The Sum of Her Parts: Essays

The Sum of Her Parts explores how women’s body parts and the roles/parts that women play have been deployed toward political ends. One essay examines Sarah Winchester and the lore that sprung up around her most famous—and most falsely mythologized—home, the Winchester Mystery House, to suggest that the woman and her house have been used as vessels to hold the nation’s ongoing gun guilt. Another essay springboards from a personal encounter into etymological history, tracing how the word “cun...