Feminism in culture

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Feminism has affected culture in many ways, and has famously been theorized in relation to culture by Angela McRobbie, Laura Mulvey and others. Timothy Laurie and Jessica Kean have argued that "one of [feminism's] most important innovations has been to seriously examine the ways women receive popular culture, given that so much pop culture is made by and for men." [1] This is reflected in a variety of forms, including literature, music, film and other screen cultures.

Contents

Women's writing

Virginia Woolf Virginia Woolf 1927.jpg
Virginia Woolf

Women's writing came to exist as a separate category of scholarly interest relatively recently. In the West, second-wave feminism prompted a general reevaluation of women's historical contributions, and various academic sub-disciplines, such as Women's history (or herstory) and women's writing (including in English) (a list is available), developed in response to the belief that women's lives and contributions have been underrepresented as areas of scholarly interest. [2] Virginia Blain et al. characterize the growth in interest since 1970 in women's writing as "powerful". [2] Much of this early period of feminist literary scholarship was given over to the rediscovery and reclamation of texts written by women. Studies such as Dale Spender's Mothers of the Novel (1986) and Jane Spencer's The Rise of the Woman Novelist (1986) were ground-breaking in their insistence that women have always been writing. Commensurate with this growth in scholarly interest, various presses began the task of reissuing long-out-of-print texts. Virago Press began to publish its large list of nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century novels in 1975 and became one of the first commercial presses to join in the project of reclamation. In the 1980s, Pandora Press, responsible for publishing Spender's study, issued a companion line of eighteenth-century novels written by women. [3] More recently, Broadview Press has begun to issue eighteenth- and nineteenth-century works, many hitherto out of print, and the University of Kentucky has a series of republications of early women's novels. There has been commensurate growth in the area of biographical dictionaries of women writers due to a perception, according to one editor, that "most of our women are not represented in the 'standard' reference books in the field". [2]

Science fiction

In the 1960s, the genre of science fiction combined its sensationalism with political and technological critiques of society to produce feminist science fiction. With the advent of feminism, questioning women's roles became fair game to this "subversive, mind expanding genre". [4] Two early texts are Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) and Joanna Russ' The Female Man (1970). They serve to highlight the socially constructed nature of gender roles by creating utopias that do away with gender. [5] Both authors were also pioneers in feminist criticism of science fiction in the 1960s and '70s, in essays collected in The Language of the Night (Le Guin, 1979) and How To Suppress Women's Writing (Russ, 1983). Another major work of feminist science fiction has been [6] Kindred by Octavia Butler.

Women's films

The term "women's cinema" usually refers to the work of women film directors. It can also designate the work of other women behind the camera such as cinematographers and screenwriters. Although the participation of women film editors, costume designers, and production designers is usually not considered to be decisive enough to justify the term "women's cinema", it does have a large influence on the visual impression of any movie.

In a film from popular culture although not in women's film, an early reference to the "feminist movement" is heard from Katharine Hepburn in the 1942 movie Woman of the Year .

Another film, She Is Beautiful When She's Angry, released in 2014, details the women's liberation movement in the United States with real accounts from women involved.

Women's music

Lady Gaga is an example of recent female feminist musicians. Lady Gaga Grammys 2017.png
Lady Gaga is an example of recent female feminist musicians.

Women's music (or womyn's music or wimmin's music) is the music by women, for women, and about women. [7] The genre emerged as a musical expression of the second-wave feminist movement [8] as well as the labor, civil rights, and peace movements. [9] The movement was started by lesbians such as Cris Williamson, Meg Christian, and Margie Adam, African-American women activists such as Bernice Johnson Reagon and her group Sweet Honey in the Rock, and peace activist Holly Near. [9] Other women such as Madonna, Cyndi Lauper and Lady Gaga have also revolutionized feminist music today by breaking barriers and allowing artists from all walks of life to have their time in the spotlight. [10] Women's music also refers to the wider industry of women's music that goes beyond the performing artists to include studio musicians, producers, sound engineers, technicians, cover artists, distributors, promoters, and festival organizers who are also women. [7]

Riot grrrl movement

Kathleen Hanna was the lead singer of Bikini Kill, a riot grrrl music band formed in 1990. Khanna.jpg
Kathleen Hanna was the lead singer of Bikini Kill, a riot grrrl music band formed in 1990.

