Cultural Politics - Queer Reading

Abstract

Was Shakespeare gay? Is The Merchant of Venice anti-semitic? How does mainstream reading differ from that of subcultural groups? How does the formal study of literature handle such questions? In this lively and readable book, Alan Sinfield engages, freely, provocatively, and wittily, with topics such as the gendering of literary culture, the sexual politics of psychoanalysis during the Cold War, and the history of cultural materialism, and discusses figures such as Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, Raymond Williams, Louis Althusser, Walt Whitman, Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, Holly Hughes, Audre Lorde, Thom Gunn and Jeanette Winterson. Sinfield boldly and persuasively challenges the assumptions that have shaped the study of English literature, investigates the principles and practice that may inform dissident reading, and ultimately argues that lesbian and gay intellectuals should cultivate an allegiance beyond the academy. Cultural Politics-Queer Reading is a lively and accessible account of cultural materialism written by a leading and controversial student of contemporary cultural politics. It intervenes in current debates in critical theory and in gender, ethnic, and cultural studies, and sets the agenda for a truly political lesbian and gay studies.

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