The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Sebastian, Four Mothers, Restless, and The Most Precious of Cargoes
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A scholarly assessment of queer theory
MARY DAVIS recommends a timely exploration of the relationship between sex, gender and gender identity
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JOHN GREEN explores the argument that psychiatry needs to move away from the idea of just seeing and treating the individual
SYLVIA HIKINS applauds a polemic against “cleanfluencers” and considers radical alternatives to current inequalities of housework
RUTH AYLETT admires the blunt honesty with which a woman’s experience is recorded, but detects the unexamined privilege that underlies it
IAN SINCLAIR draws attention to the powerful role that literature plays in foreseeing the way humanity will deal with climate crisis
High quality pulp, rollicking online murders, Abnorman Britain, and high skates drama: reviews of The Get Off, Everyone In The Group Chat Dies, Pagans and First To Fall
DENNIS BROE notes what happens to content when the streaming giants incorporate AI and deregulation into their economic models
Sex and Gender: a contemporary reader
Alice Sullivan & Selina Todd, Routledge, £35.99
THIS is an important book. It is a scholarly, multi-disciplinary and very well researched exploration of the relationship between sex, gender and gender identity.
It is also a much needed and timely book because, as the editors point out, we are currently witnessing “the erasure of sex categories from language, public policy, discourse and data collection” and this has profound implications for women’s lives.
The authors of the 15 chapters of the book share a broad understanding that sex is biological, immutable and binary, and that gender is an ideological construct which imposes gendered constraints on individuals according to their sex. As such the book’s starting premise is the refutation of gender identity ideology.
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