Judith Butler

Gender is not always-already an identity; it is a doing, a performance, a construction.

To be a body is to be given over to the world, to be given over to others, to be given over to a sociality that is not of one's own making.

Performativity is not a singular act, but a reiteration and a citationality of a prior norm or set of norms.

The 'I' is always already a social formation, a product of language and power.

Vulnerability is not a choice, but a condition of being human.

We are undone by each other. And if we're not, we're not human.

The task of critique is to make visible the mechanisms of power that produce and sustain certain forms of life.

To be recognized is to be made real, to be given a place in the world.

The body is not merely a site of inscription, but a dynamic and open-ended process of becoming.

Identity is not a fixed essence, but a continuous process of negotiation and transformation.

The very terms by which we make sense of ourselves are given to us by a social world that precedes and exceeds us.

Grief is not a private affair, but a social and political one.

To live is to be exposed to the possibility of loss, to be vulnerable to the world and to others.

The norm is not simply a rule, but a productive force that shapes and constitutes our very being.

To be human is to be in relation, to be bound up with others in ways that exceed our individual will.

The subject is not a pre-given entity, but an effect of power and discourse.

Gender is not a fact, but a norm that is constantly being reiterated and re-performed.

The political is not simply about power, but about the very conditions of possibility for life itself.

To be ethical is to be responsive to the vulnerability of others, to acknowledge our shared precariousness.

The body is a site of both constraint and possibility, a medium through which we engage with the world.