Book Launch and New Publication: Staging Queer Feminisms: Sexuality and Gender in Australian Performance, 2005-2015 by Sarah French (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017)

Staging Queer Feminisms examines sexuality, gender and race in Australia’s vibrant independent theatre and performance culture. It analyses selected feminist and queer performances that interrogate the cultural construction of identity, challenge the normative trends of mainstream Australian society and culture and open up spaces for alternative representations of gender identity and sexual expression. Offering the first full-length study on sexuality and gender in Australian theatre since 2005, the book reveals a resurgence of feminist themes in independent performance and explores the intersection of feminist and queer politics. Ranging across drag, burlesque, cabaret, theatre and performance art, this book provides an accessible and engaging account of some of the most innovative, entertaining and politically subversive Australian theatrical works from the past decade.

“Sarah French’s landmark book astutely frames twenty-first-century performance considered queer and feminist within an artistic category in its own right. It is very exciting to read about these theatrically accomplished but challenging innovative performances, and the complex ways in which they are meaningful. Just as these performances merit thorough investigation, this important book equally deserves the serious attention of a wide readership.” Peta Tait, La Trobe University, Australia

“Sarah French’s book provides a compelling insight into ten years of vital, subversive, genre-defying Australian performance. She brings the anarchic energy of the performances alive and frames her persuasive analysis within appropriate intersectional feminist and postcolonial frameworks.” Sarah Gorman, University of Roehampton, UK

Copies can be ordered at: http://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137465429
 
The book will be launched on Sunday, 23^rd April 2017 by Professor Peta Tait FAHA, La Trobe University.
At fortyfivedownstairs, 45 Flinders Lane, Melbourne, from 4pm.
RSVP’s essential to: Sarah French at frenchs@unimelb.edu.au by Wednesday 12^th April