Drawing on literature, the law, and popular media--and "taking her (counter)cue from that celebrated sitcom of American life, 'The Reagan Years'" (Homi K. Bhabha)--Berlant presents a stunning and major statement about the nation and its citizens in an age of mass mediation. Her intriguing narratives and gallery of images will challenge readers to rethink what it means to be an American and seek salvation in its promise. 57 photos.
Assailing the privatization of citizenship and the idealization of the citizen as a child, Berlant (English, Univ. of Chicago) criticizes a national political discourse that has shifted from public-sphere issues like economic inequities to the private realm of sexual intimacy. Berlant argues that the Reagan revolution based the redefinition of citizenship and national identity on a politicized private sphere overseen by a federal government increasingly less committed to social justice. She illustrates her argument with examples from television programs such as The Simpsons and the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill congressional hearings. Still, she does not adequately explore whether the privatization of citizenship has occurred because historically white, middle-class American male heterosexism has been so pervasive. A scholarly study; recommended for academic collections in American culture studies.?Charles L. Lumpkins, Bloomsburg Univ. Lib., Pa.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
The Queen Of America Goes To Washington City focuses on the need to revitalize public life and political agency in the U. S. Delivering a devastating critique of contemporary discourses of American citizenship, Lauren Berlant addresses the triumph of the idea of private life over that of public life borne in the right-wing agenda of the Reagan revolution. Berlant argues that the political public sphere has become an intimate public sphere. She asks why the contemporary ideal of citizenship is measured by personal and private acts and values rather than civic acts, and the ideal citizen has become one who is epitomized by the American child and the American fetus. The narratives and gallery of images in The Queen Of America Goes To Washington City will challenge readers to rethink what it means to be American and to seek salvation in its promise. -- Midwest Book Review
Lauren Berlant is Professor of English at the University of Chicago. She is coeditor of Critical Inquiry and Public Culture and author of The Anatomy of National Fantasy.
