Theory on the Edge ― Irish Studies and the Politics of Sexual Difference

Theory on the Edge brings together some of the foremost specialists working at the interdisciplinary interface between Irish Studies, feminist theory, queer theory, and gender and sexuality studies in order to trace the contemporary development of feminist thinking and activism in Ireland. The collection opens with a contribution from Ailbhe Smyth, the high-profile academic and public activist, whom many of the contributors acknowledge as a formative influence in their own feminist development. Essays utilize theory rooted in material issues, but always ask 'why' rather than just 'how' to draw interesting new conclusions on the depth and variety of Irish feminism.

Noreen Giffney is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist in private practice in Dublin, Ireland and coordinates research at the Humanities Institute at University College Dublin, Ireland. She is the co-editor of Clinical Encounters: Psychoanalytic Practice and Queer Theory, The Ashgate Research Companion to Queer Theory, The Lesbian Premodern, Queering the Non/Human, and Twenty-First Century Lesbian Studies.

Margrit Shildrick is Professor of Gender and Knowledge Production at the Institute of Thematic Studies at Linkoping University, Sweden and Adjunct Professor of Critical Disability Studies at York University, Canada. Her publications include Leaky Bodies and Boundaries: Feminism, (Bio)ethics and Postmodernism, Embodying the Monster: Encounters with the Vulnerable Self, and Dangerous Discourses of Disability, Sexuality and Subjectivity, as well as several edited collections.