" (1993, 6).21Loraux'sown project is an interpretationof the imaginaryof the Athe-

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nian city (1993, 14).22But she develops a methodology which resists the invisibility of women in conventional renderingsof Ancient Greece, drawing on an interdisciplinary approachto supportthis renderingvisible of women.23 Fourth,Lorauxcultivates a methodologywhich allows that which has been historically marginalizedto be brought to light in her interpretationsof Anand the GreekMan cient Greece. In The Experiences Tiresias: The Feminine of (1995), Lorauxpursuesrepresentationsof the feminine through examining such figuresas the virile warrior,including Hercules and Ulysses. She points out that most interpretations,includingthat of Plato, opposethe virile body to the feminine body.But we have seen that Lorauxconsidersit to be a "riskyintellectual business"to take at their word these edifyingdiscourseswhich allot each sex its position. Instead, Loraux's argumentis that femininity lies at the heart of virility.She offersthis interpretationfirstlyin relation to representations of the epic hero, who is, she points out (adapting a phrasefrom Emily Vermeule),"anunstablecomposite of irreconcilableelements"(Loraux1995, 100). The virile hero suffers,trembles,weeps, and laments. Though he dies like a man he sufferslike a woman (1995, 6). In Homer, we read of the warriorwho is as "nakedas a woman"(1995, 80), or of Hercules,"whoweeps and moans,and who notes, 'undersuch a blow I discovermyself,unhappythat I am, a mere female"' (1995, 39). The virile warriorparticipatesin femininity because virility, Lorauxargues,is conceived at its own frontiers. By definition, then, virility needs to be thought of in terms of its constitutive failure or internal fault (1995, 61).24Loraux'sconclusion is that the masculine/feminine opposition never works so well as when it is unstable, for this leaves it constantly being mobilizedor re-established: The opposition between the body of women and the virile body ..., this conceptual tool, is most in evidence when it is necessaryto transcendit: when imbalance takes over, blurring even well-establishedantitheses, confusingthe verycertainties that must, all the same,be re-mobilizedin orderto find ourway. all ... [T]o enhance his virility, the Greek male appropriates or some part of the feminine, as if, to remain a criterion of intelligibility, the difference between the sexes would demand something resembling. .. the regulatedpractice of its irregularity.(1995, 116) A fifth aspect of Loraux'sapproach,again common to the other contemporaryphilosophersI will discuss,is seen in a stagingof the returnof the other (in this case, the play of femininity in a hero such as Hercules) to displace a pivotal, founding,or determiningmoment in the historyof philosophy (in this case, the birth of Socratic philosophy). Having arguedthat the Greek epic hero is the site for a complex play between masculinityand femininity,Loraux introduces the figureof the philosopher, again opposing disciplinarydivides

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between history,philosophy,and myth. How should we understand,she asks, the sporadicreferencesto Herculesand epic heroes in Plato'sdialogues? What to make of the fact that they seem to have been converted into the symbolof the virile hero, denying the play of femininity and sexual ambiguityseen in Homer'sIliad,a playfromwhich Socratesis also unable to freehimself (Loraux the 1995, 143-44)? Philosophyis a domain that appropriates most unambiguous ideals of masculinity. Loraux's tropeof a Herculesof ambiguous masculinityis mobilizedas a force to underminePlato/Socrates.Socrates is refigured a personagetraversedby as the play of a disavowed femininity through Loraux'smethod of locating the "Heraklesbehind Socrates"(1995, 144), a methodology arrivedat through readingtogether the figuresof Greek myth and Greek philosophy:"Socrates, Plato, Herakles .. . ?:two philosophers,one hero. Two historical figuresand Zeus'son. An incongruousgroup,most unsatisfactoryto those fond of homogeneity" (1995, 167).
"GESTES DESFEMMES"

