Feminism is not a singular or unitary concept, but a polyvalent amalgam of diverse, multi-layered, complex and often, contradictory ideas. There are various approaches to the issue of feminism, which makes it difficult to arrive upon single definition. Lisa S Price, in Feminist Frameworks: Building Theory on Violence against Women, offers an interesting definition of the term: ’Feminism is also a method of analysis, a standpoint, a way of looking at the world from the perspective of women. It questions government policies, popular culture, ways of doing and being, and asks how women’s lives are affected by these ideological and institutional practices.’ It must be acceded, from the onset, that feminism needs to be understood in the plural; exploring and identifying ‘feminisms’ is therefore a more authentic approach. Feminisms address the issue of women’s inferior position in society and seek ways and methods of alleviating the social, cultural, political and economic discriminations that women are subjected to. But the differences in Waves of Feminism Dr SUSHEELA B the approach to this central problem contribute to the complexity, diversity, fragmentation and contradictions underlying ‘feminisms.’ ‘Who can speak and for whom? ’Who will listen?’’ How do we represent the self and others?’ Such questions point to heated issues concerning representation and essentialism. Feminist theories are occupied with similar questions of representation, voice, marginalization and the relation between politics and literature.
The origin of the term ‘feminism’ is uncertain and debatable. The term can be tracked back to 1871, when it was used as a medical term to define symptoms of ‘feminisation’ of the bodies of male patients. In 1872, Alexander Dumas used it in a pamphlet titled l’homme femme, to identify women who behaved in a masculine way. And the term had spread through Europe and America by 1910. Thus, ‘feminism’ as a term had confliction implications on both medical and political discourse. The term is made up of two components:‘femme’, ‘woman’ in French, and ‘-esme’, which refers to a social movement COVER STORY or a political ideology. It has been a controversial term and many activists struggling against sexist oppression have even rejected the label. Women fighting for better wages and job security could not always identify themselves with the middle-class, educated, suffragist feminists, while the middle-class women were very apprehensive of its radical implications. The earliest use of the term ‘feminism’ held negative connotations. In order to classify the shifting movements in the history of feminism, the paradigm of ‘waves’ came into use. Thus. ‘First wave feminism’ is used to signify the feminist movements of the nineteenth century and the early-twentieth century that were aimed at acquiring equal rights for women. ‘Second wave feminism’ refers to the feminist movements of the 1960s and 70s that addressed issues as women’s employment, role in the family and sexuality, along with their political rights. However, the practice of using ‘waves’ to classify historical moments in the feminist movements runs the risk of implying that there was no feminist activity outside the scope of these umbrella terms. The fact remains that there were numerous political, cultural and social movements which cannot be contained within these neat divisions. Rather, the heterogeneity of the theories and actions related to feminist issues run beyond the convenient compartments intended to understand the development of feminist thought.
Apart from the historical approach, attempts are also made to group feminist activity and attitudes under three categories: Liberal feminism, Marxist or socialist feminism and radical feminism. Liberal feminism argues for equal rights for women based on the ideology of the liberal state of equal rights and privileges for all citizens. Marxist or socialist feminist system believe that gender inequality is related to the capitalist mode of production, while Radical feminists’ identity patriarchy to be the root of all evils against women. Apart from these broad categories, there are several other categories such as psychoanalytical feminism, postmodern feminism, black feminism, postcolonial feminism, post structural feminism, cyberfeminism and so on. The first wave of feminist movement was simply ‘the woman’s movement’. The movement comprised struggle for legal and political rights. The suffragists, however, did not override the idea that motherhood wielded social and domestic authority.
After 1910, a younger generation of activists articulated a marked preference for a ’feminist’ political identity, advocating equal rights, often rejecting the maternal paradigm. The earlier feminists were concerned with the ‘right to earn their living’, but with time, feminism acquired varied connotations across different parts of the world depending on the heterogeneity of experiences. Since its origin, till its wider circulation in the 1960s, the feminist label had a pejorative undertone. Universal adult suffrage was extended to women in England and other countries between 1928 and the 1940s, but there was an ongoing debate the comparative merit of the terms ’humanist, and ‘feminist’ vis-à-vis the women’s movement. Liberal feminism advocates women’s equality in professional, political and public life. They argue that society’s discriminatory attitude towards women is solely predicted on the assumption that they are the ‘weaker sex’. This impedes women from exercising free choice.
Liberal feminists do not reject the capitalists system of production, since they believe this system will provide them with opportunities of realising their potentials. Liberal feminism starts with Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792), John Stuart Mill’s Subjection of Women (1869) and women’s suffrage movements in both the United Kingdom and the United States. Liberal feminists found discrimination against women in the public sphere-in society’s denial of giving them access to education, politics, financial independence and general intellectual life. Men wielded power and authority in the Church, in the state and within families. Women had no legal or political rights and had restricted access to higher education. Queen Elizabeth ascended the throne of England in 1558 and reigned successfully over a long period of time. Subsequent political events, such as English Civil War and the Glorious Revolution of 1688, destabilised the sovereignty of the monarch. There were also perceived tentative attempts at challenging patriarchal rule. Some subversive texts challenging the Genesis myth were in circulation, such as Jane Anger’s Her Protection for Women (1589) and Rachel Speght’s A Mouzell for Melastomus (1617). Working-class women often protested against legislative and social discriminations.
