Transcript Feminist Theories Goldner, V. (1993). Feminist theories. In P.G. Boss, W. J.

Feminist Theories
Goldner, V. (1993). Feminist
theories. In P.G. Boss, W. J. Doherty, R.
LaRossa, W. R., Schumm, & S. K.
Steinmetz (Eds.). Sourcebook of family
theories and methods: A contextual
approach (pp. 623-626). New York:
Plenum Press.
Introduction
 Provide an overview of the range of feminist
perspectives and of recurring themes.
 Review the historical origins of feminism and
review feminist critiques of other family
theories.
 Discuss feminist frameworks for thinking
about the family.
 Working Definition of Feminism:
 Emphasize the experience of women.
 Recognize that women, under current conditions,
are subordinated or oppressed.
 Work toward ending the subordination of women.
 Gender and gender relations are fundamental to all
social life, including the lives of men and women.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Themes in Feminist Scholarship
 Assume the centrality, normality, and value
of women’s (and girls’) experiences.
 Gender is a basic organizing concept.
 Gender relations are best understood in
sociocultural and historical context.
 Emphasize family diversity and challenge any
unitary notion of “the family.”
 Emphasize social change and utilize
methodologies that are value-committed.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Schools
 Liberal Feminism
 Historically emphasized that women and men are
equal so gender should not be used as a barrier to
rights and opportunities.
 Commitment to social and legal reforms which will
create equal opportunities for women.
 Radical feminism (two major branches):
 Sexual and reproductive oppression: demonstrate
and change men’s control of women’s sexuality.
 Cultural feminism:
 Celebrates women’s cultural, spiritual, and
sexual experiences.
Goal: fundamentally reorganize society
around values of community and
nurturance, sometimes called
“womanculture,” rather than encourage
women to achieve at the same level as
men.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Schools
(cont.)
 Socialist feminism
 Suggest that oppression of women is due to both
patriarchy and capitalism (e.g., social class is a
fundamental source of oppression).
 Women’s work is often ignored or undervalued.
 Equal opportunity is impossible in a class-based
society.
 Interpretative approaches
 Focus: nature of personal experience, patterns of
consciousness, and everyday life.
 Modified conceptual frameworks in order to
examine the social construction of gender in
everyday life.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Schools
(cont.)
 Feminist psychoanalytic theories:
 Criticisms of Freud:
 sexist concepts (e.g., penis envy)
belief that biology is destiny
views of sexual abuse.
 Useful tools:
 emphasized gender as a central category
of analysis
examined conflict and power
promoted areas of experience often
associated with women.
recognized the value of personal
experience as a valid way of knowing.
 Feminism and postmodernism: criticize
theories which claim universality by
examining their assumptions.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Origins and Initial Sociocultural
Milieu
 Pioneer feminist theorists in the late 1800s
and early 1900s
 The reemergence of feminism in the 1960s
 Family sociology in the 1960s and 1970s
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Critiques of Other
Theoretical Perspectives on Families
 Role theory
 There is an overemphasis on social determinism
(individuals are shaped by their roles) which often
blames the victim rather than social structures.
Thus, it does a poor job of explaining or predicting
social change.
 Fundamental weakness: does not examine power,
inequality, and conflict in gender relations.
 The theory is flawed because of internal
contradictions: it tries to combine a biological term
with a social one which implies that society is
pursuing natural tendencies.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Critiques of Other
Theoretical Perspectives (cont.)
 Exchange theory
 Focuses exclusively on the interpersonal and
ignores larger social forces (e.g., religious
structures that legitimate male power within
families).
 Inappropriate assumption: people enter all
relationships voluntarily. People in dominant
positions may see the relationship as voluntary but
subordinates may feel coerced.
 Benign view of power and resource obscures the
impact of social resources on access to them.
 Criticisms of “family power” studies: emphasize
complementarity and a top down approach (e.g.,
suggesting that access to resources exclusively
affects access to power) instead of a bottom up
approach (e.g., why don’t women have access to
resources?).
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Critiques of Other
Theoretical Perspectives (cont.)
 General systems theory
 Ignores sociocultural and historical contexts.
 Ignores it’s own basic premise: limited attention to
the power of larger systems.
 The suggestion that all members of the system are
responsible for dysfunction is a form of victim
blaming.
 Suggests that women and men have equal access to
power.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Conceptualizing Gender
 Biological sex and cultural gender
 Distinction between terms “sex” and “gender”
Biological sex: refers to biological fact of
being male or female.
Cultural gender: learned and cultural
phenomenon associated with sex. Gender
is socially constructed.
 Criticism of sex versus gender dualism: biology
and culture are interactive influences.
 Different dimensions of gender
 Individual or personal gender
 Individual gender identity is socialized from
birth; it shapes individual notions about
acceptable behavior.
Personal gender identity influences
interpersonal dynamics (e.g. expectations
about child-rearing).
 Structural gender: gender divisions of labor
influence personal and professional settings.
 Symbolic or cultural gender: specific sociocultural
prescriptions about gender.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Conceptualizing Gender
(cont.)
 Summary of African-American feminist
thought:
 Promote the validity of their experience (e.g., Bell
Hooks’ book From Margin to Center).
 Emphasize the interlocking influence of gender,
race, and class on oppression.
 Emphasize connections between African-American
women and men because they both experience race
and class discrimination.
 Promote African-American family strengths.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
The Debate Over Difference
Versus Equality
 Dilemma of dualistic thinking: “Do women
want equality with men or do they want their
differences recognized and more highly
esteemed?” (p. 608).
 Non-binary response: “‘equality that rests on
differences . . . differences that confound,
disrupt, and render ambiguous the meaning of
any fixed binary opposition’ between women
and men” (p. 608).
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Demystifying the Dichotomy
Between “Public” and “Private”
 Preindustrial societies and the division of labor: prior
to the industrialization revolution, an economic
division of labor valued the work of both women and
men.
 Early industrialization and separate spheres:
industrialization produced different experiences for
women from different classes.
 Working-class experiences
 Varied responses to the ideology public -- private
spheres
 Beyond the public -- private dualism
 Work within and outside families are shaped both
by patriarchal gender system and a capitalist
economic system.
 Reject family-linked stereotypes (e.g., men are
breadwinners, women are economically
nonproductive and dependent).
 Women and men are influenced by both their
professional and personal experiences; these forces
are not separate.
 Gender is distinct from any single system; it links,
however, all major institutions.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Substantive Applications:
Motherhood and Sexuality
 Motherhood
 Motherhood as institution versus experience:
 Motherhood is a social institutions;
personal experience is influenced by
cultural ideology. It is founded on the
subordination of women.
Experience: the ways women are affected
by patriarchal institutions.
 Motherhood and the engendering of personality:
men should be as fully involved in child care as
women; this would be a crucial first step for the
emancipation of women and healthier identities for
both women and men.
 Sexuality: heterosexuality has been assumed
to be natural.
 The tension between pleasure and danger in
women’s experiences of sexuality: sexual
violence (e.g., rape, domestic violence)
against women is ignored
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson
Feminist Theorizing: Limitations
and Challenges
 Important paradox: families are both a site of
conflict and oppression and a source of
strength and solidarity.
 Feminist theory is often ignored or ridiculed.
 More work is needed on the interaction of
gender and generation on women’s
experience.
Dr. Ronald J. Werner-Wilson