Background
Feminism is an academic and
political movement that attempts to establish women as equal to men in the
world. Though mainstream political and literary history of feminism began in
the nineteenth and twentieth century; struggles against patriarchy in literature
can be seen earlier too. Mary Wollstonecraft's resistance against patriarchal
ideology in 1792 with her 'A Vindication
of the Rights of Woman' is an example (Tyson 93).
Feminism's history is generally
divided into three phases – as the first, second and third waves. Each of the
waves involves some academic pioneers whose ideas led other activists. Below
are introductions to few of those theorists who led development of the first
and second wave feminisms.
1.
Virginia
Woolf
In addition to Virginia Woolf
(1882-1941)'s recognition as an essayist and fiction writer, her 'A Room of One's Own' (1929) has given
her an identity of – in Mary Eagleton's phrase - "the founding mother of
the contemporary debate" (qtd. in Selden, Widdowson and Brooker 128). She
was concerned with women's material disadvantages compared to men, women's
literary productions and the relations between male powers and the professions.
She demanded mothers' allowances, divorce law reforms, a women's college and a
women's newspapers among many others. Selden, Widdowson and Brooker write that
she also argued that women's writing should explore female experience in its
own right and not form a comparative assessment of women's experience in
relation to men's (128).
Woolf thinks women can't write
because they are imprisoned and constrained by dominant ideologies of womanhood
and the taboo of female body/sex. But optimistically she believes if women
achieve social and economic equality with men, nothing will prevent them from
developing their artistic talents.
2.
Simone
de Beauvoir
Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986)'s 'The Second Sex' (1949), in its title
and contents is
manifesto of whole history of feminism. It marks the
transition from the first to the second wave feminism, since it is preoccupied
with the materialism of the first wave and also recognizes vast difference
between the two sexes and assaults men's discrimination against women, which
belongs to the second wave. The most
famous claims of her book are "woman is not born but made" and
"he is the One, she is the Other." In 'Woman as Other', a chapter from 'The Second Sex', Beauvoir writes, " … humanity is male and
man defines woman not in herself but as relative to him; she is not regarded as
an autonomous being…He is the Subject, he is the Absolute- she is the
Other" (209-10).
Beauvoir
says when a woman tries to define herself, she begins by saying 'I am a woman';
but no man would introduce himself by saying 'I am a man.' She also recognizes
that women have no separate history, no natural solidarity; nor have they
combined as other oppressed groups have. "…she herself fails to bring
about this change. Proletarians say "We"; Negroes also. Regarding
themselves as subjects, they transform the bourgeois, the whites, into
"others." But women do not say "We," except at some
congress of feminists or similar formal demonstration; men say
"women" and women use the same word in referring to themselves"
(Beauvoir 213). She further asks the women to break out of their
objectification in order to deconstruct patriarchy.
3.
Kate
Millett
Kate
Millett (b. 1934) is a radical feminist from the United States. Her 'Sexual Politics' (1969) is perhaps the
best known and most influential book of its period and still remains as a
monument of a highly visible, self aware and activist movement of the second
wave (Selden, Widdowson and Brooker 133).
Millett
recognizes ideological indoctrination as much as economic inequality as the
cause of women's oppression. Selden, Widdowson and Brooker opine that she finds
patriarchy so pervasive that it treats the female as an inferior male and this
power is exerted, directly or indirectly, in civil and domestic life to
constrain women (133). She then names 'sexual politics' to acting-out of
culturally constructed gender roles in unequal and repressive relations of
domination and subordination.
Millett
has analysed literatures written by men and women, particularly focusing on
images of women there. Finally she found that literature has historically been
masculine. Literary values and conventions have been shaped by men and women
have found those literary values inappropriate to express their concerns. She
further claims that from history to today's mass culture, authors have thought
that their readers are only male. However, her literary analyses have been
criticised widely that she is so selective and partial to choose literary works
and her selection can not represent the world sufficiently. Cora Kaplan, for
example, has suggested that Millett sees "ideology as the universal penile
club which men of all classes use to beat women with" (qtd. in Selden,
Widdowson and Brooker 134).
4.
Elaine
Showalter
Elaine Showalter (b. 1941)'s
concept of "gynocriticism" is also one of the influential
developments for the second wave feminism. She is a key figure of American
feminism. Her book 'A Literature for
Their Own' (1977) (the title resembles Woolf's primary feminist work 'A Room of One's Own') analyses women's
presence in hitherto literature and suggest ways for improvement with what she
calls "gynotext", "gynocritics" and a "feminist
critique." She believes women's
writing is essentially different from men's, but this whole tradition of
women's writing has been neglected by male critics. Thus, she suggests women to
develop a different method to write and read literature.
