Heather Savigny highlights five key traits of cultural sexism – violence, silencing, disciplining, meritocracy and masculinity – prevalent across the media, entertainment and cultural industries that keep sexist values firmly within popular consciousness.

She traces the development of key feminist thinkers before demonstrating how the normalization of misogyny in popular media, culture, news and politics perpetuates patriarchal values within our everyday social and cultural landscape. She argues that we need to understand why #MeToo was necessary in the first place in order to bring about impactful, lasting and meaningful change.

“Savigny’s important book brilliantly illuminates the ways cultural sexism is embedded in every aspect of our lives, from the workplace to home to the streets. She asks us to consider how patriarchy has been reinvented in recent years, and calls on us to harness our rage in response, and repoliticize sexism. This is an essential guide for all of us thinking about the relationships between feminism, sexism and misogyny in the current moment.” Sarah Banet-Weiser, London School of Economics and Political Science

“An accessible account of the persistence of contemporary sexism, making a passionate case for the necessity of political and structural analysis to make the workings of sexism visible as a precursor to dismantling it.” Karen Boyle, University of Strathclyde

“A powerful contextualization of the barriers to change, doing justice to our feminist legacies, while operationalizing the core ground of political, social and media theory. Savigny gives us the clarity and vision to ‘rage, reverse and repoliticize’. All men should read this … it is time to get onboard.” Helen Wood, University of Lancaster

Heather Savigny is Professor of Gender, Media and Politics at De Montfort University.

Introduction: From Waves to Tsunamis

Repoliticizing

Sexism

Media

Merit

Silence

Discipline

Violence

Conclusion: The Politics of Feminist Rage

Appendix: Practical Steps to Overcoming Cultural Sexism

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