FEMINIST

CRITICISM
 WHAT IS FEMINISM?

The theory of Organized activity on Fight against gender

political, economic, behalf of women’s stereotypes and
and social equality rights and interests gender-based
of the sexes expectations
 HISTORY
OF
FEMINISM
 THE FEMINIST
MOVEMENT
FIRST SECOND THIRD
WAVE WAVE WAVE
FEMINISM FEMINISM FEMINISIM
Late 1700s to Early 1900s Early 1960s – late 1970s 1990s - present
In this period, women
worldwide were considered:

Intellectually
inferior

Physically weak
Suited to the role
of mother and wife
Confined in the
domestic sphere
WOMEN IN THE 1700s-1900s
• Throughout most of Western history, women were confined to the domestic
sphere, while public life was reserved for men.
• In medieval Europe, women were denied the right to own property, to study,
or to participate in public life.
• At the end of the 19th century in France, they were still compelled to cover
their heads in public, and, in parts of Germany, a husband still had the right
to sell his wife. Even as late as the early 20th century, women could neither
vote nor hold elective office in Europe and in most of the United States
(where several territories and states granted women’s suffrage long before
the federal government did so).
WOMEN IN THE 1700s-1900s
• Women were prevented from conducting business without a male
representative, be it a father, brother, husband, legal agent, or even
son.
• Married women could not exercise control over their own children
without the permission of their husbands. Moreover, women had
little or no access to education and were barred from most
professions. In some parts of the world, such restrictions on women
continue today
FEMINISM: THE FIRST WAVE
The term “The First Wave of Feminism” was coined in March 1968
in an article in New York Times Magazine by journalist Martha
Weinman Lear entitled “The Second Feminist Wave: What Do
These Women Want?”

It takes place mainly in the USA and the UK from the 1820s to
1940s when women being treated as second rate citizens in male
dominated societies and is represented by liberal feminism
FEMINISM: THE FIRST WAVE
Its primary goal is to gain equal rights for women and for
the securing of voting rights (Rampton, 10`5; Malinowska,
2020).

It aims at social reformation from the patriarchy and

liberation from oppression of racial bias (Jepsen, 2020).
FEMINISM: THE FIRST WAVE
The first-wave feminists
were influenced by the
collective activism of
women in various other
reform movements, in
particular, by women
participating in the
French Revolution.
PHILIPPINES:
THE FIRST WAVE FEMINISM
Filipino women advocated for their rights. In the
1900s, the Philippines was a colony of the United
States, but these women could note vote in either
location. In 1905, the Asociacion Feminista Filipina
was founded to encourage the participation of
women in public affairs.
In this period, women
worldwide:
Attend
school/university

Objectified
Enter the labor
force
Challenge notions
of their role in the
family, workplace,
and society
FEMINISM:
THE SECOND WAVE
Unlike the first wave, second-wave
feminism provoked extensive theoretical
discussion about the origins of women’s
oppression, the nature of gender, and the
role of the family. Kate Millett’s Sexual
Politics made the best-seller list in 1970,
and in it, she broadened the term politics to
include all “power-structured relationships”
and posited that the personal was actually
political
FEMINISM:
THE SECOND WAVE
Issues of rape, reproductive rights, domestic
violence and workplace safety were brought to
the forefront of the movement and there was
widespread effort to reform the negative and
inferior image of women in popular culture to a
more positive and realistic one. Women created
their own popular culture and the movement
spread through feminist films, music, books and
even restaurants
FEMINISM:THE SECOND WAVE

•During the 1960s, influenced and inspired by the Civil Rights

Movement, women of all ages began to fight to secure a stronger
role in American society.
•As members of groups like the National Organization for Women
(NOW) asserted their rights and strove for equality for themselves
and others, they upended many accepted norms and set
groundbreaking social and legal changes in motion.
•Title VII is the section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that
prohibited discrimination in employment on the basis of gender.
 FEMINISM:THE SECOND WAVE

In 1963, writer and feminist Betty

Friedan published The Feminine Mystique, a
nonfiction book in which she contested the
post-World War II belief that it was women’s
destiny to marry and bear children. Friedan’s
book was a best-seller and began to raise the
consciousness of many women who agreed
that homemaking in the suburbs sapped them
of their individualism and left them
unsatisfied.
FEMINISM:
THE THIRD WAVE

Influenced by the postmodernist movement in the

academy, third-wave feminists sought to question,
reclaim, and redefine the ideas, words, and media
that have transmitted ideas about womanhood,
gender, beauty, sexuality, femininity, and
masculinity, among other things.
FEMINISM:
THE THIRD WAVE

There was a decided shift in perceptions of gender, with the notion that there
are some characteristics that are strictly male and others that are strictly
female giving way to the concept of a gender continuum. From this
perspective each person is seen as possessing, expressing,
and suppressing the full range of traits that had previously been associated
with one gender or the other. For third-wave feminists, therefore, “sexual
liberation,” a major goal of second-wave feminism, was expanded to mean a
process of first becoming conscious of the ways one’s gender identity and
sexuality have been shaped by society and then intentionally constructing
(and becoming free to express) one’s authentic gender identity.
 ➢Many claim that the fourth wave
of feminism began about 2012
➢Focuses on sexual harassment,
body shaming, and rape culture,
among other issues.
➢A key component was the use
FOURTH of social media to highlight and
WAVE address these concerns.
FEMINISM
FEMINIST LITERARY CRITICISM
Feminist literary criticism
explores the social relationships
and roles of men and women
This form of literary criticism draws on
the ideas of feminist theory to critique
literature influenced by patriarchal
narratives
Patriarchy
Refers to a social system
where men hold the most
power
Feminist literary criticism examines a number of
elements of a text including:

- Gendered language and symbols

- Stereotypical or unconventional
portrayals of female characters
- How the gender of a reader can
affect their response to a text
- Roles assigned to men and women
- Tension between men and women
in terms of political, social, and
economic aspects
- Women oppression and repression
Feminist literary criticism may use
the following methods
1. Deconstructing the way that women characters are described in a
piece of work (especially if the author is a male)
2. Deconstructing how one’s own gender influences how one reads
and interprets a text, and which characters and how the reader
identifies depending on the reader’s gender
3. Critiquing a patriarchal or woman-marginalizing language, such as
a “universal“ use of the masculine pronoun “he” and “him”
Feminist literary criticism may use
the following methods
4. Unpacking differences in how men and women write: a style, for
instance, where women use more reflexive language and men use more
direct language
5. Examining how relationships between men and women and those
assuming male and female roles are depicted in the text, including power
relations.
6. Examining the text to find ways in which patriarchy and oppression
resisted or could have been resisted
EXAMPLE
First wave:

In John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, the character of

Curley’s wife is presented in a stereotypical way. She
is the only female character in the novella and mainly
acts as a plot device, rather than an individual. Her
lack of individuality and independence is portrayed
through her not having a name, only being known as
the wife of Curley
EXAMPLE
Fourth wave:

Louise O’Neill’s fiction novel ONLY EVERY YOURS

(2014) presents a dystopian future in which women are
controlled by a patriarchal society that values them as
objects rather than individuals. Within this novel,
O’Neill explores how beauty standards are used to
sexualize and control women that limiting their
independence and freedom.
THANK YOU FOR LISTENING