Introduction: At the Intersections of Feminist and Queer Debates

Abstract

Gender and sexuality, complex categories within social theory, were ignored for much of the nineteenth and the first part of the twentieth century, and it was left to psychology and sexology to lay down the first arguments about the interrelationship and their influence on human character and social relations. Feminist writers were among the first to challenge such frameworks for understanding gender and sexuality. While much of this work is associated with the second wave of feminism, in particular the work of Marxist, radical and lesbian feminism, it also goes further back into the work of first-wave feminism and its important precursors such as Mary Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792. Once social theory opened up the private realm to investigation and certain givens of what generated gender and sexuality were dispelled, debates about how we conceptualise both gender and sexuality steadily grew. In the majority of feminist work exploring their influence on social relations and identity, it has been assumed that gender and sexuality have to be examined together, with gender taking precedence over sexuality. This notion remained relatively unchallenged (and led some lesbian writers and feminists to associate with lesbian feminism rather than lesbian and gay liberation in the late 1970s) until the advent of queer ideas on the theoretical scene.