The monogamy logic and subjective restriction: reflecting on the care exercised by Western heterosexual white women

Abstract

In this paper, drawing on both classical and contemporary psychoanalytic theories, as well as feminist authors, we will situate monogamy within a socio-historical-cultural context in order to discuss it from a critical perspective. Based on a historical overview, we aim to show that the reverberations of monogamy differ across genders. More specifically, we will seek to analyze its particular implications for the subjectivity of women, especially white, heterosexual, Western women. As we will see, monogamy appears to be much more expected of women than of men, and its logic of exclusivity seems to unfold into a significant restriction of the possibilities for their affective investment, primarily tied to the care of others. For this discussion, we will articulate the relationship between monogamous logic and care work, considering its impacts on the psychic constitution of white children identified as girls and, later, on their adult lives.