Gender Midterm Notes

Midterm Study Guide Philosophy of Gender Louis Andrade

2

Table of Contents 9/15 – Sex & Gender........................................................................................3 E – X: A Fabulous Child’s Story (Gould)........................................................3 SS – Intro......................................................................................................3 SS – 1: Maleness and Femaleness................................................................3 SS – 2: Sexing the Brain................................................................................ 4 E – The Five Sexes (Fausto-Sterling).............................................................5 E – Gender Socialization (Renzetti and Curran)............................................6 FT – 13: Gender and Race (Haslanger).........................................................6 9/22 – First- and second-wave feminism..........................................................8 FT – 1: Of the Pernicious Effects… (Wollstonecraft)......................................8 FT – 2: The Subjection of Women (Mill)........................................................8 FT – 3: Introduction from The Second Sex (De Beauvoir).............................9 FT – 27: Conclusion from The Second Sex (De Beauvoir)...........................11 9/29 – Sexism & Oppression...........................................................................12 E – A Person Paper…(Hofstadter)...............................................................12 E – ‘Pricks’ and ‘Chicks’… (Baker)..............................................................12 FT - 8: Five Faces of Oppression (Young)....................................................14 FT – 9: On Psychological Oppression (Bartky).............................................16 10/6 – Third-wave feminism...........................................................................17 FT – 28: Difference and Dominance… (MacKinnon)....................................17 FT – 5: Black Women (hooks).....................................................................18 FT – 30: Feminism, Utopianism… (Cornell).................................................20 Terms............................................................................................................. .20 1. Gender Essay.............................................................................................23 2. Feminism Essay.................................................................................... ......24

3

9/15 – Sex & Gender E – X: A Fabulous Child’s Story (Gould) Project Baby X • Raise a child without making it follow social gender norms • Eexlpose it to what boys and girls do • The parents must set an example by performing non-traditional gender roles • Other parents become outraged when their kids mimic the “x” child, demand that “xperts” to find out what “x” is • Xperts say by the time it matters what x is , you won’t have to ask • Everyone’s happy for x, and raising an x is said to be a good idea SS – Intro • Mental experiment – imagine you’re in love with someone of the same sex – now the opposite – its hard to imagine what seems unfamiliar or unnatural, for both gays and straights • We must have a “radical new understanding of sexuality, one that goes beyond simple either-orts like male-female and gaystraight.” p. 3 • Gender – refers to a person’s social role; sex is biological • Transsexual – someone who’s sexual identity is at variance to their body SS – 1: Maleness and Femaleness • Left-handers used to be considered evil, it was discriminated against and tried to be cured • Homosexuality today seems to be an illness needed to be cured • The author’s son came out to her, seemed happy – she was scared for him • She thought she fucked him up or that this was a phase; she was sad that she would have no grandchildren from him, she considered him foolish • “As scientists discover more and more about human developments behavior, its becoming obvious that hhuman sexuality is much closer to a complex mosaic than it is to simple either/ors.” p. 10 Feminine Men and Masculine Women • Some couples compliment each other well although they do not fit traditional gender norms Determinism – Biological & Social • Biological – behavior flows directly from our biology

4 •

Social constructionists – people’s behavior is constructed from their family environment, friends, and culture • Reject both – genes code for proteins, not behavior and without genes, nothing is possible; behavior occurs through interactions of biological and social Male & Female Hormones • Both sexes have each other’s hormones, with different ratios • Sex is determined in the womb, but it doesn’t always match up • One theory – early hormones  erotic orientation Male & Female Brains • Animal experiments – certain hormones make them gay Four Unusual Human Syndromes • Congenital adrenal hyperplasia – women born with an enzyme deficiency  adrenal glands to produce excessive amounts of male hormones before birth and shortly afterwards. Their later behavior is more masculine • Androgen insensitivity syndrome – male fetus have malfunctioning receptors for androgen (male hormone) so they don’t get enough and usually are hyperfeminine, identify as females • Girls whose mothers received diethylstilbestrol (synthetic estrogen)  made them more masculine; as they got older, they suffered physical defects like cancer and organ failure • 5-alpha Reductase Deficiency – profound enzyme deficiency that interferes with fetal testosterone; boys born with female like genitals, raised as girls – caused by inbreeding; at puberty, testosterone is released and women become masculinized Maleness and Femaleness are separate qualities • Maleness and femaleness not ends of the same spectrum, but instead are completely independent • The brain has 2 separate neural pathways for masculine and feminine behavior • People’s masculine and feminine psychological characteristics are independent Sex is not just for Reproduction • Erotic desire vs. procreative desire  move to the former kills the homo/hetero distinction • Many animals have different kinds of sex not for reproduction 5 facets of sexuality 1. Genetic Sex – chromosomes (xx=female, xy=male) 2. Physical sex – genitals and interior sex organs 3. Sexual identity – internal sense of male or female 4. Sexual orientation – erotic attraction 5. Gender – social behavior • Sometimes facets don’t match, even 1 &2

