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With intelligence and humor, Susan Brownmiller explores the history and unspoken rules of the burden of "feminine perfection"What is femininity? How is it measured? What are its demands? How are women meant to dress, look, think, act, feel, and be, according to the mores of society? Susan Brownmiller offers a witty and often pointed critique of the concept of femininityin contemporary culture and throughout history. She explores the demands placed upon women to fit an established mold, examines female stereotypes, and celebrates the hard-won advances in women's lifestyle and attire. At once pr

Written in 1987 in response to the aids emergency unfolding in the United States, Leo Bersani's "Is the Rectum a Grave?" is often described as an early entry into the strain of queer theory that offers queerness as tarrying in abjection, failure, and antisociality. This essay, however, is much more interested in thinking about the ways Bersani mobilizes connections to femininity in "Is the Rectum a Grave?" As Bersani moves from "women and gay men" to "average, law-abiding family" to "being a woman," femininity haunts, each of these individual nodes further illuminating an insight about femininity with and without women.

When Helle Thorning-Schmidt in 2011 became the first female Prime Minister in Denmark, this "victory for the women" was praised in highly celebratory tones in Danish newspapers. The celebration involved a paradoxical representation of gender as simultaneously irrelevant to politics and – when it comes to femininity – in need of management. Based on an analysis of the newspaper coverage of the election, I argue that highlighting gender (in)equality as either an important political issue or as something that conditions the possibilities of taking up a position as politician was evaluated as a performative speech act, i.e. an act that creates the trouble it names. Ruling out gender equality as relevant was, however, continually interrupted by comments on how Thorning-Schmidt and other female politicians perform gender in ways that fit or do not fit with "doing politician". These com-ments tended to concern the styling of bodies and behaviour and followed well known – or sticky – gendered scripts.

When Helle Thorning-Schmidt in 2011 became the first female Prime Minister in Denmark, this "victory for the women" was praised in highly celebratory tones in Danish newspapers. The celebration involved a paradoxical representation of gender as simultaneously irrelevant to politics and – when it comes to femininity – in need of management. Based on an analysis of the newspaper coverage of the election, I argue that highlighting gender (in)equality as either an important political issue or as something that conditions the possibilities of taking up a position as politician was evaluated as a performative speech act, i.e. an act that creates the trouble it names. Ruling out gender equality as relevant was, however, continually interrupted by comments on how Thorning-Schmidt and other female politicians perform gender in ways that fit or do not fit with "doing politician". These com-ments tended to concern the styling of bodies and behaviour and followed well known – or sticky – gendered scripts.

When Helle Thorning-Schmidt in 2011 became the first female Prime Minister in Denmark, this "victory for the women" was praised in highly celebratory tones in Danish newspapers. The celebration involved a paradoxical representation of gender as simultaneously irrelevant to politics and – when it comes to femininity – in need of management. Based on an analysis of the newspaper coverage of the election, I argue that highlighting gender (in)equality as either an important political issue or as something that conditions the possibilities of taking up a position as politician was evaluated as a performative speech act, i.e. an act that creates the trouble it names. Ruling out gender equality as relevant was, however, continually interrupted by comments on how Thorning-Schmidt and other female politicians perform gender in ways that fit or do not fit with "doing politician". These com-ments tended to concern the styling of bodies and behaviour and followed well known – or sticky – gendered scripts.

Israel's history of conflict with its neighbours and the Palestinians, along with its militarized society, has created a militarized femininity that assigns narrow roles to Israeli women in both the armed forces and in civilian life. This militarized femininity serves to perpetuate a gendered social order that severely limits the rights, freedoms, privileges and opportunities of Israeli women. Israeli women thus have difficulty advancing themselved in the armed forces and in society.

Skjelsbaek attempts to enlarge the study of international conflicts by including consideration of gender identity construction, focusing on the construction of femininity in war & peace. There is discussion of social identity conceptualization through essentialist or social constructionist lenses. Exploration of female war experience is taken from the statements of women in Yugoslavia, Vietnam, & El Salvador. Review of the Yugoslav conflict includes figures on women's victimization as well as anecdotal experiences. Quotes by Ardilia preface data on Salvadoran female combatants & revolutionary leaders. Details of the conflict's evolution include historical facts & personal emotions & interpretations. A tracing of the Vietnam War from 1945 reveals women's militant participation. M. C. Leary

This article examines fashion models as gender myths and cultural iconsthrough a cultural history of modelling. It reveals the construction of models' personas by the successive addition of meaningful signs:physique, manner, attitude, nationality, class, race, salary, chameleonism, slenderness and so on. On the basis of empirical material on models' experiences gathered from interviews, secondary oral sources and autobiographical material, the author approaches models' bodies, identities and public personas as artefacts performed through the reiteration of collectively defined gender standards and practices. This approach overcomes the contrast cast in fashion discourse between visibility/invisibility, private/public, real/unreal while disclosing the hegemonic beauty standards as fiction.

The article examines the different interpretations of masculinity and femininity within the contexts of sociology, cultural studies, and psychology. In sociology, gender roles are considered to be socially constructed and variable, with feminist studies emphasizing the social construction of femininity in the context of gender inequality. In cultural studies, Hofstede views masculinity and femininity as cultural dimensions that influence societal attitudes and behavior. Overall, gender is interpreted as a complex of biological, social, and psychological aspects, which are expressed on a continuum and are often subject to social and cultural reconstruction. In psychology, these characteristics are associated with social and behavioral aspects, rather than with biological sex alone. Gender schema theory highlights that individuals can exhibit both masculine and feminine traits. Psychoanalysis introduces concepts of gender identity and the role of parents in the gender socialization of children.

Women in the first decades of the 21st century encounter competing ideologies of femininity. This book traces the existence of two such ideologies - traditional femininity and resistant femininity - in language, in women's magazines, and in relation to the body. The book then uses a Discourse Analysis of women's fitness magazines to investigate how these ideologies, or discourses, are encoded and ultimately merged into a single discourse of femininity. The extremely thin female body encodes

This article contributes to the debate between the merits of the 'politics of presence' versus the 'politics of ideas' by examining the case of the first female Korean president, Park Geun-Hye. On the one hand, Park did not represent 'the ideas' of feminist politics. While her gender identity was widely propagated and accepted, it did not transform into deliberate identity-based politics. On the other hand, she contributed to the elevation of women's social status through various unintended consequences, although Park's 'femininity without feminism' inevitably led to the negligence of gender politics in her government. Indeed, Park's existence, rather than her intention, stimulated the debate on the role and status of women in Korean society and enabled the rise of a number of first females in various sectors. In sum, the 'politics of presence' was triggered even without overt political measures.