Book reviews: Desire: The politics of sexuality

Abstract

Snitow, Ann and Stansell, Christine and Thompson, Sharon. Virago, 1984. £6.50. (Reviewed by Elizabeth A. Smith)

Research Highlights: No.6 Working with Children

Department of Social Work, Aberdeen. £4.50. (Reviewed by Elizabeth A. Smith)

An Introduction to Therapeutic Communities

Kennard, David and Roberts, Jeff. Routledge and Kegan Paul. £5.95 Paperback. (Reviewed by Pauline Cunningham)     

Politics: Butler's Corporeal Politics: Matters of Politicized Abjection

This essay examines the work of Judith Butler in relation to corporeality through an analysis of Bodies that Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex and Butler's notion of politicized abjection. Abjection is considered in relation to bodily materiality and proposed as the most promising path for a revamped corporeal politics. Through a reading of two novels, Katherine Dunn's Geek Love and Barbara Gowdy's Mister Sandman, the essay examines how the abject body can function as politically subversive. Throughout, the essay analyses Butler's placing of the material body in a political domain, and argues that she ultimately endorses materiality as potentially disruptive to the symbolic domain of viable bodies. This recasting of matter within her theory is shown as redefining the body as an active agent rather than a passive receptacle for regulatory norms. The essay examines this under-theorized aspect of her work, and illustrates that politicized abjection is as crucial to her philosophy as the notion of gender as performative.     

Extenbded review: Michel Serres: The Angelology of Knowledge

Books reviewed:
Michel Serres The Troubadour of Knowledge
Michel Serres The Natural Contract
Michel Serres Angels: A Modern Myth
Michel Serres Rome: The Book of Foundations     

Psychological treatment of adolescent substance abusers:: A review

Alcohol and drug abuse among youth has become a major national concern. Psychological treatment strategies reported in the literature that have been used with adolescent substance abusers include five approaches: (a) behavior therapy, (b) skills training, (c) reality therapy, (d) psychodynamic therapy, and (e) family therapy. A limited number of studies have evaluated these treatments. Behavior therapy, skills training, and family therapy approaches show some evidence of effectiveness. However, most studies had methodological flaws.     

Dilemmas of Difference:

This paper examines the contemporary intersection of postmodernism and feminist theories of gender difference. Three strategic forms for posing the relationship between western feminism and the Enlightenment legacy of humanistic rationalism are examined: feminist rationalism, feminine antirationalism, and feminist postrationalism, and feminist postrationalism. It is argued that the theoretical rigor of postrationalism. It is argued that the theoretical rigor of postrationalism is obtained at the cost of a deracinated politics, while themore tangible political appeals of rationalism and antirationalism reproduce mirrored naive accounts of the relationship between women and modern western culture. The aim of this paper isto open up, rather than to resolve, questions concerning the relationship between feminism, modernity, and postmodern theory.     

CHAPTER 5: Rights of Children Born with Disabilities:

No abstract available for this article.     

CHAPTER 3: The Economic and Psychosocial Consequences of Disability:

No abstract available for this article.