5 SS – 2: Sexing the Brain • Sexual reproduction provides greater chance of survival than asexual, we get a more diverse gene pool Adam & Eve Revisited • We all come from an ancesteral “Eve” from Africa 143,000 years ago, “Adam” came second, 59, 000 years ago Brains are not Sexually Neutral • they become masculine and feminine in womb men and women’s brains are structure different and work different Structural and Functional Differences Between Male and Female Brains • Male’s brain bigger than female • Women’s brain cells are packed more densely • Men have more white matter and cerebrospinal fluid, women have more grey matter • Men have larger left brains Right Brain/ Left Brain – Sex Differences Sex Differences in Cognitive Abilities • Hormones directly cause behavior and unique brain functioning Sex Differences in Communication and Relationships • Women want intimacy, empathy; men want independence, and sex Sex Differences in Behavior • “both boys and girls are capable of most of the same activities, but the likelihood of doing certain things differs between them” p. 52 The Role of Testosterone • “One of the biggest contributors to male aggression (though not the only one) is testosterone” p. 54 • testosterone is a cause and effect of behavior Peculiar Physical differences Between the Sexes Sex Differences in mate selection • Women are gold diggers, men want’ young women, men want pretty girls, men are more likely to cheat, but value faithfulness more E – The Five Sexes (Fausto-Sterling) ○ Fausto-Sterling is committed to breaking down the idea that sex is dichotomous  according to her, there are at least 5 sexes.  3 Intersexes • Herms: True Hermaphrodite: posses one testis and one ovary • Ferm: Female Pseudohermaphrodite: ovaries but no testis but has some male genitalia; the primary sex organs are female • Merm: Male Pseudohermaphrodite: testes and no ovaries but some female genitalia; the primary sex organs are male

6  Could be more than 5 sexes, because the intersexes are on a continuum – it’s not an all or nothing thing.  Contiuum from masculine to feminine • The continuum ○ Male ○ Male Pseudohermaphrodite ○ True Hermaphrodite ○ Female Pseudohermaphrodite ○ Female • From F and FP to TH, you’ve got to loose an ovary and gain a testis • Spectrum of secondary sexual characteristics for TH • From TH to MP, you’ve got to loose an ovary and get two testes. • So if you want to answer more than five, you say there’s not just one or one continuum, there are three continua. There’s not male and female and one continuum in the middle, but we’re all on this continuum. • Fausto-Sterling doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with sex – the problems are in gender. ○ How should intersexual babies be treated?  Education will play a big role in allowing intersexuals to be out in the open rather than forcing them to choose one gender role or the other.  It’s the social pressures that we’re worried about, but those are things we can change by getting people to change and talk more openly about these things.  Something is going to have to give: we’re either going to have to change intersexuals’ biology to fit our categories, or we’re going to have to change our conceptions of gender to allow intersexuals to fit into them.

E – Gender Socialization (Renzetti and Curran) • R & C think your behavior comes from your gender socialization – they think they’re imposed by society and that affects how people end up; however, Skene Johnson offers an alternative explanation that it’s biological. • What should we do depending on whether we think R&S or Skene Johnson are right? ○ R & S: be gender neutral – we should socialize people with respect to gender, because it disadvantages them – it shuts down particular capabilities they have. They imply that people are more malleable that Skene Johnson thinks. ○ Johnson: people and sex aren’t as malleable – they have distinct abilities and advantages.

7

FT – 13: Gender and Race (Haslanger) An epistemological framework for defining gender and race I. The Question(s) a. Conceptual – articulate concepts of race/gender (society, general, common usage) b. Descriptive – develop better concepts c. Analytical – explore pragmatics of concepts i. This essay doesn’t try ot capture what we mean, but ow we might usefully revise what we mean for certain purposes II.Critical (feminist, anti-racist) Theory a. Need to idenityf inewuality b. Need a framework that’s sensitive to both similarities and differences c. Need an account to track how race/gender impacts us d. Increase agency i. Race and Gender are valuable categories III.What is Gender a. Slogan” Gender is the social meaning of sex” b. Author: gender is a social class (materialist feminism) c. Commonality problem – men have something in common that  gender d. Normativit problem – definitions marginalize, essentialize e. Materialist feminism – define gender in terms of men subordinate positioning systems of male dominance; theory grounded in material realities of men’s lines i. Gender categories defined in terms of social positions ii.Gender one of many categories o oppression iii.Sexual difference  physical marker distinguishing between men and women iv.–p. 159 logic problem defining men and women f. What does it mean to say that women are oppressed and what does the qualification “as women” add? P. 159 g. Oppression – an enclosing structure of forces and barriers which tends to the immobilization and reduction of a group or category of people  can lead to exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism, and (systematic) violence h. Representation  implication for gender, race, etc i. The definitions above don’t lock us into using reproduction as a key indicator of gender IV.What is Race a. Slogan: “race is the social meaning of the geographically marked body, familiar markers include skin color, hair type eye shape, physique b. Def of race in logic from p. 162

8 c. Doesn’t mean these markers must be key in how race is interpreted, context key; ex: Blacks in America vs. Brazil V.Normativity& Commonality a. Material and ideological forces  oppression b. Certain women aren’t “real”  its all good because its for the greater good, and fuck them by the way VI.Negotiating Terms a. “to ask what I should be called is to ask what norms I should be judged by” b. terms are always open to interpretations c. instable defs and flexibility with terms key to fight oppression VII.Emerging Concerns, Promising Alternatives a. Don’t be utopian, we need to define gender, race b. Not just deconstruction – reconstruction c. Better if we have multiple definitions d. Hierarchal defnitions are key VIII.Conclusion a. Both gender/race are real, social categories, neither is chosen but both are contested, both are hierarchical yet not permanently so, and gender/race intersect

9/22 – First- and second-wave feminism FT – 1: Of the Pernicious Effects… (Wollstonecraft) Equality is a precondition to morality Ex.1 – while women are dependent on their husbands, they will be cunning, mean, & selfish Ex.2 – the devil loves idle hands… who is more idle than rich people? They have everything handed to them Society is not properly organized, men and women ignore their respective duties to each other. Women think compliments about their beauty make them happy, but don’t hold men accountable to turn compliments into material gestures of affection Women are affected worse by the perversions of capitalism than men, because men can forsake economics for politics or war Men get around social constraints and oppression easier than women Women should use their reason, otherwise its gift is a mockery Motherhood makes women “mere dolls” Women are forced to choose between civil duties and duties of the home Capitalism in general is fucked up, the poor keep up the rich by taking care of there duties (as if duties can be delegated away) and the few that are lucky enough are able to barely be at the heels of the rich as they work themselves to death But in order to render their private virtue a public benefit, they must have a civil existence in the state, married or single; else we shall continually see some worthy woman, whose sensibility has been

