Feminism Vocabulary Flashcards
Ableism
Discrimination or prejudice against individuals with disabilities
Androcentric
Dominated by or emphasizing masculine interests or a masculine point of view
Asexuality
The lack of sexual attraction to anyone, or low or absent interest in sexual activity
Benevolent Sexism
A subjectively positive orientation of protection, idealization, and affection directed toward women that, like hostile sexism, serves to justify women’s subordinate status to men
Biphobia
Aversion toward bisexuality and bisexual people as a social group or as individuals
Bisexuality
An identity for which sex and gender are not a boundary to attraction
Cisgender
Denoting or relating to a person whose self-identity conforms with the gender that corresponds to their biological sex; not transgender
Creep(er)
A strange person who you strongly dislike; an unpleasant or obnoxious person; someone who causes you to feel nervous and afraid
Cultural Appropriation
When members of a dominant or privileged group exploit the culture of a marginalized group, often without understanding the latter’s history, experience, or traditions
Double Standard
A set of principles that applies differently and usually more rigorously to one group of people or circumstances than to another; especially a code of morals that applies more severe standards of sexual behavior to women than to men
Fat-shaming
Unkind and usually public criticism of someone for being overweight
Homophobia
Irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against homosexuality or homosexuals
Homosexual
Sexually attracted to people of the same sex; based on or showing a sexual attraction to people of the same sex
Internalized Misogyny
The involuntary internalization by women of the sexist messages that are present in their societies and culture; the way in which women reinforce sexism by utilizing and relaying sexist messages that they’ve internalized
Institutional Racism
Societal patterns that have the net effect of imposing oppressive or otherwise negative conditions against identifiable groups on the basis of race or ethnicity; in the United States, institutional racism results from the social caste system that sustained, and was sustained by, slavery and racial segregation
Intersectionality
Concept often used in critical theories to describe the ways in which oppressive institutions (racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, xenophobia, classism, etc.) are interconnected and cannot be examined separately from one another; first came from legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989
Kyriarchy
A concept first created by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza in 1992 to describe her theory of interconnected, interacting, and self-extending systems of domination and submission, in which a single individual might be oppressed in some relationships and privileged in others
Male Gaze
Presentation of media, such as films or advertising, from the perspective of a heterosexual man
Men’s Rights Activists (MRAs)
People who believe that social, legal and economic discrimination against males is present in society to the extent that fighting it deserves an organized effort mirroring feminism; generally have asserted since the 80s that women and feminism “went too far,” and have harmed men in the process
Misandry
A hatred of men
Nice Guy (TM)
Men who view themselves as prototypical “nice guys,” but whose “nice deeds” are in reality only motivated by attempts to passively please women into a relationship and/or sex
Objectification
The treatment of someone like an object instead of a person
Patriarchy
Social organization marked by the supremacy of the father in the clan or family, the legal dependence of wives and children, and the reckoning of descent and inheritance in the male line; broadly, control by men of a disproportionately large share of power
Privilege
A set of advantages (or lack of disadvantages) enjoyed by a majority group
Purity Culture
The view of any discussion of things of a sexual nature outside of the context of heterosexual marriage as taboo; adherence to a strict heteronormative lifestyle that forbids most physical contact with significant others, as well as engaging in self pleasure, or holding lustful thoughts about another person that is not a spouse; includes an insistence on female modesty and responsibility to shield boys and men from sexual temptation
Racism
A belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race; racial prejudice or discrimination
Slut-shaming
Attacking a woman or a girl for being sexual, having one or more sexual partners, acknowledging sexual feelings, and/or acting on sexual feelings
Toxic Masculinity
Socially-constructed attitudes that describe the masculine gender role as violent, unemotional, sexually aggressive, etc.
Transgender
Of, relating to, or being a person who identifies with or expresses a gender identity that differs from the one which corresponds to the person’s sex [assigned] at birth
Transphobia
Intense dislike of or prejudice against transgender people
Victim-blaming
Here the victim of a crime, an accident, or any type of abusive maltreatment is held as wholly or partially responsible for the wrongful conduct committed against them
Wage Gap
The difference between the amounts of money paid to women and men, often for doing the same work
Womanism
A form of feminism focused especially on the conditions and concerns of black women
