Rachel Alsop - Gender Theory in Troubled Times

1 Dedication Dedication In memory of Annette Fitzsimons

2 Title page Gender Theory in Troubled Times KATHLEEN LENNON & RACHEL ALSOP polity

3 Copyright page

4 Preface

5 IntroductionWhat is gender? Doing gender theory Theoretical shifts Gender essentialism The rise of right-wing populism Gender theory under attack The boundaries of the category ‘woman’ The structure of this book Notes

6 1 The Data of Biology Sexed/gendered difference Sexed categories as natural kinds Psychological and behavioural sex differences and their biological anchorage Evolutionary psychology Male and female brains The sex/gender distinction How many sexes are there? The case of sport Trans bodies and biology Nature/culture and the new materialism Entanglements Notes

7 2 Gendered Psyches: Psychoanalysis and Sexual Difference Psychoanalysis Why Freud? The bodily ego Freud and sexual difference The boy The girl Sexual difference: in summary Reflections Lacan’s three orders Lacan and sexual difference Symbolic essentialism The importance of the Imaginary Luce Irigaray and the feminist imaginary The inevitability of sexual difference? Colonizing gestures Psychoanalysis: race and disability Conclusions Notes

8 3 Historical Materialism Gendered societies From Marxism to Marxist feminism Second-wave Marxist feminism Patriarchy Historical materialism and patriarchy Dual-systems theories and their critique From patriarchy to gender regimes: Walby and Connell Walby on gender Connell on gender Historical materialism and globally connected inequalities Conclusions Notes

9 4 Simone de Beauvoir: Becoming Woman Phenomenology ‘Woman’ as situation The One and the Other Volume 1: The objective conditions The data of biology Economic and social structure Myths Volume II: Lived experience Objectification Living bodily difference Bodily habits Life paths Complicity Dimensions of otherness Conclusions Notes

10 5 Intersectionality Intersectional analysis and material positionality Intersectionality and lived experience Intersectionality: the origins of the concept and the coining of the term Intersectionality in practice Which inequalities does intersectionality cover? The ‘etc. problem’ Who is intersectional? The metaphor of the intersection Decolonial feminism Decolonial feminism and intersectionality Intersectionality and subjectivity Conclusions Notes

11 6 Judith Butler: Performativity, Precariousness and Queering Performance and performativity Gendered scripts Subjectivity and subjectification Real genders Precariousness Queering The performativity of race The critique of identity What about the body, Judy? The expressive body and queer phenomenology Other materialities Conclusion Notes

12 7 Making Sense of our (Gendered) Selves The ‘trans’ umbrella Gendered categories Local readings Confronting nature Trans narratives and gendered homes The dangers of spatial metaphors Belongings The wrong body The expressive body Transformative possibilities Conclusion Notes

13 Conclusion: The ‘Truth about Gender’ Sites of agency Gender-based violence Toxic masculinity Coalition politics Notes

14 Questions for Further Reflection

15 References

16 Index

17 End User License Agreement

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In memory of Annette Fitzsimons

KATHLEEN LENNON & RACHEL ALSOP

polity

Copyright © Kathleen Lennon & Rachel Alsop 2020

The right of Kathleen Lennon & Rachel Alsop to be identified as Authors of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2020 by Polity Press

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