Cynthia Eller is author of The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory and Living in the Lap of the Goddess. She is assistant professor of women and religion at Montclair State University in New Jersey.
Reading Cynthia Eller's book is like having a spirited late-night
talk with a close friend . . . The intensely personal nature of
this inquiry for Eller means that she is learning as much as
telling, and material drawn from her own life-musings on the social
discomfort of armpit hair, stories of her friend who is known as
the GWB (guy with breasts) simply because of her lack of overt
emotionalism-shines. --Elle.com
"Cynthia Eller writes with brilliance and humor, and her book
enables us to look at womanhood-among other things-with new eyes.
As I read this delightful and subversive book, I often felt the
ground shifting beneath me. Am I a Woman? contains equal measures
of fine scholarship and common sense. One of the best books on
gender-or anything-written this year."--Jennifer Finney Boylan,
author of She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders
"According to Eller . . . sex is 'inextricably mixed up-at least
for now-with sexism.' If feminists embrace her radical
understanding of gender, Eller hopes to instigate a redirection of
our unequal society."--Fran Willing, Bust
"Canny and witty." --Michelle Burford, O Magazine
"In this breezy, funny treatise, Eller draws from her own 'normal'
life to demonstrate the myriad mundane ways in which gender is not
cut and dried. Behind this provocative inquiry is her hope to
bridge the gap between women who call themselves feminists and the
ones who (believe in dignity, independence, and equality, but . .
.) don't."--Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards, coauthors of
Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future
In this chatty, humorous, angst-driven book, Eller (women and religion, Montclair State Univ.) asks the titular question and circumnavigates theories and personal experiences to arrive at an answer, which, by the way, is "yes"-and "no." You are a "woman," Eller concludes, if others say that you are. To reach this conclusion, Eller explores the effects of one's biological sex vs. one's exposure to cultural gender building, i.e., social constructionism, asking which, ultimately, is more important in defining a woman. She also delves into transgenderism, chromosomal abnormalities, and other "gray areas" that threaten society's need for clearly drawn lines between the sexes. The result is a mixed bag, falling somewhere between academic theory and popular nonfiction. Theorists of gender history or feminist sociology may find this work too banal, even irritating (there are lots of personal anecdotes). For the rest of us, nudged into choosing the book based on its catchy subtitle and great, Cynthia Heimel-like cover art, there are scads of abstract chatter to plow through. But Eller also hits the bull's-eye with brilliant, amusing truisms about the sexes, and she makes the case that gender bending is a serious concern as long as our society continues to be uncomfortable with its Brandon Teenas and Christine Jorgensens. Recommended for academic and women's studies collections.-Janet Sassi, New York Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Reading Cynthia Eller's book is like having a spirited late-night
talk with a close friend . . . The intensely personal nature of
this inquiry for Eller means that she is learning as much as
telling, and material drawn from her own life-musings on the social
discomfort of armpit hair, stories of her friend who is known as
the GWB (guy with breasts) simply because of her lack of overt
emotionalism-shines. --Elle.com
"Cynthia Eller writes with brilliance and humor, and her book
enables us to look at womanhood-among other things-with new eyes.
As I read this delightful and subversive book, I often felt the
ground shifting beneath me. Am I a Woman? contains equal
measures of fine scholarship and common sense. One of the best
books on gender-or anything-written this year."--Jennifer Finney
Boylan, author of She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders
"According to Eller . . . sex is 'inextricably mixed up-at least
for now-with sexism.' If feminists embrace her radical
understanding of gender, Eller hopes to instigate a redirection of
our unequal society."--Fran Willing, Bust
"Canny and witty." --Michelle Burford, O Magazine
"In this breezy, funny treatise, Eller draws from her own 'normal'
life to demonstrate the myriad mundane ways in which gender is not
cut and dried. Behind this provocative inquiry is her hope to
bridge the gap between women who call themselves feminists and the
ones who (believe in dignity, independence, and equality, but . .
.) don't."--Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards, coauthors of
Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future
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