9 rendered painfully acute by undeserved contempt, droop like "the lily broken down by a plough share." If women were treated equal, they would be better citizens, mothers, wives, and daughtes because they respect themselves for their own worth instead of the worth given to them by men (calling them pretty, “letting them” stay home with the family, supporting them financially.) FT – 2: The Subjection of Women (Mill) Sexism is bad, it hinders human improvement, and the sexes should be equal. It be a different story if sexism had some philosophical grounding, or political or social justification that had been throught out and proven, but in reality, its just men clinging to tradition, and reaping the benefits of inequality. They say its unnatural, but really its uncustomary Some say sexism is voluntary, or women want it. –this is obviously not true, as militant feminists will attest to. Men do not want solely the obedience of women, they want their sentiments. All men, except the most brutish, desire to have, in the woman most nearly connected with them, not a forced slave but a willing one, not a slave merely, but a favourite. The masters of all other slaves rely, for maintaining obedience, on fear; either fear of themselves, or religious fears. The masters of women wanted more than simple obedience, and they turned the whole force of education to effect their purpose. Women are taught from an early age to accept submission to men, to be their counterpart. Today is different, back then men were thought to not be created equal – but today, we think everyone should have an equal chance at life, liberty, and happiness (democracy) THe social subordination of women is unique today, men have no ban on their gender. We need a real discussion about sexism, one that does not rely on just experience and custom, because we haven’t exerpeicend the alternative yet. Standing on the ground of common sense and the constitution of the human mind, I deny that anyone knows, or can know, the nature of the two sexes, as long as they have only been seen in their present relation to one another. If men had ever been found in society without women, or women without men, or if there had been a society of men and women in which the women were not under the control of the men, something might have been positively known about the mental and moral differences which may be inherent in the nature of each. No one wants to put women above men, we just want to take away the protective duties that favor men. Women will do what they are best at, and men will do the same, no need to fear a take over of either sex ----[but isn’t that what already happened? Maybe that’s why we think women are subordinate? Perhaps we need to put women on top, like affirmative action, to give them a real chance]

10 And here, I believe, is the clue to the feelings of those men, who have a real antipathy to the equal freedom of women. I believe they are afraid, not lest women should be unwilling to marry, for I do not think that anyone in reality has that apprehension; but lest they should insist that marriage should be on equal conditions FT – 3: Introduction from The Second Sex (De Beauvoir) We must ask, “what is a woman?” – its hard to define it biologically, or socially, or even economically. But the definitions we do have are given to us by men Thus humanity is male and man defines woman not in herself but as relative to him; she is not regarded as an autonomous being. She is defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her; she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute – she is the Other.’ Femininity is defined vaguely, and in dazzeling terms The fact is that every concrete human being is always a singular, separate individual. To decline to accept such notions as the eternal feminine, the black soul, the Jewish character, is not to deny that Jews, Negroes, women exist today – this denial does not represent a liberation for those concerned, but rather a flight from reality. Regardless, women are “forced” into defining themselves because men have already been defined, they are they positive and neutral sex, women are the deviation, the afterthought Otherness is a fundamental category of human thought. Yet, otherness necessarily requires a denial of one’s own uniqueness, and consequently a realization of the reciprocity of their realizations – this is true in war, trade, festivals, contests, etc. There has to be a dominant and a submissive, the Other has to accept its lower status, when did this happen for women historically? –blacks, Mexicans, jews, all have been thrust into minority status, yet women have always been half the population – its women’s own fault for not realizing their potential, They have gained only what men have been willing to grant; they have taken nothing, they have only received. The reason for this is that women lack concrete means for organising themselves into a unit which can stand face to face with the correlative unit. They have no past, no history, no religion of their own; and they have no such solidarity of work and interest as that of the proletariat. They live dispersed among the males If they belong to the bourgeoisie, they feel solidarity with men of that class, not with proletarian women; if they are white, their allegiance is to white men, not to Negro women. Men have written history and shaped culture, so its hard for women to revolt the bourgeoisie clung to the old morality that found the guarantee of private property in the solidity of the family. Woman was ordered back into the home the more harshly as her emancipation became a real menace. Even within the working class the men endeavoured to

11 restrain woman’s liberation, because they began to see the women as dangerous competitors – the more so because they were accustomed to work for lower wages. Anti-feminists created “separate-but-equal” treatment of women, a la Jim Crow Family life disguises oppression to children – they see the mom happy in her role as caretaker and wife, ignoring the lack of freedom she had in choosing this life, in choosing to take on her role in the home – she’s just happy with what she got Ignore feminists too, because their attempt to prove women’s worth as more than men is just as silly as its opposite we must get out of these ruts; we must discard the vague notions of superiority, inferiority, equality which have hitherto corrupted every discussion of the subject and start afresh. For our part, we hold that the only public good is that which assures the private good of the citizens; we shall pass judgement on institutions according to their effectiveness in giving concrete opportunities to individuals. But we do not confuse the idea of private interest with that of happiness, although that is another common point of view. In particular those who are condemned to stagnation are often pronounced happy on the pretext that happiness consists in being at rest. This notion we reject, for our perspective is that of existentialist ethics. Every subject plays his part as such specifically through exploits or projects that serve as a mode of transcendence; he achieves liberty only through a continual reaching out towards other liberties. One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. FT – 27: Conclusion from The Second Sex (De Beauvoir) Hostility between the male and female human is a historical event, it is not the cause of physiological difference or sexual tension that is purely biological. Men try to say sex is woman’s greatest weapon, but such a statement ignores women’s unique experience of the world, their femininity and their oppression Psychoanalysis has been a big oppressor of women. All oppression creates a state of war. And this is no exception. Women are not trying to imprison men, but instead are trying to free themselves. The emancipated woman, on the contrary, wants to be active, a taker, and refuses the passivity man means to impose on her. The ‘modern’ woman accepts masculine values: she prides herself on thinking, taking action, working, creating, on the same terms as men; instead of seeking to disparage them, she declares herself their equal. Man feels like he’s fucked either way – he treats here like a beauty queen and she uses sex to brainwash him, he treats her equal then she won’t give him any pussy, which would doom the whole species, so whatever pussy he gets is shitty

