Profit and Pleasure by Rosemary Hennessy

This new edition of Profit and Pleasure: Sexual Identities in Late Capitalism explores how sexual identities have been shaped, differentiated, and commodified through the cultural and economic logics of capitalism.

Examining the interrelations among labour, value, consumption, and social reproduction, the book offers a materialist account of how bodies and desires are organized within shifting historical conditions. It brings together key concepts such as totality, overdetermination, and the social reproduction of labour to illuminate the structural forces that shape sexual subjectivities, demonstrating why these dynamics remain central to understanding contemporary sexual politics. In this new edition, a substantial Afterword extends this analysis into the twenty first century, addressing the heightened politicization of transgender life and situating this development within broader crises of capitalist reproduction and state power.

This foundational text is essential reading for students and scholars of feminist studies, queer and trans studies, cultural theory, and social and political thought who seek a rigorous materialist framework for understanding the historical and contemporary formations of sexuality.