ABSTRACT
In an interview with psych & po, Kristeva says that she concentrates on discourses that break down identity because she is a woman.! Because she is a woman and concentrates on discourses that break down identity, Kristeva claims that her "work obeys ethical exigencies."2 She suggests that women are more aware of ethics because of their marginal relation to the Symbolic; and her texts in particular carry an ethical imperative to break down identity through practice.3 Her concern is to link the ethical with negativity so that it won't degenerate into either conformity or perversion. Without negativity, ethics is mere conformity. And without ethics, negativity is mere perversion.4 At the limit, without negativity, ethics is tyranny; and without ethics, negativity is delirium. By linking ethics and negativity, Kristeva tries to steer between tyranny and delirium.