12 The quarrel will go on as long as men and women fail to recognise each other as equals; that is to say, as long as femininity is perpetuated as such. Men understand it sucks to be a women, but think how lucky they are to have men supporting them Time spent together is viewed differently, women want to kill time, men want to use time. You can’t blame men for this though, they’re just being men, they can’t help it if women are being women De Beauvoir envisions a world where men and women are equal, but that might not be enough Woman is determined not by her hormones or by mysterious instincts, but by the manner in which her body and her relation to the world are modified through the action of others than herself. Sexuality can be a medium through which equality could be reached – notions of dominance and submission are played with between the sexes, fraternity could soon follow. Women can be equal – men have already begun to bend, women just have to keep bending. Some say the alt is a world of one sex that is weird and boring, but just because men won’t be fucking loose hoes and gold diggers doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy sex with an empowered woman, Let us not forget that our lack of imagination always depopulates the future; for us it is only an abstraction; each one of us secretly deplores the absence there of the one who was himself. But the humanity of tomorrow will be living in its flesh and in its conscious liberty; that time will be its present and it will in turn prefer it. Equal sexes might lead to better sex, don’t knock it till you try it. To begin with, there will always be certain differences between man and woman; her eroticism, and therefore her sexual world, have a special form of their own and therefore cannot fail to engender a sensuality, a sensitivity, of a special nature. This means that her relations to her own body, to that of the male, to the child, will never be identical with those the male bears to his own body, to that of the female, and to the child; those who make much of ‘equality in difference’ could not with good grace refuse to grant me the possible existence of differences in equality To emancipate woman is to refuse to confine her to the relations she bears to man, not to deny them to her; let her have her independent existence and she will continue none the less to exist for him also: mutually recognising each other as subject, each will yet remain for the other an other. On the contrary, when we abolish the slavery of half of humanity, together with the whole system of hypocrisy that it implies, then the ‘division’ of humanity will reveal its genuine significance and the human couple will find its true form. ‘

13

9/29 – Sexism & Oppression E – A Person Paper…(Hofstadter) • A Person Paper (i.e. a white paper) is a satire meant to draw an analogy between racism and sexism. Hofstadter’s point is that if language was embedded with racism (like ‘whe’ and ‘ble’ etc) we would see why that is wrong; thus, the sexism in language is much the same, but we’ve become so used to it that we simply accept it unquestioningly. • Specific examples: ○ He/She etc  no reason sex / gender is a more important distinction than age, race, height, eye color, etc… ○ “One small step for man,” “All men are created equal,” etc all exclude women by forcing them to see themselves as a subgroup whereas men see themselves in these statements on the surface ○ Miss / Mrs. / Ms.  women shouldn’t be categorized according to marital status – men are just Mr.  equates Mr. with Master ○ Suffix –ress and the like(waitress, actress, etc…) demean women ○ Calling women ‘girl’ is offensive / demeaning ○ Men have monopolized religion  God must be male and white • Based on columns of William Safire E – ‘Pricks’ and ‘Chicks’… (Baker) • To understand a concept we have to understand the words we use to talk about it • Baker also draws a comparison between racism and sexism • Baker uses the word “black” in reference to prove his earlier linguistic point  it is used because it is the antonym of white not because it accurately describes the skin color of most African-Americans  The word black captured both what racist saw in their inferiority but also the Black Power sentiment that there could be no integration – a feeling of irreconcilable separateness (internal colony) • Proper names and personal pronouns reflect sex rather than other attributes such as class, age, etc  Overs and Unders rather than he/she • Man is essentially human, while woman is only accidentally so: ○ Man can be substituted for humanity, mankind, etc while woman cannot • Terms for women ○ Categories (* = acceptable to M & F; + = restricted to black students; neither * or + = accepted by males but not normally used by females)

14

•

•

 Neutral Terms: *lady, *gal, *girl, *+sister, *broad (refers to pregnant cow though that’s not present in the current meaning)  Animal: *chick, bird, fox, vixen, filly, bitch  Playing: babe, doll, cuddly  Gender: skirt, hem  Sexual: snatch, cunt, ass, twat, piece, lay, pussy, +hammer ○ Neutral and animal classifications are most commonly used, while sexual was the least frequently used. ○ Women do not typically refer to themselves in sexual, gender, plaything, or animal terms  only males use nonneutral terms to identify women  Evidence that men have a prejudiced conception of women – they have certain properties of animals, toys, and playthings. ○ Animal and plaything classifications are prima facie denigrating: reflect a male conception of women as domesticated servants, pets, or both  Fox is a bit different – it can be positive but it is also something to be hunted and killed  “Doll” equated with male paternalism (like “boy” is to white paternalism) ○ There isn’t anything wrong with gender classifications per so Man ought not to think of women as sex objects: feminist mantra ○ Strange because a sex object is an object one has sex with in the same way a known object is one we’ve identified  this is part of a woman’s role ○ Different interpretations  Men ought not to conceive of women exclusively as sexual partners: too easy / simple / everyone would agree  Men should not treat women as animate machines designed to masturbate men or as conquests: being treated as an objected is to be treated as less than human  fails because it is correct is some sense – women are sex objects sometimes Our Conception of Sexual Intercourse ○ Terms / verbs we use for sex put the male in the active role of doing something to the female (Jack fucked Jill) putting him in the position of power. ○ Grammatical asymmetry doesn’t reflect natural asymmetry because we could use words like “engulfed” ○ Passive construction of sex verbs can also be used to indicate that a person is being harmed (Jill was fucked; Jack had Jill; Jill was had; etc…) ○ Middle finger = male cock…right… ○ “Fuck you,” “Screw you,” etc imply harm

