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In Living a Feminist Life Sara Ahmed shows how feminist theory is generated from everyday life and the ordinary experiences of being a feminist at home and at work. Building on legacies of feminist of color scholarship in particular, Ahmed offers a poetic and personal meditation on how feminists become estranged from worlds they critique-often by naming and calling attention to problems-and how feminists learn about worlds from their efforts to transform them. Ahmed also provides her most sustained commentary on the figure of the feminist killjoy introduced in her earlier work while showing how feminists create inventive solutions-such as forming support systems-to survive the shattering experiences of facing the walls of racism and sexism. The killjoy survival kit and killjoy manifesto, with which the book concludes, supply practical tools for how to live a feminist life, thereby strengthening the ties between the inventive creation of feminist theory and living a life that sustains it.
List of contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction. Bringing Feminist Theory Home 1
Part I. Becoming Feminist 19
1. Feminism Is Sensational 21
2. On Being Directed 43
3. Willfulness and Feminist Subjectivity 65
Part II. Diversity Work
4. Trying to Transform 93
5. Being in Question 115
6. Brick Walls 135
Part III. Living the Consequences
7. Fragile Connections 163
8. Feminist Snap 187
9. Lesbian Feminism 213
Conclusion 1. A Killjoy Survival Kit 235
Conclusion 2. A Killjoy Manifesto 251
Notes 269
References 281
Index 291
About the author
Sara Ahmed is a feminist writer, scholar, and activist. She is the author of Willful Subjects, On Being Included, The Promise of Happiness, and Queer Phenomenology, all also published by Duke University Press.
Summary
Showing how feminist theory is generated from everyday life and the ordinary experiences of being a feminist, Sara Ahmed highlights the ties between feminist theory and living a life that sustains it by building on legacies of feminist of color scholarship and discussing the figure of the feminist killjoy.
