Rewriting Difference

Elena Tzelepis is Lecturer in the Classics Department at Columbia University. Athena Athanasiou is Assistant Professor of Social Anthropology at Panteion University in Greece.

"This is no doubt a state-of-the-art edited collection which will make a major contribution not merely to existing Irigaray scholarship and to the fields of feminism, gender and queer studies but, more widely, in contemporary critical and cultural theory." — Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory"The real strength, and rare quality, of this book lies in its willingness to engage in a nuanced—at times, even critical—approach to Irigaray's feminism." — New Formations"This singular volume begins to take account of the enormous influence and range of the work of Luce Irigaray. Taking as a point of departure the key critical writings on Greek philosophy that form the basis of Irigaray's theories of sexual difference, the sexed body, and writing, this anthology brings Irigaray's Greek legacy into the present to consider feminist philosophy as a critical rereading of philosophy's foundations. Here we see that the departures from that important tradition are as important as the debts we owe. Once again we see that to read Irigaray means learning to read in both directions at once. As well, we see in vivid terms that Irigaray's work poses an enormous challenge for rethinking relations of eros and love, recrafting philosophy through new textual and corporeal practices, both embodied and critical. The volume recognizes Irigaray as a feminist philosopher whose work has itself produced an impressive legacy of diverse and vital criticism among major contemporary thinkers. This is an invaluable text for those who wish to understand just how radically feminist thought intervenes in questions of history, love, embodiment, and critical readings in philosophy." — Judith Butler, author of Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable?"This book will captivate feminist scholars and classicists alike, presenting the complex panorama of an interdisciplinary study in which the primacy of the 'text' (be it Irigaray's or that of the ancient tradition) is at the same time confirmed and trespassed." — Adriana Cavarero, author of Stately Bodies: Literature, Philosophy, and the Question of Gender

• AcknowledgmentsForewordGayatri Chakravorty Spivak1. Thinking Difference as Different Thinking in Luce Irigaray’s Deconstructive GenealogiesAthena Athanasiou and Elena Tzelepis2. The Question of Reading IrigarayElizabeth Weed3. Kore: Philosophy, Sensibility, and the Diffraction of LightDorothea Olkowski4. In the Underworld with Irigaray: Kathy Acker’s EurydiceDianne Chisholm5. Textiles that Matter: Irigaray and VeilsAnne-Emmanuelle Berger6. Mothers, Sisters, and Daughters: Luce Irigaray and the Female Genealogical Line in the Stories of the GreeksGail Schwab7. Antigone and the Ethics of KinshipMary Beth Mader8. Mourning (as) Woman: Event, Catachresis, and "That Other Face of Discourse"Athena Athanasiou and Elena Tzelepis9. Weird Greek Sex: Rethinking Ethics in Irigaray and FoucaultLynne Huffer10. Autonomy, Self-Alteration, Sexual DifferenceStathis Gourgouris11. Hospitality and Sexual Difference: Remembering Homer with Luce IrigarayJudith Still12. "Raising Love up to the Word": Rewriting God as "Other" through Irigarayan StyleLaine M. Harrington13. Dynamic Potentiality: The Body that Stands AloneClaire Colebrook14. Sameness, Alterity, Flesh: Luce Irigaray and the Place of Sexual UndecidabilityGayle Salamon15. "Women on the Market": On Sex, Race, and CommodificationEwa Plonowska Ziarek16. Irigaray’s Challenge to the Fetishistic Hegemony of the Platonic One and ManyTina Chanter17. Who Cares about the Greeks? Uses and Misuses of Tradition in the Articulation of Difference and PluralityEleni Varikas18. Conditionalities, Exclusions, OcclusionsPenelope Deutscher19. The ReturnLuce IrigarayContributors