Proposed Introduction & Thesis:
The paradigm of western political discourse is one that has established, and continues to establish itself, itself on a specific model of rights and political participation, certain notions of labor and economics, and a particular understanding of social equity and equality. This paradigm has not only historically functioned to circumscribe what counts as rights, but has also worked to define who is included in the group entitled to access these very rights, and has consequently defined the path necessary for equality rights. This paper will explore how certain praxes of feminism, specifically certain branches of liberal feminism through their articulations of the meaning of female sexuality and through their politics of representation, can concurrently marginalize and reproduce an ethics of a political subjectivity that has excluded women of color, via its whiteness and
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Firstly, this paper will evaluate how the more radical tenants of liberal feminism, specifically the ones that promote open celebrations of female embodiment and sexuality as a form of political representation through activities like The Slut Walk, can work to exclude women of color. Indeed, a woman whose political, social, and economic subjectivity/Otherness has historically and socially been formulated through a discourse of hyper-sexualization may not believe that re-appropriating a term like slut or whore is actually an effective tool for political representation and change. This is because the woman of the Other has historically been the whore within a virgin/whore dichotomy produced by colonial western political orders, in a way a white woman is not. Consequently, activities like a slut walk, may only generate the very ideologues of sexuality that have been constitutive of racialization and systemic
Throughout history, women were challenged with inequality and discrimination within a patriarchal society such voting in presidential elections, owning property and having job opportunities. During the last century, there have been many achievements that guarantee women rights and equality. For example, the Nineteenth Amendment gave women the right to vote in 1920 and the Equal Employment Opportunities Law prohibited employers from discriminating against gender in 1988.1 In her essay, “Pink Think”, Lynn Peril argues about the pressure on women that follow the rules of femininity.2 She describes the word “Pink Think”, as ideas and attitudes of proper women behavior.2 Although there are still some aspects of “Pink Think” culture that is still recognized today, the shifts in cultural and political events in recent centuries have increased attention to women’s issues against social injustice. Nevertheless, Peril neglects the fact that women today are living in a totally different time than how she pictures it because of the newly evolved cultural attitudes of gender roles and identity, labor, and living the American Dream.
Tales from the beyond, story one: a parent binds his baby girl's feet in China, so it will not grow more than five to six inches because small feet in women are a sign of elegance; story two: a wife is burned alive in India, so she can accompany her husband in death. Are these stories? No, things like this really happened in the past. They are part of the reason that contributed to the birth of the Women's Movement in the 19th century. This movement was also known as the Feminist movement because its foundation came from feminism, an ideology that developed in the 19th century, and whose main goal was to gain equality for women. The goals of the Women's Movement in the 19th century where: to get the vote, to archive equality in property rights, access to education, access to jobs and fair pay, divorce, and children's custody. These ideals had been around for a while, but the 19th century was the perfect time for them to develop. During the 19th century, nations were going through radical changes; countries were adopting new ways of life based mainly of one of three ideologies: liberalism, conservatism, and socialism. The development of one of these ideologies, and the success of feminism in a country went hand in hand, and it is by analyzing the similarities, and differences between feminism, and each of these ideologies that we can see why feminism was most successful in liberal countries.
Conceptualizations of the public and the private have always been central to the politics of second-wave feminism. The slogan, "the personal is political," implied that private life was often the site, if not the cause, of women's oppression. In 1974, some of the authors of Woman, Culture and Society (Lamphere and Rosaldo 1974), one of the founding texts of academic feminism, asserted that the universal cause of women's oppression lay in their confinement to the domestic sphere. Since that time, anthropologists have modified and complicated their assertions about the private. 1 Many other scholars have turned to confronting the meaning of the public. Joan Landes's anthology represents an important stage in this development.
Feminists are accused of taking the perspective of a woman who is a product of Western ideology. Which is to say that feminists ‘assume that all women have similar attributes and experiences and ignore the impact of other variables such as race, class, wealth, and sexual preferences on the position of women’(Chalesworth in Nayak 2013, 86). That in doing so, they have effectively excluded other women of different culture, class, and religion. What I would like to emphasize here is that in pursuing equality, feminists have become the very ‘”elite” they criticizes. Feminists’ claims for human rights are Western based, as simultaneously feminists are claiming that human rights are
Since its inception, and for the two centuries that followed, feminism has been engaged in what might be seen as a critical endorsement of Enlightenment principles of universal rights, equality, and individual freedoms. Universal principles of citizenship were generally considered fairer and more inclusive, having been developed in opposition to particularist rights such as those invested in castes, estates, or ethnic groups. While feminists have long sought to expose what in recent debates has been identified as the ‘false universalism’ of an exclusionary, androcentric liberalism, this critique informed a strategy that sought not to dispense with universalism but to ensure that it was consistently applied. Along with other disadvantaged social groups, women have demanded recognition as moral and juridical equals, and have deployed egalitarian arguments to advance claims on the rights associated with citizenship. However, while they claimed that they had the same entitlements to justice and political representation as men, they also insisted that women's ‘difference’ be recognized as...
