Women and Children First: Feminism, Rhetoric, and Public Policy (SUNY series in Gender Theory) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 079146539X ISBN 13: 9780791465394

Publisher: State University of New York Press, 2005

Synopsis

A critique of public policy rhetoric from multiple feminist perspectives.

This diverse collection explores the rhetoric of a wide range of public policies that propose "to put women and children first," including homeland security, school violence, gun control, medical intervention of intersex infants, and policies that aim to distinguish "good" from "bad" mothers. Using various feminist philosophical analyses, the contributors uncover a logic of paternalistic treatment of women and children that purports to protect them but almost always also disempowers them and sometimes harms them. This logic is widespread in contemporary popular policy discourse and affects the way that people understand and respond to social and political issues. Contributors rethink basic philosophical assumptions concerning subjectivity, difference, and dualistic logic in order to read the rhetoric of contemporary public policy discourse and develop new ways of talking and acting in the policy domain.

About this title

About the Author

Sharon M. Meagher is Professor of Philosophy and Director of Women's Studies at the University of Scranton. She is the coeditor (with Patrice DiQuinzio) of Women and Children First: Feminism, Rhetoric, and Public Policy, also published by SUNY Press.

Edition details

• Publisher: State University of New York Press
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 079146539X
• ISBN 13: 9780791465394
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 272
• Editor: Meagher Sharon M., DiQuinzio Patrice