Chris Beasley
Biographic Data
| ID | 3597815 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Chris Beasley |
| GIVEN NAMES | Chris |
| FAMILY NAME | Beasley |
| SIGNATURE | BEASLEY C |
| AFFILIATIONS | The University of Adelaide |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6399-8475 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 29 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 216 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 28 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1996 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
What Is Valued and What Counts
Feminist scholars critique conceptions of society as an aggregate of primarily self-interested and self-sufficient individuals who operate independently, challenging assumptions of atomistic individualism in neoliberal societies. Instead, they emphasize humans as inherently relational. However, valuing relationality raises issues, as women’s relational roles are often undervalued, reinforcing gendered expectations tied to self-sacrifice and careg…
Leveraging feminist approaches to care
The work of thinking about, with, and through care is not the prerogative of any single discipline or positionality, as this Special Issue vividly illustrates. Rather, its wide-ranging and enduring force as empirical reality, conceptual approach and political disposition are best grappled with through a multidisciplinary lens, bringing into meaningful conversation and careful comparison different subjects, sites and scales of care. In the process…
Social change and masculinities
Understanding social change remains a challenge in the social sciences. This has resonance when considering the continuing significance of gender inequality in Australian society despite decades of political and social reform. Our aim is to elaborate a framework regarding social change which engages with major debates in masculinity studies, with applications beyond gender and masculinity. The potential of favourable spaces for social innovation …
Schooling the public on boys
This paper explores the salience of the "crisis" in boys' education as it is articulated in Australian print media. We will consider the ways in which this crisis is expressed through a gendered language which simultaneously represents boys as "forgotten" by teaching practices thought to be prioritising girls' learning, and as an equity (disadvantaged) grouping who require specialised teaching methods different from those currently offered within…
Heterodoxy
The intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding heterosexuality, which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. By contrast, we consider heterodox possibilities for pleasure and change within the realm of the dominant. We examine three examples – divergence, transgression and subversion – and then consider some terminologies that might flesh out exp…
Introduction to the special section
Caution! Hazards ahead
This article reflects on the relationship between contemporary feminist theorising and men/masculinities scholarship and practical interventions, in particular those interventions around violence. The aim is to consider potential disjunctions between feminist thought and pro-feminist men/masculinities scholarship, and associated possible disjunctions within men/masculinities scholarship. If these disjunctions are accepted, what might be a respons…
Libidinal Heterodoxy
The central intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding hetero-masculinity-orthodoxies which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. In questioning such orthodoxies, I consider the possibilities for (libidinal) heterodoxy in relation to hetero-masculinity. The term heterodoxy enables thinking about hetero-masculinity differently. In developing an a…
Introduction to Special Issue of Men and Masculinities
Mind the Gap? Masculinity Studies and Contemporary Gender/Sexuality Thinking
This paper considers the location of Masculinity Studies within the Gender/Sexuality field. Such a location offers possibilities and problems for theorising and coalition, as well as for policy and curriculum development. Importantly, the three major subfields of Gender/Sexuality—Feminist, Sexuality and Masculinity Studies—are not simply commensurable bits that fit together neatly like pieces of a jigsaw. This paper concentrates upon potentially …
Engaging with Carol Bacchi
This book illuminates, commemorates, and builds upon Bacchi s WPR approach. It outlines the trajectory of the development of the WPR approach from Bacchi s early engagements with feminist thinking, as an academic in scholarly environments which were often the preserve of men, towards the theoretical sophistication of an approach which requires an ongoing critical assessment of assumptions about the social world, social problems , policy agendas d…
Engaging with Carol Bacchi. Strategic Interventions and Exchanges
This book illuminates, commemorates, and builds upon Bacchi?s ?WPR? approach. It outlines the trajectory of the development of the ?WPR? approach from Bacchi?s early engagements with feminist thinking, as an academic in scholarly environments which were often the preserve of men, towards the theoretical sophistication of an approach which requires an ongoing critical assessment of assumptions about the social world, social ?problems?, policy agen…
