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Men Explain Things to Me is a collection of essays on a range of feminist topics by writer and activist Rebecca Solnit. The book leads with the title essay. First published in 2008, the essay is credited for coining the term “mansplain” although the word never appeared in the essay itself. As defined by Merriam-Webster, to mansplain is “to explain something to a woman in a condescending way that assumes she has no knowledge about the topic.”

Solnit recounts an example of her own experience with this phenomenon. At a party she is attending, Solnit is talking with a man about her recently-published book on photographer Eadweard Muybridge. He proceeds to discuss a “very important” Muybridge book that was released earlier that year. The man holds forth, unaware that the book he is referencing is the one Solnit herself had written. After attempting to interject several times, Solnit was finally able to get across to the man that it is her book he was telling her about. According to Solnit, this exchange underscores persistent gender stereotypes about women’s credibility and authority compared to men – even when the woman has attained mastery in her area of work.

While the title essay is wryly humorous, the other essays in this collection are somber, thought-provoking, and empathetic. Solnit applies qualitative and quantitative data to illustrate the negative consequences of silencing women’s voices in society.  She explores a range of issues that affect women’s lives, from gender violence and inequity to online harassment, the erasure of women’s lineage, and the debate around marriage equality.

In her essay “The Longest War” Solnit draws on the example of a gang rape of a woman on a bus in New Delhi, India to illuminate the concern of violence against women around the world. Solnit writes, “We have an abundance of rape and violence against women in this country and on this Earth, though it’s almost never treated as a civil rights or human rights issue, or a crisis, or even a pattern. Violence doesn’t have a race, a class, a religion, or a nationality, but it does have a gender.”

Although published in 2014, the essays remain relevant. For example, Solnit recalls Anita Hill testifying to sexual misconduct by then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. This is similar to more recent testimony by Christine Blasey Ford at the Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Brett Kavanaugh.  In her essay “#YesAll Women” Solnit discusses rape culture, sexual assault, and the #YesAllWomen movement which arose in response to the 2014 Isla Vista Killings and has parallels with the #MeToo movement, which gained prominence in 2017 in the wake of several high-profile sexual harassment and assault allegations in the workplace.

These are just a few examples where Solnit recalls moments that can be compared to more current events. This is at times disheartening but also provides support for her thesis: that women are walking on the road towards equality and cannot be stopped, no matter how slow progress might seem.

Because the book is a collection of essays previously written and published elsewhere, it can occasionally feel disjointed. The Virginia Woolf chapter about the limits of what can be known or explained was theoretical in tone and went over my head as one who is not familiar with Woolf’s writing. I enjoyed the discussion of the progress of feminism in “Pandora’s Box”, the last essay in the collection.

Taken as a whole, this collection provides a solid framework for feminist theory. Solnit’s writing is engaging and the topics presented have the power to invite reflection and spark important conversations.

Men Explain Things to Me
By Rebecca Solnit
Pages: 115

Publisher: Haymarket Books

Publication Date: 2014 (2015 for the updated edition with two additional essays)