Somewhat scandalously, we’re not reading Judith Butler’s work this term, but Butler is one of the preeminent theorists of gender of the last 30 years, associated above all with the idea of “performativity” in gender.

In this Sunday’s NYT Magazine, there’s an inteview with Butler talking about the new book Who’s Afraid of Gender? The interview is fascinating and touches on a number of issues we’ll be talking about in the coming weeks. It also shines a bright light on the way “theory,” which seems like the most esoteric, oddball set of texts and topics, occupies center stage in our political discourse. Read the COMMENTS section: it’s really something to see how threatened many readers feel by, if not “gender” exactly, by engaging questions of gender with the thoroughness and skepticism that theoretical thinking demands:

Judith Butler Thinks You’re Overreacting

How did gender became a scary word? The theorist who got us talking about the subject has answers.

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