Woman: An Intimate Geography

by Angier, Natalie

• ISBN13: 9780395691304
• ISBN10: 0395691303
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-04-01
• Publisher: HOUGHTON MIFFLIN

Summary

A Pulitzer Prize-winner offers a book about femaleness --- in body and mind --- that could prove as important as The Second Sex or Our Bodies, Our Selves and as fresh as Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom. With the clarity, insight, and sheer joy of language that has secured her reputation as one of the New York Times's premier stylists, Natalie Angier lifts the veil of secrecy from that most enigmatic of evolutionary masterpieces, the female body, exploring the essence of what it means to be a woman. Angier's thoughts on everything from organs to orgasm evince her famously playful originality, yet stand their ground in scientific fact. She also dives into hot topics such as menopause and evolutionary psychologists' faddish views of "female nature," creating a sparkling, fresh vision of womanhood.

Author Biography

NATALIE ANGIER writes about biology for the New York Times, where she has won a Pulitzer Prize, the American Association for the Advancement of Science journalism award, and other honors. She is the author of The Beauty of the Beastly, Natural Obsessions, and Woman, named one of the best books of the year by the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, People, National Public Radio, Village Voice, and Publishers Weekly, among others.
A New York Times bestseller and National Book Award finalist, Woman is “a text so necessary and abundant and true that all efforts of its kind, for decades before and after it, will be measured by it” (Los Angeles Times Book Review). Angier lives with her husband and daughter outside of Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION: Into the Light	ix
1. UNSCRAMBLING THE EGG: It Begins with One Perfect Solar Cell	1	(16)
2. THE MOSAIC IMAGINATION: Understanding the "Female" Chromosome	17	(19)
3. DEFAULT LINE: Is the Female Body a Passive Construct?	36	(21)
4. THE WELL-TEMPERED CLAVIER: On the Evolution of the Clitoris	57	(25)
5. SUCKERS AND HORNS: The Prodigal Uterus	82	(28)
6. MASS HYSTERIA: Losing the Uterus	110	(13)
7. CIRCULAR REASONINGS: The Story of the Breast	123	(21)
8. HOLY WATER: Breast Milk	144	(18)
9. A GRAY AND YELLOW BASKET: The Bounteous Ovary	162	(15)
10. GREASING THE WHEELS: A Brief History of Hormones	177	(16)
11. VENUS IN FURS: Estrogen and Desire	193	(14)
12. MINDFUL MENOPAUSE: Can We Live Without Estrogen?	207	(9)
13. THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE NOTORIETY: Mothers, Grandmothers, and Other Great Dames	216	(22)
14. WOLF WHISTLES AND HYENA SMILES: Testosterone and Women	238	(25)
15. SPIKING THE PUNCH: In Defense of Female Aggression	263	(22)
16. CHEAP MEAT: Learning to Make a Muscle	285	(15)
17. LABOR OF LOVE: The Chemistry of Human Bondage	300	(22)
18. OF HOGGAMUS AND HOGWASH: Putting Evolutionary Psychology on the Couch	322	(33)
19. A SKEPTIC IN PARADISE: A Call for Revolutionary Psychology	355	(14)
References	369	(14)
Acknowledgments	383	(2)
Index	385