Down Girl

In Down Girl, Kate Manne does a jaw-droppingly brilliant job of explaining gender and power dynamics which have always been purposefully muddied, but which shape how and to whom sympathy and presumptions of full humanity accrue. Manne's work has been invaluable to me and so many others fighting to make sense of the world and who has power within it. You will understand our current moment far better and more easily after having read Down Girl. Perceptive, bold, stylishly written and bracingly clear eyed, Down Girl is one of the best books I have ever read on gender and power; I will never stop learning from it -- Rebecca Traister, author of Good and Mad Down Girl is excruciatingly well-timed, providing a theoretical framework for a phenomenon baring itself before us, perverse and pervasive. . . It reminds us that while revealing individual misogynists is hard, uprooting misogyny is much harder -- Carlos Lozada * Washington Post * Really excellent. . . timely and intellectually rigorous -- Nigel Warburton A must-read. . . should be in every feminist's library. . . Down Girl is destined to become a feminist literary classic alongside the likes of The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf or Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique -- Jennifer Taylor Skinner * The Electorette * The moment is ripe for a reckoning, and Manne offers the language and theory I've found myself grasping for. . . She combines the hyper-articulateness of a philosopher and the energy and humor of a down-to-earth millennial, which is electrifying -- Regan Penaluna * Guernica Magazine * Manne's book is a forensic and clever analysis which provides the cogs and wheels of how the system of patriarchal policing works, in our minds, as well as in our world. . . Down Girl offers a sharply cut prism through which to view our everyday experience -- Afua Hirsch * Times Literary Supplement * Fiercely argued and timely -- Paul Bloom * New Yorker * An important and compelling analysis of a phenomenon that's everywhere. Out of Manne's thoughtful analysis, of not just much-debated high-profile events but also everyday experiences, emerge insight after insight into the what, why, when, and how of misogyny -- Cordelia Fine * Big Issue *