Download or read book The Sceptical Feminist RLE Feminist Theory written by Janet Radcliffe Richards and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A systematic and original study of feminist issues, The Sceptical Feminist fights a battle on two fronts: against the view that little or nothing is wrong with women’s position, and at the same time against much current feminist dogma. It is written by a philosopher who, in the tradition of John Stuart Mill’s classic The Subjection of Women, avoids the psychological and sociological speculation characteristic of much recent feminism and concentrates on the analysis of arguments. By these means she constructs a powerful and often unexpected case for radical change in the position of women, as well as for a change of attitude among many feminists. From her analysis, Janet Radcliffe Richards argues that positive discrimination in favour of women is essential for justice, that traditional sexual roles never had anything to do with beliefs about each sex’s capabilities, that current abortion practice reflects a disguised wish to punish women’s sexual activity, that ‘women’s work’ is rightly little valued, and that traditional ideals of femininity are inherently pernicious. But she also argues that a movement for sexual justice cannot ‘take the woman’s side in everything’, that feminism should not be thought of as the primary struggle, that dismissing ‘male’ logic and science will undermine feminists’ own intentions, that the state should not subsidise motherhood, that ever available crèches would be disastrous for women, that there is no inherent degradation in prostitution, and that contempt for beauty and adornment has nothing to do with feminism. This is a book for feminists, for their critics, and for students of moral, political and social philosophy.
Download or read book The Sceptical Feminist RLE Feminist Theory written by Janet Radcliffe Richards and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A systematic and original study of feminist issues, The Sceptical Feminist fights a battle on two fronts: against the view that little or nothing is wrong with women’s position, and at the same time against much current feminist dogma. It is written by a philosopher who, in the tradition of John Stuart Mill’s classic The Subjection of Women, avoids the psychological and sociological speculation characteristic of much recent feminism and concentrates on the analysis of arguments. By these means she constructs a powerful and often unexpected case for radical change in the position of women, as well as for a change of attitude among many feminists. From her analysis, Janet Radcliffe Richards argues that positive discrimination in favour of women is essential for justice, that traditional sexual roles never had anything to do with beliefs about each sex’s capabilities, that current abortion practice reflects a disguised wish to punish women’s sexual activity, that ‘women’s work’ is rightly little valued, and that traditional ideals of femininity are inherently pernicious. But she also argues that a movement for sexual justice cannot ‘take the woman’s side in everything’, that feminism should not be thought of as the primary struggle, that dismissing ‘male’ logic and science will undermine feminists’ own intentions, that the state should not subsidise motherhood, that ever available crèches would be disastrous for women, that there is no inherent degradation in prostitution, and that contempt for beauty and adornment has nothing to do with feminism. This is a book for feminists, for their critics, and for students of moral, political and social philosophy.
Download or read book The Sceptical Feminist written by Janet Radcliffe Richards and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Sceptical Feminist written by Janet Radcliffe Richards and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 1991 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The sceptical feminist written by Janet Radcliffe Richards and published by . This book was released on 1980 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Oppositional Imagination RLE Feminist Theory written by Joan Cocks and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-27 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oppositional Imagination draws together elements from Marxism, analytical philosophy, post-structuralism, and post-colonial criticism to analyse the elusive interplay of culture and power. It focuses its attention on cultural domination, opposition and evasion in the realm of sex and gender. Joan Cocks reflects on questions crucial to both political theorists and feminists: the relationship between political theory and practical life; the possibility of bringing together a philosophical and a literary language to comprehend and evoke concrete experience; and the reconciliation of radical political commitment with an appreciation of shades of grey in the social world. She explores the variety of ways in which power and eroticism intersect; the liberating and tyrannical impulses of marginal cultures; and the place of the loyalist, the eccentric, the critic, the traitor, and the rebel in the sexual struggle. The Oppositional Imagination reaffirms the centrality of political theory and feminist practice while at the same time challenging certain of their key principles in thought-provoking ways.
Download or read book Subordination RLE Feminist Theory written by Clare Burton and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Subordination presents a survey of some of the most important ideas developed within feminism since the 1970s. Among the central themes addressed are: the origins of women’s subordination; the private/public split; the nature and the role of domestic labour; the impact of psychoanalysis on feminist theory; the relationship between the State and women’s subordination. One of the book’s purposes is to draw together strands of thought and debate often kept separate. Throughout, the major theoretical developments in Britain, the United States and Australia are reviewed within a comparative perspective. Consistently, the focus of attention is on how, and how far, theorists in these countries have been able to point to ways of explaining the changing but enduring nature of sexual inequalities.
