In this Book

University of Minnesota Press
summary
Community is almost always invoked as an unequivocal good, an indicator of a high quality of life, caring, selflessness, belonging. Into this common portrayal, Against the Romance of Community introduces an uncommon note of caution, a penetrating, sorely needed sense of what, precisely, we are doing when we call upon this ideal. 

Miranda Joseph explores sites where the ideal of community relentlessly recurs, from debates over art and culture in the popular media, to the discourses and practices of nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations, to contemporary narratives of economic transformation or "globalization." She shows how community legitimates the social hierarchies of gender, race, nation, and sexuality that capitalism implicitly requires.

Joseph argues that social formations, including community, are constituted through the performativity of production. This strategy makes it possible to understand connections between identities and communities that would otherwise seem disconnected: gay consumers in the United States and Mexican maquiladora workers; Christian right "family values" and Asian "crony capitalism." Exposing the complicity of social practices, identities, and communities with capitalism, this truly constructive critique opens the possibility of genuine alliances across such differences.

 

Table of Contents

restricted access Download Full Book
  1. Cover
  2. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Title, Copyright
  2. pp. i-iv
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Contents
  2. p. v
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Introduction: Persistent Critique, Relentless Return
  2. pp. vii-xxxvi
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. ONE: The Supplementarity of Community with Capital; or, A Critique of the Romantic Discourse of Community
  2. pp. 1-29
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. TWO: The Performance of Production and Consumption
  2. pp. 30-68
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. THREE: Not for Profit? Voluntary Associations and the Willing Subject
  2. pp. 69-118
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. FOUR: The Perfect Moment: Gays, Christians, and the National Endowment for the Arts
  2. pp. 119-145
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. FIVE: Kinship and the Culturalization of Capitalism: The Discourse of Global/Localization
  2. pp. 146-169
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Epilogue: What Is to Be Done?
  2. pp. 170-174
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Acknowledgments
  2. pp. 175-177
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Notes
  2. pp. 179-197
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Bibliography
  2. pp. 199-217
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
  1. Index
  2. pp. 219-231
  3. restricted access
    • Download PDF Download
Back To Top

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Without cookies your experience may not be seamless.