On Resisting Women

Michaela Chamberlain examines how individuals become misogynists through a psychoanalytic lens. She shows how unrecognised misogyny infiltrates everyday life, in both public and private, shaping how we think, feel, and speak. She also shows what this infiltration costs us and how prevalent it is, even in progressive fields such as psychoanalysis.

This exceptional collection of essays explores the persistence of misogyny: how it is woven into the fabric of our culture, our institutions, and our psyches. Building on her first book, Misogyny in Psychoanalysis, Michaela Chamberlain moves on from a conversation to a demand for action.

Drawing on her experiences as a psychotherapist, mother, and researcher, she uses psychoanalytic theory to examine what causes misogyny and how misogyny is internalised, enacted, and justified. Revisiting Freud’s case of Dora and Winnicott’s concept of the “good enough mother,” she explores how these foundational psychoanalytic ideas continue to echo in contemporary expectations placed on women – particularly around sexuality, care, and emotional labour. These essays bridge past and present, theory and lived experience, to ask what has really changed and include a much-needed update to Winnicott’s list of reasons why a mother hates her baby.

From online discussion forums to classical literature, from consulting room dynamics to cultural narratives, Chamberlain investigates how misogyny hides in plain sight, often disguised as common sense, tradition, or even progressive thinking. Her work questions who benefits from patriarchy, who is harmed, and how all of us – regardless of gender – are shaped by its assumptions.

Accessible yet deeply informed, On Resisting Women invites readers into a debate about how we think, how we feel, and how we might begin to loosen misogyny’s grip – not only on our systems, but on our inner worlds.