Making politics fleshly
In this chapter we (Chris and Carol) consider the genesis of the concept of 'social flesh', our imaginative reconceptualisation of social space and social relations. This concept emerged from a close working partnership over several years and from a series of joint publications. Here we trace the stages in the development of our ideas, moving specifically from queries about the disjunction between theories of citizenship and embodiment to explora…
Problematizing contemporaryMen/Masculinities theorizing
Critical studies of men and masculinities (CSMM) have burgeoned in recent times. For this reason, it seems to me a useful moment to reflect on what I see as some tensions, even contradictions, in these studies. In keeping withChantalMouffe's espousal of the advantages of agonism rather than consensus, I suggest that heterogeneous theoretical directions in scholarship attending to men/masculinities are by no means to be discouraged. However, the v…
Guest Editorial
Libidinous Politics
Heterosexuality is simply rarely examined nowadays in Gender/Sexuality scholarship. It is largely taken to be of little critical interest, as simply to be equated with heteronormativity. The present conflation of heterosexuality with heteronormativity presents dominant practices as monolithic, as all of a piece, and unchanging. In other words, the conflation over-determines this sexual mode as a source of domination and under-theorises it as a si…
The Elephant in the Room
Taking Turns is an open forum for brief and rapid assessments of changes emerging in the field, and its discontents. In this series, we invite Nordic as well as non-Nordic scholars to present their take on contemporary challenges for feminist scholarship and gender research. In this issue, we are handing the relay over to Chris Beasley, an Australian feminist scholar and Associate Professor in Politics at the University of Adelaide, whose main ar…
Some Implications of the Debate on the Origins of Gender
Ambivalent globalization, amorphous vulnerable nationalism
Debates about nation and national positioning within the global exemplified in the Australian culture, history and literacy 'wars' have tended to be definitive and apparently oppositional in tone. Yet these debates have proceeded in the absence of a concretized notion of Australian identity and do not adequately address the complexities of political identification and allegiance. Despite intense concerns in these 'wars' about the views of young p…
The challenge of pleasure
Men have a stake in ending gendered violence but this stake has not yet been widely embraced by men. Thus we must think carefully about our future strategic directions. Taking the case of sexual violence, I suggest that these directions involve re-thinking sexuality and sexual health by considering absences in the scholarly and policy literatures. While young people are constantly exhorted in popular media to be sexual and to undertake sex, young…
Envisaging a new politics for an ethical future
In times like these, a new ethico-political ideal is required to contest the adequacy of dominant understandings of social interaction as matters of choice and rational decision-making and in contesting these understandings encourage us to imagine social alternatives. We wish to make a contribution to this project of expanding the universe of political discourse as a means to invigorating ethico-political debate. A range of existing vocabularies …
Gender & Sexuality
Chris Beasley contextualizes a wide range of feminist perspectives, including modernist, liberal, postmodern, queer and gender difference feminism. In men's studies, he examines areas of debate ranging from gender and masculinity to questions of race, ethnicity, imperialism and gay masculinities
The political limits of ‘Care’ in re-imagining interconnection/community and an ethical future
Gender & sexuality
"This accessible introduction to gender and sexuality theory offers a comprehensive overview and critique of the key contemporary literature and debates in feminism, sexuality studies and men's studies. Chris Beasley's clear and concise introduction combines a wide-ranging survey of the major theorists and key concepts in an ever-growing and often passionately debated field. The book contextualizes a wide range of feminist perspectives, including…
Citizen bodies
In this article, we draw connections between notions of embodiment and conceptions of citizenship to provide insights into contemporary debates about desirable modes of governance. We suggest that there is a need to challenge the instrumental conception of bodies which informs much public policy (our examples are New Reproductive Technologies and cosmetic surgery in Australia), and which underlies much citizenship theory, both feminist and mainst…
Problematizing contemporaryMen/Masculinities theorizing
