Powerfully written and theoretically grounded, Me Too, Feminist Theory, and Surviving Sexual Violence in the Academy collects a range of perspectives from sexual assault survivors with backgrounds in academia. The contributors in this collection connect their experiences of sexual violence to their research and work within the academy as well as their lives outside of it. Contributors analyze the events surrounding their experiences with sexual violence as well as the cultural, social, and political effects. Their analyses are located within discussions of recent cultural events and the larger contexts of race, ethnicity, class, age, gender, sexuality, region, and nation.

The #MeToo movement inspired millions to testify to the widespread experience of sexual violence. More broadly, it shifted the deeply ingrained response to women’s accounts of sexual violence from doubting all of them to believing some of them. What changed? Leigh Gilmore provides a new account of #MeToo that reveals how storytelling by survivors propelled the call for sexual justice beyond courts and high-profile cases. At a time when the cultural conversation was fixated on appeals to legal and bureaucratic systems, narrative activism—storytelling in the service of social change—elevated survivors as authorities. Their testimony fused credibility and accountability into the #MeToo effect: uniting millions of separate accounts into an existential demand for sexual justice and the right to be heard. Gilmore reframes #MeToo as a breakthrough moment within a longer history of feminist thought and activism. She analyzes the centrality of autobiographical storytelling in intersectional and antirape activism and traces how literary representations of sexual violence dating from antiquity intertwine with cultural notions of doubt, obligation, and agency. By focusing on the intersectional prehistory of #MeToo, Gilmore sheds light on how survivors have used narrative to frame sexual violence as an urgent problem requiring structural solutions in diverse global contexts. Considering the roles of literature and literary criticism in movements for social change, The #MeToo Effect demonstrates how “reading like a survivor” provides resources for activism.

#MeToo has sparked a global re-emergence of sexual violence activism and politics. This edited collection uses the #MeToo movement as a starting point for interrogating contemporary debates in anti-sexual violence activism and justice-seeking. It draws together 19 accessible chapters from academics, practitioners, and sexual violence activists across the globe to provide diverse, critical, and nuanced perspectives on the broader implications of the movement. It taps into wider conversations about the nature, history, and complexities of anti-rape and anti-sexual harassment politics, including the limitations of the movement including in the global South. It features both internationally recognised and emerging academics from across the fields of criminology, media and communications, film studies, gender and queer studies, and law and will appeal broadly to the academic community, activists, and beyond.

Using an intersectional approach, this book amplifies the voices of those who were and continue to be at the frontlines resisting and responding to sexual violence during the rise of digital feminist movements, including #NoMore, #TimesUp, and most notably #MeToo. This book outlines the current socio-political landscape, including increased visibility of movements such as #NoMore, #TimesUp, and most notably #MeToo, and the public showcase of accused perpetrators becoming elected to the highest offices in the United States (e.g., Brett Kavanaugh’s election to the Supreme Court, Donald Trump’s election to the Presidency). It offers note to how this political landscape has impacted survivors and therapists, alike. The first of the two volumes include 10 chapters that provide a critique of the silencing of survivors who are marginalized (e.g., women of color, trans, and queer survivors) within the current movements and offer recommendations for how to center their experiences through an intersectional approach. Both the volumes together cover a wide range of perspectives that bring to light the solidarity that was built among survivors, regardless of identity and experience, within the current socio-political climate while continuing to center the voices of those who are most often marginalized. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Women & Therapy.

Grounded in an explicit focus on men's roles and responsibilities in the fight against sexual harassment, this book creates a deeper understanding of why sexual harassment against women occurs and how we, as a society, can better respond to and prevent it. Integrating theoretical analyses with empirical data from interviews with 25 Danish men, the author argues that if we want to eradicate the social and cultural tolerance of sexual harassment and the victim blaming of women, then we need a paradigm-shifting perspective. This book investigates the framing of the debates on sexual harassment, just as it looks deeper into the socialization processes of men, and raises the question of why so many men feel entitled to sexually harass women. This book also explores what part men can play in combating sexual harassment, emphasizing that it is important not only to see men as perpetrators, but also as empowered bystanders. It argues that the #MeToo movement constitutes a potential instructive moment, presenting men with an opportunity for change.

Literature has always recorded a history of patriarchy, sexual violence, and resistance. Academics have been using literature to expose and critique this violence and domination for half a century. But the continued potency of #MeToo after its 2017 explosion adds new urgency and wider awareness about these issues, while revealing new ways in which rape culture shapes our everyday lives. This intersectional guide helps readers, students, teachers, and scholars face and challenge our culture of sexual violence by confronting it through the study of literature. #MeToo and Literary Studies gathers essays on literature from Ovid to Carmen Maria Machado, by academics working across the United States and around the world, who offer clear ways of using our reading, teaching, and critical practices to address rape culture and sexual violence. It also examines the promise and limitations of the #MeToo movement itself, speaking to the productive use of social media as well as to the voices that the movement has so far muted. In uniting diverse voices to enable the #MeToo movement to reshape literary studies, this book is also committed to the idea that the way we read and write about literature can make real change in the world.

