Staging Femininities: Performance and Performativity

by Geraldine Harris

Staging Femininities focuses on the work of performance artists Rose English, Bobby Baker and Annie Sprinkle in order to explicate and examine some of the most influential thinking on the politics of identity. This is one of the first books in this field to examine the productive differences as well as the useful connections between British and North American female performance traditions, between feminist theories of performance practices and, most significantly, between theatrical performance and performativity. Geraldine Harris offers a number of readings on the ways that identity is staged. Undertaking a series of "double movements" she brings together concepts from theorists and critics that include Judith Butler, Susan Bordo, Jacques Derrida, Julia Kristeva, Joan Riviere, Jean Baudrillard, Jacques Lacan, Michel de Certeau, Luce Irigaray, Bertold Brecht, Antonin Artaud and Eleanor Fuchs.

200 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1999

About the author

Also known as Geraldine Pinch.

Reviews

[Aria-Joshes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the breakdown of the double wedding, my mathematics and Annie Sprinkles work fascinating but I didn’t like Geraldines authorial voice, it was too authoritative and too outdated in reference to views on feminism. I got sick of her constant references to Freudian psychoanalysis and she clearly takes issue with the way millennials write their essays. She also had very classicist and narrow minded views of Annie Sprinkles work.
I found a lot of the writing dense and over complicated and would not read this book again. This is a once read book only for me and I’d rather read academic books that are in more in step with our times.

[Leona · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really difficult to read. Even as someone who is familiar with the terms/theories she uses, it was hard to read this and gave me a headache. Very interesting though.