In this thesis I will take a closer look at different theories of female writing and femininity in writing, as understood by Helene Cixous, Luce Irigaray, and Judith Butler, among others. What is an author and what is an autobiography, and why their principled definitions do not correspond to the position of a woman author and autobiographer, I will ask myself through the thought guides of Giorgio Agamben, Michel Foucault and Stanley Cavell. In exploring the possibilities and significance of autobiographical writing for women, I will draw on several feminist theorists, with a special focus on one of the most groundbreaking autobiographical writings on the subject – Mémoires d’une jeune fille rangée by Simone de Beauvoir. The latter will provide me with a conceptual framework and a central philosophical reference, which is why, at the very beginning, I will also place the circumstances of the creation of her groundbreaking work The Second Sex. I will examine how (if at all) and under what conditions a woman can even embark on autobiographical writing through a more detailed insight into the status of a woman philosopher on the one hand, and a comparison of women writers on the other hand and their past experiences with the current situation.
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