Ebook: The Hysterical Male. New Feminist Theory

A companion to the editors' Body Invaders , this book offers 16 pieces that range from the academic to the pornographic. Readers not yet seduced into accepting post-modern analysis--a prerequisite for understanding several of the works--may wonder if this emperor is wearing any clothes. In "The Fetish in sex, lies & videotape ," Berkeley Kaite discusses "Baudrillard's critique of the 'metaphysic of alienated essence,' which . . . challenges the unyielding base-superstructure model whereby use-value . . . is a reflection of an anterior reality." Less obscure is Shannon Bell's "Feminist Ejaculations," a politically oriented discussion of female secretions during sex, complete with a how-to guide and a "pornographic, erotic, and educational" photo of the author masturbating. Angela Miles's intriguing "Confessions of a Harlequin Reader" suggests that the macho male of pulp romance is actually a nurturing mother figure. In "This Is Not a President," Diane Rubenstein suggests that George Bush is a living example of trompe l'oeil and, at times, resembles the 19th-century female hysterics studied by Freud. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.