Jeffrey Jerome Cohen
Author of Monster Theory: Reading Culture
About the Author
Jeffrey Jerome Cohen is professor of English and director of the Medieval and Early Modern Studies Institute at George Washington University. He is the author of Medieval Identity Machines and Of Giants: Sex, Monsters, and the Middle Ages, and the editor of Monster Theory: Reading Culture, show more Prismatic Ecology: Ecotheory beyond Green (all from the University of Minnesota Press). show less
Image credit: Jordan Emont for the GW Hatchet.
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- Works
- 16
- Also by
- 1
- Members
- 367
- Popularity
- #65,579
- Rating
- 3.7
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- 5
- ISBNs
- 47
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- 1
I got it anticipating, as it was billed, a collection of essays on monsters in mythology and stories through history. That is not what this is; it attempts to be an assessment of humanity via the lens of "the monstrous".
In the process it crashes through ableism, racism, sexism, and a variety of baseless and strange takes. (One example: Jurassic Park containing no nature, science, or philosophy, and being about 'America' (an apparent monolith, Americanising America itself?), the death of family, abortion. . . There was also, in the Jurassic Park essay, a declaration that sperm banks would bring about the end of patriarchy, and also relationships, sexuality, and love.)
Cojoined twins were used as an example of "the monstrous" in one essay. People who are transgender, likewise. Women, mentioned more than once, though at least that one was mostly in context of 'past views' rather than . . . a direct usage by the modern essayists. In at least one essay, wholesale pieces of an incredibly racist, xenophobic historical (centuries old) work were quoted, but there was no apparent argument made or explanation to go against them . . . so it felt a disingenuous way to simply carry the same message.… (more)