Third wave feminism began when Rebecca Walker founded in 1992, the Third Wave Foundation, an American non-profit organisation that aims to cultivate young women’s leadership and activism. The third wave consists of many of the daughters and sons of the second wave. These feminists grew up with many of the advantages that the second wave fought for and see women as fundamentally strong, confident and brave individuals. They seek to establish that image of women within the public consciousness, and they look for greater integration of women into politics, economics, and social forums.
Feminism has succeeded in securing many rights for women over the years it has developed, and the Western world has become close to a gender equal society. However, women in developing countries still struggle for rights and feminism is helping to bring equality into these areas.
How did this movement impact on the world or society in which it was conceived?
Feminism has greatly impacted society, especially in the Western world. As Western society has become increasingly accepting of feminist principles, some of these are no longer seen as specifically feminist, because they have been adopted by all or most people. Almost no one in Western societies today questions the right of women to vote, a concept that seemed quite strange 200 years ago. Feminism has enabled women to vote, obtain equal pay for equal work, the right to divorce, obtain birth control devices, have abortions, and many other rights.
Feminism can be said to have impacted upon modern day English. Many feminists insist on using non-sexist language. For example using “Ms.” to refer to both married and unmarried women, “humanity” instead of “mankind” and “he or she” in replace of “he” when the gender is unknown. Most feminists justify their desired use of language to promote a respectful treatment of women, rather than in the belief that language actually affects people’s perception of reality.
The feminist movement has also had an impact on religion. In Christianity and Judaism especially, women are becoming more equal with men by obtaining positions of power. Women are now ordained as clergy in Protestant Christianity and rabbis and cantors in Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist Judaism. Islam, however has not followed this trend and still forbid women to be recognised as religious clergies and scholars.
Perhaps the most notable impact that feminism has had on society is the impact on heterosexual relationships. The power relationship between men and women has shifted markedly. In the past, the male was the more dominant person in the relationship. Nowadays, females are more assertive. It is not uncommon for women to initiate a relationship, or even a marriage. This change has brought about confusion about roles and identities for some. Some women have struggled to live up to the socially accepted identity of “superwoman” i.e. being able to juggle family and a career successfully. Men are now more involved with the family and are expected to assist in managing family matters more than in previous times.
Feminism has also brought about criticism, particularly from masculists, who suggest that social change and legal reform has gone too far and are now disadvantaging men. Nowadays, women have been shown to be more intelligent and communicative than men, meaning they are doing better at school, and gaining high paying executive positions. Another argument for masculists is that much of society is now biased towards women, for example, custody hearings are biased towards the mother due to the belief that the mother-child bond is the strongest in the family, even though women are saying that men should be equally involved in family matters. The point has gotten to where it is becoming quite hypocritical and double standards are being revealed. Some feminists, especially third wave, generally agree that a greater equality between the sexes is necessary to improve society.
How can a text be said to have a feminist reading?
A text can be said to have a feminist reading when it is criticised by feminists for having the traditions and conventions of patriarchy. Patriarchy is the ideology that sees as ‘natural’, the dominance of men and the marginalising of women politically, economically and psychologically. Feminist literary criticism attempts to eliminate the notion of men’s superiority over women in literary, historical and critical contexts.
Feminist literary critics explain that gender inequalities exist in three levels: in the production of texts, the structure and language of texts and through our reading practices.
Because the majority of publishing houses and printing presses are owned by men, feminist literary critics believe that through their editorial practices, they portray negative stereotypes of women and prefer to exemplify masculine views of life.
For some feminist readers, their project of interpretation is to expose patriarchal nature of language itself. This includes usage that denigrates or ignores women. The most common example is the use of the word man to describe the all people. Feminist literary critics believe this is sexist and set out to replace sexist language with more politically correct examples. This interpretation also includes the deeper view that a masculine style of language has suppressed a feminine one.
Feminist readings have revealed that male and female readers bring very different perspective and interpretations to texts, even in the act of reading. Men and woman write differently, read differently and think about texts differently. Feminist literary criticism makes space for and listens to women’s voices previously drowned out by patriarchal literary critics.
In practice, feminist readings are not limited to texts written and read by women. Its interest is not only how women have been treated in such texts, but also how the notions of gender and sexuality have determined or enforced an inferior place for the voices of women.
Analyse a fairy tale from a feminist point of view.
Goldilocks and the Three Bears
Firstly, why must the villain in this story be a girl? Goldilocks is described as a nosy and naughty girl. This is stereotyping that little girls are nosy and are always getting into trouble.
Sexism even exists in the bear family. The father is described as big and gruff while the mother is described as soft and gentle. This is the most overused stereotype involved with any family. The mother bear is the one who cooks the porridge. Why must the mother be the one who always does the house duties? The father must be expected to be able to cook. Mother bear is also the one who forgets to close the door properly. This suggests that women are forgetful and unreliable, which is totally untrue.
Goldilocks’ temptation to enter the house suggests that women are blinded by their curiosity. Her naivety and immaturity is also shown by how she unthoughtfully enters a house without permission. When Goldilocks says how nice it was that someone had left her breakfast, the story implies that women are always thinking that they must be the centre of attention. This is farfetched because, generally, men are just as self-centred as women.
The fact that Goldilocks says that the porridge is too hot and too cold, that the chair and bed is too hard and soft, gives the impression that women are perfectionists; that everything must suit them.
When the bears come back, the father bear speaks in a gruff voice whilst the mother bear speaks with a soft, gentle voice. This seems to suggest that women are submissive whilst the male is more dominant.
Goldilocks and the Three Bears is a fairy tale that contains many politically incorrect things from a feminist perspective. A feminist reading of the text would change a lot of its context.
