One of the most talked-about scholarly works of the past fifty years,
Judith Butler's Gender Trouble is as celebrated as it is
controversial.Arguing that
traditional feminism is wrong to look to a natural, 'essential'
notion of the female, or indeed of sex or gender, Butler starts by
questioning the category 'woman' and continues in this vein with
examinations of 'the masculine' and 'the feminine'. Best known
however, but also most often misinterpreted, is Butler's concept of
gender as a reiterated social performance rather than the expression
of a prior reality. Thrilling and
provocative, few other academic works have roused passions to the
same extent.
