In this Book

  • Our Monica, Ourselves: The Clinton Affair and the National Interest
  • Book
  • Lauren Berlant, Lisa Duggan
  • 2001
  • Published by: NYU Press
    • Viewed
    • View Citation
summary

Alongside the O.J. Simpson trial, the affair between Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky now stands as the seminal cultural event of the 90s. Alternatively transfixed and repelled by this sexual scandal, confusion still reigns over its meanings and implications. How are we to make sense of a tale that is often wild and bizarre, yet replete with serious political and cultural implications?
Our Monica, Ourselves provides a forum for thinking through the cultural, political, and public policy issues raised by the investigation, publicity, and Congressional impeachment proceedings surrounding the affair. It pulls this spectacle out of the framework provided by the conventions of the corporate news media, with its particular notions of what constitutes a newsworthy event. Drawing from a broad range of scholars, Our Monica, Ourselves considers Monica Lewinsky's Jewishness, Linda Tripp's face, the President's penis, the role of shame in public discourse, and what it's like to have sex as the president, as well as specific legal and historical issues at stake in the impeachment of Bill Clinton.
Thoughtful but accessible, immediate yet far reaching, Our Monica, Ourselves will change the way we think about the Clinton affair, while helping us reimagine culture and politics writ large.
Contributors include: Lauren Berlant, Eric O. Clarke, Ann Cvetkovich, Simone Weil Davis, Lisa Duggan, Jane Gallop, Marjorie Garber, Janet R. Jakobsen, James R. Kincaid, Laura Kipnis, Tomasz Kitlinski, Pawel Leszkowicz, Joe Lockard, Catharine Lumby, Toby Miller, Dana D. Nelson, Anna Marie Smith, Ellen Willis, and Eli Zaretsky.

Table of Contents

Download PDF Download Full Book
  1. Cover
  2. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. Title Page, Copyright
  2. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. Contents
  2. pp. v-vi
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. Acknowledgments
  2. p. vii
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. Introduction
  2. pp. 1-6
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. PART 1: DEMOCRACY AND PRESIDENTIALISM
  2. p. 7
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 1. The Culture Wars of the 1960s and the Assault on the Presidency: The Meaning of the Clinton Impeachment
  2. pp. 9-33
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 2. The Symbolics of Presidentialism: Sex and Democratic Identification
  2. pp. 34-52
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. PART 2: BODILY IMAGINARIES AND SEXUAL PRACTICES
  2. p. 53
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 3. The Face That Launched a Thousand Jokes
  2. pp. 55-72
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 4. It's Not about Sex
  2. pp. 73-85
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 5. The Door Ajar: The Erotics of Hypocrisy in the White House Scandal
  2. pp. 86-101
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 6. Sex of a Kind: On Graphic Language and the Modesty of Television News
  2. pp. 102-115
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 7. The First Penis Impeached
  2. pp. 116-133
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. PART 3: FANTASIES OF RACE, CLASS, AND ETHNICITY
  2. p. 135
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 8. The Return of the Oppressed
  2. pp. 137-155
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 9. Trashing the Presidency: Race, Class, and the Clinton/Lewinsky Affair
  2. pp. 156-174
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 10. Moniker
  2. pp. 175-202
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 11. Monica Dreyfus
  2. pp. 203-222
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. PART 4: FEMINISM AND SEXUAL POLITICS
  2. p. 223
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 12. The President's Penis: Entertaining Sex and Power
  2. pp. 225-236
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 13. 'Tis Pity He's a Whore
  2. pp. 237-245
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 14. Loose Lips
  2. pp. 246-267
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 15. Sexuality's Archive: The Evidence of the Starr Report
  2. pp. 268-282
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. PART 5: ETHICS AND MORALITY
  2. p. 283
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 16. Sex and Civility
  2. pp. 285-290
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 17. "He Has Wronged America and Women": Clinton's Sexual Conservatism
  2. pp. 291-314
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. 18. Sexual Risk Management in the Clinton White House
  2. pp. 315-335
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
  1. Contributors
  2. pp. 337-340
  3. open access
    • PDF icon Download
Back To Top