Thinking Activity:Feminism

Feminism 

👉Definition

👉 According to Merriam-Webster, it’s “the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes” and “organized activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests.

👉 Feminism incorporates the position that societies prioritize the male point of view, and that women are treated unjustly within those societies.[6] Efforts to change that include fighting against gender stereotypes and establishing educational, professional, and interpersonal opportunities and outcomes for women that are equal to those for men

👉Key Concerns of Feminism(M.H.Abrams)

1.The basic view is that Western civilization is pervasively patriarchal

2.It is widely held that while one’s sex as a man or woman is determined by anatomy, the prevailing concepts of gender

3. The further claim is that this patriarchal (or “masculinist,” or “androcentric”) ideology pervades those writings which have been traditionally considered great literature

4.gynocriticism—that is, a criticism which concerns itself with developing a specifically female framework for dealing with works written by women, in all aspects of their production, motivation, analysis, and interpretation, and in all literary forms, including journals and letters.

5.One concern of gynocritics is to identify distinctively feminine subject matters in literature written by women—the world of domesticity, for example, or the special experiences of gestation, giving birth, and nurturing, or mother-daughter and woman-woman relations—in which personal and affectional issues, and not external activism, are the primary interest. 

6.Another concern is to uncover in literary history a female tradition, incorporated in subcommunities of women writers who were aware of, emulated, and found support in earlier women writers, and who in turn provide models and emotional support to their own readers and successors. 

7.A third undertaking is to show that there is a distinctive feminine mode of experience, or “subjectivity,” in thinking, feeling, valuing, and perceiving oneself and the outer world. Related to this is the attempt (thus far, without much agreement about details) to specify the traits of a “woman’s language,” or distinctively feminine style of speech and writing, in sentence structure, types of relations between the elements of a discourse, and characteristic figures of speech and imagery. 

👉Seminal Writers and their works

• Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792),
• John Stuart Mill’s The Subjection of Women (1869), 
• Margaret Fuller’s Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845)
• Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex (1949)
•  Mary Ellmann’s Thinking about Women (1968),
• Judith Fetterley’s The Resisting Reader
•  Patricia Meyer Spacks’ The Female Imagination (1975)
• Ellen Moers’ Literary Women (1976),
•  Elaine Showalter’s A Literature of Their Own:
• British Women Novelists from Brontë to Lessing (1977); and
• Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar’s The Madwoman in the Attic (1979;rev. 2000). 
• Nina Baym’s Woman’s Fiction: A Guide to Novels by and about Women in America, 1820–1870 (1978); and Elaine Showalter, A Jury of Her Peers: American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx (2009). 

👉Example

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice concerns primarily of the social norms of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century, in which was a patriarchal society ruled by men who held economic and social power. Pride and Prejudice has certain components that directly focus on the mixing of the bourgeoisie and the aristocracy during the age of the Napoleonic wars and the beginning of an industrial revolution. Interested in the balance between pragmatism, or the necessity of securing a marriage, and idealism, particularly Elizabeth’s romanticism and individualism, Austen dramatizes her heroine’s struggle to find a place within the conservative and social institution of marriage. During Elizabeth’s struggle, it is to be noted that she also beings to emerge as a feminist character. Through Elizabeth Bennett’s outburst at Lady Catherine de Bourgh , her lack of horizontal hostility and being described as sporty be Georgiana, one can see that towards the end of the novel Elizabeth Bennett truly emerges as the feminist character she only subtly began as.

When Elizabeth meets with Lady Catherine de Bourgh when the Lady visits Elizabeth’s home, Lady de Bourgh confronts Elizabeth about her relationship with Mr. Darcy during which Elizabeth says to Lady de Bourgh

 “he is a gentleman; I am a gentleman’s daughter; so far we are equal.” (Chapter 56, Page 306)

 This is the first time in the novel that Elizabeth can truly be portrayed as a feminist character. Feminism is a doctrine that equates women and men equal, and this moment when Elizabeth declares herself equal to Mr. Darcy is when Elizabeth emerges as the feminist subtly hinted in the previous chapters.

Feminism during that time is much different from how it has evolved to present time and a perfect example of a feminist during the era would be Charlotte Lucas. Charlotte can be seen as a feminist instead of Elizabeth during the first chapters of Pride and Prejudice because of her ability to make firm decisions for herself not based on wanting solely to live for her husband’s every want and need. Charlotte states 

“I ask only a comfortable home; and considering Mr. Collins character, connections and situation in life, I am convinced that my chance of happiness with him is as fair as most people can boast on entering a marriage state.” (Chapter 22, Page 109) 

Elizabeth, during these first many chapters, was much like a carefree and witty young lady, however by making such a strong statement against Lady de Bourgh, she has truly rose above that rank to a feminist woman. Equating herself with a man and that too of a much higher status than herself shows that she has not only grown as a feminist but also in the way that she has become comfortable with herself as who she is that she will not take criticism from anyone.