The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory

by Carol J. Adams

Book Overview

The author compares myths about meat-eating with myths about manliness, and seeks to explore the literary, scientific, and social connections between meat-eating, male dominance, and war. Drawing on such sources as butchering texts, cookbooks, Victorian hygiene manuals, and Alice Walker, the author argues in favor of linking feminist and vegetarian theory.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0826404553
• ISBN13: 9780826404558
• Release Date: January 1990
• Publisher: Continuum
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.2" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

A MUST READ for women who don't want to be treated like meat

Many feminists do not like to be treated like meat or like animals. I think this is because we all know, consciously or not, the extent and nature of animal oppression. Why have feminists for so long co-opted these animal metaphors to explain their own oppression, yet failed to see that these metaphors only work BECAUSE animals themselves are so oppressed? Carol Adams is among the first to step forward and call for feminist attention to animal rights and meat eating. She makes points in this book which are revolutionary and, I believe, will be the future of feminism. The questions she raises about species are no less reasonable than questions other feminists have raised about race, class, gender, and any other facet of identity. Yet most feminists have refused to analyze human identity, and look at animals with the same eyes that many men look at women. Though at times Adams writes very academically and heavily, this book should be required reading for all feminists-- and for all people who believe that both women and animals in this culture are literally and figuratively fragmented, consumed, and turned into meat, the ultimate objectification. A book whose importance I cannot stress enough.

This Book is Crucial

I could go on & on about this book. It is one the most inspiring and thought-provoking books I've ever read. I first read this book around the time I became a Vegan, developed a serious interest in Sociology, and earned a greater respect for Feminism. To truly appreciate and understand this book, one has to read it with an open mind. Some of the concepts and theories may seem extreme or abstract at first, but I suggest that people give Adams's text time to marinate.

Adams Gives Gives Voice to Historical Vegetarian Authors

Too long has vegetarian history been wrongfully called modern or faddish; Adams addresses this and explains how the messages of vegetarian authors have been muted, leading to these misconceptions. This book is a great help in giving historical examples of vegetarian authors (though mostly modern female writers) as well as how the writers assembled the messages in the texts. The first part of this book focuses on definitions and historical overviews of the treatment of animals and women. The second part gets to the literary examples, author techniques, and audience trivialization and/or dismissal of vegetarian messages. Now, when I read or hear someone discussing vegetarian authors such as Wells, Plato, Shelley, Shaw, etc., I will always have a historical and psychological awareness of how both their contemporaries and mine never had or will never have the entire messages acknowledged. I would especially recommend this book to any vegetarian and encourage him/her to read as many books by historical vegetarians as possble.

The Semiotics of Meat

Does eating rice bring "wholeness to our fragmented relationships"? Carol Adams believes that it can, and in this beautifully crafted work she lays out the entire argument. She does not minimize her personal revulsion toward the eating of meat, and the meat industry, but she ventures widely - from there. This serious, disturbing, and well-researched book covers many interrelated topics, among them women, linguistics, animal rights, violence and terror, political resistance and patriarchy.Food's meaning and importance to sustenance, spirituality, ritual and symbol and more - is undisputed. Adams' interesting, accessible, and scholarly polemic builds a solid foundation for her fervent wish that feminists embrace vegetarianism, or more accurately, veganism - the rejection of all animal-based foodstuffs. But Hitler was a vegetarian and an animal lover; and until I got to Adams' deconstruction of that seemingly hideous contradiction, I thought, "There goes the notion of the moral weight of eating habits!" But Adams tackles the topic of Hitler's vegetarianism (for example)efficiently and convincingly, and in doing so removes him from the discussion.This is a serious, disturbing, and well-researched book. Adams sounds a rational and convincing call for all people with control over what they may choose to consume - to live and eat deliberately and mindfully. Definitely worth reading.

A Must Read

Within the contexts of feminism, racism, speciesism, classism, and vegetarianism, the author lucidly demonstrates how our culture and language define and reinforce a political paradigm that supports marginalization and consumption. She does an excellent job exposing the hypocrisy and denial so prevalent in contemporary society.