The Apparatus of the Performer: The Quest to Define "Performative"
10 July 2009
Essay 2 of 9 in "Performing Identity: An Exploration of the Nature of Performance"
In regards to J. L. Austin’s How to Do Things with Words, one of my peers posited an extremely valid question: would we (scholars of Performance Studies) still be studying this text if Austin had not chosen the word “performative” to describe these particular utterances? This question sparked my interest in Austin’s book, which I had initially found quite frustrating. Although I understood the concept of a performative utterance, I did not truly understand what performative meant, which is precisely what the above question was referencing. In fact, Austin himself too readily dismisses the significance of his word choice, an offensive oversight for a linguist: “I have preferred a new word [performative], to which, though its etymology is not irrelevant, we shall perhaps not be so ready to attach some preconceived meaning” (7, my emphasis). That statement is undeniably problematic – to say the etymology is not irrelevant is to acknowledge that it is relevant, that there must be some preconceived meaning attached to it, however negligible. I was thereby inspired to take particular note of his word choice and its inherent meanings in order to draw for myself a clearer picture of Performance Studies. Although this book covers a great deal of ground (and by its end we are even unsure if all utterances are not performative) it was this particular phrase that caught my interest and demanded my focused attention.
Since I have been troubled by my inability to pin down a concrete definition of performance, How to Do Things with Words inspired me to set out on establishing some semblance of boundaries for this phenomenon, however amorphous. My confusion by Austin’s dense material and my resistance to its assertions instigated this quest. For example, although it has been suggested that Austin’s performative utterances represent the performativity of objects, I was unable to come to terms with this. I have always been under the impression that performance is something humans (conscious and mobile beings) do. How, then, can an object perform? In order to begin my brief foray into the difficult task of definition, I turned to that bastion of precision of the English language: the Oxford English Dictionary (which, significantly, includes Austin’s definition of “performative”). The OED gives the following primary definition for performance: “The accomplishment or carrying out of something commanded or undertaken; the doing of an action or operation.”
In this sense, I was struck by some of the resulting compounds, in which “performance” has an entirely different meaning for each: performance anxiety, performance appraisal, and performance art. The phrase “performance anxiety” interests me because of my interest in sexuality studies and my personal theory that sexuality is almost always a performance and not really governed by natural impulses at all. “Performance appraisal” relates to the field of criticism and judging one’s ability to accomplish an action. But “performance art” is perhaps the most interesting. In light of the definition we are working with, the concept of action doesn’t seem to gel well with art – action should be practical, but art is deliberately not so (or at least that is not its priority). However, performance art is also not theatre, since (as the OED specifies) it usually lacks narrative structure. So now we are faced with an unfamiliar definition for a familiar word: there is an inherent assumption that a performance is a theatrical production, but even that use of “performance” derives from its original and primary meaning: the doing of an action. But even action is ambiguous so now we must define that: “The process or condition of acting or doing (in the widest sense); the exertion of energy or influence; working, agency, operation.”
Although there must be much more work done on comprehending the intricacies and precision of our language, especially in reference to the concepts we are actually trying to elucidate, I conclude from the above description that performance must necessarily incite some kind of external change. And in this way I understand Austin’s performative utterances: words that do things because they actually affect environmental circumstances.
However, I am still not convinced that the words themselves are the performers, even if they are performing. After all, they are not entirely autonomous. This is the reason Austin finds himself outlining a number of circumstances that need to be in place for a performative utterance be effective: simply uttering those words does not make them perform. I suggest that in these instances, the speaker is the performer. After all, the book is called How to Do Things with Words, not How Words Do Things with Us. The words are not negligible, however, because the performer is unable to affect any change without the use of the words. One could say that the speaker is performing through the words, just as a puppeteer performs through the puppets. I maintain that we cannot call a puppet a performer, because puppets are inanimate and non-sentient. However, we may call them performative in that they are an apparatus of a performance – the puppeteer/performer could not really perform without them.