Like Loraux,the philosopherand classicist Barbara Cassin embracesunexpected juxtapositionsof areasand disciplines. Women have alwayshad, proposes Cassin, a knack for the casserole made from what you've got to hand (Cassin 1992a, 20). Fromher perspective,it wouldbe no accident that a woman philosophersometimesfavorsa methodologywhich allowsthe leapingfrom domain to domain of philosophy,stagingexchange, representinga force as the commentatorwho interlacesdomainscommonly held apart.Interestedin the marginalfigureof the sophist, Cassin suggeststhat to think philosophy from the perspective of this figureundoes much of what we take for grantedabout the tradition, including its constant opposition between philosophical content and style, or the art of persuasion.Think, she writes,of the way in which MartinHeideggerexcuses the "heavinessand lack of grace"of his analysesby opposing the understandingof Being in its being to narrativeform. It is Heior deggerhimself who opposes the ontology of Aristotle'sMetaphysics, Plato's to Parmenides, the narrativesof Thucydides,privileging in Greek philosophy the languageof ontology which Greek philosophersimposedon their contemporaries.Implicit in this opposition of ontology to Thucydidesis: "thedistinction between philosophyand all other kinds of text (narrativeand history), or between philosophical and literaryusage of language,an opposition also ... put into question by the sophist"(1992a, 514). Where Loraux's methodologyquestionsthe oppositionbetween historyand the mythologicaland imaginary, Cassin questionsthe oppositionbetween philosophy and narrative,ontology and the arts of persuasion.ImmanuelKant's view of rhetoric as the art of misleading,and of sentiment as its symptomatic affect (Cassin 1992a, 513-14), is for her as problematicas Heidegger's charac-

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terization of the object and method of philosophy in terms of ontology and phenomenology.Consider as a contrastingexample, she writes, how the Gorscene reorients our attention towardsthe mode of enunciagias/Parmenides tion ratherthan that which is enounced, "relatingthe objectivity of the object itself, even being itself, to discourse's (1992a, 513). ForCassin, performance" an operative concept of sophistics would oblige us to reconsiderdeterminations of philosophy,and of the world,as domainsof ontology and logosopposed to othered domains of sensibility,persuasion,language,rhetoric, the literary, narrative.Sophistics, as an operative concept, "considersan image of Antiquity-one that this same traditionhas renderedstrangeand hostile to us-as constituting/constitutive of'normal' philosophy"(Cassin 1995, 513). In a seriesof projects,includinga seriesof edited collections (1986a, 1986b, (1995), Cassin has argued 1992b) and her 680-page work L'Effetsophistique that philosophy is grounded in the expelling of its "alter-ego"-the sophist (1995, 9)-and never ceases this activity of expulsion (1995, 4, 9). In response, Cassin offersa reading in which sophistryis valorizedas a domain of non-philosophy, which is in fact integral to the domain of philosophy and a source of its creativity (1995, 9). It is a project which has its implicationsfor the interpretationof the feminine, as seen when the figureof Helen is interpretedby Cassin as "the sophistic heroine, parexcellence" (1995, 74). Becausethe objectivity of the object is the productof discursiveperformance,Helen, about whom two contradictory discoursesare pronounced,is at once the guiltiest and the most innocent of women: "the name of Helen can serve as the emblem of a sophistic position on discoursein contrastto a philosophicalor ontological position"(1995, 75). Helen representsreality'stransformationinto a mirage;she "upturnsthe canonical oppositions between aletheiaand pseudos,being and appearance,and overturs the platonic idea-the form is never what one thinks it is" (1995, 81). Like the sophist, the figureof Helen-for example, in the literaryrepreof and sentationsof Euripides Homer-suggests the "solidarity the idea and the and the seeming, where Plato sustainsthe opposition between the idol, truth semblance of truth, rhetoricalpersuasion,on the one hand and the pursuitof ideal reality,on the other"(1995, 91). The literarydeploymentsof Helen and on the gestureof Gorgias in the Treatise Non-being"constrainall of forthcoming ontology to admit that it is above and beyond all, discourse"(Cassin 1995, 99). Only a "hypocriticaldiscourse"presents itself not as one logos among others,but as the uniquelogos, that of Being (1995, 99). The distancingof philosophy from sophistics is a hypocritical denial of the sophist at the heart of logos. The emblem of Helen becomes, for Cassin, the emblem of a sophistic perspectiveon philosophy that we might reclaim. Cassin asks who functions as the sophist today, and what in the stance of the sophist can inspireus today."Who,"she asksof contemporary philosophy, "is imitating who, who is stealing from the other, who is naming the other,

