Phallocentrism: What It Is And What It Tells Us About Our Society
The term “phallocentrism” refers to the exercise of placing the phallus at the center of explanations about the psychic and sexual constitution. This exercise has been present in a large part of the scientific and philosophical theories of the West, and is even visible in social organization. As a concept, Phallocentrism emerged in the first half of the 20th century to criticize different practices and knowledge, including psychoanalysis, philosophy and science.
Below we will see in more detail what phallocentrism is, where this concept comes from and what some of the consequences its application has had.
As the term itself indicates, phallocentrism is the tendency to place the “phallus” at the center of explanations about the subjective constitution; concept that can be used as a synonym for “penis”, but that It is also used to designate a symbolic reference
The latter comes mainly from Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysis, but is later taken up and criticized by some currents of philosophy, as well as by feminist theories and movements, which claim a different understanding of the psyche and sexuation.
Background and development of the concept
At the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, Sigmund Freud developed a theory of psychosexual development in which he proposed that the psychic constitution of the subjects passes through the awareness of sexual difference.
This awareness brings with it two possibilities: having or lacking the valued object. This object is the penis, and carries with it a symbolic value which later (in Lacanian psychoanalysis) is transferred to other elements beyond the anatomical structure.
From childhood, whoever carries the penis enters a phase of psychic structuring based on the threat of castration (that is, of losing the phallus). On the contrary, those who do not have it go through a structuring process based mainly on said lack, which generates a constitutive envy that was called “penis envy.”
Thus, the phallus was at the center of this theory of psychosexual development, maintaining that the female psychic constitution occurred as a negation of the male one, or as a supplement to it.
The phallus, later understood as a symbolic reference; and its bearer, the male subject, They are thus positioned at the center of explanations about psychic and sexual development
First reviews
Reactions and oppositions to the psychoanalytic theory of psychosexual development occurred both outside and within the same circle of Freud’s disciples. One of them, Karen Horney, significantly criticized the penis envy theory and maintained that the psychic constitution of women was not necessarily crossed by such resentment.
Like Melanie Klein, Horney argued that there is a primary femininity, which is not a derivation or denial of the male psychosexual constitution.
Already in the 1920s, the psychoanalyst and later biographer of Sigmund Freud, Ernest Jones, took up the criticisms that Klein and Horney had made of the theory of penis envy, to maintain that the psychoanalytic postulates made by men were strongly loaded with a “phallocentric” vision.
The latter was what formally gave rise to the concept of “phallocentrism”, and since at the beginning Freudian psychoanalysis did not distinguish between the phallus and the penis, the term was used exclusively to talk about men’s empowerment
It was not until Lacanian psychoanalytic theory that the “phallus” stopped necessarily corresponding to the anatomical structure, and began to designate that which is at the center of the object of desire of each subject.
Decades later, the latter was taken up and criticized by philosophers and feminists, since it maintained the primacy of the phallus as the origin and center of power, the psyche and sexuation at different scales.
Phallocentrism and phallogocentrism
We have seen that the term “phallocentrism” refers to a system of power relations that promote and perpetuate the phallus as the transcendental symbol of empowerment (Makaryk, 1995).
Part of the latter became popular in the second half of the 20th century, when the philosopher Jacques Derrida used it in one of the most representative critiques of contemporary times.
According to Galvic (2010) Derrida maintains that, just as writing has historically been established as a supplement or accessory of speech (of the logos), women have been constituted as supplements or accessories of men.
From there, he establishes a parallel between logocentrism and phallocentrism, and generates the term “phallogocentrism”, which refers to the solidarity of both processes; or rather, he maintains that These are inseparable phenomena
Thus, phallogocentrism ensures both the binary and hierarchical opposition man/woman, and the “masculine order”, or at least, warns that said opposition can give way to exclusion (Glavic, 2010).
Starting in the second half of the 20th century, feminist movements have criticized how psychoanalysis, and later some scientific theories, have been organized around the idea of man as “a whole.” Part of these criticisms They took up an important part of Derrida’s theoretical development
For example, Makaryk (1995) tells us that phallocentrism has sustained a system of power relations that includes what Derrida called “the master narratives of Western discourse”: the classic works of philosophy, science, history. and religion.
In these narratives, the phallus is a reference for unity, authority, tradition, order, and associated values. For this reason, much of feminist criticism, especially Anglo-American, tends to relate phallocentrism to patriarchy pointing out that, frequently, the most empowered people are precisely the masculine-sexed subjects.
However, and from different perspectives, for example in decolonial approaches, these latest debates have been moved to make criticisms within feminism itself.
