Full Description
This innovative Handbook examines how gender shapes social activism and is shaped by activism. With a unique interdisciplinary focus, it explores the effects of the gender binary on experiences of activism, considering how different movements negotiate and, at times, challenge these traditional conceptions. The Handbook then moves beyond the binary with ground-breaking work from a range of scholars.
Expert authors discuss the impact and limitations of the gender binary, using examples such as the MeToo movement to demonstrate how viewing men and women as separate, monolithic categories results in countless differences being overlooked. Chapters present a range of global and intersectional case studies such as the gender hierarchies in Swedish activism, Black women's involvement in abolition movements and feminist campaigns in Saudi Arabia. The Handbook also moves beyond the binary, adopting a transfeminist approach in relation to the experiences of trans, intersex and non-binary people and crucially advocating for the conceptualization of a more expansive gender system and the ways in which gender aids activism and impedes it.
This thought-provoking Handbook is a vital resource for students and scholars of gender politics, social movements, discrimination and social inequality. It is also an enlightening read for academics interested in employing intersectional and transfeminist perspectives in their research.
Contents
Contents
1 Introduction: gender, activism, the binary, and beyond 1
Rachel L. Einwohner, Kelsy Kretschmer and Jo Reger
PART I ALONG THE BINARY
2 Gender deployment and resistance in women's movements and
modern feminism 28
Katie Mueller and Jo Reger
3 Intersectional diminishment and Black feminist invisibility in
social movement dynamics 52
Melissa C. Brown
4 How gender hierarchies shape activism: the relationship between
everyday action and extraordinary activism in cases from Sweden 74
Anna-Britt Coe
5 The Saudi feminist movement: obstacles, challenges and
opportunities 96
Zahia Smail Salhi
6 Masculinity and social movements 121
Emily K. Carian
PART II BEYOND THE BINARY
7 Theorizing gender and social movements beyond the binary 139
Nancy Whittier
8 Bodily autonomy and the limits of gender-based activism in
organizing beyond the binary 163
Zachary D. Palmer and Elle Rochford
9 Asexuality: lessons for gender activism 186
Canton Winer
10 Intersex social movements: from medical disorder to selfdetermination 209
Angelika von Wahl
11 Gender identity, national culture, language and activism: the case
of Iceland 231
Þorgerꝺur J. Einarsdóttir, Jyl Josephson and Laufey Axelsdóttir
PART III APPLICATIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
12 Emotions, gender and politics in Mexican women's collectives 263
Tommaso Gravante and Alice Poma
13 The gendered dimensions of movements for racial justice 284
Aisha Upton and Jalia Joseph
14 Could leaderless networked social movements transform women's
marginalization in social activism? A multi-dimensional
framework 302
Susanne YP Choi
15 Racial capitalism and Black women's struggle for reproductive
justice 330
Crystal Nicole Eddins
16 Gender, crises, and mobilisations in Europe 354
Silke Roth
17 Contesting the gender binary in wartime: Ukrainian women's
resistance to Russia's aggression 382
Olena Nikolayenko