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who is laying down the law?"(1995, 15). From this point, Cassin pursuesa project termed a "sophisticreading of the history of philosophy,"producing a "sophist-icatedphilosophy." Under the sign of the sophist, one would chart the self-delimitations of philosophy throughout its history. She interrogates the sophism and anti-sophismof figuresincluding Kant, Heidegger,Levinas, She Habermas,Stanley Cavell, and manyothers.25 provokesconfrontationbetween philosophical fields commonly set apart.In the conference which provided the basisfor one edited collection (Cassin 1992b) she invited Lorauxto stage the encounter between the disciplinesof historyand philosophy,invited Jonathan Bares and Monique Dixsaut to stage the encounter between analytic and hermeneutic traditions in philosophy,and named analytic philosophy'sencounter with phenomenology its encounter with the sophist.26 Beginning with the way in which Ancient Greece has been recounted by Ramnoux,Loraux,and Cassin, one wondershow a guide to the historyof philosophy would look in which each period was recounted through the lens of women philosopherswho have, with the mantle of the commentator,effected gesturesof displacement, locating figuresof alterity.A history of philosophy told in a series of displacing "gestesdes femmes"might go via the route of Marie-JoseMondzain's presentationof a Byzantinephilosophy of visibility in workssuch as L'Image Les Naturelle,Image,Icone,Economie: Sources Byzantines de l'Imaginaire and workwhich Contemporain Discourse AgainsttheIconoclasts, focuseson the attemptto suppress icon in the Byzantineera.Again Mondthe zain presentsherselfunderthe sign of the commentator,offeringan apparently conventional translationand presentationof Nicephorus'stext "Discourse against the Iconoclasts,"but at the same time explaining that she does not pretendto a conventional scholarlypresentation."Topresentmyselfas an exshe pert on Byzantine?" asks. "Mydirection is completely different:to try instead to generate a genealogy of visibility, by going back to some of the first sourcesof the thinking of the image, such as the firstdoctrinal sourcesin the Occident" (Mondzain 1989, x). LikeCassin, Mondzainidentifieswith and graftsherselfonto a marginalized historical philosophical figure:not the sophist, but the first-centuryphilosopher Nicephorus, who was exiled for his defense of the icon. Where Cassin graftsherself onto the sophist in orderto offer a sophist-icatedhistory of philosophy,Mondzaingraftsherself onto the exiled Nicephorus to offera history of philosophy turned into what she terms a "genealogyof visibility."Nicephorusis figuredby Mondzainas "thepivotal point of an intellectual mutation which we have inherited" (Mondzain 1989, 33). Nicephorus "riskedeverything to saythat the existence of the universeitself dependedon defendingthe icon, that the universe would disappearwithout the icon," and here is something which merits,she claims, "thatwe pausewith his argument" (1989, 34). Nicephorus himself took an othered figure,the icon, and arguedthat it was at the heart of the possibilityof knowledge and the universe.His passionfor the

