Feminism Flashcards
First wave of feminism:
Began in the 19th Century when the suffragettes fought for the right to vote.
Abbot & Wallace
- Malestream sociology = seeing society only from the perspective of men.
What are liberal feminists concerned with?
- Care about human rights and personal freedom.
Liberal feminism - reformism
- Trying to gradually improve society through changing laws and culture.
Types of changes proposed by liberal feminists:
Laws and policies = against sex discrimination in the workplace and at school, leads to equal opportunities. (1979 equal pay act + WISE)
Cultural change = changing sexist ideas about women.
Two ways which liberal feminists believe society will progress towards gender equality:
- Change socialisation & culture to challenge sexism.
- Campaign for anti-discrimination laws.
Walby
Says liberal feminists offer no explanation for the overall structure of gender inequality.
Radical feminists and sexual politics
Refers to how all relationships between men and women are political because men dominate women through these relationships.
Patriarchal power -> not going out at night
Men exercise power over women through sexual or physical violence and the threat of that violence.
Links to Brownmiller
Brownmiller
Says that the threat of rape acts as a curfew, preventing women from going out alone at night.
Radical feminists and constructed sexuality:
- Sexuality is constructed to satisfy men’s needs.
- Women are portrayed as passive sexual objects; penetration is seen as the main source of sexual pleasure.
Rich
Argues men continue to force women into a narrow and unsatisfying compulsory heterosexuality
Solutions to women’s oppression proposed by radical feminists:
- Separatism = since men will inevitably oppress women, women have to live apart from men. (Links to Greer)
- Consciousness-raising = women should share their experiences in women-only consciousness raising groups. May lead to collective action, e.g. Reclaim the Night and Slutwalks.
- Political lesbianism = heterosexual relationships are inherently oppressive because they involve sleeping with the enemy. The only non-oppressive relationships are lesbian.
Greer
Suggests all-female matrilocal households.
What social factors does radical feminism ignore?
- Assume that what matters to them, matters to everyone.
- Ignore class, ethnicity, etc…
Pollert
Believes the concept of patriarchy is of little value. Everything bad gets blamed as ‘patriarchy’.
Somerville
Thinks separatism is unlikely because it ignores heterosexual attraction.
What does Marxist Feminism believe is the cause of women’s subordination?
- Caused by capitalism.
Four functions that women’s subordination performs:
- Women are a source of cheap, exploitable labour = they are paid less because it is assumed they are dependent on their husbands.
- Women are a reserve army of labour = moved into the labour force when necessary, made redundant during economic recession.
- Women reproduce the labour force = raise the next generation of workers; service the current generation (husbands) at no cost to capitalism.
- Women absorb anger = Fran Ansley - wives are takers of shit.
Barrett - why must we take non-economic factors into account to understand women’s position in the family?
- We have to look at women’s consciousness and motivations. E.g. why do women want to marry, when this is what oppresses them?
Barrett - the ideology of familism.
- The nuclear family and the traditional sexual division of labour is presented as natural and normal.
- The family is portrayed as the only place when women will be fulfilled through motherhood, intimacy, etc…
What else is required to secure women’s liberation, other than overthrowing capitalism?
- We need to overthrow familism.
- Only then will men and women be free from restrictive stereotypes.
Mitchell
- It would be hard to overcome patriarchy even after the overthrow of capitalism.
- This is because ideas about femininity are so deeply implanted in women’s unconscious minds that they will be very difficult to dislodge, even in a communist society.
Two criticisms of Marxist feminism:
- Fails to explain women’s subordination in non-capitalist societies.
- Women’s unpaid labour benefits capitalism, but that doesn’t explain why women do it rather than men. Hartmann says Marxism is ‘sex-blind’.
Hartmann
Believes that capitalism and patriarchy have become intertwined.
Dual systems feminism - how can women’s subordination be understood?
- We need to look at the relationship between their position in the domestic division of labour (patriarchy) and in paid work (capitalism).
Walby - Interests of patriarchy and capitalism differ because:
- Capitalism wants women to work in low paid jobs.
- Patriarchy wants women at home.
Pollert - how does patriarchy differ from capitalism?
- Patriarchy is a not a system in the same way that capitalism is.
- Patriarchy is just a description for a range of practises such as male violence; control of women’s labour.
How does difference feminism differ from other feminist perspectives?
- Says that not all women are the same. Class, ethnicity, sexuality, etc all lead to different experiences.
Claudia Jones
- Says that white feminists criticise the nuclear family.
- For black women, families provided protection against a racist society.
Essentialism
- The idea that all women share the same fundamental essence.
Poststructuralist feminism - what are discourses?
- Ways of seeing, thinking or speaking about things.
The Enlightenment project - Butler
- Sees it as a form of power/knowledge.
- Really it was about saying that the things white western m/c men cared about were the most important.
Butler - western feminists
- Says they are wrong to claim that the feminist movement represents universal womanhood.
- Says that the white western m/c women who dominate feminism assume that they care about what all women care about.
Poststructuralism suggests there is no…
- Fixed essence of what it is to be a woman.
- This is because our identities are constructed through discourses, and discourses change in different times and cultures.
- Therefore, there can be no universal concept of what it means to be a woman.
Segal’s criticism of poststructuralist feminism:
- Says women are oppressed by social structure not discourses.
- Feminists should want things such as equal pay.
