Discussion 1

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I

12 WOMEN'S REALITIES, WOMEN'S CHOICES

publi ti n ( lark t al. 1 96· arga , 2002; hn . . re pecta bili ty and moral uplift that tian ,, Hun , 2011) md ontinu d marginalization . d "the woman movement and asa111mat an in the pro ion a a \ hol i nhart and 1. •c strategy to forge a common . po!ii-;exp 1c1 1.1ca Fink I, 199 ). Ju t a \ om n tudents were identity for women as a group In the _hopes often in the for front of initiativ to estab­ of maintaining focus ~d momentum in the li h om n tucli , o too mu t they take the . d afirer the suffragists won . the franchi· per10 se respon ibility, along with committed faculty, (Cott, 1987). Indeed, that signature achieve_ for en uring that women 1s/gender/feminist ment m l920 is generally marked as the end• . tucli program do not become obsolete­ of the first wave, for the radical and main_

a real danger considering the ever-present stream branches of the suffrage movement reality of cutbacks in university funding, the then split and pursued separate goals (Cott, declining suppon for academic programs l 987). Although not c_ommonly recognized, related to subordinated groups, and the grow­ 's acti'vism continued well afiter 1920women . . ing viewpoint, described earlier, that feminist To provide just one exampl_e, m the l 940s a goals have been achieved. 11 elite group of femuusts struggled forsma , . h Am

the passage of an Equal Rig ts endment The U.S. Women's Movement: ABrief to the Constitution (Taylor, 1989). History The mid-l 960s marks the beginning of

second-wave feminism, which, unlike com­ Although the history of the U.S. women's mon understandings of the first wave, does movement will be presented in Chapter 13, not have a clear-cut end. The 1963 publica­ here we outline the ways that it tends to be tion of The Feminist Mystique by Betty Friedan periodized, which is in terms of three broad is ofiten credited with effectively sparking eras known as "waves."

feminism's second wave (Davis, 1991). In "one The first wave of the women's movement of the most influential nonfiction books of the

occurs between the late nineteenth and the 20 th century'' (Fox, 2006), Friedan proffered

early twentieth centuries and is most associ­ a political analysis for a pervasive sentiment ated with the struggle for women's suffrage.

among middle-class, white American house­ Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902) and

wives living in the suburbs: they were deeply Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) were early

dissatisfied with their lives. Contemporary pioneers in what became known as "the

scholarship argues that The Feminist Mystique woman movement" (Cott, 1987). Having

did not quite start the movement as much as begun their activist careers as abolitionists,

it capitalized upon growing attention to wom­ they developed a critical perspective on the

en's rights that was already emerging in society subordinate place of women in American

writ large-even within the halls of govern­ society, eventually giving speeches and other­

ment (Coontz, 2011). Betty Friedan founded wise campaigning on a wide range of issues

the N ational Organization for Women in from family law to birth control to voting

1966, serving as its president until 1970. rights. T he latter issue became the rallying

The 1960s was an era of profound cultural cry of a mass movement in the 191 Os, draw­ transformation in American society, owing toing strength from the political climate of widespread political agitation occurring across

the times when, for example, the rights of the entirety of the social landscape. T he civilindustrial workers were also actively being rights and antiwar movements inspired myr­asserted. The term "feminist" emerged in this iad other political struggles-and not only inperiod, both as a reaction against the forms of the name of reform but increasingly in the

,

13

e of "freedom." The worn-. nan1 . . 10 oon.tf) found a re oluoonary oice

re''° nent . . Ge . ,. r11ove1 f u rralian i:remtrust rn1ame en!> k o D . the ,,•or 970 book The remale Eunuch 11 1 \eer, whose tseller. Unlike Friedan, GreerG, a bes . . . f l

becJt11e h her ferrurusm m terms o equa - did not corer liberation. As indicated above, icf bot ra di·es courses emerged during this · 's scu

,,·o~en Gloria Steinem an~ others founded period- •ne and figures hke tennis cham- [ magaZI ' • , s. . r Jean King became pop icons.

1 pion B

11th:r in the name of equality or lib- Whe . . l

. second-wave actIVIsm emp oyed a ei:aoon,naing set of methods. It did not focus w1de-ra o-· d li . 1th h n laws an po cies-a oug it did sole1y o 1 b ..for exarnp e y reVIVlilg the cam- do tha'

t · . for an Equal Rights Amendment to the

r~ticution. The movement also took aim at ch~ culture as ~ whole. W~men's liber~tionists

ed out their bras, calling dramatic atten-ross . . • n to the ways their bodies had been sexual- ~~d and constrained. Feminists believed that in order to effect fundamental social change, ordinary women needed to learn to recog­ nize gender oppression; the formation of women-only "consciousness-raising" groups became one strategy for achieving that goal. The slogan "the personal is political" encour­ aged women to make the connection between their own life experiences and the larger forces that produced them. Women's solidarity was framed in the idiom ofsisterhood, and explicit historical links were forged with first-wave feminists, who were claimed as foremothers. One powerful example of this reclaiming is in the writings of Shulamith Firestone, author of a seminal text, The Dialectic of Sex (2003 (1970]). Firestone resuscitated interest in the nineteenth-century women's movement by detailing the true radicalism of their work.