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image might designate for us, arguesMondzain, "the essence of all passion" (1989, 34). Mondzaindepicts her interpretationof the Byzantianas an attempt to read againstdisciplinarydemarcationsand againstexcessive regulationof the proper approachto one's domain of study:"Itis becausea very knowledgeableByzantine specialist, devoutly animated by a strong desire to discourageme, declaredto,me that there wasno philosophyin Byzantine,only history,geography and religion, that I felt an urgentneed to demonstratethe contrary" (1996, 9). Mondzain's interdisciplinary approach, deemed improper in Byzantine studies, draws on psychoanalysis, phenomenology, anthropology, theology, film theory, and visual studies. She locates a parallel between the marginal forcewith which she identifiesherself-the iconophile in Byzantine-and the organizationof the feminine in history and the history of philosophy:"Idolatry cannot be separatedfrom the power of the feminine." The repressionof the icon is also, she argues,repressionof the power of the maternal virgin (1996, 227). Mondzain interpretsthe Byzantine iconophile as a fecund marginal figure,just as Lorauxand Cassin find that which disruptsan orthodoxyof Platonic thinking in the marginalized figuresof Greek myth and the sophist, What interests Mondzain in the debates about the icon is, she respectively. explains, the attempt to think philosophicallyabout the role of the imaginary in life (1996, 11). But she also points out that Nicephorus'sreflectionsofferan anti-Platonic thought about the image. The Byzantine iconophile offers an account of the image as partakingin, ratherthan reproducing,an original.On Mondzain'sreading, it disrupts the opposition between original and copy, along with both the status of the image as copy and a Platonic tradition of thinking about representation. Where Mondzain is interested in a marginal Byzantine iconophile, Monique David-Menardis interested in a marginalSwedish visionary,Swedenborg, and his operative status as other in relation to Kantian rationalistphilosophy. For David-Menard,in her work La Folie dans la RaisonPure: Kant, Lecteurde Swedenborg (1990), the other is located in the spectre of madness and delusion. Philosopherand psychoanalystDavid-Menardpresents a readlocating structuresof negation and paranoiain the ing of "Kantwith Freud," antinomies, readingKant from the perspectiveof his marginalratherthan his majortexts, texts which refer to madness, mental disorder,delirium. DavidMenard argues that Kant's debate with occultism, and in particularthe essay he wrote on the visionarySwedenborg("Dreamsof a visionaryexplained by the dreamsof a metaphysician"[Kant 1900]), could be thought of as the themes organizingThe Critique PureReason.This work can be interpreted, of she claims,as an exchange with an otheredfigure: Swedenborg.David-Menard graftsherself onto and widens out the space of the mad visionaryto displace The Critiqueof Pure Reason,perhaps a little as Luce Irigaraywidens out the of space of femininity in Speculum theOtherWoman(1985).

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Like Kofman,David-Menardintroducesinto philosophywhat she takes to be its disavowedother: the desires,passions,and neurosesof the philosopher, which are,in the view of both, the condition of possibilityof philosophicalreason. Again, the approachis generatedthroughthe intersection of disciplinary domains. Both Kofmanand David-Menarddeploy psychoanalysisin readings of the history of philosophy in orderto show how the phantasmsaccordingto which a thinker defineshimself or herself as sexed and the philosophical conDavid-Menard cepts that the thinkergeneratesareintertwined.27 explainsthat this is why she usespsychoanalysis a critical instrumentin her philosophical as writing. And like Fraisse,David-Menarddiscussesthe relationship between the position of the woman philosopherand "findingrelationsand contiguities with other exclusions, other differences."In relation to her methodology,she says, "Iwill be asked if I am feminist."Her response is that "it is no accident if some female readersof Kant... have wanted to ... bring to light the blind spots of the philosophical text . . . because the blind spots of a text appear more clearlyto those who aren'tincludedin it. This is the orientation that you would call my feminism,even if manyfeministswouldn'trecognizethemselves within it" (David-Menard1997, 3). What Loraux,Cassin, Mondzain,and David-Menard shareis a tenuousrole in philosophy,that of female figureswho again run the risk of being depicted as not originalphilosophersbecause they write commentary,while also being seen as not reliablecommentatorsbecause they are maverick,unorthodox, in fact they don't really understandsuch and such a figure,in fact one wouldn't suggestthat students rely on this commentary. But the question posed by the historical studies of Loraux,Cassin, Mondzain, and David-Menardis how reading philosophy for its sophism, its Herculean sexual ambiguity,its imagery,its engagementwith delirium,its biograconfrontationscan displace phies, its passionsand desires,its interdisciplinary the history of philosophy in innovative ways.
"So I WILLBE ASKEDIF I AM FEMINIST"

