THE TROUBLE WITH GENDER - TALES OF THE STILL-MISSING FEMINIST REVOLUTION IN SOCIOLOGICAL-THEORY

Why do sociological theorists remain uninterested in and resistant to feminist theory? Notwithstanding indications of increasing openness to feminist theory, journals and texts on sociological theory reflect a continuing pattern of neglect. Identify reasons for this pattern; incl uding tensions resulting from the introduction of gender as a central analytical category: Nor only does gender challenge the dichotomous ca tegories that define sociology's boundaries and identity, it also disp laces the discipline's central problematic of modernity. The significa nce of this displacement is apparent when the discipline's responses t o feminist and postmodernist theory are compared I discuss the relevan ce of feminist theoretical work to contemporary issues in sociological theory, with specific attention to the synthetic nature of feminist t heorizing to work on rethinking power resistance, and oppression, and to efforts to effect a conceptual shift from ''either/or'' to ''both/a nd'' thinking and to establish new grounds for assessing knowledge cla ims.