In her essay, “Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses,” Chandra Talpade Mohanty explores the simplified construction of the “third-world woman” in hegemonic feminist discourses. In contrast, in her essay “US Third-World Feminism: The Theory and Method of Oppositional Consciousness in the Postmodern World,” Chela Sandoval specifically analyzes “US third-world feminism” and how it is the model for not only oppositional political activity, but also consciousness in the United States and how this has not been recognized by hegemonic “western” feminist discourses (). While Mohanty and Sandoval are analyzing and critiquing gender and gender politics, Mohanty is specifically focused on the simplified portrayal in “western” feminist discourses of “third world women” as victims, and Sandoval examines an oppositional mode of consciousness, which she defines as “differential consciousness” and how it is employed by “US third world feminism.” Both authors deconstruct gendered bodies of knowledge with an emphasis on the deconstruction of power, race, and colonialism. It is the deconstruction of these gendered bodies of knowledge that this essay will specifically analyze, as well as the depiction of what each author argues is missing from present discourses on gender, and finally, what they believe would be a better way to analyze gender discourses in a postmodern world. (maybe add another similar point, how western feminists are trying to portray “third-world women” and their motivation behind this act)
First, this essay wishes to examine the role of power and its deconstruction in Monhanty’s essay. Mohanty deconstructs the notion of power by critiquing three analytical assumptions that are found in western feminist...
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... She argues that while some situations may appear quite similar, they should not be treated as identical, as they have been, because they have very different, historically specifically explanations (64). It creates a false sense of commonality through oppression and overlooks that “beyond sisterhood there is still racism colonialism and imperialism” (64). Mohanty is not arguing that people of different identities and different backgrounds cannot join together to organize against a particular injustice; for example, she uses Indian women uniting against police brutality (65). However, she is arguing, “the analysis of these group identities cannot be based on universalistic, ahistorical categories” (65). So, while these women of different background can unite, it is always important that remember analyze the differences and not attempt to lump the women into “Women.”
As much as men are working, so are women, but ultimately they do not face the same obstacles. For example, “Even if one subscribes to a solely economic theory of oppression, how can one ignore that over half of the world's workers are female who suffer discrimination not only in the workplace, but also at home and in all the areas sex-related abuse” (Moraga 98). This gives readers a point of view in which women are marginalized in the work place, at home, and other areas alike. Here Moraga gives historical accounts of Chicana feminists and how they used their experiences to give speeches and create theories that would be of relevance. More so, Moraga states how the U.S. passes new bills that secretly oppress the poor and people of color, which their community falls under, and more specifically, women. For instance, “The form their misogyny takes is the dissolution of government-assisted abortions for the poor, bills to limit teenage girls’ right to birth control ... These backward political moves hurt all women, but most especially the poor and "colored." (Moraga 101). This creates women to feel powerless when it comes to control one’s body and leads them to be oppressed politically. This places the government to act as a protagonist, and the style of writing Moraga places them in, shines more light to the bad they can do, especially to women of color. Moraga uses the words, “backward moves”
Compare The Successes And Failures Of Patriarchy In Colonialism, In “The Tempest”, “Translations” And “Things Fall Apart”.
Mullings early chapters discuss the importance of considering the differences between races and gender and how this affects women within work, family and community.
We cannot deny the imperfection of the world today; poverty, violence, lack of education, and the general overwhelming deficiency of basic daily necessities are among some of the most troubling issues on the agenda. By carefully selecting our critical lens, we can gather that there are many aspects of today’s issues where we can focus our attention and begin the quest for solutions to these pervasive problems. Authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (2009) utilize their book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide to emphasize the particular struggle of women in the world today and how by addressing three particular abuses of sex trafficking and forced prostitution, gender-based violence (including honor killings and mass rape), and maternal mortality, we may begin “unlocking an incipient women’s movement to emancipate women and fight global poverty” (p. xxii). However, we must first understand the difficulty of addressing such complex issues by a proposing a “one-size fits all” solution and take into consideration the varying feminist perspectives that currently contemplate the oppression of women in societies around the world. To be able to critically digest Kristof and WuDunn’s book we must explore the types of stories and evidence included and how they’re presented, and the generalized theories behind the insight and solutions regarding the women in need around the world. The authors alienate their audience by ignoring the complexity of building a singular feminist movement. Kristof and WuDunn’s book Half the Sky further contributes to the oppression of women because they objectify Third World women by portraying them as victims in need of outside rescue and suggest that an overarching solution...
The colonial woman has often been imagined as a demure person, dressed in long skirt,apron and bonnet, toiling away at the spinning wheel, while tending to the stew at the hearth. In reality, the women of the early settlements of the United States were much more influential, strong and vital to the existence of the colonies. Her role,however, has shifted as the needs of the times dictated.
