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Feminism

[pic]Current Issues , 2010[pic]

Feminism

Feminism is both a concept and the name of a movement associated with that concept. In brief terms, feminism is the belief in the need to secure, or in the commitment to secure, rights and opportunities for women equal to those of men. The term also loaned itself to a movement determined to secure and defend equal rights and opportunities for women. The actual term feminism dates back to the 1880s and was coined in France. It migrated to Britain a decade later and came into usage in the United States in the years preceding World War I.

History of Feminism

The history and shape of the feminist movement is usually divided into three categories: first-wave, second-wave, and third-wave feminism. First-wave feminism was primarily concerned with achieving basic political rights, such as the right to vote. Its origins are in the radical new philosophies of the late eighteenth century known as the Age of Enlightenment, also called the Age of Reason. Prompted by groundbreaking discoveries in science, the philosophers of the enlightenment began to question the authority of monolithic institutions that had dominated European life for the past several hundred years, such as absolute monarchies and the Catholic Church. Mary Wollstonecraft, a British writer and mother of Mary Shelley, who wrote the first modern horror novel, Frankenstein, is credited with being one of the first published women whose work explores the deep dissatisfaction that many of her gender felt because of their second-class status.

Wollstonecraft wrote her 1792 treatise, A Vindication of the Rights of Women, at a time when women were not allowed to vote, were prohibited or severely restricted from owning property in most jurisdictions, and were deemed unable or unsuitable to make major decisions regarding their future. A woman’s desire to be educated, for example, or remain unmarried could in most cases be overruled by the authority of her closest male relative, who was considered her legal and moral guardian. Wollstonecraft asserted that she did not wish to "invert the order of things" but argues in her book for fairer treatment. "Would men but generously snap our chains, and be content with rational fellowship instead of slavish obedience, they would find us more observant daughters, more affectionate sisters, more faithful wives, more reasonable mothers—in a word, better citizens," she writes.

Wollstonecraft’s work was a profound influence on the first true generation of women’s rights advocates who followed in her wake in the nineteenth century. This is generally referred to as feminism’s first wave, and their aims were preoccupied with suffrage, or the right to vote. In the United States the movement’s most prominent leaders were Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, both of whom had been ardent abolitionists before taking up the suffrage cause. Many women in the abolitionist movement felt slighted when Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1870. This amendment prohibits federal, state, or local governments from preventing a citizen from voting based on race. Just twenty years earlier, African Americans had been slaves with no legal or political rights, essentially considered the property of their owners. The failure of the Fifteenth Amendment to include gender ignited the suffrage movement in the United States. After fifty years of bitter struggle, Congress finally passed the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, which prohibits any state or federal government entity from denying a citizen the right to vote because of that citizen’s sex.

The Second Wave

Second-wave feminism began in the early 1960s. The interim forty years between this period and the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment were full of political, economic, and social gains for women, but second-wave feminists in the United States pushed for full equality in all facets of society and for those rights to be enshrined by law. Like its predecessor, second-wave feminism was tied to the civil rights movement. American women took part in or supported the bid for equal rights for African Americans, and the passage of sweeping federal legislation guaranteeing the full participation of minorities as U.S. citizens was hotly debated in Congress. At the last minute, the word "women" was added to the text of the Civil Rights Act of 1964—some claim in a sly move to defeat it—but the bill passed anyway. This was just the beginning of feminism’s second wave, however. Women’s rights advocates began to call for a drastic rethinking of the role of women in society. Some of this was spurred on by The Feminine Mystique, a 1963 book by Betty Friedan that was both a bestseller and a topic of major debate. Friedan surveyed the women she had attended Smith College with back in the early 1940s and reported that they had a profound dissatisfaction with their traditional, homebound role as wives and mothers and with their lack of professional fulfillment.

Some scholars, however, note that discussions of the history of feminism in the United States should not focus solely on educated, middle-class women like Friedan. While many of them played a key role in framing the debate and stepping up to leadership roles, statistics show that many lower-income women worked outside of the home, either full or part-time. Second-wave feminism did secure many important gains for all women, however, such as the reform of states’ divorce laws and federal legislation that mandated equal pay and equal educational opportunities, even in athletics.