Download or read book Coming to Terms RLE Feminist Theory written by Elizabeth Weed and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-27 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over a decade, feminist studies have occupied an extraordinary position in the United States. On the one hand, they have contributed to the development of a strong ‘identity’ politics; on the other, they have been part of the post-structuralist critique of the unified subject – its experience, truth and presence – and of the massive challenge to Western metaphysics and humanism. Along with race and ethnic studies, feminist enquiry has moved beyond the fiction of a unitary feminism to address the differences within the study of difference. The essays in this volume all address feminism’s relationships to theory and politics at the level of the criticism and production of knowledge. Readers and students of politics, history, literature, philosophy, sociology and the sciences – anyone with a stake in theory and politics – will benefit from this powerful book.
Download or read book Contemporary Western European Feminism RLE Feminist Theory written by Gisela Kaplan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contemporary Western European Feminism is a ground-breaking history of feminism. Gisela Kaplan invites a critical analysis of current ideas, terms and assumptions about our modern world. Written confidently and with compassion, this is the story of a long revolution that has set out to change predominant attitudes and transform value hierarchies and human lifestyles. By outlining the postwar histories of individual countries Kaplan contextualises women’s movements and documents a significant chapter of European social history. She poses questions about the interrelationship between the new movements and the parliamentary democracies in which they occurred, while analysing the contradictions of living in modern capitalist countries. Contemporary Western European Feminism also tackles important contradictions, such as those between the welfare state and the free market economy; industrialisation and religious value systems; social engineering and the production of wealth; and dissent and patrimonial systems of democracy. For those wanting to know more about Europe without the intimidating barriers of language and for those already experts in its social history, Contemporary Western European Feminism is essential reading.
Download or read book The Liberation of Women RLE Feminist Theory written by Roberta Hamilton and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 117 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Liberation of Women, Roberta Hamilton explores two of the key questions that have been systematically raised by the Women’s Liberation Movement: why have women occupied a subordinate position in society and how can the variation in the forms and intensity of their exploitation and oppression be explained? Within the Women’s Liberation Movement there have been seen to be two different and opposed answers to these questions: a feminist answer and a Marxist one. The feminist analysis has addressed itself to a patriarchal ideology, locating the source of male domination and female subordination in the biological differences between the sexes. Marxists, on the other hand, have seen the origins of female subordination in the growing phenomenon of private property, which, in their view, has made possible and necessary the exploitation of these biological differences in the modern world. This new work attempts to examine this debate in specific analytical terms through a study of the changing role of women during a particular historical period – the seventeenth century. In the course of less than one hundred years the rise of capitalism and the acceptance of Protestantism had separately and together radically altered every aspect of a woman’s life. Can both a feminist and a Marxist analysis account for these changes? Do such accounts conflict with each other, making a choice inevitable? Do they overlap to such an extent that retaining both would be redundant? Or, finally, are they complementary, can they usefully coexist? To answer these questions Roberta Hamilton tries to work out the changes that can be attributed to the emergence of capitalism (a Marxist explanation) and those that stemmed from the transformation in patriarchal ideology (a feminist explanation). The Liberation of Women will be of particular interest to students of history, sociology and Women’s Studies and to those who have been involved in the Women’s Liberation Movement. In particular, it will prove essential basic reading for an ever-growing number of courses on sexual divisions in society and the role of women.
Download or read book Tearing the Veil RLE Feminist Theory written by Susan Lipschitz and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This a collection of essays about women, by women, which examine the production of femininity within a patriarchal society. The essays show that characteristics generally considered to be ‘feminine’ are in fact cultural constructions within a patriarchal order. The patriarchal culture is taken by us to be a system of meanings, as well as power relations, which pervades our view of women at both a conscious and an unconscious level. The symbolism of the rituals, myths, art works and polemics examined in the essays is related to the ways women are psychically constructed and constrained by the dominant heterosexual order. The Mother, the Witch, the Whore, the Pure Woman, the Amazon and the Free Woman are considered and the contributors make extensive use of original source material to give force to the argument that the stereotypic view of a feminine woman as naturally and inevitably weak, passive and powerless is one that can be seriously challenged.
Download or read book Materialist Feminism and the Politics of Discourse RLE Feminist Theory written by Rosemary Hennessy and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-27 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Materialist Feminism and the Politics of Discourse confronts the impasses in materialist feminist work on rethinking ‘woman’ as a discursively constructed subject. The book looks at the problem of examining critically the social dimensions on which theories of discourse are premised: how such theories understand ‘materiality’; the relation between ‘women’s experience’ and feminist politics, and that between history and discourse. Rosemary Hennessy considers the work of Kristeva, Foucault, Laclau and Mouffe, and argues for a materialist feminist re-articulation of discourse as ideology. Concerns over identity and difference are incorporated into a rewriting of materialist feminism's analysis of women's oppression across capitalist and patriarchal structures. In adapting postmodernist theories in this way, Hennessy develops a project of social change, where feminism, while maintaining its specificity, is necessarily aligned with other emancipatory movements.