15

• •

•

○ “Prick” = penis = harm ○ Woman who has sex with a lot of men is a whore (negative: decreases social status), while a man who has sex with a lot of women is a pimp (positive: increases social status) Men ought not to think of women as sex objects is a call for a new conception of the male and female roles We are preoccupied with sex thus it permeates our language, because we believe sex tells you a lot about someone which is antithetical to sexual egalitarianism since women are viewed negatively. Conclusion: feminists should advocate the utilization of netural proper names and the elimination of gender from our language; and they should vigorously protest any utilization of the thirdperson pronouns “he” and “she” as examples of sexual discrimination – “The limits of our language are the limits of our world.”

FT - 8: Five Faces of Oppression (Young) • There is no one definition of oppression – each oppressed person has subjective qualities • Oppression refers to several distinct structures/situations A) New Left Revision of the Concept of Oppression • Oppression is not used very much as a term. It carries a strong connotation of conquest and colonial domination – lots of groups have been oppressed in history. • “In dominant political discourse, it is not legitimate to use the term to describe our society because “oppression” is the evil perpetuated by “Others.”’ P. 92 • We use the term “discrimination instead – but this term has been very individually identified, needing a specific discriminator and discriminated. • Marilyn Frye – “oppression reefers to ‘an enclosing structure of forces and barriers which tends to be the immobilization and reduction of a group or category of people.” P.93 B) The Concept of Social Group • “Individuals constitute associates, they come together as already formed persons and set them up, establishing rules, positions, and offices. Groups on the other hand constitute individuals.” P 93 • You can join an association and it not change your identity, but if you are part of a group, you “find yourself” as a member, and it does affect your self identity. • Examples of social groups: Class, gender, race, sexual orientation. 1. Exploitation

16

2.

3. 4. 5.

a. “Every commodity’s value is a function of the labor time necessary for the production of labor power labor power is the one commodity which in the process of being consumed produces new value. Profit then comes from the difference between the actual labor an d the value of that capacity to labor which the capitalist purchases and puts to work.” P. 95  this is exploitation, the capacity for the capitalist to reach a profit with someone else’s work. b. Power is transferred from the worker to the capitalist c. Class division and injustice exists not only because some people have and other’s don’t, it is because the relation of power and inequality is “produced and reproduced through a systemic process in which the energies of the have-nots are continuously expended to maintain and augment the power status and wealth of the haves.” P. 96 d. This exchange of power can be seen between men and women as well – transfer of the fruits of material labor to men, and the transfer of nurturing and sexual energies to men (gender exploitation, p. 96) e. Women clean up the house, cook, and clean for someone they are dependent on – that is exploitation, they’re labor only produces more for their master. f. Women are exploited by that state too as they become dependent on gov’t to support their children when daddy isn’t around. Marginalization a. Marginals are people the system of labor markets cannot or will not employ. P. 98 b. Marginalization is the most dangerous form of oppression – a group is expelled from useful participation in social life, possibly subject to extermination. c. We see the exclusion of dependent persons from equal citizenships d. Feminists have challenged the notion that moral agency and full citizenship require that a person be autonomous and independent. This was made by men that value competition, and solitary achievement. Powerlessness Cultural imperialism Violence

FT – 9: On Psychological Oppression (Bartky) •

There’s a brief bio at: http://www.cddc.vt.edu/feminism/Bartky.html. She also has an entry in Contemporary Authors.

17

• One of the ways an anthology is useful is that one can trace out

relationships among the pieces, thus enhancing one’s understanding of all of them as one reads further. Bartky’s piece touches on points in both Freire and Young. Freire writes: “Selfdepreciation is another characteristic of the oppressed, which derives from their internalization of the opinion the oppressors hold of them. So often do they hear that ther are good for nothing, know nothing and are incapable of learning anything – they are sick, lazy, and unproductive – that in the end they become convinced of their own unfitness.” (19) The closest connection I could find to Young comes in her section ‘Cultural Imperialism:’ “Those living under cultural imperialism find themselves defined from the outside, positioned, placed, by a network of dominant meanings they experience as arising from elsewhere, from those with whom they do not identify and who do not identify with them. Consequently, the dominant culture’s stereotyped and inferiorized images of the group must be internalized by group members at least to the extent that they are forced to react to the behavior of others influenced by those images” (55). Bartky takes this internalization of “inferiorizing” images (what she calls “psychological oppression”) as the central topic of her essay on the oppression of women.

•

•

•

The beginning of Bartky’s article makes it clear that she is taking over an analysis of racism from Frantz Fanon and applying it to oppressive relations between men and women. She claims at the outset that three central ideas from Fanon’s analysis of racism will also describe oppressive relations between the sexes: stereotyping, cultural domination, and sexual objectification. Stereotyping -- Bartky’s protest against stereotyping is partly something like Freire’s. She is concerned that people who have an identity thrust upon them will have great difficulty discovering or constructing their identity. For Freire, this discovery/construction is the authentically human activity, so that being deprived of this opportunity is de-humanization. Note that this critique would apply to the imposition of any identity; it is a kind of wrong to people who are labeled “genius” and “savior” just as much as to people who are labeled “imbecile” and “good-for-nothing.” A second layer of Bartky’s criticism concerns the content of the stereotypes of women: stereotypes that preclude independence or authority. It is important, however, to notice that these are two different criticisms. Cultural domination – Here, Bartky distinguishes between the situation of women and the situation of colonized peoples. Like victims of colonialism, women exist in a culture that underlines male supremacy. But, unlike those under colonial rule, women cannot take refuge in or hark back to an alternative, suppressed culture. They are dominated by their own culture.