Third-wave feminism was a term that came into use in the early 1990s, though its roots date back to the previous decade and the writings of a younger generation of women’s rights advocates. One of them was Rebecca Walker, daughter of African American novelist Alice Walker, who founded the Third Wave Direct Action Corporation in 1992. The nonprofit organization sought to advance new ideas about feminism and serve as a more inclusionary organization for women of color. One of its first major actions was a voter registration drive that focused on young women of color in urban communities. Some third-wave feminists even resisted the label "feminist," arguing that women are such a diverse group with so many types of goals and aspirations that using any definition at all to describe their struggle is overly simplistic. Another facet of third-wave feminism is the Riot Grrrl movement, which borrowed some elements of the punk-rock music scene to transmit ideas. Several notable musical acts fronted by women emerged out of the Riot Grrrl phenomenon, among them Bikini Kill and L7.

Diverging Viewpoints

The debate about feminism and its relevance to women’s concerns in the twenty-first century has not only made it a target for criticism but has also divided the movement itself. Some argue that feminism is still a valid movement in the twenty-first century. The leaders of one of the second wave’s most visible groups, the National Organization for Women, concede that major milestones have been achieved for women in the areas of job security, domestic-abuse laws, reproductive rights, and other significant areas that affect a woman’s freedom to lead the life she chooses—an unthinkable concept back in Wollstonecraft’s era—but contend that women still face discrimination on many fronts. Political representation in Congress, for example, still does not accurately reflect the nation’s demographics, and women in many professions encounter subtle biases in their careers. Much of that discrimination is linked to the perception that women who become parents sometimes abandon their careers to raise their children, at least for a few years.

Others argue that feminism is an outdated notion and that everyone should be expected to adhere to the core tenets of the feminist movement. They argue that women often choose motherhood and marriage, out of the thousands of potential lifestyle choices they are free to make, and often choose to stay at home and raise their children just as their grandmothers—the unhappy generation who confessed their disappointments and feelings of powerlessness to Friedan—had done. Countering that is the argument that working mothers are faced with so many obstacles, particularly in the realm of day care and household chores—the majority of which are still done by female members of two-person heterosexual couples—that they feel pressured to choose one or the other.

The gains made by American women since Friedan’s 1963 book are significant: Women in violent and abusive marriages can file sexual assault charges against their husbands, for example. Prior to the 1970s, the U.S. legal system did not recognize marital rape as a crime, because a woman was considered to have given her consent through the act of marriage itself. Single, divorced, or widowed women faced enormous obstacles in lending and other consumer-finance practices, and before Congress amended the Fair Housing Act in 1974 to prohibit bias against gender, it was extremely difficult for women to obtain a home mortgage in their own name; the same held true for bank loans and credit cards. Because of these gains, some argue that the concept of feminism is no longer valid. Others point to the enduring discrimination that takes other forms: Single women and African American women are more often the holders of subprime mortgages, sold to them by predatory lenders.

Another viewpoint holds that the feminist movement has had a negative impact on women. Urging women to obtain a college degree, enter the workforce, and pursue goals is admirable, but feminism’s emphasis of these as the only valid and honorable life choices is also a disservice to women. Studies show that women are still as unhappy and dissatisfied with their lives as back in Friedan’s era. Those women who choose to do both—a career and a family—face enormous demands on their time on both fronts. Others argue that feminism’s primary beneficiaries have been men, for the sexual revolution condoned promiscuity and that resulted in a vast population of men who are unwilling to enter into a committed relationship when the available pool of women to date—and enter into sexual liaisons with—is limitless.

Exploitation Takes Many Forms

There are numerous other topics that concern feminists and provoke the same heated debate on both sides. Prostitution, often referred to as "the world’s oldest profession," is one of them, and some feminists note that this particular form of female exploitation—along with exotic dancing—is often one of the few professions available to women with little education, negligible job skills, and children to support. Pornography is another divisive subject: Some contend that this is another form of exploitation of women, while others argue that, like exotic dancing, it is a form of women assuming personal control over their sexuality and asserting power over men.

The Future of Feminism

One of the most important advances in feminism, however, has been in reproductive technology. In 1970 Shulamith Firestone, a radical feminist active in the New York City branch of the movement, published The Dialectic of Sex: A Case for Feminist Revolution. In it, she argues that women will only achieve truly equal status as men in society when they are freed from what she considers to be the biological tyranny of procreation. Because only women can bear children, she argues, they will always be relegated to secondary status. Firestone envisions a future where science advances to the point of artificial wombs and where the responsibility of raising children is shared by all.

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Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2012 Gale, Cengage Learning.

[pic]Source Citation

"Feminism." Current Issues: Macmillan Social Science Library. Detroit: Gale, 2010. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 5 Oct. 2012.

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