Illa

A major figure in contemporary feminist critical theory, Cixous is known for works that analyze and attempt to counter Western culture's traditional concepts of male and female. Cixous is best known for her essay collaboration with Catherine Clément, La jeune née (1975; The Newly Born Woman) and her essay "Le rire de la Méduse" (1975; "The Laugh of the Medusa"). Both texts are recognized as being markedly influenced by the writings of Jacques Derrida, the French philosopher and founder of the critical method known as deconstructionism; Michel Foucault, the French philosopher and historian who rejected the theory of human nature and was a proponent of the notion of an ever-changing self; Jacques Lacan, the French psychoanalyst and philosopher who proposed a linguistic theory of the unconscious; and Sigmund Freud, the originator of psychoanalysis. A proponent of écriture féminine, or feminine writing, Cixous strives in all of her works to establish a uniquely feminine perspective, both to correct what she and many feminist theorists view as the traditionally masculine character of Western discourse and as a methodology with which to critique that discourse.