ABSTRACT
Chapter 1 introduces the notion of definitional politics, which refers to the ways in which gender and other foundational concepts are constantly redefined. The book’s focus on the concept of gender is elucidated, but the chapter equally shows that the approach taken in the book can be applied to other foundational or emergent chapters. The empirical context of the book is set—academic conferences—and conferences are situated within wider issues of mobilities and global knowledge production. The chapter includes narrated incidents of the public conceptualisation of gender at academic events, which serve to illustrate the need for a distinctive approach to researching and theorising ‘live’ knowledge production. Finally, the structure of the book is laid out with chapter summaries.
