Article
Feminist Review (1987) 26, 29–41. doi:10.1057/fr.1987.18
The Concept of 'Difference'
Michele Barrett teaches sociology at The City University, London. She is an associate editor of New Socialist and was until recently a member of the Feminist Review collective.
This article is a revised version of a talk given at the University of Alabama in 1986 and I am grateful to Elizabeth Meese and Alice Parker for inviting me to the symposium on The Difference Within'. It is also to be published in The Difference Within: Feminism and Critical Theory Philadelphia: John Benjamin (forthcoming).
Sally Alexander and Mandy Merck, as well as giving me useful comments, revealed enough anxiety about an earlier version of this paper to cause me to rewiite it completely, and for this protection from myself I am very grateful to them both. Less critical encouragement, from Mary McIntosh, William Outhwaite and Ruthie Petrie, was also appreciated.
Michele Barrett
