Reveals the psychic and social costs of racial and sexual oppression

We are, Julia Kristeva writes, strangers to ourselves; and indeed much of contemporary theory, whether psychoanalytic, historical, social, or critical, describes the human condition as one of alienation. Eloquently arguing that we cannot explain the development of individuality or subjectivity apart from its social context, Kelly Oliver makes a powerful case for recognizing the social aspects of alienation and the psychic aspects of oppression.