Kristeva on Forms of Revolt

This week’s question is to compare and contrast two forms of revolt in Julia Kristeva’s recent article, “New Forms of Revolt.” Kristeva defines revolt “for the past two centuries, particularly in politics and its accompanying ideologies, has most often been the abandonment of retrospective questioning in favour of an outright rejection of the old, so that new dogmas can take its place” (Kristeva 5). 

She cites psychoanalysis as one form of revolt, as confronting sexual perversions that may put the populace in a state of revolt. However, she claims that psychoanalysis has been the object of ridicule and disgust for centuries and she quotes because, “it collides with the human being’s desire not to know, the human being preferring sexual mystification to confronting truths that may place him in revolt” (Kristeva 10). Via this form of revolt, in which sexual analysis is the base for other derivative forms of revolt, the revolter uses Freud’s revolutionary theories on the psychoanalytic structure of the human mind to find truth or meaning in human nature. Kristeva claims that the dualistic and often contradictory nature this type of analysis proposes leads to a state of “juissance” meaning “enjoyment.”

 This is different from another form of revolt, Retrospective Return, she cites as being used by Christian theologians post Socrates and Plato, to invite the revolter to revolt via a form of philosophical introspection. This type of revolt questions values, and can lead to what she quotes as a state of “nihilism” because the very values that constitute the form of this revolt, are deconstructed through questioning and philosophical introspection. Both of these forms of revolt obviously challenge the status quo and invite the revolt to engage in analysis that may be unusual or counter-intuitive, however psychoanalysis often involves questioning human nature and instinctual inclinations, while Retrospective Return involves challenging pre-existing theory, independent of human nature.