Gendered Worlds

Over the past forty years, feminism and gender studies have become global movements and have produced a wide array of empirical findings, bold concepts, and transformative theories. Due to these successes, it is becoming increasingly difficult to comprehend the breadth and complexity of this burgeoning field. Gendered Worlds responds to the growing need for a text that clarifies and synthesizes the multiple strands of gender research in a way that students can understand.

In Gendered Worlds, Judy Root Aulette, Judith Wittner, and Kristin Blakely use the sociological imagination to explore gender relations throughout the world. They look at how concrete forms of gender, race, class, and sexual inequality operate transnationally; examine the impact of globalization on local and everyday life experiences; and identify how local actors re-imagine social possibilities, resist injustice, and work toward change. Integrating theory with empirical studies that are of particular interest to college students--including research on violence, sports, and sexuality--the authors make gender concepts genuinely interesting and accessible. They also demonstrate how students can think critically about gender, both within and beyond the classroom.

Incorporating a broad range of pedagogical features, including boxed sections and end-of-chapter sections that focus on social movements, Gendered Worlds is ideal for courses in sociology of gender and sociology of sex roles.

Distinct Features


Each chapter ends with a fascinating look at a relevant social movement


A keen focus on diversity by race, ethnicity, social class, age, sexuality, and nation


A consistent exploration of local and global levels of analysis and the connections between them