Critical studies of men and masculinities (CSMM) have burgeoned in recent times. For this reason, it seems to me a useful moment to reflect on what I see as some tensions, even contradictions, in these studies. In keeping withChantalMouffe's espousal of the advantages of agonism rather than consensus, I suggest that heterogeneous theoretical directions in scholarship attending to men/masculinities are by no means to be discouraged. However, the v…
Envisaging a new politics for an ethical future
In times like these, a new ethico-political ideal is required to contest the adequacy of dominant understandings of social interaction as matters of choice and rational decision-making and in contesting these understandings encourage us to imagine social alternatives. We wish to make a contribution to this project of expanding the universe of political discourse as a means to invigorating ethico-political debate. A range of existing vocabularies …
Mind the Gap? Masculinity Studies and Contemporary Gender/Sexuality Thinking
This paper considers the location of Masculinity Studies within the Gender/Sexuality field. Such a location offers possibilities and problems for theorising and coalition, as well as for policy and curriculum development. Importantly, the three major subfields of Gender/Sexuality—Feminist, Sexuality and Masculinity Studies—are not simply commensurable bits that fit together neatly like pieces of a jigsaw. This paper concentrates upon potentially …
Citizen Bodies
The starting point for this paper is that bodies give substance to citizenship and that citizenship matters for bodies. However, the growing literatures on the body and on citizenship rarely 'speak to each other' in any straightforward sense. Feminist theory has made a significant contribution to both fields of thought,but once again the connections between these fields tend to be passing and underdeveloped. Feminist literature on citizenship - f…
Caution! Hazards ahead
This article reflects on the relationship between contemporary feminist theorising and men/masculinities scholarship and practical interventions, in particular those interventions around violence. The aim is to consider potential disjunctions between feminist thought and pro-feminist men/masculinities scholarship, and associated possible disjunctions within men/masculinities scholarship. If these disjunctions are accepted, what might be a respons…
The political limits of ‘Care’ in re-imagining interconnection/community and an ethical future
Libidinous Politics
Heterosexuality is simply rarely examined nowadays in Gender/Sexuality scholarship. It is largely taken to be of little critical interest, as simply to be equated with heteronormativity. The present conflation of heterosexuality with heteronormativity presents dominant practices as monolithic, as all of a piece, and unchanging. In other words, the conflation over-determines this sexual mode as a source of domination and under-theorises it as a si…
The challenge of pleasure
Men have a stake in ending gendered violence but this stake has not yet been widely embraced by men. Thus we must think carefully about our future strategic directions. Taking the case of sexual violence, I suggest that these directions involve re-thinking sexuality and sexual health by considering absences in the scholarly and policy literatures. While young people are constantly exhorted in popular media to be sexual and to undertake sex, young…
Libidinal Heterodoxy
The central intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding hetero-masculinity-orthodoxies which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. In questioning such orthodoxies, I consider the possibilities for (libidinal) heterodoxy in relation to hetero-masculinity. The term heterodoxy enables thinking about hetero-masculinity differently. In developing an a…
The Elephant in the Room
Taking Turns is an open forum for brief and rapid assessments of changes emerging in the field, and its discontents. In this series, we invite Nordic as well as non-Nordic scholars to present their take on contemporary challenges for feminist scholarship and gender research. In this issue, we are handing the relay over to Chris Beasley, an Australian feminist scholar and Associate Professor in Politics at the University of Adelaide, whose main ar…
Introduction to Special Issue of Men and Masculinities
Guest Editorial
Schooling the public on boys
This paper explores the salience of the "crisis" in boys' education as it is articulated in Australian print media. We will consider the ways in which this crisis is expressed through a gendered language which simultaneously represents boys as "forgotten" by teaching practices thought to be prioritising girls' learning, and as an equity (disadvantaged) grouping who require specialised teaching methods different from those currently offered within…
Ambivalent globalization, amorphous vulnerable nationalism
Debates about nation and national positioning within the global exemplified in the Australian culture, history and literacy 'wars' have tended to be definitive and apparently oppositional in tone. Yet these debates have proceeded in the absence of a concretized notion of Australian identity and do not adequately address the complexities of political identification and allegiance. Despite intense concerns in these 'wars' about the views of young p…
