Professor Amber Musser Recognized by ALA and Choice

Choice, a publishing unit of the Association of College and Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association (ALA), published its list of 2022 Outstanding Academic Titles, including Keywords for Gender and Sexuality Studies, co-edited by Professor Amber Musser (English). The annual list reflects the best in scholarly titles reviewed by Choice. Only about 10% of the approximately 5,000 titles reviewed each year receive this recognition.

Keywords for Gender and Sexuality Studies contains 80 essays focused on 70 keywords to deepen the analyses of feminist and queer studies through intersectional and interdisciplinary studies.

Musser said the news of the book’s inclusion on the 2022 Outstanding Academic Titles list was “thrilling, not only because it showcases really important approaches, topics, and methodologies for gender and sexuality studies, but because it helps to reinforce our contention that gender and sexuality cannot be thought separately from histories of racialization and colonialism.” She added that she hopes that “this recognition brings the book into more classrooms and conversations.”

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She cites the book’s short length — she and her co-editors set out to create “a smart book that was accessible,” and each essay ranges from 1,000 to 3,000 words — and its cross-disciplinarity as its strengths. Before the announcement of the 2022 Outstanding Academic Titles list, the book was lauded in the October 2022 issue of Choice Connect.

Musser is a member of the Keywords Feminist Editorial Collective, which conceived and edited the book. She shared that the collective intended to produce a book that was “explicit about the interconnections between gender, race, sexuality, and coloniality.”  Members of the collective co-wrote the entry on ‘race’ to reflect its central focus and multiple dimensions, Musser said.

Musser has published widely on race and critical theory, queer femininities and race, race and sexuality, and queer of color critique. Her previous publications include Sensational Flesh: Race, Power, and Masochism and Sensual Excess: Queer Femininity and Brown Jouissance, and she is currently working on a research project about noise. She is president of the Association for the Study of Arts of the Present (ASAP) and co-editor of the series Cambridge Elements in Feminism and Contemporary Critical Theory.

She joined the Graduate Center faculty in 2021 and spoke about her work in this January 2022 interview.

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