In this article, the author argues that we need to conceptualize gender as a social structure, and by doing so, we can better analyze the ways in which gender is embedded in the individual, interactional, and institutional dimensions of our society. To conceptualize gender as a structure situates gender at the same level of general social significance as the economy and the polity. The author also argues that while concern with intersectionality must continue to be paramount, different structures of inequality (...) have different constructions and perhaps different influential causal mechanisms at any given historical moment. We need to follow a both/and strategy to understand gender structure, race structure, and other structures of inequality as they currently operate while also systematically paying attention to how these axes of domination intersect. Finally, the author suggests we pay more attention to doing research and writing theory with explicit attention to how our work can indeed help transform as well as inform society. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to advance a new understanding of gender as a routine accomplishment embedded in everyday interaction. To do so entails a critical assessment of existing perspectives on sex and gender and the introduction of important distinctions among sex, sex category, and gender. We argue that recognition of the analytical independence of these concepts is essential for understanding the interactional work involved in being a gendered person in society. The thrust of our remarks is toward theoretical (...) reconceptualization, but we consider fruitful directions for empirical research that are indicated by our formulation. (shrink)

The book constitutes a reconsideration of her earlier view on gender performativity from Gender Trouble. In this work, the critique of gender norms is clearly situated within the framework of human persistence and survival.

This article reviews the development of feminist studies during the latter quarter of the twentieth century, identifying initial themes in feminist theory and highlighting three major themes framing feminist scholarship today: the relationship between structure and agency; the intersection of race, class, and gender; and emerging studies of the political economy of sexuality. The article emphasizes the significance of understanding structured inequality, including new studies of sexuality and their relationship to race/class/gender stratification.

While recent emphasis has been placed on transformations of gender in the public sphere, changes in gender relations between heterosexual couples in the domestic sphere have been less fully developed in the theoretical literature. The author presents evidence for change at various levels, from the discursive to the quantitative. She outlines a theoretical framework for the analysis of such change based on the “doing gender” and gender consciousness perspectives, readdressed in the light of the new emphasis on discourses of reflexivity (...) and intimacy. She argues for a conception of change that is slow and uneven, in which daily practices and interactions are linked to attitudes and discourse, perhaps over generations. (shrink)