Shifting Perspectives on Intersectionality

Applying intersectional lenses

Since its inception by Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989, intersectionality has evolved to become a powerful tool for understanding complex social and racial inequalities. „Shifting Perspectives on Intersectionality“ explores the rich history and crucial relevance of the concept in the U.S., where access to health care and education, women’s reproductive rights, or the status and viability of trans people are socially and politically jeopardized. The volume illuminates how intersecting forms of discrimination affect marginalized groups in the United States, providing a backdrop for understanding the significant racial, gender, and socioeconomic disparities that shape U.S. history and contemporary society. The essays in this collection apply intersectional lenses to topics as diverse as the massive resistance to school desegregation, the Black Power Movement, controlling images of Black womanhood, representations of mental illness and trauma, and drag performance. Highlighting systemic oppression, marginalization, and complex power structures, the individual contributions

• showcase how intersectionality can be applied across different academic disciplines by juxtaposing perspectives from American studies, history, sociology, rhetoric and media studies, and queer studies in paired thematic chapters;
• address issues that predate the coinage of the term to demonstrate the importance of intersectional politics in theory and as praxis in real-world contexts;
• expand the critical terminology of current scholarship and introduce complementary concepts to advance our understanding of intersectionality and related ideas

„Shifting Perspectives on Intersectionality“ allows readers to grasp the particular ways in which systemic inequalities manifest and persist in U.S. society, making it a valuable resource for anyone seeking to address and dismantle these complex power structures.

The transdisciplinary series “Diversity, Gender & Intersectionality” discusses the relevance of these concepts for pluralistic societies in a globalised world from different perspectives. The series is edited by the University Women’s Representative and the Vice President for International Affairs and Diversity of the University of Passau.

Das Buch ist auch als Open Access-Publikation erhältlich.