Julia Kristeva

Julia Kristeva (born 24 June 1941) is a famous Bulgarian philosopher, psychoanalyst, feminist, and, most recently, novelist, who has been living in France since the middle of the 1960s. Her works have an important place in post-structuralist thought.

Related Topics:
24 June - 1941 - Bulgarian - Philosopher - Psychoanalyst - Feminist - Novelist - France - 1960s - Post-structuralist

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Born in Bulgaria, Kristeva moved in her late teens to France, where she continued her education at several universities. She arrived there just in time to experience the rapidly waning influence of structuralism, which was being challenged by Foucault and Derrida, among others. In some ways, her work can be seen as trying to adapt a psychoanalytic approach to these poststructuralist critiques.

Related Topics:
Bulgaria - France - Structuralism - Foucault - Derrida - Psychoanalytic - Poststructuralist

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For example, her view of the subject, and its construction, shares many similarities with Freud and Lacan. However, Kristeva rejects any formal systematical (or structuralist) understanding of the subject in favor of a subject perpetually "in process" or "in crisis." In this way, she addresses the poststructuralist critique of essentialized structures, while preserving a psychoanalytic approach.

Related Topics:
Subject - Freud - Lacan

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One of Kristeva's most important propositions is her idea of the semiotic. For Kristeva, the semiotic is closely related to the infantile (pre-mirror) state in both Lacan and Freud. It is an emotional force, tied to our instincts, which exists in the fissures and prosody of language rather than in the denotative meanings of words. In this sense, the semiotic is opposed to the symbolic, which refers to a more denotative almost mathematical relation of words to meaning. Kristeva's use of semiotic here should not be confused with the much different, earlier use of Saussure.

Related Topics:
Mirror - Instincts - Prosody - Denotative meaning - Semiotic - Saussure

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Julia Kristeva is married to the French writer Philippe Sollers.

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