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This collection of essays is an interdisciplinary work bringing together an internationally acclaimed group of transgender writers. Informed by both academic and street experiences, it considers the practical issues faced in changing the world view of gender as well as the limitations of queer, feminism and post-modernism. In a wide-ranging set of contributions, it addresses our engendered places now and what we can aim for in the future. It evaluates the mechanisms we can use to galvanize both the micro theories of gender as a personal experience of oppression and the macro theories of gender as a site of social regulation. The collection aims to take identity politics and reclaim identity for the self.

Do depictions of crazy cat ladies obscure more sinister structural violence against animals hoarded in factory farms? Highlighting the frequent pathologization of animal lovers and animal rights activists, this book examines how the “madness” of our relationships with animals intersects with the “madness” of taking animals seriously. The essays collected in this volume argue that “animaladies” are expressive of political and psychological discontent, and the characterization of animal advocacy as mad or “crazy” distracts attention from broader social unease regarding human exploitation of animal life. While allusions to madness are both subtle and overt, they are also very often gendered, thought to be overly sentimental with an added sense that emotions are being directed at the wrong species. Animaladies are obstacles for the political uptake of interest in animal issues—as the intersections between this volume and established feminist scholarship show, the fear of being labeled unreasonable or mad still has political currency.

Women's Experimental Writing considers six contemporary authors who use experimental methods and negative modes of critique in their fiction and feminism.The authors covered are Valerie Solanas, Kathy Acker, Theresa Cha, Chantel Chawaf, Jeanette Winterson, and Lynda Barry.These writers all share a commitment to combining extreme content with.

What is steampunk? Fashion craze, literary genre, lifestyle - or all of the above? Playing with the scientific innovations and aesthetics of the Victorian era, steampunk creatively warps history and presents an alternative future, imagined from a nineteenth-century perspective. In her interdisciplinary book, Claire Nally delves into this contemporary subculture, explaining how the fashion, music, visual culture, literature and politics of steampunk intersect with theories of gender and sexuality. Exploring and occasionally critiquing the ways in which gender functions in the movement, she addresses a range of different issues, including the controversial trope of the Victorian asylum; gender and the graphic novel; the legacies of colonialism; science and the role of Ada Lovelace as a feminist steampunk icon. Drawing upon interviews, theoretical readings and textual analysis, Nally asks: why are steampunks fascinated by our Victorian heritage, and what strategies do they use to reinvent history in the present?

Blurb: From Rococo to Edwardian fashions, Japanese street style has reinvented many western dress styles, reinterpreting and altering their meanings and messages in a different cultural and historical context. This wide ranging and original study reveals the complex exchange of styles and what they represent in Japan and beyond, contesting common perceptions of gender in Japanese dress and the notion that non-western fashions simply imitate western styles. Through case studies focussing on fashion image consumption in style tribes such as Kamikaze Girls, Lolita, Edwardian, Ivy Style, Victorian, Romantic and Kawaii, this ground-breaking book investigates the complexities of dress and gender and demonstrates the flexible nature of contemporary fashion and style exchange in a global context. Japanese Fashion Cultures will appeal to students and scholars of fashion, cultural studies, gender studies, media studies and related fields.

This title traces the lives of individual lesbians against the background of the politics and history of the 20th century, and shows the infinite variety of ways in which lesbians made their lives in Britain. This history has relevance to contemporary life and politics within the lesbian community. British lesbians have a long tradition of diversity, of action, of success and of pride, which is documented here.

Education and Gender draws on international research from the USA, the UK, India, Mexico, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean, to provide a comprehensive global overview of the relationship between gender and education. Rooting constructions of gender and sexuality in specific geographical contexts, the contributors consider a range of issues. Themes discussed include the gender gap in educational attainment; pedagogical strategies; stereotyping in curricula; and education policy. Drawing on best practices worldwide, the contributors identify the current gaps and propose solutions to promote gender-just, equitable and pluralistic societies. Each chapter includes key questions to encourage active engagement with the subject and a list of further reading to support taking the exploration further.

Are Shakespeare's plays dramatizations of patriarchy or representations of assertive and eloquent women?Or are they sometimes both?And is it relevant, and if so how, that his women were first played by boys?This book shows how many kinds of feminist theory help analyze the dynamics of Shakespeare's plays.

Using the idea of “performative essentialism,” meaning that gender in the Middle Ages was both a product of and a reaction to biology, social roles, and personal actions, Gender in Medieval Culture explores the roles men and women fulfilled in medieval Europe, while also suggesting that these functions were often surprisingly flexible. Although most facets of medieval life, including the law, literature, science, and religion, worked together to ensure that the natural state of woman was a fundamentally lesser being than man, there were exceptional situations where gender became fluid or malleable. For instance, when a woman chose a life of vowed virginity, rejecting the traditional female role of motherhood, she transcended the confines of her flesh, and performed in a rational masculine manner instead. Similarly, Christ was equally constructed as the ideal man and spouse, yet was also the ultimate model of perpetual virginity and was deemed maternal for his suffering for and nurturing of humanity. Ultimately, this volume examines the medieval world through the lens of gender and sexuality in order to create a fuller understanding of the gendered expectations we still live with today.

This work lies at the critical juncture of feminism and religious studies and participates in the vibrant tradition of the feminist anthology. It is part of a broad feminist discourse that continues to grow less monolithic and more varied in material, method and style each year. The papers are divided into three main sections: the representation of women in sacred texts and theologies, the fundamental need to recover the heritage of women and to return to women their history, and the coming together of canonical texts with contemporary feminist theory in order to address philosophical and theological problems.