The Politics of Citation | CU Experts

Abstract; This chapter analyzes citation as a form of reproductive labor in academia. Building on Sara Ahmed’s account of citational privilege and socialist feminist theories of reproductive labor, it argues that some bodies of work reproduce themselves effortlessly while others require sustained, intentional effort. Feminist political theory falls into the latter category: its reproduction today depends on intentional labor unevenly distributed across the discipline. Drawing on an interpretive study of seven leading political theory journals from 2010 to 2025, the chapter identifies recurring citation patterns that limit the reproduction of feminist scholarship: including generic references, nonspecific citation, marginal citation, author biography citation, temporally truncated citation, and the privileging of established “stars” over other voices. These collective practices detach feminist work from living traditions and reinforce disciplinary hierarchies that treat it as supplementary rather than central to political theory. The result is an uneven division of citational labor in which feminist scholars disproportionately bear responsibility for sustaining their own traditions. The chapter calls for a redistribution of this labor across what Clare Hemmings terms “knowledge communities,” framing the intentional reproduction of feminist political theory as a shared responsibility necessary to sustain it as a vibrant intellectual tradition.

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