18 •

•

•

•

Sexual objectification – Bartky’s definition is worth holding on to: “A person is sexually objectified when her sexual parts or sexual functions are separated out from the rest of her personality and reduced to the status of mere instruments or else regarded as if they were capable of representing her” (28). In this definition, sexual objectification seems to be partly a special form of stereotyping – or at least a close relative of stereotyping. Bartky is careful to strike a balance here, to affirm that there is a legitimate place for identifying a person with his or her sexuality. At the same time, she wants to point out that this identification is often part of a pattern of domination, in that it narrows the objectified person’s focus to one aspect of her complex personality and mind and that it encourages the pursuit of impossible bodily ideals, thus generating a pervasive sense of inferiority. The limitations of ordinary concepts of oppression – Like Young, Bartky points out that unfairness and economic exploitation are only part of the syndrome of oppression. One can be economically well off and yet prevented by one’s picture of oneself from using one’s economic advantages to achieve autonomy: a creative and constructive stance towards one’s own life. Mystification: the double bind – On Bartky’s analysis, the situation of women is that they are caught in a society that works in various ways to disable them, vis-à-vis men, and yet claims that they are “of course” equal. Thus the fact that they don’t feel equal is experienced not as a cultural product but as a personal hang-up or neurosis. Connection to the Marxist theory of alienation – Marx has an ideal for essentially human life: “the free, conscious, and creative transformation of nature in accordance with human needs” (33). Capitalist production breaks up this natural process, so that the work is separated from its natural outcomes, which belong to the owner of the factory. The person is not creative but just a kind of mindless tool for someone else’s projects. Extending Marx’s point, Bartky points out that people don’t merely produce objects: they also produce culture and they produce themselves, their identities. And when the freedom of cultural production is disrupted by cultural domination, when the freedom of self-production is disrupted by stereotyping and sexual objectification, the same kinds of harm are done to the person that Marx identifies with the term “alienation.” She extends the notion of alienation in this way: “Alienation occurs in each case when activities which not only belong to the domain of the self but define, in large measure, the proper functioning of this self, fall under the control of others” (34).

19

10/6 – Third-wave feminism FT – 28: Difference and Dominance… (MacKinnon) ○ Difference vs. Dominance approach  Difference approach • Reference to sex differences is bad – politically, legally, socially… ○ Shouldn’t treat men and women different for alimony  • Androcentrism: the male is the standard. • Treat likes alike; unlikes differently: the idea is that if you’re different, you should be treated differently, but if you’re the same, then you should be treated the same. • Tension between treating everyone the same and treating people who are different differently.  Dominance approach • Gender is a matter of distribution of power (men over women) • Redistribution of power is a priority ○ List on 397: violence against women, equal pay, etc ○ Not a classic piece of 3rdWave Feminism, but shares the characteristic that it’s talking about something in general – social norms. It’s easy to see how you might translate MacKinnon’s argument into another type of oppression. ○ Why can’t women be prison guards? Should we repeal the laws? They’ll get raped! MacKinnon would say we want to work on rape in general and take it more seriously than it is taken now. FT – 5: Black Women (hooks) ○ Critique of 2nd Wave Feminism (Friedman)  2nd Wave Feminism popularized feminism in 1960s America in the mold of deBeauvoir  this is the idea of feminism most Americans without in depth knowledge have: fighting against “women belong in the kitchen” etc…  What does hooks think 2nd Wave Feminism gets wrong? • Focused on middle-class, white women: all women don’t experience oppression in the same way  2ndWave represents itself as covering all women’s experience but only focuses on one subcategory of all women. It’s also not a coincidence that it’s white, middle-

20

•

•

•

class women – it’s the white middle-class that has power: access to universities etc… Racist: one of the goals of 2nd Wave feminism was to get women out of the kitchen and into profession, but an implicit assumption is the existent of an under class which can take over the work that the white, middle class women leave behind. ○ hook’s personal experience: 2nd Wave Feminism was run by white, middle class women in the 60s or 70s and were racist in the sense that black women didn’t have anything to offer feminism Androcentric: you take maleness as the standard to which things are compared as deviant or Other. There’s a problem with androcentrism for many reasons including that it involves moving from being oppressed to being an oppressor necessarily Otherizing other groups. Co-opts the term ‘oppression,’ where ‘exploitation’ or ‘discrimination’ would be more accurate. Definition of oppression: not having any choices. Contrasted with discrimination and exploitation as having fewer choices than white, middle class men. 2ndWave Feminism coopted the term oppression, but they are not oppressed because it is not the case that they have no choices, while it is the case that there are women with no choices. Thus, by co-opting the term, they make white-middle class women’s situation seem the same as that of black working class women. ○ What would Young / Bartkey say?  Oppression was unintentional / unconscious  idea of systematicity. The idea of oppression as a complete lack of choices is radical in that it narrows the group down significantly. Young and Bartkey think there is a continuum of oppression (not conscious or explicit) where as hooks wouldn’t necessarily disagree with this – more she would say to reserve the term oppressed to the bottom rung – those who have no choices.

