Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Palgrave Macmillan

‘Am I That Name?’

Feminism and the Category of ‘Women’ in History

  • Book
  • © 1988

Overview

Authors:
  1. Denise Riley
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Part of the book series: Language, Discourse, Society (LDS)

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this book

Log in via an institution
eBook USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access

Licence this eBook for your library

Institutional subscriptions

Table of contents (5 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-vi
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Does a Sex Have a History?

    • Denise Riley
    Pages 1-17

  3. Progresses of the Soul

    • Denise Riley
    Pages 18-43

  4. ‘The Social’, ‘Woman’, and Sociological Feminism

    • Denise Riley
    Pages 44-66

  5. The Womanly Vote

    • Denise Riley
    Pages 67-95

  6. Bodies, Identities, Feminisms

    • Denise Riley
    Pages 96-114

  7. Back Matter

    Pages 115-126
    Download chapter PDF
Back to top

Keywords

About this book

Writing about changes in the notion of womanhood, Denise Riley examines, in the manner of Foucault, shifting historical constructions of the category of "women" in relation to other categories central to concepts of personhood: the soul, the mind, the body, nature, the social. Feminist movements, Riley argues, have had no choice but to play out this indeterminacy of women. This is made plain in their oscillations, since the 1790s, between concepts of equality and of difference. To fully recognize the ambiguity of the category of "women" is, she contends, a necessary condition for an effective feminist political philosophy.

Reviews

'A classic of feminist intellectual history. Am I That Name? is a sort of Anglo-American end of innocence for anyone who tries to speak of 'women.' Riley makes the word run, since she cannot make it stand still. She offers a history of how feminism has faced its paradoxical core.' - Voice Literary Supplement

Essential reading for philosophers, historians, and feminist theorists.' - History Review of Books

About the author

DENISE RILEY teaches at the University of East Anglia, UK, and has also held teaching posts at Brown University and at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. Her most recent books are The Words of Selves: Identification, Solidarity, Irony and Selected Poems.

Bibliographic Information

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Back to top

Search

Navigation