to the feminist cause.
             Drawing on the Lacanian theory that outside language what we understand to be "feminine" does not exist, Kanneh examines Cixous theoretical description of a woman who is making a public address.
             In what she calls "a dubious valorisation" (Kemp & Squires. p293) Kanneh reiterates Cixous depiction of the emotional, trembling woman. The woman is offered, by Cixous, as exhibiting the interplay of language and body. Her "body" is, we are told, projected through her language. Her body being so projected then becomes purely her own voice which exceeds the limitations of masculine constructed discourse. Kanneh, noting how Cixous insists that the woman's body, her "feminine essence", instructs her language maintains that this runs counter to Lacan's thinking of language being a symbolic system (Magezis. p58). She sites this as a notable flaw in Cixous' as it seems to counter Lacan's linguistic theories which has informed much French feminist thought.
             Making her own analysis of the theoretical speech scene, Kanneh arguing from what she calls a "social viewpoint" (Kemp & Squires p293) offers that the tremors with which the woman's body suffers as she speaks are rooted not in intrinsic feminine characteristics but are the direct result of "social marginalisation and intolerable sexual visibility" (K&S p293).
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