The influence of race on approaching families for organ donation and their decision to donate
OBJECTIVES: This study examined whether patients' race was associated with their families' being approached for organ donation and agreeing to donation. METHODS: Logistic regression models were applied to data collected from records at 112 hospitals. RESULTS: The odds that a family of a White patient was approached for donation were nearly twice those for a family of an African American. The odds of donation also differed by race, but the magnitu…
Charting an/other direction
Leveraging feminist approaches to care
The work of thinking about, with, and through care is not the prerogative of any single discipline or positionality, as this Special Issue vividly illustrates. Rather, its wide-ranging and enduring force as empirical reality, conceptual approach and political disposition are best grappled with through a multidisciplinary lens, bringing into meaningful conversation and careful comparison different subjects, sites and scales of care. In the process…
Charting an/other direction
What is Feminism
The influence of race on approaching families for organ donation and their decision to donate
OBJECTIVES: This study examined whether patients' race was associated with their families' being approached for organ donation and agreeing to donation. METHODS: Logistic regression models were applied to data collected from records at 112 hospitals. RESULTS: The odds that a family of a White patient was approached for donation were nearly twice those for a family of an African American. The odds of donation also differed by race, but the magnitu…
Citizen Bodies
The starting point for this paper is that bodies give substance to citizenship and that citizenship matters for bodies. However, the growing literatures on the body and on citizenship rarely 'speak to each other' in any straightforward sense. Feminist theory has made a significant contribution to both fields of thought,but once again the connections between these fields tend to be passing and underdeveloped. Feminist literature on citizenship - f…
Citizen bodies
In this article, we draw connections between notions of embodiment and conceptions of citizenship to provide insights into contemporary debates about desirable modes of governance. We suggest that there is a need to challenge the instrumental conception of bodies which informs much public policy (our examples are New Reproductive Technologies and cosmetic surgery in Australia), and which underlies much citizenship theory, both feminist and mainst…
Gender & Sexuality
Chris Beasley contextualizes a wide range of feminist perspectives, including modernist, liberal, postmodern, queer and gender difference feminism. In men's studies, he examines areas of debate ranging from gender and masculinity to questions of race, ethnicity, imperialism and gay masculinities
The political limits of ‘Care’ in re-imagining interconnection/community and an ethical future
Gender & sexuality
"This accessible introduction to gender and sexuality theory offers a comprehensive overview and critique of the key contemporary literature and debates in feminism, sexuality studies and men's studies. Chris Beasley's clear and concise introduction combines a wide-ranging survey of the major theorists and key concepts in an ever-growing and often passionately debated field. The book contextualizes a wide range of feminist perspectives, including…
Envisaging a new politics for an ethical future
In times like these, a new ethico-political ideal is required to contest the adequacy of dominant understandings of social interaction as matters of choice and rational decision-making and in contesting these understandings encourage us to imagine social alternatives. We wish to make a contribution to this project of expanding the universe of political discourse as a means to invigorating ethico-political debate. A range of existing vocabularies …
The challenge of pleasure
Men have a stake in ending gendered violence but this stake has not yet been widely embraced by men. Thus we must think carefully about our future strategic directions. Taking the case of sexual violence, I suggest that these directions involve re-thinking sexuality and sexual health by considering absences in the scholarly and policy literatures. While young people are constantly exhorted in popular media to be sexual and to undertake sex, young…
The Elephant in the Room
Taking Turns is an open forum for brief and rapid assessments of changes emerging in the field, and its discontents. In this series, we invite Nordic as well as non-Nordic scholars to present their take on contemporary challenges for feminist scholarship and gender research. In this issue, we are handing the relay over to Chris Beasley, an Australian feminist scholar and Associate Professor in Politics at the University of Adelaide, whose main ar…
Some Implications of the Debate on the Origins of Gender
Ambivalent globalization, amorphous vulnerable nationalism