21 ○ Suggestions for what black women in particular have to contribute to feminism  3rd Wave Feminism  What does hooks think black women have to contribute to Feminism in general? What about their experience makes them unique? • They are oppressed, but do not oppress. Because they occupy the lowest position on the social hierarchy, they are oppressed but do not oppress anyone; thus, they have a unique perspective on oppression. The 2nd Wave Feminist would say that though there are group that are oppressed, there are not groups that do the oppressing – it’s unconscious. They’d say that everyone engages in oppression: you can participate in your own oppression by conforming to norms. • Black (esp. working class) women are well placed to observe the interaction of various oppressions. Feminism is just one movement against oppression (including racism, classism, etc). You can’t just talk about gender if you want to talk about feminism, because for many women, gender is just one position they occupy in the interlocking web of social interactions. ○ “Privileged feminists have largely been unable to speak to, with, and for diverse groups of women because they either do not understand fully the inter-relatedness of sex, race, and class oppression or refuse to take this inter-relatedness seriously. Feminist analyses of woman’s lot tend to focus exclusively on gender and do not provide a solid foundation on which to construct feminist theory” (67). • The feminism that hooks is imagining would say different things about different people in different places. She thinks 2nd Wave Feminism is too narrow and doesn’t apply to most women. ○ Characteristics of 3rd Wave Feminism:  1st Wave: biological answer for what is woman  Moving to 2nd Wave: reconceptualizing what a woman is  2nd to 3rd Wave: • Idea of intersectionality: feminism’s role is not just about gender – it’s about group and how we sort people. We don’t sort people by eye color, and race is much more complicated than

22 simply skin color. A lot of these distinctions and norms don’t seem to be based on anything independent of themselves. Just like there is no blue-eyeism, if there was no conception of race, there could be no racism  Feminism as part of a bigger idea FT – 30: Feminism, Utopianism… (Cornell) Cornell considerscharges that feminism is too utopian, and defends her ideal of liberationl Liberation is the freedom of what she calls the “imaginary domain,” which is the “freedom to create ourselves as sexed beings, as feeling and reasoning persons. Cornell thinks tha our sexual freedom is at the ver heart of freedom and our emotional and intellectual capacities. Freedom, rather than equality, is the primary demand of feminism. We are not feminazi’s, no totalitarianism cuz everyone should be able to express themelves sexually, as long as they allow others to do so too. The ideal of the imaginary domain expresses the desires implicit in actiosn of feminists and gay rights activists to expres their sexuality freely, answering utopian charge can’t be brought into practice. What is possible cannot be known in advance of social transformation, so fem must take freedom as the ideal rather than some substangeive notion of equality

Terms • •

•

Normative: something you should do, a social rule – doesn’t have to be ethical e.g. basketball, chess, etc rules. ○ Heteronormativity: people should be heterosexual Intersexuality ○ Kinds  Herm (True Hermaphrodite): posses one testis and one ovary  Ferm (Female Pseudohermaphrodite): ovaries but no testes but with some aspect of the male genitalia; primary sex organs are female  Merm (Male Pseudohermaphrodite): testes but no ovaries but with some aspect of the female genetalia; primary sex organs are male ○ Associated with Fausto-Sterling’s “5 Sexes” ○ Notion of 3 continua within the larger continuum of sexuality: Male to Merm, True Herm, Ferm to Female 5 Sexual Categories (Skene Johnson) ○ Genetic sex: biological, chromosomes ○ Physical sex: sex organs ○ Sexual identity: internal sense of what sex you think you are ○ Sexual orientation: which sex you’re attracted to ○ Gender: how you behave socially so people perceive you as M or F

23 •

•

•

Woman ○ Haslanger  Definition: a woman is systematically subordinated along some dimension (economic, political, legal, social, etc), and is marked as a target for this treatment by observed or imagined bodily features presumed to be evidence of a female’s biological role in reproduction.  We can have a world without “women,” though there would still be females  Contrasts with older conceptions of woman: Wollstonecraft uses woman as synonymous with female, because she doesn’t share the same conception of gender as Haslanger does – hers is purely biological (JS Mill is the same).  Woman should be an uncomfortable term to use ○ deBeauvoir  Shares much of Haslanger’s view in that the notion of woman is a societal construction  2nd Wave view that the feminist problem runs much deeper than simple legal parity (Wollstonecraft) Social group: used by Young as the object of oppression ○ Definition: a group in which you’re a member that you do not choose to be a part of – you’re a part of it due to an essential, unchanging aspect of your person which are perceived as natural differences. ○ This concept is contrasted with an association which is a group which you choose to be a part of Oppression ○ Young: Systemic (without a specific agent), non-obvious, and possibly unintentional inhibition of a social group’s autonomy.  5 categories of oppression • Exploitation: domination through a steady process of the transfer of the results of the labor of some people to benefit other. For women, it’s the transfer of the fruits of material labor and sexual energies to men. • Marginalization: inability to work which makes one dependent on society thus making one subject to often arbitrary and invasive authority of social service providers  loss of rights to privacy, respect, and choice. ○ Most dangerous form of oppression to Young, because a whole category of people is excluded from useful participation in social life leading to serve material deprivation and possible extermination • Powerlessness: describe people with little or no work autonomy, exercise little creativity or

