ABSTRACT
Now more than forty years since feminist thinkers entered academia and began the work of introducing feminist studies into the curricula of their respective disciplines, feminist theory has fi rmly established itself as part of the social and cultural theory canon. The particular feminist theories and theorists included in textbooks and readers vary. Social theory textbooks tend to include a chapter that gives a broad overview of the history of feminism and provides some type of categorization of feminist perspectives. Only sometimes do particular theorists fi gure prominently in the presentation, as many of the perspectives, questions and concerns are so broadly shared. Social theory readers, by necessity, must select the work of some particular feminist theorists. Dorothy Smith, Patricia Hill Collins, Nancy Chodorow and Judith Butler tend to be the most widely excerpted in those readers oriented mostly to an American sociological audience. Post-structuralist theorists such as Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray are commonly included in the more international and multidisciplinary social and cultural theory canon, in addition to Butler and varying others. Whatever the selections may be, however, rarely are they representative of a very broad range of central issues in feminist thought, currently or historically. One could master the thinking of Smith, Collins, Chodorow, Butler, Kristeva and Irigaray, theorists who have gained recognition as important individual contributors to feminist theory, and still not know a great deal about feminist theory.
