The Future is Feminine: Capitalism and the Masculine Disorder

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Carnage in the classroom, misogynists in high office, sociopaths in uniform, masculinity is a killer. From styles of dress to the stunted capacity for expressing a diversity of emotions, becoming a man involves killing off and repudiating anything that in our society is held as feminine. When a person is unable to show compassion and tenderness, or when exposed for their frailties, feels angry and humiliated, they have problems. Problems that none of us are immune to. Masculinity, Cremin provocatively declares, is a generic disorder of a sick society that afflicts even the best of us. Neither a condition of being human nor even of male, it is a disorder, as she illustrates, of a capitalist society that depends and even thrives upon its very symptoms. From the perspective of a trans woman raised to be a man, the book maps the disorder and speculates on the possible means to overcome it. Instead of signifying weakness, catastrophes can be prevented when the qualities men often fear and women often feel subordinated to are prioritised, affirmed and nourished. Drawing, amongst others, on Marx and Freud, Cremin eloquently demonstrates why there can be no future other than one in which we are all reconciled as a society with the feminine. In such a future, the terms masculine and feminine will neither define us nor determine our relationship to one another.

Reviews

Extremely thoughtful, insightful and provocative. * Times Higher Education *
Gender, havent we had enough of the old clichs But in these pages Ciara Cremin makes a compelling and eloquent case for the necessity of all that is signified by the feminine. It is those practices anchored in masculinity, whoever performs them, with their repudiation of the feminine, which secure the depredations of our capitalist world. This is crucial reading for all in search of that transformed world we all need, if we are to have any viable future at all. * Lynne Segal, Anniversary Professor, Emeritus, Birkbeck, University of London, UK *
Man enough to be a woman and not hate it Ciara Cremin courageously attacks the severe gender dysphoria of the androcentric capitalism that underpins our white supremacist society, arguing that the antidote for its toxicity is femininity seen not as a biological destiny but as a vector of futurity. A powerful and original voice in "second wave" transgender studies, Cremins visionary sociology points toward the only possible livable future. * Patricia Gherovici, psychoanalyst and author of Transgender Psychoanalysis (2017) *
Seldom does an essay feature such beautiful writing that it looks like a novel. Cremin's prose unfolds from the first to the last page, supple and sensual. It links two intimately intertwined themes: masculinity as a disorder of capitalism and feminist praxis as its antidote. This is not a book that can be explained, it must be read in one go. * Silvia Gherardi, Professor of Sociology, Research Unit on Communication, Organization Learning and Aesthetics (RUCOLA), University of Trento, Italy *
The Future is Feminine has heart - a political and practical commitment to addressing the phallocentric dis(order) which sustains heterogenous gender relations. In this transgressive feminine critique of capitalist patriarchy and hegemonic masculinity, a different humanity is imagined for a post-capitalist future. When the future is feminine, joyous, caring, and sustainable lives are possible beyond identity politics and performance. * Alison Pullen, Professor of Gender, Work and Organization, Macquarie University, Australia and Co-Editor of "Gender, Work and Organization" *

Author Bio

Ciara Cremin lectures in sociology and leads the Gender Studies programme at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She has published a number of books, including Man-Made Woman (2017), that reflects on her early experiences of presenting publicly as a woman. Her work, in general, draws on Marxist, psychoanalytic and critical theory perspectives to diagnose the human condition in capitalism today.