Hewitt, N. (2001). Re-rooting American women’s activism: Global perspectives on 1848. In C. R. McCann & S. Kim (Eds), Feminist Theory Reader: Local and Global Perspectives (3rd Ed.). (p. 31-38). New York, NY: Routledge.
We must also understand the exclusion of gender from revolutionary discourses as being part of patriarchy that is not challenged in certain revolutions. The exclusion of gender equality from what Lumumba struggled for is where there is a certain patriarchy, and this kind of patriarchy is evident in almost all revolutionary anti-colonial writing.
Lugones, Maria C. and Elizabeth V. Spelman. Have We Got a Theory for You! Feminist Theory, Cultural Imperialism and the Demand for “The Woman’s Voice.” Women and Values: Readings in Recent Feminist Philosophy. Edited by Marilyn Pearsall. Wadsworth Publishing Company: California. 1986. 19-31.
Feminism is approached by various meanings. As noted by a Salvadoran feminist activist Gloria Guzman, “It is a proposal for a change in the relations of power between people, men over women, and the relations of power expressed in the different realms of life” (Shayne, 2007).
In many ways, 1980’s feminist theories started to peel back the masculinist surface of world politics to address and bring to the surface these intricate gendered and racialized dynamics. Caprioli amongst many, not only asks that there be room for Tickner’s appeal for dialogue with feminist and IR scholars, but demands this to be necessary. Why is it essential for dialogue between these perspectives? Before answering that, we should first try to understand why it is that international politics was...
Feminists are accused of taking the perspective of a woman who is a product of Western ideology. Which is to say that feminists ‘assume that all women have similar attributes and experiences and ignore the impact of other variables such as race, class, wealth, and sexual preferences on the position of women’(Chalesworth in Nayak 2013, 86). That in doing so, they have effectively excluded other women of different culture, class, and religion. What I would like to emphasize here is that in pursuing equality, feminists have become the very ‘”elite” they criticizes. Feminists’ claims for human rights are Western based, as simultaneously feminists are claiming that human rights are
Academic discourse is the means by which new and old theories may be applied to a topic in order to reach a better understanding or challenge a notion raised within the field. It is through discussing and analyzing these concepts that individual voices may be applied to an academic community, allowing for a wider lens of thought to be picked up and further discussed. Grewal participates in this discourse in her article “'Women's Rights as Human Rights': Feminist Practices, Global Feminism, and Human Rights Regimes in Transnationality”. This paper shall analyze and discuss how Grewal applies previous theoretical concepts related to feminist discourse in order to offer a Transnationalist Feminist critique to the Global Feminist notion of Women's Rights as Human Rights.
...action with others… especially men. This supplies final substantiation of the authors' argument, that women continue to be oppressed by their male-dominated societies. It is a bold undertaking for women to ally and promote a world movement to abandon sexist traditions. Although I have never lived in a third world or non-Westernized country, I have studied the conditions women suffer as "inferior" to men. In National Geographic and various courses I have taken, these terrible conditions are depicted in full color. Gender inequality is a terrible trait of our global society, and unfortunately, a trait that might not be ready to change. In America we see gender bias towards women in voters' unwillingness to elect more females into high office, and while this is not nearly as severe as the rest of the world, it indicates the lingering practice of gender inequality.
Mohanty is drawing upon theoretical perspectives of postmodernism to understand difference and by that uncover essentialist and Universalist interpretations (Uduyagiri 1995:159). In particular she is drawing upon approaches familiar to Edward Said’s Orientalism and Focault’s approach to discourse, power and knowledge. Foucault’s theories are especially useful in a postmodernist argument since he acknowledge that there are several structures of power, and that the there is a diversity of localized resistances ( Udayagiri 1995: 161). Mohanty uses Foucault’s conception of power to uncover Universalist categories and how feminist writers define power as a binary structure – to be in possession of power versus being powerless (Mohanty 1991:71). This limited way of theorizing power fails to recognize counteroffensives and the varied forms of power. Mohanty uses Said’s Orientalism to show how the way Western cultural perceptions of the Orient “became a means of controlling the regio...
In this paper feminist aspect of post colonization will be studied in “Season of Migration to the North” novel by Tayeb Salih. Postcolonial feminism can be defined as seeks to compute for the way that racism and the long-lasting economic, cultural, and political influences of colonialism affect non-white, non-Western women in the postcolonial world, according to Oxford dictionary. As it mentioned earlier about the application of Feminism theory in literature, the provided definition of postcolonial feminism also is not applicable in literature analysis. Therefore, Oxford defines another applic...