Judith Butler (Routledge Critical Thinkers)

Paperback, reprint, xiv + 177 pages, NOT ex-library. Light external handling wear only. Contents are clean and bright throughout with unmarked text, free of inscriptions and stamps, firmly bound. Straight uncreased spine. -- Sara Salih offers a clear and accessible introduction to Judith Butler's philosophy. She elucidates Butler's complex arguments on the performative construction of gender and identity, tracing their evolution from early influences like Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit and early works such as Subjects of Desire through landmark texts including Gender Trouble, Bodies That Matter, Excitable Speech, and The Psychic Life of Power. Salih highlights Butler's critiques of binary oppositions between sex and gender, her engagement with power and subjection drawing on Foucault, and her explorations of the body as a site of cultural inscription influenced by Lacan and Kristeva. The book also covers Butler's forays into queer theory, speech acts, and melancholy, positioning her as a pivotal figure in poststructuralist feminism. It includes a detailed chronology of Butler's life and works, a glossary of key terms, and further reading suggestions, making it invaluable for undergraduates in philosophy, literary theory, cultural studies, and gender studies. Butler's ideas have profoundly shaped debates on identity politics and performativity since the 1990s.