Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory

This is an introduction to poststructuralist theory which examines how poststructuralism might be used to theorize gender, identity and experience in patriarchal societies. This revised and updated edition includes an additional final chapter on the recent debate about feminism and postmodernism. Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory offers a clear and accessible introduction to poststructuralist theory, focusing on questions of language, subjectivity and power. It examines how we might use poststructuralism to theorize gender, identity and experience in patriarchal societies. Drawing on the work of Saussure, Derrida, Freud, Lacan, Kristeva, Irigaray, Cixous, and Foucault, it argues for a form of feminist poststructuralism that can help bring about social change. This new edition has been revised and updated and includes an additional final chapter on the recent debate about feminism and postmodernism. Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory offers a clear and accessible introduction to poststructuralist theory, focusing on questions of language, subjectivity and power. Key book features: Classic text. Now updated and revised. New final chapter on feminism and postmodernism.

What do the theories of poststructuralism have to offer contemporary feminism? In a discussion which assumes no prior knowledge of these complex theoretical issues, Chris Weedon argues that feminism is a politics which depends for its effectiveness on an alliance of theory and practice. Making the case that poststructuralism is the theory with most explanatory and practical relevance to feminism, she examines the possibilities for a feminist practice. She suggests that patriarchal power is structural: it exists in institutions and social practices and not merely in individual intentions. It is, therefore, not a part of immutable nature but open to effective theoretical analysis and practical change. To develop this view, she mobilizes recent poststructuralist developments in the theory of language, subjectivity and power to develop a sophisticated feminist politics that takes into account not only questions of language and gender but also of class and race. Her argument, finally, is that it is through poststructuralist theory that an adequate feminist practice may emerge