Editing Jacques Lacan (section)

===Phallus===
[[Feminism|Feminist]] thinkers have both utilised and criticised Lacan's concepts of castration and the [[Phallus#Psychoanalysis|phallus]]. Feminists such as [[Avital Ronell]]{{Citation needed|date=September 2024}}, [[Jane Gallop]],<ref>Gallop, Jane, ''Reading Lacan''. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985</ref> and [[Elizabeth Grosz]],<ref name="Grosz">Elizabeth A. Grosz, ''Jacques Lacan: A Feminist Introduction''</ref> have interpreted Lacan's work as opening up new possibilities for feminist theory.

Some feminists have argued that Lacan's phallocentric analysis provides a useful means of understanding gender biases and imposed roles, while others, most notably [[Luce Irigaray]], accuse Lacan of maintaining the [[sexism|sexist]] tradition in psychoanalysis.<ref>Irigary, Luce, ''This Sex Which Is Not One'' 1977 (Eng. trans. 1985)</ref> For Irigaray, the phallus does not define a single axis of gender by its presence or absence; instead, gender has two positive poles. Like Irigaray, French philosopher [[Jacques Derrida]], in criticizing Lacan's concept of castration, discusses the phallus in a [[chiasmus]] with the hymen, as both one and other.<ref>Derrida, Jacques, ''[[Dissemination (Derrida)|Dissemination]]'' (1983)</ref><ref>Butler, Judith. ''Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of "Sex"'' (1993)</ref>