Daddy Issues
Love and Hate in the Time of Patriarchy
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4.0 • 1 Rating
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- $13.99
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
On the fraught bonds between daughters and their fathers, women and the patriarchywomen patriarchy
In this beguiling, incisive book, critically acclaimed writer Katherine Angel examines the place of fathers in contemporary culture with her characteristic mix of boldness and nuance, asking how the mixture of love and hatred we feel toward our fathers—and patriarchal father figures—can be turned into a relationship that is generative rather than destructive.
Moving deftly between psychoanalysis from Freud to Winnicott, cultural visions of fathering from King Lear to Ivanka Trump, and issues from incest to MeToo, Angel probes the fraught bond of daughters and fathers, women and the patriarchal regime. What, she asks, is this discomfiting space of love and hate—and how are we to reckon with both fealty and rebellion?
As in her earlier book Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again, Angel proves herself to be one of the most perceptive feminist writers at work today.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This incisive analysis by Angel (Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again) contemplates the intersection of fatherhood with toxic masculinity and patriarchy. Noting that "fathers wield troubling power, whether they like it or not," Angel draws on literature, film, and current events to explore the nature of patriarchal authority within families. She turns the "daddy issues" trope on its head, criticizing it for insinuating that women's romantic troubles with men stem from strained relationships with their fathers. Instead, she asks, "What of the father's daughter issues?" Examining the films Meet the Parents and the 1991 Father of the Bride remake, the author observes that fathers' hostility toward their daughters' male suitors acts as a type of control over their sexual and romantic lives. The author also unpacks real-world examples, concluding that Ivanka Trump's defenses of her father whitewash his misogynistic comments, and that Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court exposed the limits of truth-telling in fighting abuse. Effortlessly moving from the novels of Virginia Woolf to the theories of psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, Angel demonstrates a sharp intellectual acuity in her elucidation of the cultural mythos surrounding "daddies." The result is a valuable contribution to the feminist understanding of fatherhood.
