everybody can take a walk? Or why do we assume that a walk requires
two feet or being able to stand upwards or being able to balance on whatever feet one has? So I wanted to call into question the idea of taking a walk. When I asked Sunny, do you take walks? I wasnt sure if that would be the term she would use for going out for a stroll in her wheelchair. She said, yes, I take walks everyday and I replied, perfect! Lets start with that. You can take a walk in a variety of ways: on wheels, through film, in your dreams. It doesnt necessarily mean that one has the mobility and balance that we associate with physical walking. I wanted to let taking a walk become a metaphor, or at least a transposable term that could describe any number of ways of being in motion. Udi Aloni: That walk stayed with me for days, after the movie, after I left the theater and went home. You spoke of this kid, the one who always had a queer walk, and just because of that walk he was murdered by his friend. How movement can be everything. There was something amazing and yet simple in that. Some say that your writing is complicated, but there is a simplicity that is very deep at the same time. I want to go back a bit. In Israel, people know you well. Your name was even in the popular film Ha-Buah (The Bubble). (Laughs.) Judith Butler: (Laughs.) Although I disagreed with the use of my name in that context. I mean, it was very funny to say, dont Judith Butler me, but to Judith Butler someone meant to say something very negative about men and to identify with a form of feminism that was against men. And Ive never been identified with that form of feminism. Thats not my mode. Im not known for that. So it seems like it was confusing me with a radical feminist view that one would associate with Catharine MacKinnon or Andrea Dworkin, a completely different feminist modality. Im not always calling into question whos a man and whos not, and am I a man? Maybe Im a man. (Laughs.) Call me a man. I am much more open about categories of gender, and my feminism has been about womens safety from violence, increased literacy, decreased poverty, and more equality. I was never against the category of men. Udi Aloni: A beautiful Israeli poem asks, How does one become Avot Yeshurun? Avot Yeshurun was a poet who caused turmoil in Israeli poetry. I want to ask, how does one become Judith Butlerespecially with the issue of Gender Trouble, the book that so troubled the discourse on gender? Judith Butler: You know, Im not sure that I know how to give an account of it, and I think it troubles gender differently depending on
(Methuen Drama Engage) Mark Edward (Editor), Stephen Farrier (Editor) - Contemporary Drag Practices and Performers - Drag in A Changing Scene, Volume 1-Methuen Drama (2020)