Reconcilable Differences: Confronting Beauty, Pornography, and the Future of Feminism

by Lynn S. Chancer

Overview

This volume examines controversial faultlines in contemporary feminism—pornography, the beauty myth, sadomasochism, prostitution, and the issue of rape—from an original and provocative perspective. Lynn Chancer focuses on how, among many feminists, the concepts of sex and sexism became fragmented and mutually exclusive. Exploring the dichotomy between sex and sexism as it has developed through five current feminist debates, Chancer seeks to forge positions that bridge oppositions between unnecessary (and sometimes unwitting) "either/or" binaries. Chancer's book attempts to incorporate both the need for sexual freedom and the depth of sexist subordination into feminist thought and politics.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520209237
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	05/15/1998
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	330
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments 
Introduction: Sex versus Sexism 
PART 1: FEMINIST DEBATES IN CONTEMPORARY CONTEXT
1. Why Split Sex from Sexism? 
2. A Problem from Within 
PART 2: FIVE CASE EXAMPLES
3· Feminist Offensives:Beyond Defending Pornography 
4· The Beauty Context:Looks, Social Theory, and Feminism 
5· Prostitution and Feminist Theory:Notes from the Sociological Underground 
6. Feminism and Sadomasochism:Regarding Sadomasochism in Everyday Life 
7· Victim Feminism or No Feminism? The Case of Rape 
PART 3: FEMINIST FUTURES
8. Beyond Gender versus Class 
9· Third-Wave Feminisms and Beyond 
Notes 
Bibliography 
Index 

Editorial Reviews

For Third Wave feminists to suceed at "filling out feminism" by accomodating the broadest range of views, it will be necessary to avoid strategies that foiled Second Wave feminists' attempts at dialogue and activism across sexual differences. This important task is made easier by the recent publication of feminist sociologist Lynn S. Chancer's new book, Reconciliable Differences. Chancer...argues that the future of feminism depends on a more productive attitude toward difference: "Two things must again become possible for feminists both to disagree from within and to focus on effecting the desperately needed changes that require collective action."...According to Chancer, the split within Second Wave feminism can best be understood as a difference of political emphasis—whether to prioritize "sex" or "sexism." These quickly became positioned as mutually exclusive choices: either to focus on the pursuit of sexual freedom, personal power, and individual pleasure in the midst of a hierarchically organized sexist society, or to be committed to fighting social and structural inequality at the expense of individual sources of pleasure and power.

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