Jemima Repo, Lecturer in the Politics of Gender at Newcastle University, Newcastle University

Jemima Repo is Lecturer in the Politics of Gender at Newcastle University

"The Biopolitics of Gender is an illuminating and important study, which reconfigures many taken-for-granted assumptions about the notion of gender and its role in feminist theory as well as politics. It is essential reading not only for feminist scholars, but also for those engaged in the task of critiquing neoliberal power structures." - Boglárka Kiss, Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies (24.1)

"Given that gender is not a synonym for women, what then does it signify? How have feminist challenges to biological determinism become bureaucratized as capitalist biopolitics and state feminisms? In this provocative genealogical study of gender, Jemima Repo answers these questions and challenges us to unlearn what we think we already know." - Terrell Carver, Professor of Political Theory, University of Bristol

"In this groundbreaking reappraisal of both Foucault and feminism, Repo shows how gender became an apparatus for the regulation of life processes, and gender equality policy became embedded in governmental, bioeconomic projects to optimize population management. Such projects have, she argues, been fortified by feminism while also relying on disturbing differentiations between womens reproductive worth. Boldly arguing for a provisional suspension of all theories of gender, The Biopolitics of Gender assesses the distribution of inequality constitutive of gender equality." - Penelope Lisa Deutscher, Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University

"Gender is a useful category for feminism. However, it is also an instrument of biopower. Gender is a double-edged sword both critical and normative. Jemima Repos powerful argument elaborates on Foucaults work to trace the genealogy of gender from the invention of the concept in a medical context in the 1950s through its feminist appropriation in the 1970s to contemporary neoliberal uses of gender equality. This original and important book thus turns the tables around: it makes trouble in gender studies, as feminist politics appear entangled in neoliberal biopolitics." - Éric Fassin, Professor of Sociology, Paris 8 University

"The importance of the questions raised, and careful attention paid to government gender deployments, renders this book invaluable to a vast inter-disciplinary audience. It cautions against accepting macro-level political efforts as non-normative and equal. More academics, especially in the humanities and social sciences, should consider the utility of the biopolitical framework. Repos work may be one of many methodological approaches, but is arguably one of the most robust and powerful in its theoretical breadth and substance." - Corina Schulze, University of South Alabama