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Feminist theory is not only about women; it is about the world, engaged through critical intersectional perspectives. Despite many significant differences, most feminist theory is reliably suspicious of dualistic thinking, generally oriented toward fluid processes of emergence rather than static entities in one-way relationships, and committed to being a political as well as an intellectual enterprise. It is rooted in and responsible to movements for equality, freedom, and justice. Three important contemporary questions within feminist theory concern (a) subjectivity, narrative, and materiality; (b) global neoliberal geopolitics; and (c) global ecologies. Feminist theorists employ the tools of intersectionality, interdisciplinarity, and the intertwinings of scholarship and activism to address these questions. While we labor to contribute to our academic fields, our primary responsibility is to contribute to positive social change.

This chapter maps the emergence of a posthuman turn in feminist theory, based on the convergence of posthumanism with postanthropocentrism. The former critiques the universalist posture of the idea of "Man" as the alleged "measure of all things." The latter criticizes species hierarchy and the assumption of human exceptionalism. Although feminist posthuman theory benefits from multiple genealogical sources and cannot be reduced to a single or linear event, it can be analyzed in terms of its conceptual premises, the methodology and its implications for feminist political subjectivity and for sexual politics, notably in relation to nonhuman agents.

Over the past two decades, academic feminism has differentiated & fragmented substantially in light of a wide range of new approaches in theory. This overview & assessment of the wide, diverse, & changing field of feminist theory gives particular attention to contestations surrounding the political theorizing of gender, identity, & subjectivity. Three divergent & oppositional perspectives -- difference feminism, diversity feminism, & deconstruction feminism -- frame current discussions regarding the "construction" of the female subject; the nature of sexual difference; the relation between sex & gender; the intersection of gender, race, class, sexuality, etc; & the significance of "women" as a political category in feminism. The problem of epistemic identification (locating or dislocating the female subject, analyzing gender difference, politicizing identity) is also a central element in the theorizing of feminist politics, multicultural citizenship, justice, power, & the democratic public sphere. Within this domain, we find equally intense debates among feminist theorists concerning the meaning of feminist citizenship & the politics of recognition, as well as the relations between gender equality & cultural rights, feminism & multiculturalism, democracy & difference. Although the field is far from convergence even on the meaning of feminism itself, we might take its current state as a sign of its vitality & significance within the discourses of contemporary social & political theory. 278 References. Adapted from the source document.

Although pragmatism and feminism share a number of key features, pragmatist philosophy has had little influence on feminist thought. This article explores the reasons for this failed rendezvous. Focusing particularly on Rorty's neo-pragmatism, it is argued that neo-pragmatism's lack of an adequate political theory, particularly regarding key issues in current feminist theory such as the conceptualization of the relations between the public and private spheres and the understanding of subjectivity, is a particularly important factor here. Earlier versions of pragmatist thought, however, might make more useful contributions to current feminist debates, particularly on the issues of rationality and ethics of care.

An analysis of a paradigm shift in US academia which posits that the major legacy of literary, artistic, & philosophical works to be transmitted to future generations should represent more than just the white, European & North American, male experience. Feminist scholarship has been a force in advancing this shift, primarily through identifying the misogynist underpinnings of Western tradition & the persistent misogynist orientation in political theory & empirical research. Gender is not even considered to be an analytical category; it is thus trivialized & left with no explanatory framework. The traditional alliances of feminist theory with the traditions of Sigmund Freud & Friedrich Nietzsche have been counterproductive because these two thinkers also held misogynist views. The current alliance between feminism & poststructuralism also presents political & intellectual problems. Thus, feminist theory still awaits critical application to the present. C. Grindle