It is time, Andrea Nye argues,to "abandonthe requirementthat texts of interest to feminists must deal primarilywith gender"(Nye 1990, xvi). This can also be seen in the work of the many feminist philosophers, including many Australian writers, who have broadened their attention from what is overtly said in philosophical texts about women and femininity, or men and masculinity,to what is said aboutthe passionsand emotions, embodiment,the private sphere, the imaginary,and the poetic. Perhapsthis is a feminist philosophical practice that knows that problems concerning the place and experience of women in philosophyexceed the overt claims made in the history of philosophy about women and femininity. Becausewomen have been associatedwith embodiment,Gatens'sand Lloyd'suse

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of Spinozist philosophy to challenge dualist models which associate personhood with mind is of interest to the feminist philosopher,even though this Because project might have little to say about BaruchSpinoza"on women."28 women have been associatedwith literatureand literaryproductionmorethan with dryanalysis,it might matterfroma feministperspectivethat we locate the the and literary, imaginary, the poetic at the heartof dry,rationalphilosophical analysis.Becausewomen have been associatedwith faulty reasoning,perhaps it mattersthat women philosophersoffer a "sophist-icatedhistory of philosophy."Becausewomen have been associatedwith literatureratherthan logic, a feminist perspectivemight be interestedin projectsby women philosophersto logic and philosophyof languageas domainswhich speakto literature, refigure even where such embodiment,materiality,psychoanalysis,and the imaginary, (as in the case of writingby Antonia Soulezand ClaudeImbert)do not projects Because women have been identify their philosophical writing as feminist.29 associatedwith dutifulcommentary,it might matterthat we reclaimthe status and the innovations of the woman commentator,though the latter might not alwaysbe identifiablyfeminist. I like my historyof philosophy as interpretedby Ramnoux,Loraux,Cassin, Mondzain,David-Menard,Imbert,Kofman,and othersbecausethey pivot the question. The issue isn't whether the canon will fully recognizetheir innovaof tions; it is to change ourunderstanding the canon which might do so. When or we think of the history of philosophy as "sophist-icated," when we think Plato with Hercules,or when we think of the philosopher'stext as the play of the imaginaryand of desire, our perceptions of the canon change. This maneuver displaces the issue away from how and whether these women might need to change to fit into a static object, the "historyof great philosophers." Who better than a woman to commemoratethe historyof philosophy?asksLe Doeuff,but the displacementof perceptionsof the historyof philosophy is the vengeance of the "indiscretecommentator."

NOTES

at are at of 1. All the cassettes presentations the Ramnoux colloquium archived for and de the CollegeInternationale Philosophie areavailable publicconsultation. readher workwith that de 2. Maurice Gandillac(1998) commented he always with in he wasn't especially interest, always agreement all of herwork, although great But elaborated. he commented whichweren't the psychoanalytic completely aspects, the thathe wantedto remember person. were menof theEcoleNormale that recalled theyoung 3. Onespeaker Superieure to not always hospitable the newwomenstudents. entirely It et 4. Formulation by suggested MicheleSinapi,"Ouverture presentation." is herselfunderthe mantleof the oftenpresents truethat in her own work,Ramnoux Ramnoux or dutiful discrete (1970, 1983). see, commentator; forexample,

