Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch002
This chapter discusses feminist perspectives on sex and gender. The chapter starts by discussing feminist arguments against biological determinism and the claim that gender is socially constructed. Next, the chapter examines feminist critiques of prevalent understandings of gender and sex, and the distinction thereof. In response to these concerns, the final section of the chapter discusses how a unified women's category could be articulated for feminist political purposes illustrating at least two things: first, that gender is still very much a live issue and second, that feminists have not entirely given up the view that gender is about social factors and that it is in some sense distinct from biological sex. The jury is still out on what the best, the most useful, or the correct definition of gender is.
{"title":"Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch002","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses feminist perspectives on sex and gender. The chapter starts by discussing feminist arguments against biological determinism and the claim that gender is socially constructed. Next, the chapter examines feminist critiques of prevalent understandings of gender and sex, and the distinction thereof. In response to these concerns, the final section of the chapter discusses how a unified women's category could be articulated for feminist political purposes illustrating at least two things: first, that gender is still very much a live issue and second, that feminists have not entirely given up the view that gender is about social factors and that it is in some sense distinct from biological sex. The jury is still out on what the best, the most useful, or the correct definition of gender is.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"83 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131575521","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch012
This chapter discusses marriage and reproductive choice issues. The chapter argues that feminists have seen marriage and reproduction as playing a crucial role in women's oppression and thus a central topic of justice. The chapter starts by defining and setting out the historical development of the philosophy of marriage, which shapes today's debates. The chapter argues that many of the ethical positions on marriage can be understood as divided on the question of whether marriage should be defined contractually by the spouses or by its institutional purpose. The debate further divides on whether that purpose necessarily includes procreation or may be limited to the marital love relationship. The chapter closes by discussing reproduction choice, specifically abortion and commercial surrogacy.
{"title":"Marriage and Reproductive Choice","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch012","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses marriage and reproductive choice issues. The chapter argues that feminists have seen marriage and reproduction as playing a crucial role in women's oppression and thus a central topic of justice. The chapter starts by defining and setting out the historical development of the philosophy of marriage, which shapes today's debates. The chapter argues that many of the ethical positions on marriage can be understood as divided on the question of whether marriage should be defined contractually by the spouses or by its institutional purpose. The debate further divides on whether that purpose necessarily includes procreation or may be limited to the marital love relationship. The chapter closes by discussing reproduction choice, specifically abortion and commercial surrogacy.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131576067","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch007
This chapter discusses liberal feminism, divided into liberal feminism and libertarian feminism. The liberal variant of liberal feminism sees freedom as personal autonomy and political autonomy. The exercise of personal autonomy depends on some enabling conditions that are insufficiently present in women's lives and other elements of women's flourishing. Autonomy deficits like these are due to the patriarchal nature of inherited traditions and institutions, and that the women's movement should work to identify and remedy them. Liberal feminists believe that the state should be the women's movement's ally in promoting women's autonomy. The libertarian variant of feminism sees freedom as freedom from coercive interference. It believes that both women and men have a right to such freedom due to their status as self-owners. Coercive state power is justified only to the extent necessary to protect the right to freedom from coercive interference. Feminism's political role is to bring an end not only to laws that limit women's liberty but also to laws that grant special privileges to women.
{"title":"Gender Inequality Theories of Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch007","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses liberal feminism, divided into liberal feminism and libertarian feminism. The liberal variant of liberal feminism sees freedom as personal autonomy and political autonomy. The exercise of personal autonomy depends on some enabling conditions that are insufficiently present in women's lives and other elements of women's flourishing. Autonomy deficits like these are due to the patriarchal nature of inherited traditions and institutions, and that the women's movement should work to identify and remedy them. Liberal feminists believe that the state should be the women's movement's ally in promoting women's autonomy. The libertarian variant of feminism sees freedom as freedom from coercive interference. It believes that both women and men have a right to such freedom due to their status as self-owners. Coercive state power is justified only to the extent necessary to protect the right to freedom from coercive interference. Feminism's political role is to bring an end not only to laws that limit women's liberty but also to laws that grant special privileges to women.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"58 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133640875","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch003
This chapter argues that feminist epistemology identifies ways in which dominant conceptions and practices of knowledge attribution, acquisition, and justification systematically disadvantage women and other subordinated groups, and strives to reform these conceptions and practices so that they serve the interests of these groups. The central concept of feminist epistemology is that of a situated knower, and hence of situated knowledge: knowledge that reflects the particular perspectives of the subject. Feminist philosophers are interested in how gender situates knowing subjects. Different conceptions of how gender situates knowers informs feminist approaches to the central problems of the field: grounding feminist criticisms of science and feminist science, defining the proper roles of social and political values in inquiry, evaluating ideals of objectivity and rationality, and reforming structures of epistemic authority. The chapter thus explores these epistemological, metaphysical, scientific, and hermeneutics issues in feminist studies.
