Feminism

 

Feminism: emerges as an ideology, further started as a movement, it may be social or political.

·         Talks about gender equality (male, female or any gender)

•  As a term coined by French philosopher Charles Fourier in 1837

• Appeared as an ideology in France
  
  
  and Netherlands in 1872, after that in Great Britain during 1890s and in United States during 1910.    If we go through its history, we can see four phases of Feminism-

  First wave of Feminism:

·         A critic named Martha Lier has coined this in an article named The New York Times

·         The main motto of first wave was promoting women’s right to educate, vote and property.

·         Marry Wollstonecraft; Margaret Fuller and Virginia Woolf were its major thinkers.

Marry Wollstonecraft: called foremother of british feminist movement, her ideas regarding feminist thoughts can be seen in A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792)

Considered that the lack of education is major factor or reason behind the deprivation of women

Margaret fuller: is called the first feminist thinker of US also talked about women’s education. Her work is Women in 19^th Century (1845).

Virginia Woolf: a first critic who have talked about the language of society, which is male-oriented

Her work- A Room of One’s own (1929)

Points to be noted: all focused on education primarily. The first wave of feminist are sometimes called Liberal Feminist also, the ultimate reason behind this is they seek to provide individual equality of male and female also without changing the structure of society through political-legal reforms.

Second wave of Feminism:

Martha lear is supposed to be its coiner

Started in US during 1960s

Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex (1949), written in French and translated into English in 1953 by H. M. Parshley, became the basis for this wave. In this book Beauvoir perceives women as ‘Others’. They are always kept in binary opposition.

Betty Friedan: called the mother of second wave

She was the American feminist, who launched the second wave feminist across the United States under the influence of Simone de Beauvoir. In her work The Feminine Mystique (1963) she gave her ideas regarding feminism.

Point to be noted:

Radical feminism put their existence during the second wave against liberal feminism.

Radical feminists seek to abolish patriarchy by challenging existing social-norms of society and institution. They believe that by eliminating the patriarchy, a justice can be provided to human beings of society.

Third wave:

As a term coined by Rebecca Walker in an article “Becoming the Third Wave”, came in 1992, in which she said” I am not post-feminism feminist. I am the third wave.”

Thinkers: Judith Butler, Helene Cixous, Julia Kristeva and Catherine Belsey etc.

Third-wave is also called the post-feminism because third-wave feminists tended to use a post-structuralist interpretation of gender and sexuality. They were highly influenced by post-structuralist thinkers like Foucault, Derrida and Lacan. Third-wave saw the emergence of new feminist theories like…

Black feminism

Eco-feminism

Marxist-feminism

Trans-feminism

Eco feminism: gave notion regarding men’s exploitation towards nature and women for the sake of happiness. Eco-feminism objectified nature with feminine characteristics.

Fourth wave:

Started around 2012

Earlier feminist focused on liberation, individuality and mobility, where as fourth wave talked about physical assault, sexual harassment, bodily autonomy, body shaming, and sexiest imagery of women in media, glass ceiling, work-place discrimination and rape-culture.

Example of the fourth wave:

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