Not All Dead White Men by Donna Zuckerberg

Not All Dead White Men

Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age

Donna Zuckerberg

WW Norton · Print & ebook · October 15, 2019

A Times Higher Education Book of the Week A virulent strain of antifeminism is thriving online that treats women’s empowerment as a mortal threat to men and to the integrity of Western civilization.

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Who it’s for
A sharp look at how ancient texts are recruited into online antifeminist arguments.
Themes
Online antifeminism, Misogyny and racism, Misuse of classical texts
Genres
Feminist Theory & Criticism, Gender Studies, Ancient Greece

About this book

A Times Higher Education Book of the Week A virulent strain of antifeminism is thriving online that treats women’s empowerment as a mortal threat to men and to the integrity of Western civilization. Its proponents cite ancient Greek and Latin texts to support their claims—from Ovid’s Ars Amatoria to Seneca and Marcus Aurelius—arguing that they articulate a model of masculinity that sustained generations but is now under siege.

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Not All Dead White Men reveals that some of the most controversial and consequential debates about the legacy of the ancients are raging not in universities but online. “A chilling account of trolling, misogyny, racism, and bad history proliferated online by the Alt-Right… Zuckerberg makes a persuasive case for why we need a new, more critical, and less comfortable relationship between the ancient and modern worlds in this important and very timely book.” —Emily Wilson, translator of The Odyssey “Explores how ideas about Ancient Greece and Rome are used and misused by antifeminist thinkers today.” —Time “Zuckerberg presciently analyzes these communities’…embrace of stoicism as a self-help tool to gain confidence, jobs, and girlfriends. Their adoration of men like Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Ovid…is founded in a limited and distorted interpretation of ancient philosophy…lending heft and authority to sexism and abuse.” —The Nation “Traces the application—and misapplication—of classical authors and texts in online communities that see feminism as a threat.” —Bitch Media

The Classics, Reframed

A sharp look at how ancient texts are recruited into online antifeminist arguments.

Come here for

  • Ancient Greek and Roman writing colliding with present-day gender politics
  • A critical lens on who gets to claim the classical past

Expect

  • Online debates, examined through their use and misuse of classical texts
  • A layered account of the ancient world’s modern afterlife

Where it sits

Feminist Theory & Criticism46%
Ancient Greece41%
Gender Studies32%

Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.

Publisher categories

  • Ancient Greece
  • Ancient & Classical Literary Criticism
  • Gender Studies
Authors
Donna Zuckerberg
Publisher
WW Norton
Published
October 15, 2019
Format
Print & ebook
Theme
Online antifeminism · Misogyny and racism · Misuse of classical texts
Reading lane
Ancient Greece