GENDER IS THE LACK OF THE LACK: A PSYCHOANALYTICAL READING OF THE THEATRICAL REPRESENTATIONS (Pages 80-87) by Mr. Santhosh. S in THE ENGLISH RESEARCH EXPRESS / ISSN:2321-1164 (Online); 2347-2642 (Print)

The concept of gender is an important one which permeates the disciplines of literature, political sciences, cultural studies, film studies and in theatre as well. In that, psychoanalysis has its own radical theorizing of gender identity after the emergence of Lacanian theory and that of Judith Butler’s Performativity. Borrowing the term “performativity” from theatre studies in order to formulate her gender theory in Gender Trouble, Butler drew parallels between the two, arguing that the acts by which gender is constituted bear similarities to performative acts within theatrical contexts. In that sense, the paper aims to explore and explicate the theatrical representation of gender identity through psychoanalytical theory, especially, the doctrine of Lacan’s psychoanalytical theory and in addition, the Butlerian notion of gender identity allows this Lacanian focus to be empirically grounded in embodied enactments of gender. As it happens in the Lacanian analysis, the theatre also stops with mere indication of the gender identity in the process of enactment on the stage. The actor is provided with the stage, space to show or enact the gender identity. But in this process, only the actor’s part of dramatic text gets indicated instead of attaining any gender identity. And thus, gender is in the state of lack of the lack which no one can attain since the subjectivity is in lack. This paper explicates the problematics of defining gender identity in the theatre space, and exemplifies the issues of gender identity in the process of performance. Key-words: Psychoanalysis, Oedipus Complex, Imaginary, Symbolic, Drama and Performance, Lacan, Gender Identity, subjectivity.