Feminism

A Brief Introduction
Sex and Gender
 Sex and Gender
• Before we start discussing feminism, a quick distinction
is in order:
– Sex refers to one’s biological makeup, by which one is defined
as being male or female. By and large it is the sexual organs
that define one’s sex (although there are individuals who
possess organs proper to both sexes).
– Gender refers to a set of ideas associated with men and women.
The genders of masculine and feminine are sets of ideas that
vary greatly between different cultures (what it means to be male
is very different in cosmopolitan London compared to Texas or
the upper Amazon basin, for example)
• The association of the colour blue with boys and pink with girls has
no biological basis. Instead, it is a cultural practice developed in
some Western cultures.
• Some feminists see gender as the most important factor
in how women are treated, but other feminists will argue
that it is the inherent biological difference between men
and women that makes women different to men.
 What is Feminism?
• Feminism as a term developed in France in the late C19
(although there have been women throughout history
who sought to rethink how women are represented).
• It came to prominence in C20 when it was used to
described a social movement which sought to advance
women’s political and social rights to a level equal with
that of men.
• Early feminist movements, such as the suffragettes,
demanded voting rights for women, but later movements,
such as radical feminism, attempted to re-think the idea
of woman in ways that were entirely independent of men.
 Why Feminism?
• Central to the argument for
feminism is that society is
constructed around the male:
it is patriarchal (power and
wealth pass from father to
son) and phallocentric
(centred around the penis);
• Because of this, women have
been subjugated to men,
reduced to being status
God creates Adam
symbols, child-rearing animals (Genesis 2:7)
or servants (and often all
three).
 Click
here…

Power and Control

• Feminists argue that the patriarchy has, over millennia, assembled a
wide range of means of controlling women and legitimising that control.
– Physical force;
– Social codes such as the promise to obey in the marriage ceremony;
– Social conventions, such as the pejorative references to sexually
promiscuous women in contrast to high social status accorded to men who;
controls and
– Legal means: denying women the vote, property rights, the belief that rape
was legitimate within marriage (i.e. a woman had no right to deny her
husband sexual intercourse. This remained part of British law until the 1990s)
– Marriage bargain: the woman provides sexual and child-rearing services in
return for the male’s breadwinning;
– Foundation myths and religious stories, such as the Adam and Eve story (it is
worth noting that the earliest religions appear not to have shared this trait);
 Always and everywhere:
perpetuating male power
• Following the logic of the Marxist theories of
ideology, feminists argue that masculine power
is pervasive in almost all cultures (i.e. that it
invades every aspect of our existences, from
birth to death);
• Language and culture play central roles in
perpetuating male power. For example:
– “man” used to mean the whole human race;
– The use of the pronoun “he” for any child or person of
non-specific gender (now much more commonly
replaced with “they”)
 The Idea of Woman
What exactly the female is
has long been a subject Masculine Feminine
of debate. Simone de Strength Weakness
Beauvoir (wife of the
Rational Emotional
existentialist philosopher
Jean Paul Sartre) argued Sun Moon
that the female has
Fire Water
almost always been
construed as the opposite Boldness Timidity
of the masculine in what
has been termed binary Independent Dependent
oppositions: Stability Mutability
 The Feminine “Lack” or Absence
The qualities assigned to the feminine (instability,
mutability, weakness) are all characterised by
the idea of a lack, whereas the masculine
qualities of strength and power are very much
present.
Some feminists argue that this stems from the
simple anatomical difference between men and
women: the penis is, when erect, undeniably
present, whereas the vagina remains hidden,
dark, at once terrifying and fascinating.
Female Stereotypes
Salome
 A Feminist Reading
• Feminist responses to literature fall by and
large into two different groups:
– Texts can be read to understand how women
are represented by the society that produced
that text, often by exploring the unspoken acts
of subjugation and repression at work in a
text.
– Look at the poem on the following slide and
see how women’s bodies and identities are
controlled by the poet (who here speaks for
the whole of masculine experience)
 Discussion Point
• Analyse one of the two following texts (She
Walks in Beauty, Byron and a speech from
Macbeth) from a feminist perspective;
• How do the writers use language to construct
gender?
– What stereotypes are employed?
– What assumptions about gender does their language
imply?
– How do the texts function within the systematic
repression of women?
 She walks in Beauty
SHE walks in beauty, like the night  
  
  Of cloudless climes and starry skies;  

And all that 's best of dark and bright  

  Meet in her aspect and her eyes:  

        
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
 5
  Which heaven to gaudy day denies.  

One shade the more, one ray the less,  

  Had half impair'd the nameless grace  

Which waves in every raven tress,  

  Or softly lightens o'er her face;   10

Where thoughts serenely sweet express  

  How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.  

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,  

  So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,  

The smiles that win, the tints that glow,   15

  But tell of days in goodness spent,  

A mind at peace with all below,  

  A heart whose love is innocent!

The other side of Gender – a Male
Sergeant

Doubtful it stood;

Fantasy?
As two spent swimmers, that do cling together

And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald--

Worthy to be a rebel, for to that

The multiplying villanies of nature

Do swarm upon him--from the western isles

Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;

And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,

Show'd like a rebel's whore: but all's too weak:

For brave Macbeth--well he deserves that name--

Disdaining fortune, with his brandish'd steel,

Which smoked with bloody execution,

Like valour's minion carved out his passage

Till he faced the slave;

Which ne'er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,