24 judgment in their work, express themselves awkwardly, and do not command respect. ○ Notion that a profession grants privilege:  1. Acquiring and practicing a profession has an expansive, progressive character  2. Considerable day-to-day work autonomy  3. Privileges of the professional extend beyond the workplace to elevate a whole way of life  respect • Cultural Imperialism: experience of existing with a society whose dominant meanings render the particular perspectives and point of view of one’s own group invisible at the same time as they stereotype one’s group and mark it out as the Other. ○ Often done without intent / unconsciously ○ Stereotypes mark and define the culturally dominated and confines them to a nature which is usually attached in some way to their bodies and thus which cannot easily be denied. ○ “Double consciousness:” the sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that look on in amused contempt and pity. ○ Examples:  Men are usually the heroes  positive characteristics embodied within the hero (strength, intelligence, autonomy, etc) are equated with masculinity, while female characters typically embody weaknesses (powerlessness, dependency, etc) • Violence: random and systematic – directed at any member of the group simply because they’re a member  Ex. Arab-Americans after 9/11, Japanese-Americans during WWII, AfricanAmericans by the KKK ○ bellhooks: oppression means not having any choices (differs from Young’s view). hooks’ definition responds to the 2nd wave feminism claim that all women are oppressed – hooks thinks this equates the disadvantages of white, middle class women with black working class women though there is a great disparity between the two

25 •

• •

Androcentrism: notion that maleness is the standard against which all else is compared as deviant or Other ○ bell hooks: critiques 2nd wave feminism as androcentric in that it encourages women to be more like men to gain equality (i.e. becomes CEOs, play sports, take a dominant role, etc) ○ MacKinnon: difference approach is androcentric by providing a view of sexual equality in which women appropriate more masculine values (like bell hooks) to gain parity. ○ deBeavoir: the notion of woman is androcentric in that it is defined in opposition to man while man isn’t defined in opposition to woman Difference approach: K: Add in argument  Kind of argument that Wollstonecraft and Mill use; why is Haslanger’s definition of woman the way it is; 3 types of project; Baker’s argument about gendered language

1. Gender Essay •

• • •

General characterization: Gender refers to the social role which one identifies oneself with as opposed to sex which is based on genetic and biological factors. ○ The notion of gender is defined in 2nd wave feminism ○ K: refers to shared social conceptions (make explicit) ○ K: make it more social than individual ○ K: normative aspect – you ought not wear a dress because it’s the social norm even though you might reject it ○ K: “social expression of sex” but there needs to be a normative aspect even if you disagree with it Initially, feminists didn’t have a conception of gender that was any different than sex  Wollstonecraft and Mill don’t make a distinction K: Fausto-Steling’s 5 sexes show that there’s a problem with the conception of gender as binary More recently, people have come to see the social influence that culturally-engrained gender roles have ○ Gould’s X story shows the normative role of gender as well as a possible view of what the world would look like if gender wasn’t normative ○ Renzetti & Curran: Gender socialization  aspects of gender surround us from the moment we’re born  “Boy or girl”  Portrayal of men and women in advertisements, literature, movies, etc  Reward boys for being adventurous, reward girls for being submissive, social  K: gender norms bad because it’s oppressive ○ SkeneJohnson differs from many of the theorists in that she makes a strong case for how the sexes are distinct with specific strengths and weaknesses but equal overall. Women may be better at doing something, on average, than men, but

26

•

there will always be some men that are better at it than women.  Gender doesn’t necessarily follow sex  cases of people with male bodies and female genetics as well as vice versa ○ K: Haslanger: the issue isn’t about what jobs people want or what clothes they have – it’s about dominance  people are subordinated because of their perceived biology  Rethink what gender terms are for  Think of men and women in the gender sense – about subordination / oppression  Ideal world – no men or women • R and S wouldn’t put it that way  there are men and women but we should treat them equally.  H says they’re focusing on the details  H ideal world  Definition of gender at the end of article  pregenant woman should be treated a certain way – must depend on your biologically role but aren’t oppressive and are the opposite of oppression  R & S: conception of gender is more neautral – not about power like Haslanger  H would say the detail don’t matter – it’s the subordination Gendered Language ○ K: use as an example of oppression, or ○ Hofstadter’s article shows how gendered language doesn’t make sense through satire using racialized language ○ In “Pricks and Chicks,” Baker shows the sexual inequality present in everyday language  Metaphorical terms for women are dehumanizing  animal, play thing, sexual

Sexual verbs usually include the notion of something being done to the female which usually has a harmful connotation, while the same phenomenon doesn’t happen to males

2. Feminism Essay • •

General / neutral description? Feminism is the struggle for gender equality while respecting the differences between the sexes. Feminism has evolved from over time to become increasingly broad. In its initial form, 1stwave feminism was mostly concerned with getting women equal rights (Wollstonecraft and Mill). From the 1st to 2nd wave, feminism took on a broader scope in identifying that sexism ran much deeper than legal equality and into the everyday notions whichdisadvantaged women. Feminists like deBeauvoir and Haslangerquestion the notion of woman, establishing it as a term for one who is subordinated. 3rd wave feminism again broadens the scope from 2nd wave feminism by placing sexism in context as one form of oppression among many and claiming that women can be

27

•

more or less oppressed depending on their place within society e.g. black working class women are more oppressed than middle class white women, because they have less choices. Evolution ○ Wollstonecraft and Mill both argue for equal rights for women, but do so based solely from a viewpoint that equates gender and sex. The concept of gender as its own category has not evolved. They view feminism as primarily a fight for equal rights and fail to see how sexism will continue when these rights are achieved, though Mill hints at this in his point about custom and feeling. ○ deBeauvoir and Haslangerdefine the notion of woman as one who is subordinated, reflecting the fact that even though women has legal parity with men, sexism is so deeply engrained in society at a structural level that women still suffer.  Renzetti & Curran: Gender socialization  women are brought up surrounded by stereotypes which favor the masculine  Haslanger:  Young  oppressed through exploitation, cultural imperialism, violence 2nd wave though? ○ Bell hooks is an example of 3rdwave feminism which places sexism within the larger context of oppression / subjugation in general. Argues against the narrow view of white, middle class 2nd wave feminists, and points out that black womenhave a lot to offer the movement. All women are not oppressed or disadvantaged equally  white women have many more choices than black working class women