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A review by danielle_w
The Accidental Feminist: Restoring Our Delight in God's Good Design by Courtney Reissig
2.0
I'm not going to write all of my thoughts down here because I have no doubt Courtney Reissig and I are going to spend eternity together and I don't want to make it awkward. There are many criticisms already on this review page that I agree with so there's no reason to spell them all out again.
This book seemed to take a rom-com caricature of a self-centered feminist who loved to indulge in 'boy-bashing' and revolved its critical premise around this. Even when she hit upon an argument that I agreed with, they were poorly sourced and pieced together. There was little exploration of the history of gender issues and its theories, or of the current prevalence of serious issues facing women today (specifically in a context outside of the US). There were a couple of factual inaccuracies that I picked up (like the quote that said first-wave feminists interpreted the Bible through a feminist lens- feminist literary criticism only took root in the 1960's). All of the definitions- from what she defines as 'feminism' to 'theology' to 'the world'- were all fluid and cloudy. I was also expecting a brief systematic theology on gender and an intelligent response to Christians whose hermeneutic brings them to an egalitarian conclusion (such as Oxford professor of theology NT Wright) and found it simplistic instead. And, to be fair, I don't see much of this as a Courtney Reissig problem (in fact, I've heard great things about her other Glory in the Ordinary and look forward to reading it!) but rather as a Christian publishing problem. We have to seriously study the face of any theory or idea frankly, acknowledging all of its tentacles and complexities and cultures before responding, otherwise we end up fighting ghosts of our own making.
I'd recommend Carolyn McCulley's books on gender identity and theology instead.
This book seemed to take a rom-com caricature of a self-centered feminist who loved to indulge in 'boy-bashing' and revolved its critical premise around this. Even when she hit upon an argument that I agreed with, they were poorly sourced and pieced together. There was little exploration of the history of gender issues and its theories, or of the current prevalence of serious issues facing women today (specifically in a context outside of the US). There were a couple of factual inaccuracies that I picked up (like the quote that said first-wave feminists interpreted the Bible through a feminist lens- feminist literary criticism only took root in the 1960's). All of the definitions- from what she defines as 'feminism' to 'theology' to 'the world'- were all fluid and cloudy. I was also expecting a brief systematic theology on gender and an intelligent response to Christians whose hermeneutic brings them to an egalitarian conclusion (such as Oxford professor of theology NT Wright) and found it simplistic instead. And, to be fair, I don't see much of this as a Courtney Reissig problem (in fact, I've heard great things about her other Glory in the Ordinary and look forward to reading it!) but rather as a Christian publishing problem. We have to seriously study the face of any theory or idea frankly, acknowledging all of its tentacles and complexities and cultures before responding, otherwise we end up fighting ghosts of our own making.
I'd recommend Carolyn McCulley's books on gender identity and theology instead.