Feminism and cultural studies: pasts, presents, futures

Abstract

Both feminism and cultural studies have complicated and contradictory histories, inside and outside academy. It would be impossible, as well as perhaps undesirable, to map out a comprehensive outline of these developments here, as if there were simply one single, linear or unified account. However, we fell it is important to highlight what we consider to be some of the key issues in these developments in order to consider the nature of their relationship. In the first section of this article we look at some parallels between feminist and cultural studies in terms of these histories; in the second, we look at the lack of overlap, and explore some more general questions about the feminist analysis of culture; and in the final section, we outline three areas of work that illustrate three kinds of overlap between feminism and cultural studies.