The Feminist perspective on the family

Question 1

What is Liberal Feminism?

Answer 1

1. Liberal feminism
   - Concerned with campaigning against sex discrimination and for equal rights and opportunities for women
   - They argue that women’s oppression is being gradually overcome through changing attitudes and changes in the law
   - In regards to the family, they feel that there has been some progress
   - But they are criticised for believing that equality can be achieved from changes in the law and attitudes
   inism

Question 2

What is Marxist Feminism?

Answer 2

2. Marxist feminism
   - Women’s oppression performs several functions for capitalism:
   a) women reproduce the labour force through their unpaid domestic labour, socialising the next generation and maintaining the current one
   b) women absorb anger that would otherwise be directed at capitalism
   c) women are a reserve army of cheap labour

Question 3

What is Radical Feminism?

Answer 3

3. Radical feminism
   - The family and marriage are key institutions in patriarchal society
   - The family must be abolished through separatism and political lesbianism, and creating ‘matrilocal’ households
   - Liberal fems. say that Radical fems. don’t recognise there have been improvements

Question 4

What is Difference Feminism?

Answer 4

4. Difference feminism
   - They argue that we cannot generalise about women’s experiences
   - Lesbian and heterosexual women, white and black women, m/c and w/c women all have very different experiences of the family from one another
   - By regarding the family purely negatively, white feminists neglect black women’s experience of racial oppression, whereas black feminists see the family as a resistance against racism
   - Other feminists argue that difference feminism neglects the fact that all women share many of the same experiences