Book review: Male Rape is a Feminist Issue: Feminism, Governmentality and Male Rape
| Date | 01 May 2016 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0269758016628950 |
| Author | Jennifer Sloan |
| Published date | 01 May 2016 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
building and transitional justice cannot be limited in time, I cannot help but wonder whether they can
ever be achieved or at least approached, or whether this is another never ending story ....
Claire Cohen
Male Rape is a Feminist Issue: Feminism, Governmentality and Male Rape
Palgrave Macmillan: Basingstoke, 2014; 214 pp.: hbk, ISBN 9780230223967.
Reviewed by: Jennifer Sloan, Sheffield Hallam University, UK
DOI: 10.1177/0269758016628950
Claire Cohen has taken great steps to highlight the problematic nature of the invisibilisation of
male rape in culture and practice in this book. It is highly insightful and challenges notions of
discourse, feminism and victimisation in a sensitive yet passionately delivered manner. Through-
out, Cohen makes it clear that this is a serious issue that needs immediate attention, and that cannot
be ignored as to do so merely accentuates conformity to hegemonic masculinity, rape scripts and
the revalidation of rape myths for all. She shows her anger at the current situation, which gives the
book an honourable sense of honesty and reality – she articulately shouts the key message: ‘Male
rape is ‘‘real’’ rape: it is really enshrined in law, it is really a risk for men in the community and it is
really a lived experience for many men’ (p.63).
The book is split into three parts – one introducing the issue of feminism, governmentality and
male rape overall and its ‘omission from victimology’ (p.14) through a process of providing a
‘Critical Ontology of the Present’ (Chapter 2). This was a fascinating chapter including a section
entitled the ‘forgotten history of the male rap e victim’ (p.29), which highlights the gende red
divisions of rape as being ‘politically expedient’ (p.32) in modern society. Chapter 3 looks at the
methodological issues of embracing Foucauldian thought to enquire about the position of male
rape, more particularly through multiple, complementary examinations of media representations of
the issue, that is, ‘an examination of the biopolitics of audience understanding of male rape’ (p.43),
and ‘individuation as reflected in the practices around the male rape victim’ (ibid.). Together, this
triangulation produces a highly insightful evaluation of the situation both represented and real for
male rape victims.
Part two contains the triangulation chapters, in the first of which (Chapter 4) Cohen looks into
representations of male rape in films, including horror movies like Ginger Snaps (2000), Battle
Royale (2001) and Audition (1999), alongside comedies including Supernatural (2007), My Name
is Earl (2007 and 2008), Me, Myself and Irene (2000) and Bruce Almighty (2003). I have to say,
having seen many of these comic depictions, I had not realised the underpinning discourses of male
rape, nor the fact that such depictions ‘revalidate rape myths’ (p.79), such is the pervasive under-
playing of male sexual victimisation. Chapter 5 takes on the topic of biopolitics through the use of
what Cohen terms ‘contemporary artefacts of the active audience: fan fiction’ (p.95). This chapter
took me quite a long way from my comfort zone, introducing a whole new language to me
including ‘slash fiction’ (whereby characters from popular representations are positioned into male
homosexual relationships); ‘fluff’, ‘non-con’ (non-consent) and ‘dub-con’ (dubious consent).
Having never experienced this area of popular culture, I found this chapter to be of particular
interest in itself with regard to methodology, cultural discourses and feminist concerns. Cohen
Book reviews 197
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