One of the most talked-about scholarly works of the past fifty years, Judith Butler’s _Gender Trouble_ is as celebrated as it is controversial. Arguing that traditional feminism is wrong to look to a natural, 'essential' notion of the female, or indeed of sex or gender, Butler starts by questioning the category 'woman' and continues in this vein with examinations of 'the masculine' and 'the feminine'. Best known however, but also most often misinterpreted, is Butler's concept of gender as a reiterated (...) social _performance _rather than the expression of a prior reality. Thrilling and provocative, few other academic works have roused passions to the same extent. (shrink)

Few topics evoke so much anxiety and pleasure, pain and hope, discussion and silence as sexuality. Throughout the Christian era it has been a major moral preoccupation. Since the eighteenth century it has also been the focus of 'scientific' exploration and political activity. But, despite this obsessive concern, we are still as baffled as our predecessors about the 'true' meaning of sex. In this book Jeffrey Weeks unravels the dense web of historical, theoretical and political forces that have culminated in (...) the contemporary crisis of sexual meanings and values. The book begins with a powerful evocation of our present discontents and their potent signs: the rise of the New Right, the retreat of progressive forces and a wave of moral panics around sex. It argues that this crisis is rooted in a tradition which has ascribed an inflated importance to sexuality, whilst claiming a privileged access to truth. The author then examines radical debates of recent years, and asks whether they contain the potentiality for taking us beyond the existing boundaries of sexuality. From this analysis emerges a controversial 'radical pluralist' approach to sexuality built on an acceptance of diversity and choice. By linking our present discontents to a clear understanding of the past, Jeffrey Weeks presents a rational, optimistic and challenging vision of a realizable future. (shrink)

From 30 contributors--including Kate Millett, Barbara Kruger, and Sharon Olds--a richly diverse collection of essays and poetry exploring female sexuality.

Michel Foucault's involvement with politics, both as an individual and a writer, has been much commented upon but until now has not been systematically reviewed. This is the first major introductory study of Michel Foucault as a political thinker. Jonathon Simons explores the importance of the political in all areas of Foucault's work and life, including important material only recently made available and the implications of various revelations about his private life. Simons relates Foucault's work both to contemporary political thinkers (...) such as Michael Walzer, Charles Taylor and Jurgen Habermas, and to those challenging conventional political categories, especially people who write on feminist and gay theory, such as Judith Butler. Students of Foucault and of political and social theory, as well as those working in lesbian and gay theory, and feminist studies, will find this book essential. (shrink)

Unruly Practices brings together a series of widely discussed essays in feminism and social theory. Read together, they constitute a sustained critical encounter with leading European and American approaches to social theory. In addition, Nancy Fraser develops a new and original socialist-feminist critical theory that overcomes many of the limitations of current alternatives. First, in a series of critical essays, she deploys philosophical and literary techniques to assess the work of Michael Foucault, the French deconstructionists, Richard Rorty, and Jürgen Habermas. (...) Then, in a group of constructive essays, she incorporates their respective strengths in a new critical theory of late-capitalist political culture. Fraser breaks new ground methodologically by integrating the previously divergent insights of poststructuralism, critical social theory, feminist theory, and pragmatism. Thematically, she deals with varied forms of dominance and subordination in modern, industrial, late-capitalist societies. These themes are integrated in an original theory of 'the politics of need interpretation.' This concept becomes the linchpin of the socialist-feminist critical theory. (shrink)

Rosemary Hennessy confronts some of the impasses in materialist feminist work on rethinking `woman' as a discursively constructed subject. She argues for a theory of discourse as ideology taking into account the work of Kristeva, Foucault and Laclau.

In this new book, David Harvey seeks to determine what is meant by the term in its different contexts and to identify how accurate and useful it is as a description of contemporary experience.

A provocative and controversial challenge to postmodern academic feminism.

An expanded edition of the first comprehensive overview of Baudrillard's work, this new edition adds examples from after 1985.

"One of the most comprehensive and intelligent postmodern critics of art and literature, Huyssen collects here a series of his essays on pomo... " —Village Voice Literary Supplement "... his work remains alert to the problematic relationship obtaining between marxisms and poststructuralisms." —American Literary History "... challenging and astute." —World Literature Today "Huyssen's level-headed account of this controversial constellation of critical voices brings welcome clarification to today's murky haze of cultural discussion and proves definitively that commentary from the tradition of (...) the German Left has an indispensable role to play in contemporary criticism." —The German Quarterly "... we will certainly have, after reading this book, a deeper understanding of the forces that have led up to the present and of the possibilities still open to us." —Critical Texts "... a rich, multifaceted study." —The Year's Work in English Studies Huyssen argues that postmodernism cannot be regarded as a radical break with the past, as it is deeply indebted to that other trend within the culture of modernity—the historical avant-garde. (shrink)

A trenchant critique of sexuality in an age of discipline, where bodies and pleasures have become sites of regulatory power.

This is the first major study of Michel Foucault as a political thinker. Written in clear prose, Foucault and the Political explores the ramifications for political theory of the whole range of Foucault's writing, including materials only recently made available. Jon Simons argues that Foucault's work is animated by a tension between his presentation of modern life as "unbearably heavy" and his temptation to escape its limitations by aiming for "unbearable lightness." Through expositions of Foucault's ideas on power/knowledge, subjectification, governmentality, (...) political rationality and the aesthetics of existence, Simons demonstrates how Foucault resists both extremes. Foucault's thought entails an ethic of permanent resistance, best embodied in radical democracy. Simons relates Foucault's work both to contemporary political thinkers, such as Michael Walzer, Charles Taylor and Jurgen Habermas, as well as to scholars challenging conventional political categories, especially feminist and gay theorists such as Judith Butler. (shrink)

First published in 1995. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Analyzes the relationship of power, bureaucracy, and change in modern society.

A critical look at two books, Coming to Power – Writings and Graphics on Lesbian S/m, published in 1981, and its ‘long awaited sequel’, The Second Coming – A Leatherdyke Reader, published in 1996, yields many differences and similarities. Both books have been judged negatively or positively on the basis of their sadomasochistic content and in line with knee-jerk positions around the lesbian ‘sex wars’ of the 1980s. The feminist politics represented in each book and the connections to more general (...) lesbian feminist concerns and developments of either the late 1970s (Coming to Power) or the late 1980s and early 1990s (The Second Coming) are often overlooked or dismissed. Comparing the kind of sex acts and personas fetishized in each book as well as the claims made for lesbian sm by its adherents often reveals more than the writers may have intended. A more nuanced reading of both books also reveals connections between lesbian feminism, particularly lesbian radical feminism and the sm dykes. Rather than being the ‘illegitimate children’ of lesbian feminism, as Coming to Power maintained in 1981, it is clear now that sm dykes and lesbian feminists are strange sisters who needed each other to define their particular politicized identities. (shrink)