This book considers the global discourses and debates about ‘intoxication’, engaging in critical academic discussion around this concept. The problems in defining intoxication are considered, alongside the meanings of intoxication and how these meanings often differ across diverse drug using populations. The way that intoxication has been engaged with over the centuries has affected how particular groups are perceived and responded to, resulting in punitive responses such as drug prohibition, alongside harsh treatment of those who are seen to transgress societal norms and values. Therefore, this collection seeks to unsettle dominant discourses about intoxication and to consider this concept in new, critical ways. Ways of being intoxicated are also defined in this book in their broadest sense; from ‘energy drinks’ and other legal drugs, to recreational use of illicit drugs such as ecstasy, to ‘problematic’ drug use.

This book gathers reflections from 15 US based feminist social scientists about gender – as orienting framework, as one aspect of an intersectional approach, as a feature of intellectual identity, and as a problematic construct. Gender as an analytic, dynamic concept has had an important impact within and across social sciences in the past several decades. That impact for some arose in dialogue with interdisciplinary women’s studies, and was sometimes troubled both in women’s studies and in relation to other interdisciplines and disciplines. As a new generation of gender scholars embarks on their careers in social science, Fenstermaker and Stewart's collection provides scholars an opportunity to reflect on the course of different disciplinary histories and autobiographies, as well as illuminate individual scholarly craft and disciplinary direction as our understanding of gender has unfolded over time. The volume will also represent one kind of collective wisdom to inspire younger scholars.

Elizabeth Ettorre offers a clear account of women and substance use in a field which has been resistant to a woman-oriented perspective. The authors of most "addiction studies" view women as stigmatized and marginalized. Ettorre strongly counters this perspective. She focuses specifically on women's use of alcohol, prescribed drugs (specifically minor tranquilizers), heroin, tobacco, and food. Using the term "substance use" rather than "abuse" throughout the text, she directly challenges ideas regarding women in the field of addiction. More significantly, Ettorre deliberately puts forward a feminist perspective rooted in the identity and consciousness of women substance users. In order to expose the major misconception held by both clinicians and researchers in the field--that women substance abusers are a homogeneous group--Ettorre provides separate analyses of the different substances used and abused by women. She emphasizes the types of feminist strategies to use in the substance abuse field which will mobilize women. These strategies, she argues, must become increasingly visible if changes are to occur. Women need to build an alternative creative response which challenges the pervasive dogmatism in the substance abuse field.

Inspired by feminist scholars who revolutionized our understanding of women's gender roles, the contributors to this pioneering book describe how men's proscribed roles are neither biological nor social givens, but rather psychological and social constructions. Questioning the traditional norms of the male role (such as the emphasis on aggression, competition, status, and emotional stoicism), they show how some male problems (such as violence, homophobia, devaluation of women, detached fathering, and neglect of health needs) are unfortunate by-products of the current process by which males are socialized. By synthesizing the latest research, clinical experience, and major theoretical perspectives on men and by figuring in cultural, class, and sexual orientation differences, the authors brilliantly illuminate the many variations of male behavior. This book will be a valuable resource not just for students of gender psychology in any discipline but also for clinicians and researchers who need to account for the relationship between men's behavior and the contradictory and inconsistent gender roles imposed on men. This new understanding of men's psychology is sure to enhance the work of clinical professionals-including psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, counselors, and psychiatric nurses-in helping men reconstruct a sense of masculinity along healthier and more socially just lines.

How do various social theories explain gender inequality? Are these theories infused with masculinist biases that need to be redressed with insights from feminist theory? To address these questions, this collection of original essays features prominent sociologists discussing the strengths and the limitations of the theoretical traditions within which they have worked. Among the theoretical perspectives included are those of Marxism, world system theory, macrostructural theories, rational choice theory, neofunctionalism, psychoanalysis, ethno-methodology, expectation states theory, poststructuralist symbolic interactionism, and network theory. Each of the chapter-length essays of the first two sections provides an overview of the theory, explains its implications for gender inequality, reviews empirical research, and comments upon sexist biases or other limitations of the perspective. The final section contains chapters on feminist debates over methodology, critical commentaries on the preceding papers by four feminist scholars, and replies by the original authors.

In Intoxicated Identities, Tim Mitchell provides a novel and well-grounded framework for understanding subjective drinking experiences from the Aztecs to the present day in areas as diverse as Chiapas, Chihuahua, Oaxaca, Mexico City, Texas and California. Power drinking plays a crucial role in Mexican religion, politics, fine arts and ritual spousal abuse. Mexico ranks number one in deaths from cirrhosis, and Mexican Americans are twice as likely to be arrested for drunken driving as blacks or whites. With methods and concepts derived from an extraordinary range of disciplines, Mitchell explains how Mexican culture reinforces heavy drinking. He analyzes supply (nationalistic marketing strategies) but emphasizes demand (psychocultural motivations unique to Mexico). He chronicles the joys and sorrows of a borrachera, or drinking binge, and explores this altered state of consciousness on its own terms, not from any temperance or anti-alcohol perspective.