{"title":"Epistemological Issues in Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch003","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter argues that feminist epistemology identifies ways in which dominant conceptions and practices of knowledge attribution, acquisition, and justification systematically disadvantage women and other subordinated groups, and strives to reform these conceptions and practices so that they serve the interests of these groups. The central concept of feminist epistemology is that of a situated knower, and hence of situated knowledge: knowledge that reflects the particular perspectives of the subject. Feminist philosophers are interested in how gender situates knowing subjects. Different conceptions of how gender situates knowers informs feminist approaches to the central problems of the field: grounding feminist criticisms of science and feminist science, defining the proper roles of social and political values in inquiry, evaluating ideals of objectivity and rationality, and reforming structures of epistemic authority. The chapter thus explores these epistemological, metaphysical, scientific, and hermeneutics issues in feminist studies.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126620515","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch009
This chapter discusses feminist standpoint theories. Feminist standpoint theorists claim that knowledge is socially situated; marginalised groups are socially situated in ways that make it more possible for them to be aware of things and ask questions than it is for the non-marginalised; and research, particularly that focused on power relations, should begin with the lives of the marginalised. Feminist standpoint theories emphasise the ways in which socially and politically marginalised groups are in a position of epistemic privilege vis-à-vis social structures. Drawing on Hegel and Marx, they argue that those on the “outside” of dominant social and political groups must learn not only how to get along in their own world, but also how to get along in the dominant society. Hence, they have an “outsider” status with respect to dominant groups that allows them to see things about social structures and how they function that members of the dominant group cannot see. There is, however, disagreement about standpoint theory parentage, its status as a theory, and its relevance to current thinking about knowledge.
{"title":"Standpoint Theories of Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch009","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses feminist standpoint theories. Feminist standpoint theorists claim that knowledge is socially situated; marginalised groups are socially situated in ways that make it more possible for them to be aware of things and ask questions than it is for the non-marginalised; and research, particularly that focused on power relations, should begin with the lives of the marginalised. Feminist standpoint theories emphasise the ways in which socially and politically marginalised groups are in a position of epistemic privilege vis-à-vis social structures. Drawing on Hegel and Marx, they argue that those on the “outside” of dominant social and political groups must learn not only how to get along in their own world, but also how to get along in the dominant society. Hence, they have an “outsider” status with respect to dominant groups that allows them to see things about social structures and how they function that members of the dominant group cannot see. There is, however, disagreement about standpoint theory parentage, its status as a theory, and its relevance to current thinking about knowledge.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"16 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128721809","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch004
This chapter discusses the various ways in which language portrays a negative image of women. Some of the ways in which language has been found wanting in as far as women are concerned are outlined as follows: Language creates false gender neutrality as this purported neutrality ends up showing a bias towards maleness anyway. Language generally makes women invisible and always overshadowed by men. It makes maleness the standard measure of humanity, and maturity is all about and thus maleness is seen as the norm. Sex-marking also encourages male visibility and powerlessness of women in a male-dominated world. The world is seen through an oppressive male worldview. Reform efforts have been piecemeal and as such have largely failed to reach the desired destination. The chapter closes by discussing the concepts ‘woman' and ‘generics' which have been found to be controversial in the life of women.
{"title":"Language and Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch004","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses the various ways in which language portrays a negative image of women. Some of the ways in which language has been found wanting in as far as women are concerned are outlined as follows: Language creates false gender neutrality as this purported neutrality ends up showing a bias towards maleness anyway. Language generally makes women invisible and always overshadowed by men. It makes maleness the standard measure of humanity, and maturity is all about and thus maleness is seen as the norm. Sex-marking also encourages male visibility and powerlessness of women in a male-dominated world. The world is seen through an oppressive male worldview. Reform efforts have been piecemeal and as such have largely failed to reach the desired destination. The chapter closes by discussing the concepts ‘woman' and ‘generics' which have been found to be controversial in the life of women.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121710127","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch006
This chapter discusses typologies of modern feminist theories. Lorber's categorisation of feminist theories distinguishes between three broad kinds of feminist discourses: gender reform feminisms, gender resistant feminisms, and gender revolution feminisms. Lengermann and Niebrugge-Brantley categorise the various types of feminist theories as theories of gender difference, theories of gender inequality, theories of gender oppression, and theories of structural oppression. All theories of gender difference are based on the thesis that the differences between men and women are immutable. These theories include cultural feminist theories, institutional role feminist theories, and existential feminist theories. Cultural feminism is a variety of feminism emphasising essential differences between men and women, based on biological differences in reproductive capacity. Institutional role feminist theories argue that gender differences result from the different roles that women and men come to play within various institutional settings. Existential feminist theories focus on the marginalisation of women as other in a male-created culture.
