The Difficulty of Difference: Psychoanalysis, Sexual Difference and Film Theory (Routledge Library Editions: Cinema) - Hardcover

Rodowick, D. N.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 041572676X ISBN 13: 9780415726764

Publisher: Routledge, 2013

Synopsis

This book argues that serious misreadings of Freud and Lacan on sexual difference have characterized prevailing models of psychoanalytic film criticism. In critiquing theories of identification and female spectatorship, the author maintains that early film theorists and feminist critics are equally guilty of imposing a binary conception of sexual difference on Freud’s thought. By embracing such a rigid definition of male/female difference, they fail to understand the fundamentally complex and fluid process of sexual identification as it is articulated in Freud’s writing, constructed in film texts, and negotiated by spectators.

The book turns to Freud’s work on fantasy to develop an alternative model for interpreting sexuality in the visual and narrative arts, one that emphasizes a ‘politics of critical reading’ over accepted theories of ideological identification. Originally published in 1991, its strategic focus on psychoanalysis itself as an object of historical and critical inquiry, and not simply as a reading method is the unique quality of this book.

About this title

Review

Reviews of the original edition:

‘Not to be missed by those who love the cinema as art and entertainment and who revel in its eccentricities…very sharp, knowledgeable and fiercely nostalgic.’ – Birmingham Post

‘..deals brightly and knowledgably with Casablanca, Mission to Moscow, Five Graves to Cairo, Guadalcanal Diary, Action in the North Atlantic, Since They Went Away and all other war movies which kept the queues lengthening for five years.’ – Screen International

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 041572676X
• ISBN 13: 9780415726764
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176