Literature has always recorded a history of patriarchy, sexual violence, and resistance. Academics have been using literature to expose and critique this violence and domination for half a century. But the continued potency of #MeToo after its 2017 explosion adds new urgency and wider awareness about these issues, while revealing new ways in which rape culture shapes our everyday lives. This intersectional guide helps readers, students, teachers, and scholars face and challenge our culture of sexual violence by confronting it through the study of literature. #MeToo and Literary Studies gathers essays on literature from Ovid to Carmen Maria Machado, by academics working across the United States and around the world, who offer clear ways of using our reading, teaching, and critical practices to address rape culture and sexual violence. It also examines the promise and limitations of the #MeToo movement itself, speaking to the productive use of social media as well as to the voices that the movement has so far muted. In uniting diverse voices to enable the #MeToo movement to reshape literary studies, this book is also committed to the idea that the way we read and write about literature can make real change in the world.

"In a moment when scholars and activists are wrestling with the cultural and political impact of #MeToo, Boyle carefully parses the differences between a 'moment' and a movement, and importantly reminds us to think beyond the hashtag to consider history, political contradictions, and the limits of media visibility." ̶ Prof Sarah Banet-Weiser, LSE, Author Empowered: Popular Feminism & Popular Misogyny (2018) "Karen Boyle shows us how mainstream media coverage of the #MeToo moment re-focused our attention away from violence towards women, towards the interests of men: men's right to sexual freedoms, and their right to have jokes and 'banter'. Her profound analysis asks us to reflect on the fundamental question: why do our media narratives STILL not ask why men rape?" ̶ Prof Heather Savigny, Professor of Gender, Media and Politics at De Montfort "Professor Boyle writes that she hopes to demonstrate how those in media studies might reintegrate and learn from feminist activism and interdisciplinary scholarship on men's violence against women. She can be congratulated in achieving this - providing an exemplary text demonstrating the crucial role of feminist media scholars in advancing theoretical and practical knowledge on pressing social problems." ̶ Prof Nicole Westmarland, Director, Durham University Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse. This book provides a feminist analysis of #MeToo and the sexual assault allegations against celebrity perpetrators which have emerged since Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey broke the Harvey Weinstein story in October 2017. It argues for the importance of understanding #MeToo in relation to a longer, and on-going, history of Anglo-American feminist activism, theory and interdisciplinary research on men's violence against women. The introduction argues for the importance of distinguishing between #MeToo as a hashtag and a movement. Chapter 2 investigates how speaking out about rape, sexual assault and harassment on social media can be understood in relation to second-wave feminist traditions of consciousness-raising, and concludes with an analysis of how feminism - and feminists - have featured in mainstream media coverage of the Weinstein case. Chapter 3 uses Liz Kelly's (1988) theorisation of the continuum of sexual violence to discuss how feminists understand connections between different forms of male violence against women and explores the challenges of translating feminist theory into media commentary. Chapter 4, The cultural value of abuse, examines that the cultural values associated with men's abuse with an emphasis on the film and television industries. The book concludes with an exploration of what the #MeToo era has meant for men, focusing first on men as victim/survivors, before moving on to consider how alleged perpetrators are situated in relation to narratives of victimisation and of monstrosity. Karen Boyle (@ProfKarenBoyle) is Professor of Feminist Media Studies and Programme Director for Applied Gender Studies at the University of Strathclyde, Scotland. Karen is the author of Media and Violence: Gendering the Debates (2005), editor of Everyday Pornography (2010) and co-founder of Gender Equal Media Scotland (@EqualMediaScot). .

This volume of new essays represents a collective, academic, and activist effort to interpret German literature and culture in the context of the international #MeToo movement, illustrating and interrogating the ways that rape cultures persist.

Revisits the sex wars of the 1970s and ’80s and examines their influence on how we think about sexual harm in the #MeToo era #MeToo’s stunning explosion on social media in October 2017 radically changed—and amplified—conversations about sexual violence as it revealed how widespread the issue is and toppled prominent celebrities and politicians. But, as the movement spread, a conflict emerged among feminist supporters and detractors about how punishment should be doled out and how justice should be served. The New Sex Wars reveals that these clashes are nothing new. Delving into the contentious debates from the ’70s and ‘80s, Brenda Cossman traces the striking echoes in the feminist divisions of this earlier period. In exploring the history of past conflicts—the resistance to finding common ground, the media’s pleasure in portraying the debates as polarized cat fights, the simplification of viewpoints as pro- and anti-sex—she shows how they have come to shape the #MeToo era. From the ’70s to today, Cossman examines tensions between the need for recognition and protection under the law, and the colossal and ongoing failure of that law to redress historic injustice. By circumventing law altogether, #MeToo has led us to question whether justice can be served outside of the courtroom. Cossman argues for a different way forward—one based on reparative models that focus on shared desired outcomes and the willingness to understand the other side. Thoughtful and compelling, The New Sex Wars explores what can been learned from these stories, what traps we repeatedly fall into, how we have been denied our anger, and where to begin to make law work.