Looking into the Toilet: Potty Politics
http://thewip.net/contributors/2009/08/looking_into_the_toilet_potty.htmlMandy Van Deven
8/17/09
What do former U.S. Senator Larry Craig, women in Victorian England, and transgender activists have in common?
Toilets!
The first multi-disciplinary book about potty politics to be published, Ladies and Gents: Public Toilets and Gender, explores the ways in which one of our most private public spaces is laden with cultural, social, and ideological meaning. From ablism (discrimination in favor of the able-bodied) to ethnocentric hygiene, this collection of essays encourages us to consider what toilets—their design and functionality—say about societies around the globe. I spoke with editors Olga Gershenson and Barbara Penner, who spearheaded the project, about how they came to write about the water closet, why the loo is still taboo, and what about their work struck a nerve among conservatives.
