Feminism Without Women: Culture and Criticism in a "Postfeminist" Age [Paperback]

Tania Modleski (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 20, 1991 | ISBN-10: 041590417X | ISBN-13: 978-0415904179

Feminism Without Women examines the operation of "postfeminism" in popular culture, especially popular film, and in cultural studies. By scrutinizing a variety of feminist and poststructuralist theoretical positions and freqently juxtaposing her discussions with analyses of contemporary movies (ranging from Pee-wee's Big Adventure to Lethal Weapon and Three Men and a Baby ), Modleski offers a broad perspective on the future of feminism. In particular, she shows how women as social subjects are once again being relegated to the margins of discourse and society, only now, ironically, they are in danger of being marginalized by feminism itself . Feminism Without Women is a multifaceted response to the shift within feminist theory from "gynocritics" (a woman-centred critical practice) to an increasingly male-oriented "gender studies". This move has been accompanied by feminist/philosophical attempts to abolish the very category of "woman". A large portion of the book is devoted to analyzing the state of "male feminism" and argues that the "new masculinities" being heralded by some feminists are less revolutionary than is often claimed; that these kinder , gentler masculinit are in many ways perfectly consonant with the conservative times. Modleski situates her discussions of criticism and theory in the context of popular culture, and social issues relevant to feminism: surrogate mothering, women and war, the debates over pornography, gay representation in the era of AIDS, the controversy within feminism over lesbian S&M, and the intensification of racism in the 1980s and 1990s.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the face of a self-proclaimed feminist criticism that leaps to embrace the often dubious pleasures of popular culture, Modleski calls for "a feminist rethinking of the articulations of popular culture and political criticism." The book offers such a rethinking, first in terms of theory, then as applied to several recent film trends. Much of Modleski's ( Loving with a Vengeance ) sardonic ire is leveled against ostensibly pro-feminist men; she finds male critics in support of feminism "most useful . . . where they analyze male power, male hegemony, with a concern for the effects of this power on the female subjectitals in text and with an awareness of how frequently male subjectivity works to appropriate 'femininity' while oppressing women." The volume is at its best when dissecting "profoundly regressive" films like Three Men and a Baby and "considering how various representations of masculinity that resist traditional patriarchal images and plots either contribute to or, on the contrary, undermine the feminist project." At other times, particularly in the last of the three theoretical essays, readers without a grounding in Lacan and Foucault will be utterly lost.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Feminist critic Modleski, author of four titles on women and media (e.g., The Women Who Knew Too Much , Routledge, 1987), here takes on the assumptions of her "postfeminist" contemporaries who, she argues, are unwittingly participating in a backlash against the very values they claim to promote. Using examples as diverse as Manuel Puig's novel Kiss of the Spider Woman ( LJ 5/15/79), the Disney movie Three Men and a Baby , and Ann Douglas's highly regarded historical study The Feminization of American Culture ( LJ 8/77), she shows how women continue to be degraded and devalued in both popular and academic representations. Her discussions of race, gender, pornography, Pee Wee Herman, war films, the function of the critic, and bestiality and pedophilia in popular culture are always provocative and often brilliant, although she relies too heavily on psychoanalytic ideas for some tastes. Highly recommended for film and women's studies collections.
- Beverly Miller, Boise State Univ. Lib., Id.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 188 pages
• Publisher: Routledge (September 20, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 041590417X
• ISBN-13: 978-0415904179
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #916,248 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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