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  • Who's Afraid of Gender?

  • By: Judith Butler
  • Narrated by: Judith Butler
  • Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
  • 4.8 out of 5 stars (24 ratings)

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Who's Afraid of Gender?

By: Judith Butler
Narrated by: Judith Butler
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Publisher's summary

This program is read by the author.

Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Time, Elle, Kirkus, Literary Hub, The Millions, Electric Literature, and them.

"A profoundly urgent intervention.”—Naomi Klein

"A timely must-read for anyone actively invested in re-imagining collective futurity.”—Claudia Rankine

From a global icon, a bold, essential account of how a fear of gender is fueling reactionary politics around the world.

Judith Butler, the groundbreaking thinker whose iconic 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 are dedicated to circulating a fantasy that gender is a dangerous, perhaps diabolical, threat to families, local cultures, civilization—and even “man” himself. Inflamed by the rhetoric of public figures, this movement has sought to nullify reproductive justice, undermine protections against sexual and gender violence, and strip trans and queer people of their rights to pursue a life without fear of violence.

The aim of Who’s Afraid of Gender? is not to offer a new theory of gender but to examine how “gender” has become a phantasm for emerging authoritarian regimes, fascist formations, and transexclusionary feminists. In their vital, courageous new audiobook, Butler illuminates the concrete ways that this phantasm of “gender” collects and displaces anxieties and fears of destruction. Operating in tandem with 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 to refuse the alliance with authoritarian movements and to make a broad coalition with all those whose struggle for equality is linked with fighting injustice. Imagining new possibilities for both freedom and solidarity, Butler offers us a hopeful work of social and political analysis that is both timely and timeless—an audiobook whose verve and rigor only they could deliver.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2024 Judith Butler (P)2024 Macmillan Audio
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: LGBTQ+

Critic reviews

“A brilliant writer and thinker, Butler . . . offers a long-needed text clarifying confusion by design . . . Their newest offering is urgent, returning breathable air into a toxic cloud . . . The result is exhilarating and life-changing.”—Booklist (starred review)

"[A] trenchant polemic . . . Thoughtful and powerfully assured, this is an essential take on an ongoing political battle."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A wonderfully thoughtful and impassioned book on a critically important centerpiece of contemporary authoritarianism and patriarchy. A master class in how gender has been weaponized in support of conservative values and authoritarian regimes.”—Kirkus Reviews

Editorial Review

A message that’s even more powerful in audio
Having studied their work in college, I was thrilled to hear that legendary thinker Judith Butler had a new listen coming. I was even more excited when I found out Butler would also be narrating. Though Who’s Afraid of Gender? doesn’t offer a new theory on sex, gender, or sexuality, it does provide a deep exploration of how gender has been weaponized to fuel fear, hate, and harmful reactionary movements. Butler’s analysis covers an incredible breadth of topics and history in just under five hours, and invites us to take a step back to better examine and dismantle the rhetoric that helps incite racism, fascism, homophobia, antisemitism, and misogyny. It’s an unfortunately timely and necessary reminder that we all need to loudly, proudly, and consistently support one another in the fight against bigotry and hate. —Michael C., Audible Editor

What listeners say about Who's Afraid of Gender?

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Kind, uncompromising and relevant

I was very moved by this book. It paints a painfully clear picture of the anti-woke mob and where their magical thinking and how incoherent ramblings spawn from.

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  • jj
  • 04-05-24

Should be required reading

Excellent analysis; insightful and packed with receipts, Butler exposes the nonsense passing for science and the hypocrisy underpinning the miscreants, misinformed, and outright neo fascist right-wing ers
attempting to erase transgender rights and selves

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You afraid?

Great and relevant information. Judith gives a great performance for their own work. Consice and greatly fascinating.

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Accessible book about one of the divisive issues of this century

Easy to comprehend and follow, well-structured and cleverly written collection of arguments against the anti-gender movement. It provides a roadmap for thinking gender that reaffirms its critical and analytical edge by linking previous research and Butler’s own thoughts.

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The answer is clear.

Butler’s perspective on the centrality of gender for the global far right is spot on. As a family scholar myself, I emphatically nodded along as they presented their argument.

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I am in love.

I want to live in such a way that if I meet Judith while they are still with us in this life, they will think I'm cool.

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1 person found this helpful