| Summary: | 'Compromising Positions' argues that sex scandals aren't really about sex. Rather, they are a form of cultural theatre - a moment of highly visible, public storytelling - the purpose of which is to use specific racial and gendered symbols to create a collective sense of national worth and strength. To arrive at this conclusion, the text charts the ways in which attitudes about gender, race, and religion are woven together to create a certain sort of rhetoric about what America is, who is eligible to formally represent it, and what types of religiosity such leaders must display in order to legitimize their power.
|
|---|