Judith Butler
Philosopher and gender theorist
Judith Butler is an American philosopher and gender studies scholar. They wrote Gender Trouble, where they set out their theory of gender performativity.
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American Born 1956 in Cleveland, United States
Influenced by Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida
About Judith Butler
Judith Butler was born in 1956 in Cleveland, Ohio. They earned a PhD in philosophy from Yale University in 1984. They have taught at Wesleyan University, George Washington University and Johns Hopkins University, and joined the University of California, Berkeley in 1993. At Berkeley, Butler has held appointments in Rhetoric and Comparative Literature, and cofounded the Program in Critical Theory. Butler also holds the European Graduate School's Hannah Arendt Chair. Butler is best known for Gender Trouble (1990) and Bodies That Matter (1993), which develop the theory of gender performativity. They have also written and spoken about war, non-violence, ethics, mourning in public life and democratic theory. Abroad as well, they have spoken up for the rights of sexual and gender minorities.