10 Books About Gender Inclusion
Gender equality and inclusion are key themes in Global Sustainable Development. This reading list highlights ten books that explore gender, identity and social justice, helping students connect these issues to sustainability challenges and the GSD curriculum.
1. Butler, J. (2006)Gender trouble: feminism and the subversion of identity. 2nd ed. London: Routledge.
The classic book on gender. In this book, Butler proposes that gender is a social construct, a performance. Although it doesn鈥檛 relate directly to GSD, reading this will give you a solid understanding of the social underpinning of gender that will be necessary to investigate this topic beyond just binary genders.
2. Mortimer-Sandilands, C. & Erickson, B. (eds. (2010) Queer ecologies: sex, nature, politics, desire. Bloomington, Ind: Indiana University Press.
This is probably the best introduction to the field of queer ecology. This edited collection explores the ways in which natural spaces are often seen as straight, and queer is seen as a threat to them. It challenges this duality, and the language we use around it, and starts to construct different (queer) ways of viewing, and relating to, nature. It also critiques queer ecology as a concept, which is a sign of how much this book wants to question the current mode of thinking around nature.
3. Roughgarden, J. (2013) Evolution鈥檚 rainbow: diversity, gender, and sexuality in nature and people. Tenth anniversary. Berkeley: University of California Press.
If there is any proof needed that queerness in both gender and sexuality is an entirely natural thing, this book has it. But more that that, it explores human queerness as well, fully acknowledging our place in the natural world. This book is a fascinating insight into how far the real world deviates from our social ideas of gender and sexuality.
4. Sweetman, C. ed. (2019) Working with men for gender equality. Rugby: Practical Action Publishing.
Gender development often focuses solely on women and girls, but this book takes a different approach. It is a collection of journal articles that highlight case studies from around the world where men and boys are being included in the struggle for gender development. This is worthwhile considering, since deconstructing the patriarchy would be significantly easier if men and boys were aware and helped. This book is part of a series called Working in Gender & Development, which includes many other interesting titles relating to gender and development.
5. Thomas, L. (2025) The intersectional environmentalist: how to dismantle systems of oppression to protect people + planet. London: Souvenir Press.
Half informative, half call to action, this book argues for the need for intersectionality between environmentalism and social justice for all marginalized people (although focusing in this book on race and gender). This book is intended as an education 鈥� it provides discussion point at the end of each chapter, but what it is really trying o do is to make you care enough to act. This is a great book to introduce a wider perspective on environmentalism and its links to social justice.
6. Williams, M. (2016) Gender and climate change financing: coming out of the margin. London: Routledge.
This book takes a more economics鈥恇ased approach to the intersection between gender and GSD. Although it only considers binary genders, this book provides a valuable analysis of women are excluded from climate change policy and financing, and the implications of this. The book is very comprehensive, covering many aspects of sustainability, gender, finance in all sectors, and global policy, and perhaps most usefully, what needs to change.
7. Roach, C.M. (2003) Mother / Nature: Popular Culture and Environmental Ethics. Bloomington, US: Indiana University Press.
This book analyses the gendering of nature as a mother. It analyses the different ways that we as a society characterize nature as a mother, and the implications of it. This is a good book for those who are interested in the was that we perceive and therefore interact with nature.
8. Singh, V., Lakshminarayan, L., Farris, C., Teodorani, A., Jurado, C., Luka膷ovi膷ov谩, L., Ntumy, C., Sun, A. & Bianchi, J. (2023) The Bright Mirror: Global Solarpunk by Women. Edited by F. Verso. Future Fiction.
In this anthology, ten women authors write stories of solarpunk hope. Solarpunk is a genre that aims to imagine a bright future, one where the problems that plague the 21st century have been solved. Most prominently, the climate catastrophe. This anthology serves to showcase the unique qualities of solarpunk, and to inspire us to create a better future.
9. Le Guin, U.K. (1986) Always coming home. London: Gollancz.
This book is one of the precursors to the solarpunk movement. It is set in an egalitarian society (the Kesh) that has broken down the gender norms that civilizations around them have. The book is presented as an ethnography, with essays, poems, maps, and other collected in鈥恮orld material. This makes for an unusual read, and reflects Le Giun鈥檚 anthropological interests. The Kesh are contrasted with civilizations around them and with the past to highlight to the reader the deep flaws that our society possesses.
10. Chambers, B. (2025) Monk and Robot: A Psalm for the Wild-Built and A Prayer for the Crown-Shy. Tor Publishing Group.
In this solarpunk novel, Chambers imagines a world where the woes of capitalism and industrialization have been left behind, quite literally, because centuries ago all the robots left for the wilderness. In the first contact between humans and robots since then, the protagonists learn to see their world in a different way. This book is so casually inclusive (Chambers doesn鈥檛 do it to check boxes), and the whole world is the kind of one that GSD really aims for.