Feminism Enchanted - by Yanbing Er

About the Book

Yanbing Er reveals how a literary mode of enchantment fundamentally transforms feminist theory and praxis, imagining new and surprising possibilities that had once been foreclosed by dominant paradigms of progress.

Book Synopsis

The feminist movement has long been guided by the promise of progress for women: politically, economically, and in personal life. But we live in a time when history appears to be moving backward into a more reactionary past. How might feminist thought make sense of this plight without returning to the liberal, Western framework of progressive reason?

Yanbing Er argues that the key to this predicament lies in the capacity of the literary imagination to invigorate feminist critical practice. She reveals how a literary mode of enchantment fundamentally transforms feminist theory and praxis, imagining new and surprising possibilities that had once been foreclosed by dominant paradigms of progress. Enchantment illuminates forms of existence that have been lost, erased, or obscured, allowing us to encounter both feminism and the world anew. Er finds incantatory power in the works of writers such as Rivers Solomon, Akwaeke Emezi, Ruth Ozeki, and Alexis Wright, who disrupt hegemonic ways of thinking by summoning otherwise unimaginable ways of being. Their works collectively present an immersive and expansive feminist imaginary that makes space for marginalized histories, narratives, and lifeworlds.

Elegantly written and boldly argued, Feminism Enchanted shows how poetic language conjures alternative futures for feminist thought.

Review Quotes

Feminism Enchanted reminds us of what we tend to forget in times of crisis and uncertainty--that we can, through literature and art, discern other worlds, those that acknowledge what from earlier times we have forgotten, neglected or misunderstood. This book explores our capacity to summon up the forgotten, the half-remembered and what never had its time and to bring it to a new life.--Elizabeth Grosz, author of The Incorporeal: Ontology, Ethics, and the Limits of Materialism

Waves, sexual difference, revolution, the commons: these are the figures Yanbing Er's Feminism Enchanted turns to in its counterintuitive exploration of the role literature plays in cultivating and expanding contemporary feminist imaginaries. In lucid and stunningly alive prose, Er offers readers new sources and insights for inhabiting feminism's affective force in a historical moment of imminent danger.--Robyn Wiegman, author of Object Lessons

About the Author

Yanbing Er is assistant professor of literature at the National University of Singapore.