Believability: Sexual Violence, Media, and the Politics of Doubt [Paperback]

The #MeToo movement created more opportunities for women to speak up about sexual assault. But we are also living in a time when fake news and alternative facts call into question the very nature of truth.

This troubling paradox is at the heart of this compelling book. The convergence of #MeToo and the crisis of post-truth is used to explore the experiences of women and people of color whose claims around issues of sexual violence are often held in doubt. Banet-Weiser and Higgins investigate how the gendered and racialized logics of believability are defined and contested within media culture, proposing that a mediated economy of believability is the context in which public bids for truth about sexual violence are made, negotiated, and authorized today.

Introduction: (Post)Truth, Belief, Media, and Sexual Violence

1 Construction:? #MeToo Media and Representations of Believability

2 Commodification: Buying and Selling Belief in the #MeToo Marketplace

3 Contest: Media, Mob Justice, and the Digitization of Doubt

4 Conditional: Kavanaughs, Karens, and the Struggle for Victimhood

Conclusion: #BelieveWomen, Revisited



References

Index

Believability ... is an essential text for anyone interested in the problem of sexual violence, feminist politics after #MeToo, or contestations around truth in our hyper-mediated and privatised public sphere.... [It]offers the best and most nuanced analysis of the cultural significance of #MeToo I have read ... the book is not only a crucial contribution to feminist thought, but also an important step towards reconceptualising the cultural politics of belief and truth in transformative feminist ways.
European Journal of Cultural Studies