Essay 2 of 9 in "Performing Identity: An Exploration of the Nature of Performance"
In regards to J. L. Austin’s How to Do Things with Words, one of my peers posited an extremely valid question: would we (scholars of Performance Studies) still be studying this text if Austin had not chosen the word “performative” to describe these particular utterances? This question sparked my interest in Austin’s book, which I had initially found quite frustrating. Although I understood the concept of a performative utterance, I did not truly understand what performative meant, which is precisely what the above question was referencing. In fact, Austin himself too readily dismisses the significance of his word choice, an offensive oversight for a linguist: “I have preferred a new word [performative], to which, though its etymology is not irrelevant, we shall perhaps not be so ready to attach some preconceived meaning” (7, my emphasis). That statement is undeniably problematic – to say the etymology is not irrelevant is to acknowledge that it is relevant, that there must be some preconceived meaning attached to it, however negligible. I was thereby inspired to take particular note of his word choice and its inherent meanings in order to draw for myself a clearer picture of Performance Studies. Although this book covers a great deal of ground (and by its end we are even unsure if all utterances are not performative) it was this particular phrase that caught my interest and demanded my focused attention.
Since I have been troubled by my inability to pin down a concrete definition of performance, How to Do Things with Words inspired me to set out on establishing some semblance of boundaries for this phenomenon, however amorphous. My confusion by Austin’s dense material and my resistance to its assertions instigated this quest. For example, although it has been suggested that Austin’s performative utterances represent the performativity of objects, I was unable to come to terms with this. I have always been under the impression that performance is something humans (conscious and mobile beings) do. How, then, can an object perform? In order to begin my brief foray into the difficult task of definition, I turned to that bastion of precision of the English language: the Oxford English Dictionary (which, significantly, includes Austin’s definition of “performative”). The OED gives the following primary definition for performance: “The accomplishment or carrying out of something commanded or undertaken; the doing of an action or operation.”
In this sense, I was struck by some of the resulting compounds, in which “performance” has an entirely different meaning for each: performance anxiety, performance appraisal, and performance art. The phrase “performance anxiety” interests me because of my interest in sexuality studies and my personal theory that sexuality is almost always a performance and not really governed by natural impulses at all. “Performance appraisal” relates to the field of criticism and judging one’s ability to accomplish an action. But “performance art” is perhaps the most interesting. In light of the definition we are working with, the concept of action doesn’t seem to gel well with art – action should be practical, but art is deliberately not so (or at least that is not its priority). However, performance art is also not theatre, since (as the OED specifies) it usually lacks narrative structure. So now we are faced with an unfamiliar definition for a familiar word: there is an inherent assumption that a performance is a theatrical production, but even that use of “performance” derives from its original and primary meaning: the doing of an action. But even action is ambiguous so now we must define that: “The process or condition of acting or doing (in the widest sense); the exertion of energy or influence; working, agency, operation.”
Although there must be much more work done on comprehending the intricacies and precision of our language, especially in reference to the concepts we are actually trying to elucidate, I conclude from the above description that performance must necessarily incite some kind of external change. And in this way I understand Austin’s performative utterances: words that do things because they actually affect environmental circumstances.
However, I am still not convinced that the words themselves are the performers, even if they are performing. After all, they are not entirely autonomous. This is the reason Austin finds himself outlining a number of circumstances that need to be in place for a performative utterance be effective: simply uttering those words does not make them perform. I suggest that in these instances, the speaker is the performer. After all, the book is called How to Do Things with Words, not How Words Do Things with Us. The words are not negligible, however, because the performer is unable to affect any change without the use of the words. One could say that the speaker is performing through the words, just as a puppeteer performs through the puppets. I maintain that we cannot call a puppet a performer, because puppets are inanimate and non-sentient. However, we may call them performative in that they are an apparatus of a performance – the puppeteer/performer could not really perform without them.