The message of Lugones and Spelman in Have We Got a Theory for You! Feminist Theory, Cultural Imperialism and the Demand for “The Woman’s Voice,” is that the entire worldwide experience of women cannot be universally articulated. Blanket definition of woman is impossible due to the many characteristics of women that make the gender so diverse, specifically race and economic status in society. “The women’s voices most likely to come forth and the women’s voices mostly likely to be heard are, in the United States anyway, those of white, middle-class, heterosexual Christian women” (Lugones and Spelman 21). Since “feminist theory” has been established without encompassing the inherently different experiences of non-white/non-Anglo women “much of the theory has failed to be relevant to the lives of women who are not white or middle class” (Ibid. 21). This displacement of a large population of the world’s women from feminist theory is extremely threatening to the development of a woman’s voice, in so far as this voice is key to fighting the battles that feminism sets out to fight: the end of re...
The most related terms when women’s right is brought up are feminism and feminist. A feminist, by definition, is someone the fights for feminism. The definition of feminism, one the other hand, is very complex. Throughout history, the word has continuously had bad images and connotations thrown its wa...
As Third Wave feminism is currently unfolding before us, and its aims encompass a wide array of complex issues, it is often hard to describe what Third Wave feminism is. The feminist theories, mainly associated with First and Second Wave feminism attempt to describe the power imbalances that are found in society, and while doing so expose other oppressions, such as discrimination based on race or sexual orientation. As this essay attempts to place a clear definition to Third Wave feminism, feminists are concurrently trying to deconstruct old definitions and open it up for women to determine what feminism means to them. In other words, no clear definition on what is meant to be a feminist is sufficient, as the Third Wave is about equality and freedom for all citizens, regardless of sex, class, race or sexual orientation.
Feminists are accused of taking the perspective of a woman who is a product of Western ideology. Which is to say that feminists ‘assume that all women have similar attributes and experiences and ignore the impact of other variables such as race, class, wealth, and sexual preferences on the position of women’(Chalesworth in Nayak 2013, 86). That in doing so, they have effectively excluded other women of different culture, class, and religion. What I would like to emphasize here is that in pursuing equality, feminists have become the very ‘”elite” they criticizes. Feminists’ claims for human rights are Western based, as simultaneously feminists are claiming that human rights are
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a Nigerian author who has received numerous awards and distinctions. Her main argument is that everyone should be a feminist not because of our gender, but because it is what is right. Adichie has been featured in Beyonce’s song, “Flawless”, spreading awareness to the idea of feminism. “We Should All Be Feminists” is a book about her experiences in Nigeria, where men are more powerful than women. The intended audience of the passage is each and every person residing in heavily patriarchal societies. Hesr thesis is “we should all be feminists”.
Multiracial Feminism: Recasting the Chronology of Second Wave Feminism introduces ideas by Becky Thompson that contradict the “traditional” teachings of the Second Wave of feminism. She points out that the version of Second Wave feminism that gets told centers around white, middle class, US based women and the central problem being focused on and rallied against is sexism. This history of the Second Wave does not take into consideration feminist movements happening in other countries. Nor does it take into consideration the feminist activism that women of color were behind, that centered not only on sexism, but also racism, and classism as central problems as well. This is where the rise of multiracial feminism is put to the foreground and
However, the stigma of openly sexual women was not eliminated therefore marking down women's sexual freedom because of the stigma they carry in society.In conclusion, chapter by chapter hooks highlights how feminist theory repeatedly excluded non-white and working class women by ignoring white supremacy as a racial problem and by disregarding the highly psychological impact of class in their political and social status all while, in the case of black women, facing three classes of oppression in a racist, sexist and capitalist state. Throughout the book the author defines feminism, the meaning of sisterhood, what feminism is to men in addition to brushing upon power, work, violence and education. Although I found some elements of this book problematic hooks' critiques of feminist theory and the movement are well-presented, piercingly direct and remain relevant.
Feminist political ideology focuses on understanding and changing political philosophies for the betterment of women. Studying how the philosophies are constructed and what makes them unjust, this field constantly generates new ideas on how these philosophies need to be fundamentally reconstructed. Liberal feminism, for example, was built around promoting economic and political equality for women. By arguing the older concepts of the split between public and private realms as a way to politically protect male domination of women as “natural”, and ideas about a women’s place in the household, came evidence that supported legal cases leading “to the criminalization in the United States of spousal rape” (qtd. in McAfee). Another completely different approach is radical feminism, which advocates a separation from the whole system, perceiving that the sexual relations between male and female as the basis of gender inequality and female subordination (qtd. in McAfee). Democratic femin...
The combination of liberal and radical feminism is not one that often comes to the mind, but it can be useful to consult various viewpoints when tackling complex issues. Despite drastic differences between them, these two views of feminism do hold some similarities with each other by virtue of their common goal (when that goal is simplified to simply equality of the genders). In this paper I will be outlining some of the basic similarities and differences between these two ideologies of feminism and I may not cover all of the connections and gaps between the two for the sake of length. Moving forward from this explanation of liberal and radical feminism, I will use it to explain their views of pornography and how it aided my own understanding
Feminism is defined as the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes. It began as an organized activity on behalf of women?s rights and interests. This concept was developed to help women earn a place in a predominantly male society. Unfortunately over the years, the intentions of feminism have become distorted, not only by anti-feminists, but also by the feminists themselves. The principle of equality for women and men has turned into a fight in which feminists wish to be better than men. Feminism has been twisted and misunderstood so much that it has become a harmful idea.