Harvard Book Store Presents:

Judith Butler

presenting
Who’s Afraid of Gender?
in conversation with Doris Sommer

Please Note: Tickets to this event are sold out. We will have a stand-by line at the Brattle Theatre. If any seats are still open five minutes before the event begins, we will sell tickets to those in the stand-by line on a first-come, first-served basis.

Harvard Book Store welcomes Judith Butler—global icon and author of several books, including Gender Trouble; Bodies That Matter; The Psychic Life of Power; and The Force of Nonviolence—to celebrate the paperback release of their book Who’s Afraid of Gender?, a bold, essential account of how a fear of gender is fueling reactionary politics around the world. They will be joined in conversation by Doris Sommer—the Ira and Jewell Williams Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University and founder of “Cultural Agents,” an Initiative at Harvard and an NGO dedicated to reviving the civic mission of the Humanities.

Ticketing

Please Note: Tickets to this event are sold out. We will have a stand-by line at the Brattle Theatre. If any seats are still open five minutes before the event begins, we will sell tickets to those in the stand-by line on a first-come, first-served basis.

There are two ticket options for this event.

1. Book-Included Tickets: Includes admission for one and one paperback copy of Who’s Afraid of Gender? pre-signed by the author.
2. Admission-Only Tickets: Includes admission for one.

About Who’s Afraid of Gender?

Judith Butler, the groundbreaking thinker whose book Gender Trouble redefined how we think about gender and sexuality, confronts the attacks on “gender” that have become central to right-wing movements today. Global networks have formed “anti-gender ideology” movements that depict gender as a threat to families, cultures, and even “man” himself. Inflamed by public figures, this movement has sought to nullify reproductive justice, undermine protections against sexual and gender violence, and strip trans and queer people of safety.

The aim of Who’s Afraid of Gender? is to examine how “gender” has become a phantasm for authoritarian regimes, fascist formations, and trans-exclusionary feminists. In their courageous new book, Butler illuminates the concrete ways that this phantasm of “gender” collects and displaces fears of destruction. Operating alongside deceptive accounts of “critical race theory” and xenophobic panics about migration, the anti-gender movement demonizes struggles for equality, fuels aggressive nationalism, and leaves millions of people vulnerable to subjugation.

An essential intervention into one of the most fraught issues of our moment, Who’s Afraid of Gender? is a bold call for coalition building between all of those struggling against injustice. Butler offers us a hopeful work of social and political analysis that is both timely and timeless.

Praise for Who’s Afraid of Gender?  

“A cogent and deeply thoughtful case against the right’s attempts to limit ideas of gender to male and female, offering philosophical and historical evidence to support a fluid system in which all people might present authentically.” —Bethanne Patrick, Los Angeles Times

Bio

Judith Butler is the author of several books, including Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity; Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of “Sex”; The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection; and The Force of Nonviolence. In addition to their numerous academic honors and publications, Butler has published editorials and reviews in a wide range of journals and newspapers, including The New York Times, Time, and the London Review of Books, and has been featured on radio programs and podcasts throughout the world. They live in Berkeley, California.

Doris Sommer is the Ira and Jewell Williams Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures and of African and African American Studies. She is founder of “Cultural Agents,” an Initiative at Harvard and an NGO dedicated to reviving the civic mission of the Humanities. Her academic and outreach work promotes development through arts and humanities worldwide, specifically through the “Arts and Policy Certificate,” for city governments and “Teach With,” a train-the-trainers program to support democracy through literacy, critical thinking, and creativity. Among her books are Foundational Fictions: The National Romances of Latin America (1991) about novels that helped to build new nations; Proceed with Caution when Engaged by Minority Literature (1999) on the difference positionality makes; Bilingual Aesthetics: A New Sentimental Education (2004) for our times of contested immigration; and The Work of Art in the World: Civic Agency and Public Humanities (2014). Sommer has enjoyed and is dedicated to developing good public-school education. She has a B.A. from New Jersey’s Douglass College for Women, and Ph.D. from Rutgers University.

Masking Policy

Masks are encouraged but not required for this event.