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Reading
Guide to: Humm M
(Ed) (1992)
Feminisms:
A Reader,
Hemel Hempstead:
Harvester Wheat sheaf
Part
2 Introduction (Humm)
Feminism has
contributed a number
of significant innovations
in social thought
-- innovatory language,
practices
(such as
consciousness raising groups),
and campaigns,
such as those
about rape and
sexual abuse.
The history of
feminist movements is
a long one,
but the recent
waves probably began
in about the
1840s in both
Britain and the
USA, originally
connected to broader
movements to extend
the suffrage.
Connections with other
civil rights movements
persisted in the
1960s, with
the beginning of
civil rights campaigns.
However, by
then there were
already distinct characteristics,
such as the
extension to the
personal, and
the role of
new networked organisations.
In the USA
especially, Women's
Studies were established
as an academic
specialism too.
Feminism seems
to have occupied
distinctive ‘waves’,
with different combinations
of theoretical and
political impulses.'...
first wave feminism...
[was]...
principally concerned with
equalities...
second-wave feminism...
uses women's differences
to oppose the
"legalities"
of a patriarchal
world' (page 11).[So
we see here
the familiar 'escalation'
of the movement,
rather as in
the marxist scenario.
There is also
something similar to
a shift, which
we have detected
before, from a
theoretical perspectives
aimed at assisting
practical struggles,
to a more
investigative and eventually
constructive role for
theory].
First-wave debates centred
on 'materialism...
women's collective social
and political interests',
while second-wave debates
turned more on
'materiality --
moral solidarities created
by female standpoints,
and identities based
on differences which
include women's material,
psychic and affiliative
strengths'
(11).
There is a
shift from an
interest in access
to one of
developing autonomy and
differences from men.
Resources used to
develop these debates
including psychoanalytic
theory and Social
Theory, leading
to 'the
making of a
new knowledge from
the standpoint of
women's embodiment'
(12).
However, these
theoretical developments
can be seen
as emerging 'from
those whose interests
[they]
affirm'
(12).
[So theory
becomes the traditional
'handmaiden'
of practice?]
The notion
of identity and
who defines women's
identity remains as
a constant issue,
however, and
there are similar
questions and similar
goals shared between
feminists of the
different 'waves'.
'What
unites twentieth-century
feminists, arguably,
is the desire
to be united'
(13).
[This seems
a rather abstract
goal, not
really an immediately
practical one.
There is also
here some hint
of a belief
in ‘reconciliation’
-- and notion
that in some
unspecified future Utopia
all differences will
be reconciled.
This is also
characteristic of some
of the work
in the dubious 'alienation
problematic’ in marxism]
According to
Humm, Kristeva offers a
three-phase model.
The first wave
features demands for
equal treatment within
male institutions,
and shares a
male linear notion
of time.
The second wave
breaks with the
old forms and
introduces 'female
time',
which is cyclical.
The third phase
becomes possible given
the 'demassification
of power'
which enables substantial
local liberation from
conventional ideologies,
leading to a
final autonomy for
women.
Although there
are different phases,
there is an
underlying escalation model
so that the
first wave was
crucial in permitting
subsequent waves.
Part 3
Introduction
(Humm)
Second-wave feminism
has focused on the concepts
'reproduction',
'experience',
'difference’.
The notion
of reproduction emerges
as ‘the sum
of radical campaigns,
of theories of
gender difference,
of sexual preferences,
of social representations,
of family identities,
oentific [sic] paradigms,
environmental and pacifist
issues, and,
crucially, differences
of race’
(53).
The focus is on
the politics of
reproduction, the
way in which
a oppression is
based on representations
of sexuality,
as a critical
take on the
apparently biological constraints
that still affect
women (affecting
their opportunities in
paid work, for example).
[There is
a greater role
here for theory
as well].
'Theory proves
necessary when commonsense
designations are at
stake'
[still a
bit of a handmaiden
though -- but
see below].
Reproduction has
expanded from classic
Marxist conceptions to
incorporate the notion
of difference.
Differences are now
celebrated, and
the accompanying change
away from the
notion of 'women'
as sharing ‘a single
universal experience’
is 'liberating'--
there is now
a 'world
of multiple and
mobile racial,
class and sexual
preferences'
(54).
Nevertheless, women
still need to
fight for their
reproductive rights.
This is a
struggle against violence,
sexual stereotyping and
'the orthodoxies
of sociopsychological theories'
(54)
These elements can
come together in
struggles such as
research on,
and campaigns for,
abortion or the causes
of rape and
violence. The
struggles grew to
incorporate environmental
issues and
peace campaigns.
Second-wave feminism
gained impetus from
New Left,
socialist and civil
rights campaigns and
policies, and also
reflected the increase
in women's paid
work. In
America especially,
Women's Studies emerged
'as a
distinct discipline'
(55).
New terms and
slogans appeared, such
as 'sexism', ‘consciousness raising’ and
'the personal
is political'.
'The recognition
that public policies
[and politics
itself] could be
crafted from private
experience is unique
to feminism'
(55).
Women's publishing
increased public visibility,
but 'the
development of radical
women - centred
activism, for
example the women's
refuges' remained
crucial.
The second wave
also saw a
more organised critique
of traditional theories,
which include Anthropology
(enabling criticism
of the apparently
eternal differences between
the sexes);
Economics
(valuing women's
economic activities,
such as those
in domestic labour);
History
(criticising male
emphases, and
restoring accounts of
empowered women and
their role);
Law
(how it
tends to support male
power);
Literature
(how the
literary tradition ignored
women's writing);
Media
(representations
of women and
accounts of the
'male gaze');
Medicine
(which objectifies
women ,perpetuates sexist
ideology, and
ignores women's health
agendas);
Psychoanalysis
(which institutionalises
men's definitions of
women and
'the feminine');
the sciences (the
very categories are
seen as sexist,
and women scientists
are marginalised);
Sociology
(which still
sees gender as
just another category,
instead of as
a central one. Each
of these
areas also features
important feminist
developments -- new
questions, a
new work which
centralises women,
new proposals in
law and medicine,
new developments in
epistemology.
Political themes turn
on the recognition
of the universality
of patriarchy,
and the diversity
of women's responses
and experiences.
There have been
various alliances with
other movements,
connections especially
with black and non-Western
women's movements.
These alliances have
led to new
challenges, including
the problems of
articulating these different
sorts of oppressions.
Ultimately,
'The aim
of all feminist
theory and practice
is the creation
of equal rights
shared by non-alienated
beings of women
and of men
free to attend to
personal and collective
reproduction and autonomy’
(60).
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