Riot grrrl (or riot grrl) is an underground feminist punk movement that started in the 1990s and is often associated with third-wave feminism (it is sometimes seen as its starting point). It was grounded in the DIY philosophy of punk values. Riot grrrls took an anti-corporate stance of self-sufficiency and self-reliance. [11] Riot grrrls' emphasis on universal female identity and separatism often appears more closely allied with second-wave feminism than with the third wave. [12] Riot grrrl bands often address issues such as rape, domestic abuse, sexuality, and female empowerment. Some bands associated with the movement are Bikini Kill, Bratmobile, Excuse 17, Free Kitten, Heavens to Betsy, Huggy Bear, L7, and Team Dresch. In addition to a music scene, riot grrrl is also a subculture; zines, the DIY ethic, art, political action, and activism are part of the movement. Riot grrrls hold meetings, start chapters, and support and organize women in music. [13]

The riot grrrl movement sprang out of Olympia, Washington, and Washington, D.C., in the early 1990s. It sought to give women the power to control their voices and artistic expressions. [11] Riot grrrls took a growling double or triple r, placing it in the word girl as a way to take back the derogatory use of the term. [11]

The riot grrrls' links to social and political issues are where the beginnings of third-wave feminism can be seen. The music and zine writings are strong examples of "cultural politics in action, with strong women giving voice to important social issues though an empowered, a female oriented community, many people link the emergence of the third-wave feminism to this time". [11] The movement encouraged and made "adolescent girls' standpoints central", allowing them to express themselves fully. [14]

Pornography

The feminist sex wars is a term for the acrimonious debates within the feminist movement in the late 1970s through the 1980s around the issues of feminism, sexuality, sexual representation, pornography, sadomasochism, the role of trans women in the lesbian community, and other sexual issues. The feminist debate on porn pitted anti-pornography feminism against sex-positive feminism, and parts of the feminist movement were deeply divided by these debates. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19]

Anti-pornography movement

Anti-pornography feminists, such as Catharine MacKinnon, Andrea Dworkin, Robin Morgan, and Dorchen Leidholdt, put pornography at the center of a feminist explanation of women's oppression. [20]

Some feminists, such as Diana Russell, Andrea Dworkin, Catharine MacKinnon, Susan Brownmiller, Dorchen Leidholdt, Ariel Levy, Robin Morgan, and Page Mellish, argue that pornography is degrading of women and complicit in violence against women both in its production (whereby, they charge, abuse and exploitation of women performing in pornography is rampant) and in its consumption (whereby, they charge, pornography eroticizes the domination, humiliation, and coercion of women and reinforces sexual and cultural attitudes that are complicit in rape and sexual harassment). [21]

Beginning in the late 1970s, anti-pornography radical feminists formed organizations such as Women Against Pornography and Feminists Fighting Pornography that provided educational events, including slide-shows, speeches, and guided tours of the sex industry in Times Square, New York City, in order to raise awareness of the content of pornography and the sexual subculture in pornography shops and live sex shows. [22] Andrea Dworkin and Robin Morgan began articulating a vehemently anti-porn stance based in radical feminism beginning in 1974 and anti-porn feminist groups, such as Women Against Violence in Pornography and Media in San Francisco, became highly active in various U.S. cities during the late 1970s. [21]

Sex-positive movement

Sex-positive feminism is a movement that was formed in order to address issues of women's sexual pleasure, freedom of expression, sex work, and inclusive gender identities. Ellen Willis' 1981 essay, "Lust Horizons: Is the Women's Movement Pro-Sex?" is the origin of the term, "pro-sex feminism"; the more commonly used variant, "sex positive feminism" arose soon after. [23]

Although some sex-positive feminists, such as Betty Dodson, were active in the early 1970s, much of sex-positive feminism largely began in the late 1970s and 1980s as a response to the increasing emphasis in radical feminism on anti-pornography activism.

