Different Ways of Conceptualizing Sex/Gender in Feminist Theory and their Implications for Criminology

In the 1980s there were major challenges to feminist theory by women of color and by postmodern/poststructuralist theorists. Three modes of feminist enquiry responded to these challenges: class-race-gender, doing gender, and sexed bodies. I assess the contributions and limits of each to criminological knowledge. Several themes emerge. First, while modern/postmodern boundaries are blurred in feminist knowledge debates, important tensions remain concerning the relationship of a `real world out there' to `discourse'. Second, while most feminist scholars are interested in linking sex/gender to class, race-ethnicity, etc., the problem of sex-specific corporeality is receiving renewed attention.