Eros and Alienation

“Sears takes social reproduction feminism and queer Marxism in exciting new directions as he historicizes penetration and orgasms. He expands the concept of alienated labor to all life-making and founds a queer ecology, foregrounding colonized, racialized, and disabled voices” Peter Drucker, author of Warped

“Meticulously outlines how capitalism shapes human intimacy. ... A sweeping, original analysis that challenges how we think about sexuality, life-making, and building a better world” Holly Lewis, author of The Politics of Everybody

“A compelling argument on the pervasive alienation of capitalist society that truncates and distorts our capacities for creative expression, love, and human flourishing” M. E. O’Brien, author of Family Abolition

Our deeply human drive to shape the world around us and fulfill ourselves through labor is subverted by capitalist alienation, leaving us to find fulfillment elsewhere.

As a result, our erotic drives become the central focus for transformation and life-making, but are themselves restricted and fueled by whatever energy is left after completing the monetized or social reproductive work required to survive. This alienation encounters ongoing resistance, as life-making activity can never be fully separated from the person who labors.

Eros and Alienation delves into the underexplored relationship between alienated labor and sexuality. Alan Sears explores the ways this alienation frames the processes of gender and sexual formation, showing how the organization of work contributes to the development of a dominant regime of gendered sexualities, defined by a binary gender mapping of desire as heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual.

Alan Sears is Professor of Sociology at Toronto Metropolitan University. He is an activist and author of several books including The Next New Left.