Gender, Race, and Class: An Overview

By Beverly Watkins and Lynn S. Chancer

Book Overview

Gender, Race, and Class is a critical overview of these three well-known dimensions of the social world. The study of gender, race and class as a combined topic has evolved over the years, and this concise, accessible volume shows why the subject continues to resonate both in and outside the academy. Examines recent scholarship to how one's gender, with the added dimension of race and class, can impact one's experiences in society. Probes deeper under the surface of different biases to see whether common elements of discrimination may also be at work. Includes a conceptual "vocabulary" that describes how gender, race and class interrelate.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0631220356
• ISBN13: 9780631220350
• Release Date: February 2006
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Length: 160 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.9" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Another Masterpiece From Blackwell Publishers

This book is a well organized summary of the concepts most frequently employed by social scientists of various stripes. Using an interdisciplinary approach, the authors borrow mainly from sociological, anthropological, and historical perspectives. Chancer and Watkins explore some of the major theories contributed to gender, race and class from the nineteenth to the twentieth centuries. They do so with little or no prejudice while showing that all of these theoretical considerations have limitations. This is done by using analytical dichotomies that include, determinism/essentialism, universalism/cultural relativism, and reductionism/autonomy. The theories range from those laid out by John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill, to Marx and Engels, to modern femimints such as Bell Hooks. These theories are particularly well expressed and supported with empirical evidence quite well. Read some sample pages and experience how enjoyable this book is to read. It is not a book to be 'skimmed'. Rather, take some time with it and reflect on how the text matches human behavior in contemporary history. 'Inventing Popular Culture by Joseph Storey and 'A Companion to the Study of History'. Are two other excellent books published by Blackwell. I have personally found these books to be worth reading and meditating upon for days at a time. These books, along with the book reviewed here, truly have the potential to change an individual's perception of human behavior witin a cultural/historical framework. Blacwell publishers have a knack for finding authors (or the authors find them) who are into critical theory. Knowledge has limitations. In this day and age, one must learn to live with uncertainty while enjoying the questions raised by intellectual pursuits. This is a book that opens up lines of critical questioning rather than concrete answers. It should be required reading material in more classroooms. One must learn to enjoy the questions.