Date of Award
Spring 2021
Department or Program
Comparative Literature Program
First Advisor
Silvia Spitta
Second Advisor
Tarek El-Ariss
Abstract
This article examines the possibilities and limits of gender becomings in Paul Preciado’s book Testo yonqui (Testo Junkie). A genre-fluid “body-essay,” his text theorizes a departure from gender through contemporary medicine. Following Preciado in his self-administration of testosterone, the book labels today’s reality a “pharmacopornographic era,” a new iteration of Foucault’s biocapitalism. After designating Preciado’s self-generated transformations as becomings, I explore how the book’s heterotopic spaces––including its genre––facilitate Preciado’s forward-moving gender identity. A Foucauldian term, heterotopia has not yet been applied to Testo Junkie, however it offers insight into the book’s potential to motivate individuals to shape their own identities. To conclude this analysis, I consider how, while these instances of becomings are exemplified especially in Testo Junkie’s fictional passages, the text’s theoretical passages fail to qualify as heterotopic. Preciado’s pharmacopornographic theory therefore limits the book’s power to cultivate a reader’s ability to destabilize societal expectations around bodies.
Recommended Citation
King, Caroline, "Spaces for Becomings? Heterotopic Fictions in Preciado’s Testo yonqui" (2021). Dartmouth College Master’s Theses. 41.
https://digitalcommons.dartmouth.edu/masters_theses/41
Included in
Comparative Literature Commons, Feminist Philosophy Commons, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons, Modern Literature Commons, Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Spanish Literature Commons