Sex-positive feminists are also strongly opposed to radical feminist calls for legislation against pornography, a strategy they decried as censorship, and something that could, they argued, be used by social conservatives to censor the sexual expression of women, gay people, and other sexual minorities. The initial period of intense debate and acrimony between sex-positive and anti-pornography feminists during the early 1980s is often referred to as the feminist sex wars. Other sex-positive feminists became involved not in opposition to other feminists but in direct response to what they saw as patriarchal control of sexuality.[ citation needed ]

Sex work and sex industry

Feminist views on sex work and prostitution vary. Feminist supporters of sex worker rights and decriminalization argue that women's right to control their own bodies and sexuality includes the right to engage in consensual sexual commerce. They also argue that criminalization and social stigmatization of sex work and sex workers only worsens the existing marginalization and victimization that sex workers are often subjected to. On the other hand, feminist opponents of prostitution argue that prostitution is so tangled with forced prostitution, human trafficking, exploitation, and violence as to be inseparable from these ills in practice. They also argue that prostitution and other forms of sex work are inherently a product of patriarchy and sexism, and that the presence even of consensual sex work is harmful to society and women in particular. While feminists across all positions generally agree that direct criminalization of women in prostitution should be ended, there is little or no consensus on much else on the topics of legal approaches to the sex trade, the status of sex workers, or the nature of sex work itself.

See also

Related Research Articles

Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that societies prioritize the male point of view and that women are treated unjustly in these societies. Efforts to change this include fighting against gender stereotypes and improving educational, professional, and interpersonal opportunities and outcomes for women.

Radical feminism is a perspective within feminism that calls for a radical re-ordering of society in which male supremacy is eliminated in all social and economic contexts, while recognizing that women's experiences are also affected by other social divisions such as in race, class, and sexual orientation. The ideology and movement emerged in the 1960s.

The sex-positive movement is a social and philosophical movement that seeks to change cultural attitudes and norms around sexuality, promoting the recognition of sexuality as a natural and healthy part of the human experience and emphasizing the importance of personal sovereignty, safer sex practices, and consensual sex. It covers every aspect of sexual identity including gender expression, orientation, relationship to the body, relationship-style choice, and reproductive rights. Sex-positivity is "an attitude towards human sexuality that regards all consensual sexual activities as fundamentally healthy and pleasurable, encouraging sexual pleasure and experimentation." It challenges societal taboos and aims to promote healthy and consensual sexual activities. The sex-positive movement also advocates for comprehensive sex education and safe sex as part of its campaign. The movement generally makes no moral distinctions among types of sexual activities, regarding these choices as matters of personal preference.

This is an index of articles related to the issue of feminism, women's liberation, the women's movement, and women's rights.

Sex-positive feminism, also known as pro-sex feminism, sex-radical feminism, or sexually liberal feminism, is a feminist movement centering on the idea that sexual freedom is an essential component of women's freedom. They oppose legal or social efforts to control sexual activities between consenting adults, whether they are initiated by the government, other feminists, opponents of feminism, or any other institution. They embrace sexual minority groups, endorsing the value of coalition-building with marginalized groups. Sex-positive feminism is connected with the sex-positive movement. Sex-positive feminism brings together anti-censorship activists, LGBT activists, feminist scholars, producers of pornography and erotica, among others. Sex-positive feminists believe that prostitution can be a positive experience if workers are treated with respect, and agree that sex work should not be criminalized.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catharine A. MacKinnon</span> American feminist scholar and legal activist

Catharine Alice MacKinnon is an American feminist legal scholar, activist, and author. She is the Elizabeth A. Long Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, where she has been tenured since 1990, and the James Barr Ames Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. From 2008 to 2012, she was the special gender adviser to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Third-wave feminism</span> Feminist movement, 1990s–2010s

Third-wave feminism is a feminist movement that began in the early 1990s, prominent in the decades prior to the fourth wave. Grounded in the civil-rights advances of the second wave, Gen X third-wave feminists born in the 1960s and 1970s embraced diversity and individualism in women, and sought to redefine what it meant to be a feminist. The third wave saw the emergence of new feminist currents and theories, such as intersectionality, sex positivity, vegetarian ecofeminism, transfeminism, and postmodern feminism. According to feminist scholar Elizabeth Evans, the "confusion surrounding what constitutes third-wave feminism is in some respects its defining feature."

Antisexualism is opposition or hostility towards sexual behavior and sexuality.

Women Against Pornography (WAP) was a radical feminist activist group based out of New York City that was influential in the anti-pornography movement of the late 1970s and the 1980s.

Sheila Jeffreys is a former professor of political science at the University of Melbourne, born in England. A lesbian feminist scholar, she analyses the history and politics of human sexuality.

