Difference Troubles
Difference Troubles
Queering Social Theory and Sexual Politics
Difference Troubles, first published in 1997, examines the implications for social theory and sexual politics of taking difference seriously. It explores the trouble difference makes not only for the social sciences, but also for the people - feminists, queer theorists, postmodernists - who champion difference. Seidman asks how social thinkers should conceptualize differences such as gender, race, and sexuality, without reducing them to an inferior status. This is a wide-ranging and sophisticated discussion of contemporary social theory and sexual politics, presented with Seidman's familiar imagination and clarity. In addition, it argues persuasively for a pragmatic approach to difference troubles in theory and politics.
- Author very well known for contributions to social theory and queer theory
- Provides a major new statement addressing weaknesses in much contemporary theorising about 'difference' and identity politics
- Offers a sophisticated integration of gender/gay studies with mainstream sociology and cultural studies
Product details
October 1997Hardback
9780521590433
322 pages
229 × 152 × 22 mm
0.64kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Introduction: the contemporary reconfiguring of social theory and cultural politics
- Part I. Resisting Difference: The Malaise of the Human Sciences:
- 1. The political unconscious of the human sciences
- 2. The end of sociological theory
- 3. Relativizing sociology: the challenge of cultural studies
- 4. The refusal of sexual difference: queering sociology
- 5. Difference troubles: the flight of sociology from 'otherness'
- Part II. Between Identity and Difference: From Lesbian and Gay to Queer Theory:
- 6. Identity and politics in a 'postmodern' gay culture
- 7. Deconstructing queer theory or some difficulties in a theory and politics of difference
- Part III. Democratic Prospects: The Politics of Knowledge and Identity:
- 8. Transfiguring sexual identity: aids and the cultural politics of sexuality and homosexuality
- 9. From gay ethnicity to queer politics: the renewal of gay radicalism in the United States
- 10. Postmodern anxiety: the politics of epistemology
- 11. The politics of sexual difference in late twentieth century America
- 12. Difference and democracy: group recognition and the political cultures of the United States, Holland, and France
- Epilogue: pragmatism, difference and a culture of strong democracy.