{"title":"Modern Theories of Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch006","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses typologies of modern feminist theories. Lorber's categorisation of feminist theories distinguishes between three broad kinds of feminist discourses: gender reform feminisms, gender resistant feminisms, and gender revolution feminisms. Lengermann and Niebrugge-Brantley categorise the various types of feminist theories as theories of gender difference, theories of gender inequality, theories of gender oppression, and theories of structural oppression. All theories of gender difference are based on the thesis that the differences between men and women are immutable. These theories include cultural feminist theories, institutional role feminist theories, and existential feminist theories. Cultural feminism is a variety of feminism emphasising essential differences between men and women, based on biological differences in reproductive capacity. Institutional role feminist theories argue that gender differences result from the different roles that women and men come to play within various institutional settings. Existential feminist theories focus on the marginalisation of women as other in a male-created culture.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"104 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122549512","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch015
This chapter presents global attempts at improving women's position, namely the welfare state, affirmative action, women in development, women and development, gender and development, gender mainstreaming, national women machineries, and the Beijing declaration. Despite all these global initiatives at solving gender imbalances, the desired results have not yet been attained. Despite good intentions and some real progress, the development community is still falling short in delivering on its promises.
{"title":"Feminist Policies and Practices","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch015","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter presents global attempts at improving women's position, namely the welfare state, affirmative action, women in development, women and development, gender and development, gender mainstreaming, national women machineries, and the Beijing declaration. Despite all these global initiatives at solving gender imbalances, the desired results have not yet been attained. Despite good intentions and some real progress, the development community is still falling short in delivering on its promises.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"468 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121463688","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This chapter discusses feminist theories of embodiment. The theories provide a general account of the relations between bodies and selves. The philosophy of embodiment extends outside the social and political sphere to engage with debates in philosophy of mind/body, where attention to embodiment has extended beyond a simple reductionist picture of the relation between mind and brain, to consider an embodied self, embedded within an environment. The formation of embodied subjectivity as constitutive of the self, to which feminists have paid such careful attention, and the persisting interrogation of the appropriate way of understanding biological and social embodiment, has links with these debates. Feminist theorists discussed in this chapter argue that naturalising frameworks need supplementing with phenomenological, poststructuralist, and psychoanalytic ones for a complete understanding of the embodiment of the female human body.
{"title":"Feminist Perspectives on the Body","authors":"Barbara Brook","doi":"10.4324/9781315839554","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315839554","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses feminist theories of embodiment. The theories provide a general account of the relations between bodies and selves. The philosophy of embodiment extends outside the social and political sphere to engage with debates in philosophy of mind/body, where attention to embodiment has extended beyond a simple reductionist picture of the relation between mind and brain, to consider an embodied self, embedded within an environment. The formation of embodied subjectivity as constitutive of the self, to which feminists have paid such careful attention, and the persisting interrogation of the appropriate way of understanding biological and social embodiment, has links with these debates. Feminist theorists discussed in this chapter argue that naturalising frameworks need supplementing with phenomenological, poststructuralist, and psychoanalytic ones for a complete understanding of the embodiment of the female human body.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129163316","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch008
This chapter discusses gender oppression theories including feminist psychoanalytic theory and radical feminism. The former explains the oppression of women in terms of psychoanalytic descriptions of the male psychic drive to dominate and the latter in terms of men's ability and willingness to use violence to subjugate women. The chapter also discusses structural oppression theories including Marxist feminism, socialist feminism, and intersectionality feminism. Socialist feminism describes oppression as arising from a patriarchal and a capitalist attempt to control social production and reproduction. Intersectionality theories trace the consequences of class, race, gender, affectional preference, and global location for lived experience, group standpoints, and relations among women. The chapter closes by briefly looking at the relationship between feminism and postmodernism.
{"title":"Gender Oppression and Structural Oppression Theories of Feminism","authors":"","doi":"10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-4090-9.ch008","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter discusses gender oppression theories including feminist psychoanalytic theory and radical feminism. The former explains the oppression of women in terms of psychoanalytic descriptions of the male psychic drive to dominate and the latter in terms of men's ability and willingness to use violence to subjugate women. The chapter also discusses structural oppression theories including Marxist feminism, socialist feminism, and intersectionality feminism. Socialist feminism describes oppression as arising from a patriarchal and a capitalist attempt to control social production and reproduction. Intersectionality theories trace the consequences of class, race, gender, affectional preference, and global location for lived experience, group standpoints, and relations among women. The chapter closes by briefly looking at the relationship between feminism and postmodernism.","PeriodicalId":359014,"journal":{"name":"Philosophising Experiences and Vision of the Female Body, Mind, and Soul","volume":"530 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124731751","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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