Showalter divides development of
women's writing into three phases (Selden, Widdowson and Brooker 137). The
first one is "feminine" (1840-80), when women writers imitated and
internalized dominant male aesthetic standards. The second phase is
"feminist" (1880-1920), when female writers protested against male
values and advocated for their rights. The third is "female" (1920
onwards), which has added into previous developments ideas of specific female
writing, female experiences and self discovery.
She agrees with other feminists' view that women's writing has a
multiple receptivity which rejects definite views and opinions, which are
"masculine things" for her.
5.
Julia
Kristeva
Julia Kristeva (b. 1941) is one of
the key figures of French feminism, who defined "semiotic" language
for women's writing. Her ideas are influenced by Jacques Lacan's psychoanalytic
theories of a child's development and personality formation. As a key idea of French feminism, her works
also focus on aspect of language as a means of struggle against patriarchy.
Her concept of "semiotic"
language is associated with Lacan's definition of 'Imaginary Order', when the
child feels united with the mother's body, before it enters into the 'Symbolic
Order.' Thus, it is in apparent contrast to "symbolic" aspect of
language, which is governed by the father / the patriarchy. Since one can feel
association with mother in "semiotic" language, it is domain for
women, and feminists. "The utterance which most approximates to a semiotic
discourse is the pre-Oedipal babble of the child" (Selden, Widdowson and
Brooker 143). In this stage, one feels
oneness and plentitude as experienced by mother-child dyad, which Kristeva
names "semiotic chora."
The shift from semiotic to symbolic
involves repression of flowing and rhythmic drives of a language, but some flux
of it still remains even in symbolic language. And, Kristeva says a poet is attuned
to tapping its resonances. Kristeva believes that use of semiotic in literature
leads one to "jouissance" which means delight. And, this is a
"poetic revolution", closely linked to political revolution in general
and feminist liberation in particular.
Kristeva further associates her
concept with "abjection" which means the horror of being unable to
distinguish between 'me' and 'not-me'. A being wants to expel the
"abject" in order to achieve an independent identity, but never can. Abject also stands as a marker bordering the
self and the other including the self and the mother.
6.
Helene
Cixous
Though Helene Cixous (b. 1937) is
also a key French feminist and contemporary of Kristeva, she differs from her
in many respects. Her major concept is development of a new language for
women's writing, which is named "ecriture feminine." She develops it
as a means of positive representation of women and femininity. Explaining the
women's writing, in her essay 'The Laugh
of the Medusa' (1976), she writes, "Write yourself. Your body must be
heard. Only then will the immense resources of the unconscious spring
forth" (qtd. in Selden, Widdowson and Brooker 145). 'Put your bodies onto
pages' is at the heart of 'ecriture feminine.' Cixous opines, women must
uncensor herself, recover "her goods, her organs, her immense bodily
territories which have been kept under seal" (qtd. in Selden, Widdowson
and Brooker 145).
Cixous criticizes the concept of
"neutral sexuality" for balance between men and women as proposed by
Virginia Woolf, but she advocates for "the other bisexuality" which
celebrates sexual differences. "A woman's body with its thousand and one
thresholds of ardor… will make the old single-grooved mother tongue reverberate
with more than one language" (qtd. in Selden, Widdowson and Brooker 146).
In this respect, her main idea is that since women have multiple centers of
sexual pleasure, their literatures too are polysemic, and thus require a new
language to express it.
Cixous rejects theorizing her
concept arguing that women's writing will always surpass the discourse (of
theory) that regulates the phallocentric system. With 'ecriture feminine', she
wants to subvert masculine symbolic language and create new identities for
women, which stand beyond theories. However, her own work has theoretical
contradictions in many respects. In addition, though her approach is creative
and visionary, it has risk of leading women to a political and intellectual
silence, and placing them in 'uterine babble.'
Conclusion
Each of the
above explained theorists have different approaches to fight against
patriarchy. Nevertheless, they all have the same mission – to give women equal
status of men. These theories, though some are quite impractical, have inspired
women to move forward not only in their respective times, but even today.
Works
Cited
Beauvoir, Simone
de. "Woman as Other." Essays on
Western Intellectual Tradition. Ed. Shreedhar Lohani, Krishna Chandra
Sharma, Arun Gupto and Anand Sharma. Kathmandu: MK Publishers and Distributors.
2008. 208-16.
Selden, Raman,
Peter Widdowson, and Peter Brooker. A
Reader’s Guide to Contemporary Literary Theory. 5th ed. New
Delhi: Pearson, 2005.
Tyson, Lois. Critical Theory Today. 2nd
ed. New York: Routledge, 2006.
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