Debates about nation and national positioning within the global exemplified in the Australian culture, history and literacy 'wars' have tended to be definitive and apparently oppositional in tone. Yet these debates have proceeded in the absence of a concretized notion of Australian identity and do not adequately address the complexities of political identification and allegiance. Despite intense concerns in these 'wars' about the views of young p…
Guest Editorial
Libidinous Politics
Heterosexuality is simply rarely examined nowadays in Gender/Sexuality scholarship. It is largely taken to be of little critical interest, as simply to be equated with heteronormativity. The present conflation of heterosexuality with heteronormativity presents dominant practices as monolithic, as all of a piece, and unchanging. In other words, the conflation over-determines this sexual mode as a source of domination and under-theorises it as a si…
Engaging with Carol Bacchi
This book illuminates, commemorates, and builds upon Bacchi s WPR approach. It outlines the trajectory of the development of the WPR approach from Bacchi s early engagements with feminist thinking, as an academic in scholarly environments which were often the preserve of men, towards the theoretical sophistication of an approach which requires an ongoing critical assessment of assumptions about the social world, social problems , policy agendas d…
Engaging with Carol Bacchi. Strategic Interventions and Exchanges
This book illuminates, commemorates, and builds upon Bacchi?s ?WPR? approach. It outlines the trajectory of the development of the ?WPR? approach from Bacchi?s early engagements with feminist thinking, as an academic in scholarly environments which were often the preserve of men, towards the theoretical sophistication of an approach which requires an ongoing critical assessment of assumptions about the social world, social ?problems?, policy agen…
Making politics fleshly
In this chapter we (Chris and Carol) consider the genesis of the concept of 'social flesh', our imaginative reconceptualisation of social space and social relations. This concept emerged from a close working partnership over several years and from a series of joint publications. Here we trace the stages in the development of our ideas, moving specifically from queries about the disjunction between theories of citizenship and embodiment to explora…
Problematizing contemporaryMen/Masculinities theorizing
Critical studies of men and masculinities (CSMM) have burgeoned in recent times. For this reason, it seems to me a useful moment to reflect on what I see as some tensions, even contradictions, in these studies. In keeping withChantalMouffe's espousal of the advantages of agonism rather than consensus, I suggest that heterogeneous theoretical directions in scholarship attending to men/masculinities are by no means to be discouraged. However, the v…
Mind the Gap? Masculinity Studies and Contemporary Gender/Sexuality Thinking
This paper considers the location of Masculinity Studies within the Gender/Sexuality field. Such a location offers possibilities and problems for theorising and coalition, as well as for policy and curriculum development. Importantly, the three major subfields of Gender/Sexuality—Feminist, Sexuality and Masculinity Studies—are not simply commensurable bits that fit together neatly like pieces of a jigsaw. This paper concentrates upon potentially …
Heterodoxy
The intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding heterosexuality, which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. By contrast, we consider heterodox possibilities for pleasure and change within the realm of the dominant. We examine three examples – divergence, transgression and subversion – and then consider some terminologies that might flesh out exp…
Introduction to the special section
Caution! Hazards ahead
This article reflects on the relationship between contemporary feminist theorising and men/masculinities scholarship and practical interventions, in particular those interventions around violence. The aim is to consider potential disjunctions between feminist thought and pro-feminist men/masculinities scholarship, and associated possible disjunctions within men/masculinities scholarship. If these disjunctions are accepted, what might be a respons…
Libidinal Heterodoxy
The central intention of this article is to challenge orthodoxies regarding hetero-masculinity-orthodoxies which have tended to constitute it as a static monolith and queer as the only potential site for a less oppressive sexuality. In questioning such orthodoxies, I consider the possibilities for (libidinal) heterodoxy in relation to hetero-masculinity. The term heterodoxy enables thinking about hetero-masculinity differently. In developing an a…
Introduction to Special Issue of Men and Masculinities
Sociology (24 works) · Political science (17 works) · Gender Studies (14 works) · Law (14 works) · Politics (12 works) · Psychology (11 works) · Epistemology (10 works) · Gender, Feminism, and Media (10 works) · Gender Roles and Identity Studies (9 works) · Gender Studies (9 works)