Feminism (yr13) Flashcards
What are the 4 different types of feminism?
Liberal feminism.
Radical feminism
Marxist feminism
Difference feminism
What are liberals concerned with?
Liberals are concerned with the human and civil rights and freedoms of the individual. In keeping with the Enlightenment tradition, they believe that all human beings should have equal rights. Men and women are both human beings so therefore both should have the same inalienable rights and freedoms.
What are liberal feminists ideas about laws and policies.?
Liberal feminists believe women can achieve gender equality through laws and policies. For example they argue thats laws and policies against sex discrimination in employment and education can secure equal opportunities for women.
What are liberal feminists thoughts on cultural change?
Liberal feminists call for cultural change. In their view, traditional prejudices ad stereotypes about gender differences are a barrier to equality. For example, beliefs that women are less rational and more dominated by emotion and instinct are used to legitimate their exclusion from decision making roles and their confinement to childrearing and housework.
True or false: liberal feminists reject the idea that biological differences make women less competent or rational than men, or that men are biologically less emotional or nurturing.
True!!
What are liberal feminists ideas on sex and gender?
Like ann Oakley liberal feminists distinguish between sex and gender.
What do liberal feminists say the difference between sex and gender is?
They say SEX refers to biological differences between males and females, such as their reproductive role, hormonal and physical differences.
They say GENDER refers to culturally constructed differences between the ‘masculine’ and feminine roles and identitities assigned to males and females.
What are the strengths of liberal feminism?
Liberal feminist research has produced much evidence demonstrating that gender differences are socially constructed, through prejudice and discrimination generated by the socialisation process and the legal political system.
It has had important effects on social policy, with the passing of anti-discrimination laws like the equal pay act 1970. The sex discrimination act, 1975 and the equality act 2010, and has done lots to change traditional attitudes and improve women’s lives and opportunities.
What are the weaknesses of liberal feminism?
Liberal feminism merely deals with reducing the effects of women’s subordination, rather than challenging the fundamental causes. Radical, marxist and dual systems feminists suggest these lie in the structures of patriarchy and/or capitalism and women’s equality can only be brought about by revolutionary changes that overthrow these.
What do Radical feminists regard as the most fundamental form of inequality?
Radical feminists regard patriarchy as the most fundamental form of inequality, with the world divided into two sex classes of women and men, with men dominating women in all areas and from which all men benefit.
What are some of the criticisms of radical feminism?
It assumes all women share common interests. It fails to recognise, as marxist and difference feminism insist do, that other factors like social class and ethnicity are also important sources of inequality.
It fails to recognise that gradual reform has improved women’s opportunities and weakened the significance of patriarchy without revolutionary change, as liberal feminists argue.
What is the key principle of marxist feminism?
Marxist feminists argue gender inequality arises primarily from the nature of capitalist society, not from an independent system of patriarchy. Capitalism intensifies patriarchal inequalities in pursuit of its own interests. They say women are used as a cheap labour force, asa reserve army of labour which can be sacked and returned to the home during economic recession.
What are some criticisms of marxist feminism?
Marxist feminists don’t explain the fact that patriarchy has existed in all known societies, not just capitalist societies, as radical feminists point out.
What are difference feminism’s main ideas?
Sometimes known as black feminism, originally Emerged as a result of concerns that many early feminist theories ignored the different experiences of patriarchal subordination found among black women and others from minority ethnic groups. This concern has now been broadened to include a range of other groups, and is considered here under the border heading of difference feminism which is also sometimes referred to as post-modern feminism.
What does difference feminism suggest about other forms of feminism?
Difference feminists suggest the other variants of feminism particularly in the early days of feminism in the 1960s viewed women’s subordination through the eyes of white middle-class women. They emphasise that while women suffer many of the same problems not all women are in the same position. The subordination of women and women’s experiences of oppression and take very diverse forms in different contexts and among different social groups. 
Examples of difference feminism
For example there are substantial differences in the experiences of women from different social classes and from different ethnic groups and between non-disabled and disabled women between lesbian transgender bisexual and heterosexual women and between women living in different areas such as in working class communities in the north of England and southern middle class communities. Specific groups may face multiple oppression such as racism and homophobia which may be intensified by patriarchy so that for example black working class lesbians may experience patriarchal oppression in different ways to white middle-class heterosexual women.
Helene Cixoux is associated with which branch of feminism?
Difference feminism
True or also: difference feminism sees women as a single homogenous group.
False. They do not. they see and highlight the differences between women and the difficulties these differences bring.
What are some of the criticisms of difference feminism?
Dividing women subgroups Weakens the movement for change as some argue it shows a division between women and not one solid united group fighting for change.
Walby says, Women are still oppressed by objective social structures the main one being patriarchy and feels like they should tackle this key main issue first before tackling each individual groups difficulties.
Why does Fran Ansley describe women as ‘takers of shit’? (Marxist feminism)
This is because Marxist feminists believe women absorb anger that would otherwise be directed at capitalism. Fran Ainsley describes wives is takers of shit he’s soak up the frustration their husbands feel because of the alienation and exploitation they suffer at work for Marxist feminists this explains male domestic violence against women.
