judith butler (born february 24, 1956) is an american philosopher. they were born in ohio. they got their phd in philosophy from yale university in 1984. they live in berkeley, california, with their partner wendy brown. in 1990 their book "gender trouble" was published by routledge. it is considered an important work in modern feminism. in the book butler talks about their theory of gender performativity, which is that gender, along with sex and sexuality, is something you "perform" rather than an expression of human biology. in other politics, they have supported palestine and the democratic party, including hillary clinton and kamala harris.