Abstract
Physician, psychiatrist, and Marxist activist for women’s rights, Nawal El Saadawi (1931-2021) published fiction and non-fiction exposing how a capitalistic, phallocratic social order keeps Egyptian women in thrall to men through violent suppression. Women are exploited by men, who see women as weak and prey on these presumed docile subordinates in a display of masculinity. Deciphering the effects of this gendered performativity through the lens of Judith Butler, El Saadawi’s novel Woman at Point Zero (1977/2015a), or Ferdaous, une Voix en Enfer (El Saadawi, 1977/2007) in French, provides a narrative whose significance is amplified by Butlerian theory. The protagonist, whose voice is filtered through the agency of an amanuensis, struggles to perform and define womanhood or femininity, only to claim liberation by murdering an antagonist and assuming a stoic posture vis-à-vis her death by hanging. In other words, repeated attempts to undo gender in El Saadawi’s hierarchical society fail. Nonetheless, as Firdaus rebels against the rules of feminine behavior, she dismantles the common assumption that female genital mutilation (FGM), imposed as a tool of patriarchal power, inevitably results in disability. Clitoridectomy certainly leads to a recurring sense of dislocation and haunting loss, yet Firdaus flouts victimhood and remains mutinous despite discrimination, rape, marital abuse, and physical violence. Breaking with gender norms, she refuses abjection through her own initiative by deploying her body as a weapon, enticing her prey, and performing the “feminine evil” projected on all women since Eve by a usurped patriarchal power.
Recommended Citation
Levin von Gleichen, Tobe; Jesmin, U. H. Ruhina; and Khair, Tasnuva
(2025)
"Undoing Gender Performativities in Nawal El Saadawi’s Woman at Point Zero,"
Journal of International Women's Studies: Vol. 27:
Iss.
4, Article 4.
Available at:
https://vc.bridgew.edu/jiws/vol27/iss4/4