Dorchen A. Leidholdt is an activist and leader in the feminist movement against violence against women. Since the mid-1970s, she has counseled and advocated for rape victims, organized against "the media's promotion of violence against women", served on the legal team for the plaintiff in a precedent-setting sexual harassment case, founded an international non-governmental organization fighting prostitution and trafficking in women and children, directed the nation's largest legal services program for victims of domestic violence, advocated for the enactment and implementation of laws that further the rights of abused women, and represented hundreds of women victimized by intimate partner violence, human trafficking, sexual assault, the threat of honor killing, female genital mutilation, forced and child marriage, and the internet bride trade.

The feminist sex wars, also known as the lesbian sex wars, sex wars or porn wars, are terms used to refer to collective debates amongst feminists regarding a number of issues broadly relating to sexuality and sexual activity. Differences of opinion on matters of sexuality deeply polarized the feminist movement, particularly leading feminist thinkers, in the late 1970s and early 1980s and continue to influence debate amongst feminists to this day.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andrea Dworkin</span> American feminist writer and activist (1946–2005)

Andrea Rita Dworkin was an American radical feminist writer and activist best known for her analysis of pornography. Her feminist writings, beginning in 1974, span 30 years. They are found in a dozen solo works: nine books of non-fiction, two novels, and a collection of short stories. Another three volumes were co-written or co-edited with US constitutional law professor and feminist activist, Catharine A. MacKinnon.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Feminism in the United States</span> History of the feminist movement in the USA

Feminism is aimed at defining, establishing, and defending a state of equal political, economic, cultural, and social rights for women. It has had a massive influence on American politics. Feminism in the United States is often divided chronologically into first-wave, second-wave, third-wave, and fourth-wave feminism.

Feminist views on pornography range from total condemnation of the medium as an inherent form of violence against women to an embracing of some forms as a medium of feminist expression. This debate reflects larger concerns surrounding feminist views on sexuality, and is closely related to those on prostitution, BDSM, and other issues. Pornography has been one of the most divisive issues in feminism, particularly in Anglophone (English-speaking) countries. This division was exemplified in the feminist sex wars of the 1980s, which pitted anti-pornography activists against pro-pornography ones.

Feminist views on BDSM vary widely from acceptance to rejection. BDSM refers to bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, and Sado-Masochism. In order to evaluate its perception, two polarizing frameworks are compared. Some feminists, such as Gayle Rubin and Patrick Califia, perceive BDSM as a valid form of expression of female sexuality, while other feminists, such as Andrea Dworkin and Susan Griffin, have stated that they regard BDSM as a form of woman-hating violence. Some lesbian feminists practice BDSM and regard it as part of their sexual identity.

Feminist pornography is a genre of film developed by or for those within the sex-positive feminist movement. It was created for the purpose of promoting gender equality by portraying more bodily movements and sexual fantasies of women and members of the LGBT community.

Feminist views on sexuality widely vary. Many feminists, particularly radical feminists, are highly critical of what they see as sexual objectification and sexual exploitation in the media and society. Radical feminists are often opposed to the sex industry, including opposition to prostitution and pornography. Other feminists define themselves as sex-positive feminists and believe that a wide variety of expressions of female sexuality can be empowering to women when they are freely chosen. Some feminists support efforts to reform the sex industry to become less sexist, such as the feminist pornography movement.

<i>Woman Hating</i> 1974 book by Andrea Dworkin

Woman Hating: A Radical Look at Sexuality is the debut nonfiction book by American radical feminist writer and activist Andrea Dworkin. It was first published in 1974 by E. P. Dutton.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Feminist views on the sex industry</span>

Feminist perspectives on sex markets vary widely, depending on the type of feminism being applied. The sex market is defined as the system of supply and demand which is generated by the existence of sex work as a commodity. The sex market can further be segregated into the direct sex market, which mainly applies to prostitution, and the indirect sex market, which applies to sexual businesses which provide services such as lap dancing. The final component of the sex market lies in the production and selling of pornography. With the distinctions between feminist perspectives, there are many documented instances from feminist authors of both explicit and implied feminist standpoints that provide coverage on the sex market in regards to both "autonomous" and "non-autonomous" sex trades. The quotations are added since some feminist ideologies believe the commodification of women's bodies is never autonomous and therefore subversive or misleading by terminology.

