Gender and Nation

Exploring gender relations and the ways they affect and are affected by national projects and processes, Nira Yuval-Davis argues that the constructions of nationhood usually involve specific notions of both ′manhood′ and ′womanhood′, although their explicit inclusion in the analytical discourse around nations and nationalisms is only a very recent endeavor.

She promotes this analytical project by examining systematically the crucial contribution of gender relations into several major dimensions of nationalist projects, national reproduction, national culture, citizenship, and national conflicts and wars. She sharply differentiates national projects from ′nation-states′ and she emphasizes that membership on ′nations′ can be sub-, super-, and cross-states.

Gender and Nation is an important contribution to the debates on citizenship, gender, and nationhood. It will be essential reading for academics and students of women′s studies, race and ethnic studies, migration, nationalism, sociology, and politics.

Nira Yuval-Davis is Director of the Research Centre on Migration, Refugees and Belonging (CMRB) at The University of East London.