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5. However,manyof the women scholarsmade some kind of personalreferenceto the importanceshe had had for them, and the difficultiesof the intellectual scene she faced, recounting anecdotes about women'sexclusion from French education institutions, or about her marginalor ambiguousstatus throughouther career. 6. I do not deny that commentary,particularly France,is seen as a scholarlyand in respected philosophical activity. However, a distinction is sustained between those who are considered commentators, and those who are considered original philosophers. 7. Some of her essays on Plato have also been published, and her study of the Gnostics has been translatedinto English. See Petrement (1946, 1947, 1990). 8. I have discussedthe problemof Kofman'sapparentlyexcessive but unfaithful fidelity to figuressuch as Derrida,Freud,and Nietzsche in Deutscher (1999, 2000). 9. "The Society for the Study of Women Philosophersseeks papersor proposals for discussions at a session, 'Why Are There No Great Women Philosophers?' the at PacificMeeting of the American PhilosophicalAssociation, to be held in March 1998" (Call for Papers1997, 204). 10. See, for example, the anthologies edited by Wamock (1996) and LopezMcAlister (1996), which include discussionsof the women philosopherswhom I proceed to mention below, including Conway and Cockburn. 11. Amongst the many studies of this problemsee M. Simons'sessay "Sexismand the Philosophical Canon: On Reading Beauvoir'sThe SecondSex,"in Simons (1999). 12. While Elisabeth'sletters do not addressissuesof gender,it is a feminist issue to scrutinizethe conventional teaching of the rationalisttradition and ensurethat those letters take their place within it. As Andrea Nye comments, "Mostof Descartes'biographershave devoted a page or two to Elisabeth'sfirst letter to the philosopher, in which she posed a question: if the thinking mind is separatefrom the body, then how can mind and body interact? ... But few have noted the widening scope of topics discussed as the correspondence continued until Descartes' death" (Nye 1999, xi). CompareMaryWamock's explanation of her exclusion of Elisabethfromher anthol"I ogy WomanPhilosophers: have found it impossibleto include any extracts from her letters, because it is impossibleto make them freestanding"(Warnock 1996, xxxv). 13. Helen John points out that while the philosophical tradition tends to include medieval Christian thinkers as philosophers,they are included insofaras "they relied upon human reasonand experience (as distinct fromdivine revelation) in their search for understanding." order to re-evaluate Hildegardas a philosopher,John suggests In that we identify Augustine, Aquinas, and Abelard as religious thinkers who draw,as Hildegarddoes, "on both culturalheritage and personalexperience"in the "searchfor wisdom"(John 1996, 23). Again, compareto Warnock:"Ihave ... omitted the writings of women who, to put it crudely,seem to rely more on dogma, revelation or mystical experience than on argument,and this means that I have had to exclude some astonishinglypowerfulwritingsby the fourteenth-centuryJulianof Norwich; likewise I have excluded the strange effusions on theosophy and spiritualismof Helena Blavatsky and Anne Besant (her follower) in the nineteenth century;and, in the twentieth century,I have excluded, for the samereasons,the worksof Simone Weil.... [N]o one would dispute that the task of separatingphilosophy from religion is far more difficult in the case of women than of men" (Warnock 1996, xxxii-xxxiii). 14. Gilson is best known for his work on medieval and Christian philosophy,

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Delcourt is an Ancient Greek scholar,and Rodis-Lewisis best known for her work on Descartes. Of course,manycontemporarymale philosopherscould be understoodas practica formof commentarywith a particularly maverickstatus,underthe aegis of which ing we easily identify the production of philosophical innovation; the books by Gilles Deleuze on David Hume, Kant, Nietzsche, Foucault, and BaruchSpinoza provide an obvious example. In associatingwomen philosopherswith a particularpolitics for the re-interpretationof commentary,I am not suggestingeither that this is the only philosophical mode practicedby women, or that only women have practiced it or its more subversivevariations. 15. Is there a tendency to consider that women who have written education apologies, theological texts, correspondence,philosophical novels, etc., are not fully philosophers because they practice these forms, whereas this does not prohibit the inclusion in the history of philosophy of male philosophers who have favored these same forms?Wamock discussessome of these issues,admitting that few male philosophers in the history of philosophy fit simple criteria of what a philosopher is, but nevertheless adhering to those criteria in her consideration of women philosophers. My project is therefore based on a different strategyfrom that of Warnock. Her introduction, where she explains the rationale behind the exclusion and inclusion of various figuresin the volume, is a good example of the practice of deeming various women philosophers"not-quite"properlyphilosophical in their methodology,scope, or concerns. 16. Along with Delcourt'swork on Oedipus, the Delphic Oracle, and other aspects of Greek mythology,one possiblecandidate for such productivereinterpretation would be Hermaphrodite: Myths and Rites of the BisexualFigurein ClassicalAntiquity (Delcourt 1961). Women(1992) 17. I am thinking of EricaHarth'sdiscussionin her book Cartesian Anne de la Vigne, of a groupof seventeenth-centurywomen writers,"lescartesiennes." Marie Dupre, and Catherine Descartesproducedlittle scholarlywriting but produced verse inspiredby, and sometimes addressedto, Cartesianphilosophy. 18. Citations provided in English from untranslatedFrench works are my own translations. 19. A classicist, Nicole Lorauxmakes frequent reference to Ancient Greek phid'Athenes(1997) and dansla Memoire losophy in workssuch as La Cite Divisee:L'Oubli The Experiences Tiresias:The Feminineand the GreekMan (1995), and her many of workshave been increasinglydiscussedby contemporaryFrench philosophers. 20. I discuss at greater length the advantages, as I see them, of this kind of approachto the interpretationof representationsof women and femininity in the history of philosophy in Deutscher (1997). 21. Loraux's methodology,which interconnects the analysisof history,myth, tragthe Greek epic tale, and philosophy,has a feminist inflection. She points out that edy, the conventional Ancient Greek historian will find almost no women in the texts of Thucydides. Since women's value was seen as lying in her role as virtuous wife and childbearer,women are missing from history books which depict glorious lives-and deaths-in the battlefields.By contrast, to studydomainssuch as Ancient Greek tragedy is to admit into the domain of history texts in which there is a much higher proportion of representationsof women.