References

  1. ↑ Laurie, Timothy; Kean, Jessica (2015). "Why consenting adults should see 50 Shades of Grey - and take their teens". The Sydney Morning Herald. February 19
  2. 1 2 3 Blain, Virginia; Clements, Patricia; Grundy, Isobel (1990). The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers From the Middle Ages to the Present. New Haven: Yale University Press. p.  1231. ISBN   0-300-04854-8.
  3. ↑ Gilbert, Sandra M., Paperbacks: From Our Mothers' Libraries: Women Who Created the Novel, in New York Times, May 4, 1986.
  4. ↑ Clute, John; Nicholls, Peter (1995). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: St. Martin's Griffin. p. 1386. ISBN   0-312-13486-X.
  5. ↑ Helford, Elyce Rae, in Westfahl, Gary, The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy (Greenwood Press, 2005), 290.
  6. ↑ Sturgis, Susanna, Octavia E. Butler: June 22, 1947 — February 24, 2006, in The Women's Review of Books, 23(3): 19 May 2006.
  7. 1 2 Lont, Cynthia, Women's Music: No Longer a Small Private Party, in Reebee Garofalo, ed., Rockin' the Boat: Mass Music & Mass Movements (Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1992 ( ISBN   0-89608-427-2), p. 242).
  8. ↑ Peraino, Judith, Girls with Guitars and Other Strange Stories, in Journal of the American Musicological Society, vol. 54, no. 3 (2001), p. 693.
  9. 1 2 Mosbacher, Dee, Radical Harmonies , Woman Vision (2002 (OCLC 53071762)). See also Archived 2008-05-13 at the Wayback Machine .
  10. ↑ Reddington, Helen. The Lost Women of Rock Music: Female Musicians of the Punk Era. Vol. 2nd ed, Equinox Publishing Ltd, 2012.
  11. 1 2 3 4 Rowe-Finkbeiner, Kristin (2004). The F-Word: Feminism In Jeopardy—Women, Politics and the Future. Seal Press. ISBN   1-58005-114-6.
  12. ↑ Rosenberg, Jessica; Gitana Garofalo (1998). "Riot Grrrl: Revolutions From Within; Spring 1998". Signs. 23 (Feminisms and Youth Cultures, number 3): 809. doi:10.1086/495289. S2CID   144109102.
  13. ↑ Schilt, Kristen (2003). "'A Little Too Ironic': The Appropriation and Packaging of Riot Grrrl Politics by Mainstream Female Musicians" (PDF). Popular Music and Society. 26 (1): 5–16. doi:10.1080/0300776032000076351. S2CID   37919089.
  14. ↑ Code, Lorraine (2004). Encyclopedia of Feminist Theories. London: Routledge. p.  560. ISBN   0-415-30885-2.
  15. ↑ Duggan, Lisa; Hunter, Nan D. (1995). Sex Wars: Sexual Dissent and Political Culture. New York: Routledge. ISBN   0-415-91036-6.
  16. ↑ Hansen, Karen Tranberg; Philipson, Ilene J. (1990). Women, Class, and the Feminist Imagination: A Socialist-Feminist Reader . Philadelphia: Temple University Press. ISBN   0-87722-630-X.
  17. ↑ Gerhard, Jane F. (2001). Desiring Revolution: Second-Wave Feminism and the Rewriting of American Sexual Thought, 1920 to 1982. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN   0-231-11204-1.
  18. ↑ Leidholdt, Dorchen; Raymond, Janice G. (1990). The Sexual Liberals and the Attack on Feminism. New York: Pergamon Press. ISBN   0-08-037457-3.
  19. ↑ Vance, Carole S. (1989). Pleasure and Danger: Exploring Female Sexuality. Thorsons Publishers. ISBN   0-04-440593-6.
  20. ↑ McElroy, Wendy (1995). XXX: A Woman's Right to Pornography. New York: St. Martin's Press. p.  243. ISBN   0-312-13626-9.
  21. 1 2 Dworkin, Andrea (1989). Pornography: Men Possessing Women. New York: Plume. p. 300. ISBN   0-452-26793-5.
  22. ↑ Brownmiller, Susan (1999). In Our Time: Memoir of a Revolution. New York: Dial Press. p.  360. ISBN   0-385-31486-8.
  23. ↑ Willis, Ellen (1981-06-17). "Lust Horizons: Is the Women's Movement Pro-Sex?". Village Voice . No. 17 June 1981.
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