The National Subject

Melanie Toombs, Kim Rubenstein

Research output: A Conference proceeding or a Chapter in BookChapterpeer-review

Abstract

This chapter affirms the feminist impetus of this collection by reflecting on power relations in society and their impact on law and law’s regulation. An acute site for this inquiry is in the state itself, and the state’s determination of its own membership. It is the thesis of this chapter that the national subject, the legal citizen, 1 is a space in which gender, sexuality and race keenly interact with the everyday lives of individuals. An appreciation of this point is often overlooked. While the language of citizenship is often gender neutral, it often ‘perpetuat[es] the invisibility of women’ as citizens.2 Margaret Thornton examines the civil status of women as citizens in the early years of the twentieth century to ‘illustrate the peripheral civil status of women as citizens’ and, therefore, questions the full membership consequences of citizenship.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationThe Cambridge Companion to Gender and the Law
EditorsStéphanie Hennette Vauchez, Ruth Rubio-Marín
Place of PublicationUnited Kingdom
PublisherCambridge University Press
Chapter8
Pages271-301
Number of pages31
ISBN (Electronic)9781108634069
ISBN (Print)9781108499248
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jan 2023

Publication series

NameCambridge Companions to Law
PublisherCambridge University Press

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