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22. Herwork in withthatof Moira who couldbe interpreted connection Gatens, in in the publicandlegallife,particularly analyzes roleof the imaginary contemporary See to relation the placeof womenandthe feminine. Gatens(1996) andGatensand Lloyd(1999). and 23. However, Loraux sphere step pointsoutthatwomendo leavethe private of deaths intoa publicrealm discourse the expense theirowntragic of at which,unlike in maleheroicdeaths,stillcanneverbe shownon stage.InMothers Mourning (1998), the Loraux discusses status womenasinvisible, the of addressing viewthatwomagain whatthecityfears en'smouring andlamentations a menace public are to order, asking of in femininemourning whatis produced the corralling feminineexcess.In and by and TheChildren Athena (1993), Loraux mythsof Athena,Pandora, the analyzes of citizens sincein theGreekimaginary raceof Athenianwomen whoarenot considered theyarenot bornof the earthof Athens. conclusionis that this complexplayof femininity the heartof at 24. Loraux's a The the virilitysustains masculine/feminine opposition. heronamesandconfronts of so threat,or interior temptation, presence femininity as to staveit off. 25. Cassinsuggests an immense that wouldbe neededjustin order reto project nouncethe sophists: thinkwithout to themorto thinkwiththem.She argues, "That's now"(Cassin1992b,12). partof whatis involvedin philosophizing 26. Cassin looksforremnants the sophistic of also stancein certain philosophers: Arendtin relation Aristotle, example, one essay. writes trying apply to for in She of to a sophistic methodto a reading Heidegger of she re-reads Pro(1997b,139); reading as Aristotleas the anti-phenomenologist (1997b,99). tagoras a phenomenologist, David-Menard that of 27. Forexample, argues the "construction a conceptof a universal example, universal moral consolidates particular a [for principles] anthropoland whichis moremasculine thanfeminine" (David-Menard ogyof desire an analysis 1997,2). 28.A substantial feminist literature couldbesaid Anglo-American contemporary to havefoundwhatis saidaboutembodiment the history philosophy in of (suchas in the workof Freud, Maurice Nietzsche, etc.) Merleau-Ponty, moreusefulthanwhatis saidexplicitlyaboutwomenor femininity. 29. Whilethe workof SoulezandImbert cannotbe discussed here,excerpts apissueof Hypatia, whichI amguest-editing, the subject on pearin a forthcoming special of "Contemporary French Women and with Cassin, Philosophers," interviews Imbert, andDavid-Menard forthcoming Women's in are Review. reader The could Philosophy consultImbert (1992, 1999)andSoulez(1994, 1996, 1998a,1998b).

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