Second-wave feminism has long been cri­ tiqued for being a white middle-class move­ ment blind to the ways that gender is lived by poor women, lesbians, and women of color, again as suggested above. Yet the fact

INTRODUCTION

that wome~ of marginalized groups may have been outsider 'th • · . s WI m mainstream feminist c~cles ~oes not mean that they did not par­ tJ.cpate m the movement. In the 1970s black and Chicana women's feminist activisn~ more often .took place in organizational arenas revolvmg around race. While not hostile to white women's liberation efforts feminists of

' color prioritized their work in organizations where they could forge a politic consistent with their view that race, class, and gender were inseparable bases of oppression (Roth, 2004). White-run women's organizations that did attract black women were those that operated from that point ofview (Valk, 2008). Among the most enduring achievements of women of color's second-wave activism is the scholarship they produced. In addition to some of the anthologies cited above (e.g, Moraga and Anzaldua, 1983), there is also the groundbreaking theoretical-cum-political treatise by the Combahee River Collective (1979) called "A Black Feminist Statement" (see Chapter 3).

Feminists of the second wave generally belong to the "baby boomer" generation, a term for people born between 1946 and 1964. Feminism's third wave-again speaking very generally-belongs to "Generation X," which refers to people born between 1963 and 1974. Some third wavers passionately distinguish themselves from their predecessors (Walker, 1995; Astrid, 2004). In general, these third wavers seek to redress what they see as the shortcomings of the second wave- such as its singular focus on women, as opposed to a larger, more complex set of politics and social positions. They couch their critique of the movement in terms of a generational split, which is both poignant and fitting consider­ ing that many of them are the actual daugh­ ters of second-wave activists. Rebecca Walker, daughter of the author Alice Walker, famously proclaimed the very dawn of the third wave when, in 1992, she wrote the following in

14 WOMEN'S AEAUTIES,WOMEN'S CHOICES

and posts tructuralism. In. short, theseMs.: "I am not a po t-femini t femjni t. I am • es posed a senous challe 1:\\,0the Third Wa e" (Walker, 1992: 41). In o Perspect1v . th nge

. 1. m- or the VIew at any id todeclaring, Walker h raided th arrival of an essentla is " ,, h enti ry such as woman, as a set of . tyentirely n , incarnation of femjni , one that catego , · 11 ltr

wa clear! not a continuati n of th econd duc1 "b. l e, stable , and uruversa y-agreed-uPon.e, wa (thi , d pite the fuct that her important meanings. . f thir proclamation appear d in th cond wave's The two express10ns o ~-wave fellli pathbreaking mag-azine). or rud Walker . ketched above share the VIew that -rusm s b . gen1mean for the third wa e to be confused with nnot be a stand-a one as1s of ide,.... . -der ca I . . T 4 •l:lh, ~r:£emi~i t femini . 'The tern1 "postfemi­ l.ty or politica actIVIsm. hird_,,. -,,

commun , k ""ave rust I a hppery tenn, sometimes referring to r . • ts on the whole see to transc1e111lllls end conserv-c1ti e femini ts and other times refer­ a narrow focus on gender. Walker, herself ing to the view that, having acrueved its goals, a black woman, foun?e? the Third Wave femini mis over. Foundation, whose ID1ss10n state1:11ent indi­

wa the case with the previous waves, cates that it supports "grou~s and mdividuais the thjrd is not monolitruc. Some trurd king towards gender, racial, economic ¾d wor ~L:_dwavers do recognize and celebrate their con­ social justice" (http:/lwww.ulll wavefounda- tinuiti~ with the second wave. They locate tion.org/about-us/mission/)._ The_ third Wave the bndge between eras in the scholarsrup of also opposes the kind of identity policing U.S. women of color, such as that wruch has that would restrict young women's desires in already been cited in thjs chapter. Scholars the realm of fasruon and lifestyle. They seek such as Gloria Anzaldua, Angela Davis, instead to broaden ideas of what an indepen­ ~herrie Moraga, Chela Sandoval, and, very dent woman with control over her life might ~ponantly, bell hooks all wrote critically look like. They are sex-positive-a position unponant works in the 1980s and the early that eschews censorship or other ways of 1990s. These women's works argued for the restricting the free expression of sexuality­ inextricability of race, class, sexuality, and and they embrace nonnormative gender iden­ gender, both as axes of power and as bases of tities including transgender. identity, community, and solidarity. And their One of the cornerstones of third-wave fem­ works, each in its own way, emphasized both inism is its technology: its message is often the ilifficulty and the importance of respect­ spread through websites, blogs, and social ing ilifference and negotiating across it for

networking sites. And it is not the traditional the purposes of forming political coalitions. organizations and publications, such as the Yet, whereas the second wave would simply National Organization for Women OW) acknowledge difference by proclaiming that

or Ms. magazine, that are galvanizing young "sisterhood is powerful" (Morgan, 1970), this

women on feminist issues through rugi­ new generation dispensed altogether with

tal media, but rather sites such as Reel Girl, the language of "sisterhood" and of "fore­