Writers like Aphra Behn (1640–89) and Lady Chudleigh (1656–1710) were articulating their views on the subordination of women at the hands of men. Quakers played a crucial role in inculcating awareness against discriminatory practices based on gender and race. In an ideal Quaker family, men and women enjoyed quality of status, which was reflected in the fact that ‘Quaker women comprised 40% of female abolitionists, 19% of feminists born before 1830, and 15% of suffragists born before 1830. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, several thinkers and social reformers debated in favour of women’s claims to social and political equality. The legacy of the Enlightenment, the emphasis on rationality instead of faith, and the increased importance of free inquiry resulted in challenges to the status quo. This included arguments and polemics about the subordinate position of women in society. John Stuart Mill, Mary Wollstonecraft and Harriet Martineau (1802-76) provided the intellectual impetus for this first wave of feminism. These first-wave feminists struggled against inequalities in opportunities of education, employment and political rights, the unjust marriage laws. Wollstonecraft challenged the assumptions of Rousseau in A Vindication of the Rights of Women, advocating equal participation of women in public life and greater empowerment in economic and private spheres. Her insistence on sexual equality and her radical views on marriage were not well received in her time. This was largely due to the unconventionality of her personal life, revealed in the Memoirs authored by her husband, William Godwin, social reformers like John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill (1807-58) debated the ‘woman question’ gender roles, inequality and subordination of women in essays such as On Subjugation of Women (1869) and The Enfranchisement of Women (1851).
Though their views occasionally hinted at certain prevalent prejudices about motherhood and domesticity, they were largely supportive of social transformation that accommodated the rights and dignity of women. In the turbulence of the 1960s, women’s movements gained momentum under the banner of ‘women’s liberation’ which soon was derisively abridged as ‘women’s libbers’. The 60s offers an interesting area of investigation. During the Second World War, women were compelled to join the workforce but by the end of the war, women were expected to return to their ‘homes’-domesticity was emphasized, as was women’s role as nurturers and care-givers, the agencies of socialisation; and consumerism became significant. Women were also present in the workforce in significant numbers, which was at odds with the idealisation of the nuclear family unit. As a result, feminism in the 60s acquired a diversity of perspectives depending on race and class positions. Feminist movements in the 60s were also influenced by, and overlapped with, other political, social and cultural movements like the student’s movements in Europe and America, the Civil Rights Movement and the anti-Vietnam War movements. The second wave was, however, far-reaching with women not only demanding political and legal equality but also control over their reproductive and sexual roles. Another significant paradigm shift was discerned after the 1960s-feminist movement championed not just demands for equality but also insisted upon the acknowledgment of the ‘difference’ between men and women. This coincided with the ascendant us the term ‘gender’, instead of ‘sex’ underscoring the importance of the social ‘constructions’ of the idea of the ‘feminine’ and not just biology determining the paradigms of masculinity and femininity. As the term ‘feminism’ did not enjoy wide popularity, but it signified, with moderate success, certain political, social and cultural goals. This is largely due to the fact that feminism, as a concept, has continuously modified itself to address varied concerns, stake-holders and debates.
Thus, over the last decades of the twentieth century, feminism was appended to qualifiers to produce new compounds, all addressing the diversity of its praxis-black feminism, Asian-American feminism, postcolonial feminism, lesbian feminism, ecofeminism and Islamic feminism attest to the complexity of this label. The third wave of feminism and postmodern feminism attack the binaries of the ‘masculine’ and the ‘feminine’, ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ inherent in patriarchal structures. The third -wave feminist assert the importance of difference in speaking, thinking and writing for and about women. It is increasingly a challenge for contemporary feminists to merge the inevitability of the contradictions in women’s experiences and the necessity of finding shared dimensions and commonality in these experiences. This makes us question whether the possibility of a global sisterhood is a reality or a myth. Again, the validity and authencity of such of such a sisterhood can also be put to test. In the 1980s, the idea of ‘post feminism’ started gaining around. It is diverse in its implications. The prefix ’post’ led to a number of analyses of the phenomenon. To some, it implied a movement beyond sexism and feminism, while to others, it meant feminism’s adolescent altogether. A significant aspect of post feminism is its marked departure from any social agenda. Post feminism is, on another level, connected to anti-feminist attitude, not just restricted to the twentieth century; it is present whenever feminism poses a threat to the patriarchal status quo. In this respect, ’post feminism’ as a concept is ambiguous. It subsumes the contradictory discourses of discouraging women from pursuing their own interests and bemoaning the inequality of status inflicted on them.
In the 1990s, the younger generation of women made a decisive and conscience movement beyond the ‘second wave’. Rebecca Walker, daughter of Alice Walker, the African-American who famously coined the term ‘womanist’ prefers the term ‘third wave’ to ‘postfeminism’. The third-wave feminists, insignificantly, accept the label ‘feminist’. Feminism is now understood as broad-based and not restricted to white, middle-class, educated women. It addresses and encompasses the diversity, differences and contradictions of women’s experiences across race, caste, class and sexuality. The definition of feminism put forwarded by Estelle. B. Freeman, in Not Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of Women, contains the key elements of feminism as a social, cultural, political and personal movements for freedom and equality: Feminism is a belief that women and men are inherently of equal worth. Because most societies privilege men as a group, social movements are necessary to achieve equality between women and men, with the understand that gender always intersects with other social hierarchies.
For many feminists, the contentions within postmodernist, poststructuralist and psychoanalytic criticism are merely academic, since they elide the ‘real’ experiences of women. It is alleged that these debates are situated within the context of intellectual, affluent, urban women and their limited intellectual circle. Feminism fundamentally entails The struggle against the sexist oppression perpetrated by patriarchy. Women were traditionally discriminated against on essentialist grounds-the qualities of rationality, aggression and leadership were held ‘masculine’, while gentleness and intuitiveness were considered ‘feminine’ traits. These assumptions, compounded by the biological differences among the sexes, resulted in the marginalisation of women.
∎
