Butler

"If gender is a construction, must there be an "I" or "we" who enacts or preforms that construction?" Judith Butler, Bodies that Matter, p 7

Butler is one of the “big” people to discuss HOS and the idea of discourse really, really critically (and there have been TONS of back and forth with her and other authors on the subject)- she talks about discourses creating sex/gender/sexuality etc. as a performance. You are both, "subjected to gender, but subjectivated by gender" (Butler, p 7) by the creations that "we" have set up to define what gender is to "us". Our creation of ourselves is in relation to what we are and what we are not- we can not have black without white, male without female- and that is the problem! We set up these creations of opposites and binaries and do not explore the possibilities beneath what these binaries mean. (See genderqueer)

Then, so following, sexuality is performative, much in the same way that what can be popular culture would be considered performative and is based on what the regimes deside the frameworks are [for culture and media, what is cool- ie coolhunting, etc]).

This awesome Judith Butler card which looks like a playing card (hey I was discussing binaries here and it fits!) was found at: http://www.theorycards.org.uk/card02.gif