The Crunk Feminist Collective (rooted in mothers" (Hewyood and Drake, 1997; Astrid,

southern black rup-hop culture), and Jezebel, 2004) since those terms assume a common

a site proudly proclaiming to be about identity among women. The trurd wave, after

"Celebrity. Sex. Fashion for Women. Without all, came of intellectual-cum-political age in

Airbrushing." Jezebel consistently deliverswomen's studies classes in the 1990s. The irreverent but wholly feminist messages. It

brand offeminist theory they would have been can also boast more "likes" on Facebook than

reading was dominated by postmodemism NOW and Ms. combined. The instantaneous

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t communication also facili­ _,re of Interne of protests and boycotts,

nati.v efficacy . d. l &the sprout up 1mme iate y · om rate5 theill to

0wing rnan's blog or Facebook post a 1 . .dua1wo th l . ' 0 jnd1V1 d ending on e s ow-movmg

a than ep 1 . . rather . ns of rraditiona orgamzations.

01echa~st e of waves has become fundamen- 'fhe irnag the U.S. women 's movement is

the ,vay . h . raI to d Bowe er, 1t as some very serious understoks° Chief among them is the fact that, d wbac . hi . 1 . d'ra nempts at stonca per10 ization !.,. 111ost a f h ' u~e false sense o co erence within . creates a . . . it and downplays cont1nu1t1es across one era h cl . " f

And as a metap or, 1e rmage o waves eras. d d th di " doesonto lan an en rece ng erashing . . h d.-.:rice 1f not outng t amage, to thea disse1.. ,

nt as a whole (Fernandes, 2010: 114) 111meme . · For example, i~ creates the 1mpr~ssion that nothing of sigmficance happened m the gaps between eras, which could not be more untrue (Harrison, 1988; Taylo_r, 1989). Moreover, the wave idiom overvalonzes mass mobilization and concrete victories such as the passage (or repeal) of laws, and hence renders the move­ ment's less visible triumphs-for example, in the sphere of social transformation or shifts in attirudes- less important. The apparent lack of spectacular achievements invites detrac­ tors to glibly announce the death of feminism (Nicholson, 2010). Finally, the wave narrative normalizes the American experience, promot­ ing a nationalist view of the world.

In closing, our own (the authors) personal experiences suggest that wholesale distinc­ tions between the waves is overdrawn, the result of cultural misrepresentations. Some of us who came of age in the 1980s and 1990s were taught by the surrounding culture that the pioneers of the second wave of the femi­ nist movement were angry, man-hating, and anti-sex (see Box I.2). When we explored this history for ourselves we discovered how courageous, creative, and forward-thinking these women were about every aspect of life. Likewise, the older women among us

INTRODUCTION

remember that h suffragettes wh w en we were young, the vote for o demonstrated and won the wanted t women were no models of who we

F. 0 be. And here the work of Shulamith 1restone m · d b . ' entione a ove was pivotal forhs e railed a · th ' '

of £ . . gamst e common stereotyping emtntSt5 that served to inhibit women

from d fi · I e rung .themselves as such (see Box 3· ). Our own image of the suffragists was of

w:omen who were dowdy, frumpy, and defi­ rutely not sexy. We wanted to be attractive contemporary, and focused on our own lives'. We thought we were interested in the same tltings as men. Only later did we appreciate the achievements of the suffragists and begin to see how far we still needed to go to achieve the equality for which gaining the vote was only a beginning.

How This Book Presents Women's Studies

We begin with a focus on the ways that the category "woman" and gender more broadly have been culturally constructed in differ­ ent times and places and within different kinds of representations and socio-political contexts-all with an eye toward showing the ways these constructions have affected lived experience. We then move on to study women in the context of their various social relationships, with special reference to their positions within ever-changing family forms; and lastly, we examine the gendering of key social arenas and institutions-specifically, the domains of education, work, religion, and politics. Inevitably, we found that certain top­ ics could just as easily have appeared in the work chapter as in the one on politics. At times we opted in favor of slight repetition in order to highlight the way a single phe­ nomenon or event (such as the U.S. Supreme Court decision of 2011 favoring Wal-Mart in a class action suit filed by women employees) could focus important attention on different