Gender: The Basics: 2nd edition

The Basics

by Hilary Lips

The Basics is an engaging introduction to the influence of cultural, historical, biological, psychological, and economic forces on ways in which we have come to define and experience femininity and masculinity, and on the impact and importance of gender categories. Highlighting that there is far more to gender than biological sex, it examines theories and research about how and why gender categories and identities are developed and about how interpersonal and societal power relationships are gendered. It takes a global and intersectional perspective to examine the interaction between gender and a wide range of topics This new edition includes increased coverage of trans visibility and activism, LGBTQ studies and critical masculinity studies, global developments in women’s political leadership, links between gender and economic wellbeing, and cyberbullying. Supporting theory with examples and case studies from a variety of contexts, suggestions for further reading, and a detailed glossary, this text is an essential read for anyone approaching the study of gender for the first time.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sociology, Gender

310 pages, Paperback

Published August 13, 2018

Reviews

[Bookshire Cat]

DNF in about one third. It’s just not what I need. One thing is that it doesn’t lie when it says it is basic. But worse - it is overwhelmingly binary and focuses mainly on male-female division. There are some small paragraphs scattered throughout on queer theory and gender expressions and sexualities outside the binary but the author hurries back to the safe straight binary almost immediately.

If you are interested in that, you will probably find this book useful. It is written very clearly and provides lots of further reading suggestions.

[Joey]

As someone with no real education on gender, I found this book very useful. It’s certainly changed the way I think about gender, men, women, sexism, and feminism. I think it provides a good starting point for a lot of different aspects of gender studies. One issue I had was that, at times, the author is essentially just rattling off lists of statistics that get redundant at a certain point. Also, some sections didn’t appeal to me as much as others just because of my personal interests.