''Bad Feminist: Essays'' is a 2014 collection of essays by cultural critic, novelist and professor

Roxane Gay Roxane Gay (born October 15, 1974) is an American writer, professor, editor, and social commentator. Gay is the author of ''The New York Times'' best-selling essay collection ''Bad Feminist'' (2014), as well as the short story collection ''Ayiti ...

. ''Bad Feminist'' explores being a

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

while loving things that could seem at odds with feminist ideology. Gay's essays engage pop culture and her personal experiences, covering topics such as the ''

Sweet Valley High ''Sweet Valley High'' is a series of young adult novels attributed to American author Francine Pascal, who presided over a team of ghostwriters to produce the series. The books chronicle the lives of identical twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefiel ...

'' series, ''

Django Unchained ''Django Unchained'' () is a 2012 American revisionist Western film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kerry Washington, and Samuel L. Jackson, with Walton Goggins, Dennis Chri ...

'', and Gay's own upbringing as a

Haitian-American Haitian Americans (french: Haïtiens-Américains; ht, ayisyen ameriken) are a group of Americans of full or partial Haitian origin or descent. The largest proportion of Haitians in the United States live in Little Haiti to the South Florida area ...

Publication history

''Bad Feminist'' was one of two books published by Gay in 2014, the other being her novel ''

An Untamed State ''An Untamed State'' is the debut novel of writer Roxane Gay, first published in 2014 by Grove Atlantic. Plot Mireille Duval Jameson is born and raised in the United States, her parents are from Haitian descent. Her parents move back to Haiti. ...

''.

Content

The essays in ''Bad Feminist'' address a wide variety of topics, both cultural and personal. The collection of essays is broken into five sections: Me; Gender & Sexuality; Race & Entertainment; Politics, Gender & Race; and Back to Me. In a 2014 interview with ''Time'', Gay explained her role as a feminist and how it has influenced her writing: "In each of these essays, I’m very much trying to show how feminism influences my life for better or worse. It just shows what it’s like to move through the world as a woman. It’s not even about feminism per se, it’s about humanity and empathy."

Reception

''Bad Feminist'' was widely reviewed. Gay drew praise for her "wry and delightful voice." ''The'' ''Boston Globe'' wrote that "there is much to admire," such as her "insightful" essay "What We Hunger For"; ''Bad Feminist'' "signals an important contribution to the complicated terrain of gender politics." ''The'' ''Huffington Post'' was more effusive in its praise, writing, "Gay's essays expertly weld her personal experiences with broader gender trends occurring politically and in popular culture," and gave it an 8/10 rating. The ''Boston Review'' wrote that "''Bad Feminist'' surveys culture and politics from the perspective of one of the most astute critics writing today." In the United Kingdom's ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', critic Kira Cochrane wrote, "While online discourse is often characterised by extreme, polarised opinions, her writing is distinct for being subtle and discursive, with an ability to see around corners, to recognise other points of view while carefully advancing her own. In print, on Twitter and in person, Gay has the voice of the friend you call first for advice, calm and sane as well as funny, someone who has seen a lot and takes no prisoners." ''Time'' dubbed ''Bad Feminist'' "a manual on how to be human" and called Gay the "gift that keeps on giving." ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' Book Review wrote that Gay relied too heavily on an "unreasonable

strawman A straw man (sometimes written as strawman) is a form of argument and an informal fallacy of having the impression of refuting an argument, whereas the real subject of the argument was not addressed or refuted, but instead replaced with a false o ...

" to make her point, and ''The Independent'' found that Gay's own contradictions within the book come off as "intellectually flimsy." ''The Chicago Tribune'' noted that while "Gay writes incisively, fearlessly, sometimes angrily, often wittily and always intelligently on an incredibly diverse array of issues: race, domestic violence, pop culture, food, social media, child sexual abuse, the Obamas and, of course, feminism" in her columns, ''Bad Feminist'' is somewhat lacking: "why, then, is there not more to admire in this collection of Gay's new and previously published essays? One problem is the aforementioned recapitulation of tried and true analyses, opinions and memes, any or all of which might bear reprising if Gay brought to them a new and original take." The book was noted for its popularity in feminist circles, with the

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

site ''

Reductress ''Reductress'' is an American satire website that parodies the style, tone, and perspective of media targeted towards women, especially women's magazines. Founded in 2013 by comedians Beth Newell and Sarah Pappalardo, the site has received praise ...

'' publishing a story about how someone was a bad feminist because they hadn't yet read ''Bad Feminist''. A group of feminist scholars and activists analyzed Gay's ''Bad Feminist'' for "Short Takes: Provocations on Public Feminism," an initiative of the feminist journal ''Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society''.

References

{{Reflist 2014 non-fiction books American essay collections Feminist books Feminist essays Literature by African-American women HarperCollins books