Download or read book Skeptical Feminism written by Carolyn Dever and published by U of Minnesota Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this major work, Carolyn Dever considers the ambivalence or outright hostility many feminists feel toward theory, arguing that a fundamental skepticism toward abstraction has been vital to the development of the movement. Dever analyzes the politics of feminist theory by looking at its popular, activist, and academic modes, from the liberation movements of the 1970s to gender and queer studies now. Using key moments in the history of modern feminism--consciousness-raising, best-selling books like Sexual Politics by Kate Millett and The Women's Room by Marilyn French, and media representations of women's struggle for equality--Dever outlines heated debates over psychoanalysis, sexuality, and activism. The abstract and the grounded converge in discussions about the relationship between the feminist mind and the feminist body and in the preoccupation, both uneasy and utopian, with lesbian sexuality. Powerful, illuminating, and galvanizing, Skeptical Feminism traces the strategies the women's movement has used to make theory matter--and points toward a new, politically engaged approach to feminist thought. A clarion call for a new approach to feminist thought.
Download or read book Feminist Knowledge RLE Feminist Theory written by Sneja Gunew and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-20 with total page 357 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The ‘minority’ feminist viewpoints have often been submerged in the interests of maintaining a mainstream, universal model of feminism. This anthology takes into account the various differences among women while looking at the important areas of feminist struggle. While sisterhood is indeed global, it certainly does not mean that all women are required to submerge their specific differences and assimilate to a universal model. Consequently, the collection includes essays by leaders in the field of post-structuralist enquiry as well as by those immersed in the new spirituality, and the social consequences of recent biological research. Other essays reflect the political struggles which continue to be waged with different strategies by socialist and radical feminists, and the self-searching analyses undertaken by feminists uneasy about their inclusion within educational institutions and the radical new interpretations of sexuality within the cultural domain. The collection begins with a critique of white mainstream feminism emanating from Aboriginal women in Australia. The implications of the critique indicate that there is a pervasive racism within the feminist movement.
Download or read book Feminists and State Welfare RLE Feminist Theory written by JENNIFER DALE and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-11-12 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Designed for students of social policy and women’s studies, this text gives a readable account of the wide range of feminist ideas about women and welfare. The authors draw on feminist theory, research and analysis to explore women’s experiences of welfare, and the debates within feminism on how and why the welfare state oppresses women. In an original contribution they discuss women’s impact on the development of the welfare state both as feminist campaigners and as pioneers of new welfare professions. The book concludes by reviewing contemporary feminist strategies to transform the welfare state to meet women’s needs. Whilst the authors put forward their own evaluation of these different feminist approaches, they aim to leave readers with plenty of scope to make up their own minds on the issues.
Download or read book Ethics and Human Reproduction RLE Feminist Theory written by Christine Overall and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-20 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Ethics and Human Reproduction, Christine Overall blends feminist theory and philosophical expertise to provide a coherent analysis of a range of moral questions and social policy issues pertaining to human reproduction and the new reproductive technologies. Topics covered include: sex preselection, artificial insemination, prenatal diagnosis, abortion, in vitro fertilisation and embryo transfer, surrogate motherhood, and childbirth. Throughout the book, the author examines the values and assumptions underlying common perceptions of sexuality and fertility, the status of the foetus, the value of children, the nature of parenting, and the roles of women. In so doing, she develops a feminist approach to answering questions about reproductive rights and freedoms, the value of a genetic link between mother and their offspring, the commodification of reproduction, and the effects of reproductive technologies on women and children. This book should be essential reading for anyone interested in the new reproductive technologies, biomedical ethics, and women’s health.
Download or read book Nostalgia and Sexual Difference RLE Feminist Theory written by Janice Doane and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-20 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dissatisfaction with the present can cause people to gaze nostalgically back to an idealized past; that nostalgia pervades contemporary rhetoric. In lamenting the ‘degeneracy’ of present-day America, social and literary critics as well as contemporary novelists often choose as their scapegoat the women’s movement and its increasing influence. Doane and Hodges show us how these social observers seek to ‘reinstate’ America and American values in ways that, overtly or covertly, do battle with the feminist movement for control of rhetoric, the power of language.
