Academic superstars Andrew Ross Edward Said and Henry Louis Gates Jr. Badboy filmmakers Quentin Tarantino Spike Lee and Brian de Palma. What do theseinfluential... » 

Academic superstars Andrew Ross Edward Said and Henry Louis Gates Jr. Badboy filmmakers Quentin Tarantino Spike Lee and Brian de Palma. What do theseinfluential contemporary figures have in common? In Cool Men and the SecondSex Susan Fraiman identifies them all with cool masculinity and boldlyunpacks the gender politics of their work.According to Fraiman cool men rebel against a mainstream defined asmaternal. Bad boys resist the authority of women and banish mothers to therealm of the uncool. As a result despite their hipness or because of it these men too often feel free to ignore the insights of feminist thinkers.Through subtle close readings Fraiman shows that even Gates champion of blackwomens writing and even queer theorists bent on undoing gender binaries attimes end up devaluing women in favor of men and masculinity.A wideranging and fairminded analysis Cool Men acknowledges the invaluablecontributions of its subjects while also deciphering the gender codes andbaring the contradictions implicit in their work. Affirming the legacy ofsecondwave feminist scholars and drawing as well on the intersectional work ofthirdwavers Cool Men helps to reinvent feminist critique for the twentyfirstcentury. «