Jenny Cameron.Throwing a Dishcloth into the Works: Troubling Theories of Domestic Labor. RM 9(2):24-44 "Considers the theory of the patriarchial mode of production to illuminate the construction of coherence in the gender category of woman, and assesses the resulting political project, drawing on the poststructuralist theory of Harriet Fraad, Stephen Resni ck, and Richard Wolff (1994 [see abstract 96c02300]), Resnick and Wolff (1987), and Judith Butler (1990). The patriarchal mode of production is described as a set of social relations that function in the household as part of a dual system involving the capitalist mode of production outside the household. One consequence of this theory is to position men and women as separate and mutually exclusive groups. The consequent political project is taken to be directed toward developing gender relations that are nonoppressive and nonexploitative, so that distinctions between the sexes lose significance. Discussed is an alternative politics of the household that begins from the premise that there are multiple relationships in the household. Domestic labor is viewed as producing subjects whose gendering is consistent with heterosexualized discourses of gender. It is concluded that this alternative theory contains the possibility for a more realistic, if fragmented and uneven, form of political practice that opens the possibility for disruption and transgression for both sexes. 21 References. D. M. Smith"