Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

• Omid Momtaz ¹
• Mohammad Reza Gholami Shekarsaraee ²
• Hasan Chavoshian ³
• Hadi Noori ⁴
• Mohammad Amin Sorahi ⁵

¹ Social Science department, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Guilan, Rasht, Iran

² Assistant Professor, Department of Social Sciences, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Gilan Faculty, Rasht, Iran.

³ Associate Professor of Social Sciences Department, Social Science department, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Guilan, Rasht, Iran

⁴ Assistant Professor of Social Sciences Department, Social Science department, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Guilan, Rasht, Iran.

⁵ Associate Professor of English Language and Literature Department, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Guilan, Rasht, Iran.

Abstract

Introduction
The purpose of this study is to investigate the concepts of performativity and performance from the viewpoint of distinguished experts in the field of gender and sex studies. Our understanding of the relationship between sex and gender was profoundly affected by the publication of Judith Butler's book "Gender Trouble," a post-structuralist critique of modernist feminism that was based on the idea of performativity, which came from the speech act theory of English philosopher J.L. Austin.
Performance theory has two main traditions that are connected to feminist theory. Performance studies have an impact on one and help one comprehend actions in the context of theatrical matters. An alternative viewpoint is offered by feminist sociology, which takes an anthropological approach to gender, seeing it as "performed in everyday life." The research agenda includes investigating the origin of the terms "performance" and "performativity."
Erving Goffman and the issue of self-sexualized representation
In his book "The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life," Erving Goffman lays forth basic ideas, including the idea that there is no such thing as a natural masculinity or femininity or an authentic central self. what's known as the outcome of controlling an actor's influence on people while they're in their direct presence.
Garfinckel and the issue of managed achievement of sex
The article by Garfinckel titled " Passing and the Managed Achievement of Sex Status in an “Intersexed” Person" His primary contribution lies in the field of gender sociology. Similar to Goffman, he considers gender to be an everyday, controlled performance, and that normalization guarantees that the person performs gender without considering the underlying processes.
Like Goffman, he thinks that a person has to act in concert with other people in particular social contexts, like "Community of understandings" in order to achieve either masculinity or femininity.
On the gendered self-presentation, Garfinkel disagrees with Goffman's research. He thinks that Goffman's studies of self-presentation often ignore the ways in which self-presentation is viewed as a continuous process in favor of concentrating on a number of distinct individual occurrences.
 
 
Kessler and McKenna and the issue of gender assignment
These two writers tackle the topic of gender allocation in their book "Gender: An Ethnographic Approach." They look at the processes by which meaning is created and propagated in society, and how bodies are understood as gendered bodies.
Unlike Garfinkel and Goffman, these two writers view gender performances and their meanings as more stable topics. According to their theory, the natural attitude is hard to change once they are formed. This means that once a person is assigned a gender, they tend to stay that way and even increase social anxiety.
West and Zimmerman and the issue of doing gender
In "doing Gender," these two writers have drew from the research of earlier ethnographers. Naturally, they have also altered earlier pieces. They view gender as a political issue on a micro level in addition to an interactive one. They recognize that doing gender is a form of  doing power and highlight the important role that micro-level social relations play in either sustaining or restraining power at the level of social structures.
Judith Butler and the issue of gender performativity
Judith Butler has developed her ideas using psychoanalytic concepts, John Austin's speech act theory, and Monique Wittig's materialist feminism. She has never theoretically used an ethnographic methodology in her narratives of gender and identity. According to Butler, gender is performative and is created and demonstrated by repeatedly acting out particular behaviors in line with social norms that specify what it means to be a man or a woman.
Discussion and conclusion
The following issues can be brought up by looking at the writings of ethnomethodology theorists:

The gendered self in specific contexts is constructed through the representations of actors in dyadic or polyadic interactions with others.
Representation or performance of gender is recognized as a reflexive process, meaning that current performances determine future performances.
Biographies (which can more or less remain unchanged) are expanded and developed through the integration of performances and gendered interactions over time.
Sexuality is formed in ways that oneself or others perceive as satisfying (or unsatisfying).
Community members continuously "doing gender."
Rules and norms regarding what constitutes "assingment" gender roles are established, imposed, and changed in specific contexts.
Those who engage in sexual activity are under the supervision of themselves and others, and if the sexual activity is not conducted in an approved manner, they are held accountable.
Placing self within the categories of gender and those categories themselves means perceiving them as natural matters, and this superficial naturalness is a imposed matter.
Performing gender, including forms of power at the micro level, means that performing gender involves doing power, and the micro level is connected to broader social structures.

Based on Butler's approach, the following points are noteworthy:

Gendering practices shaped by discourse mature over time to create the illusion that gender, instead of being seen as a construct specific to power relations, pertains to a stable essence.
Repetition and stylization in any assumed form or example of gender are involved.
Gender differentiation is created and stabilized through the specific functions of heterosexuality, and the regulatory power, along with the heterosexual matrix, organizes gendered subjects.
Gender and heterosexuality are based on an imitative logic in which the manipulation of symbolic substitution can either reinforce or challenge dominant relationships.

Keywords

• Performance"
• Performativity"
• Butler"
• Sex"
• "
• Gender"