Feminism originated in the west and is understood as a social theory and political movement with female experience as its source and motivation. Feminism, which first appeared in France, means women's liberation, and then spread to Britain and the United States, and gradually became popular. It was introduced into China during the May 4th Movement and was designated as feminism. In the west, it initially refers to the pursuit of equality between men and women, and the first is to fight for the right to vote. In the 1920s and 1930s, women in western countries basically gained equal political rights, but they were still unequal to men in social life and people's ideas. Feminists began to realize that there was a problem of different relations and different powers, so the feminist movement became a different analysis of why men and women were unequal and the power structure between men and women. It is also recognized in China. It is not enough to talk about women's rights first, but also to talk about other analyses. From feminism-feminism is not essentially different, but a deepening of understanding. At present, feminism is widely used in China, so it is of profound significance to study the two kinds of power in other ways, and people can easily accept it. Feminism is a combination of theory and practice, a belief and ideology of equality between men and women, aiming at opposing all inequalities, including gender discrimination.
China's feminism refers to a kind of female thought, social speech and political assistance that women strive for equality with men and embody women's spirit and energy. Gender equality is the most basic goal of feminism. While striving for equality with men, women should also attach importance to my value expression, show women's unique charm, tap and exert women's social strength, work hard for the liberation of women's thoughts and behaviors at all levels of society, put the interests of women all over the world at the same starting point, and help the government deal with the problems faced by feminism.
Feminist theory
To sum up, feminist philosophy mainly focuses on the following ten aspects: theoretical issues of common concern and the application of various successful theories:
1. Feminism finds that women's underground status and tragic situation are not what male rulers say and are not taken for granted. Both women's gender and women's social status, identity and perspective are endowed by the reality of social inequality. Women are constructed and have no power and ability to choose.
2. The lack of women's existence. In the research, people found that women are everywhere in this society. They just don't exist, they are men's accessories and obedience; The non-existence of women is caused by the patriarchal rule and unreasonable history in society, and it is the lack of expressive existence of human beings as a whole.
3. The practice of women's rights: economic rights, political rights and legal rights. Equality between men and women is first of all equality of power, and the awareness of equality of rights between men and women and real equality of power are very important. However, to this day, the exclusion and trampling on women's rights are still unexpected and very serious;
4. Women's safety is not guaranteed and needs warning and social protection measures; Women are often attacked and disturbed by men in family or social public places; The male-centered single-sex rule treats women and the weak in a restrained and harmonious way, which leads to the terrorist disaster of women.
5. Women's creativity is suppressed and ignored. Women are the great force of human cultural creation, but their creation is ignored; What's more, women's creativity and creation are seized by men and become their own; The suppression and plunder of women's creativity is caused by the unreasonable state of society. This is the loss of society and the misfortune of all mankind;
6. The self-consciousness and subject of female consciousness have established the liberation and development of women, which is not only a social problem, but also a female physical problem, which needs my awakening and development. As the main body of creative practice, women are often not recognized. Only by relying on the combination of women's self-struggle and social movements can we succeed.
7. Women's humanitarian justice exposes the fact that women are discriminated against, and at the same time, women bear the responsibility of realizing real justice, fairness, freedom and harmony of mankind. Including women and nature, human culture and national culture, individuals and the whole, should be treated with humanitarian justice.
8. It is urgent to realize the reorganization of women's organizational structure in order to protect women anytime and anywhere. However, when women's rights and interests are hurt, there is no fair channel to seek and no support from social forces; It can be said that social organizations and male abusers have become accomplices, even palliative treatment, which is the support for male crimes of hurting women; Women's organizations are not only women's federations, but also courts, public security and all social organizations.
9. Female discourse right, discourse subject and discourse practice: Because male discourse and male domination do not contain female rights, women do not exist in them. Moreover, male discourse and discourse style are full of destruction and bondage of war and power. Women must create women's right to speak for their own rise and the development prospect of mankind, become the subject of women's discourse practice, and build a brand-new humanitarian world in an inclusive and harmonious way.
10, feminists found that women don't live in this world, and the people who occupy this world kingdom are men. Such a large group of men, whether white or not, have wealth. The world's potential reputation, authority, security and fair return, and the recognition of a person's identity and ability are such a world. Some people's behavior habits are just like their innate conditions, depending on their differences. It is not determined by the basic situation of people in this society. The privilege of status and intention exists in other things as well as in the genus. Therefore, the development of women lies in my identity and social recognition, so as to gain a proper position and foothold in society. Women's liberation, freedom and development is a trilogy of feminist development, which comes down to the development of women and the creation of women's culture, thus helping the whole mankind to get out of the crisis situation and gain broad development prospects.
Development history of western feminism
Western feminism can be divided into three stages: 1. The first generation of feminism (1from the second half of the 9th century to the beginning of the 20th century) II. Modern feminism (early 20th century to 1960s) 3. Postmodern feminism (1960s to present)
◆ 1, the first generation of western feminism: Western feminism originated after the French bourgeois revolution and the Enlightenment, and the first generation appeared in the second half of19th century, synchronized with industrial revolution in europe, with Harriet Taylor Muller as the representative. The initial appeal was that women should be equal in education and legislation, and equal with men in economy. They called for women's liberation mainly from the economic aspect, which had a great influence on the later feminist movement, especially the Marxist/socialist feminist movement. The influential literary works of this generation include Nora and Anna karenin by Tolstoy. Some socialists in China in the 1920s and 40s were influenced by feminism and probably belonged to this generation. During this period, feminism has not yet risen to the theoretical level, mainly some practical activities, such as Clara. Tsetkin led the equal pay movement for women. The birth of International Women's Day.
◆2. The second generation of western feminism:
From the early 20th century to the 1960s, the world experienced two world wars, the colonial system collapsed and various contradictions were rearranged. In this turbulent period, feminism has also raised its own flag and is surging. Feminism in this period parted ways and became "progressive feminism" represented by Kate Miller, Catherine McKinnon and others, "Marxist/socialist feminism" represented by Zhu Liye Mitchell and "feminist feminism" represented by betty friedan and others. Marxist/socialist feminism demands gender equality and women's material status mainly from the aspects of economic and social struggle. However, both "into feminism" and "from feminism" are pursuing women's liberation. They challenge the whole male society and the "hierarchy" system. Kate from America. Emily first introduced the concept of "patriarchy" in Political Science (1970). She believes that the root of women's oppression is "patriarchy". They completely oppose women and men: men are enemies and women are friends; Men are impetuous and women are gentle; Men are persecutors and women are persecuted; Men are oppressors and women are oppressed; Men are warmongers and women are pacifists; Men are winners and women are losers; Men are individualists and women are relational; Men's pleasure is limited to genitals, while women's pleasure is reflected in all aspects of the whole body; Men only pay attention to the results, while women pay attention to the process … and so on. This simple dichotomy has been criticized by post-modern feminism, which is very important and is another story. However, feminism in this period, especially its pursuit of "liberation", had a great influence on a group of feminist writers. Although Ghiglia Woolf and Lessing's works have traces of postmodernism, they are basically the literary representatives of feminism in this period. Plus Duras and Milan Kundera.
◆3. Postmodern feminism
Postmodern feminism began in the 1960s and 1980s, and its appearance is probably related to two factors. First, due to the "liberation" in the 1960s and the feminist ideology of male and female opposition, countless families broke down, single mothers, problem children and AIDS epidemic, so people reflected: Is social value worth paying such a high price for liberation and feminism? Another factor is that more and more post-80s women occupy the leading position in government, enterprises and school media. When they became bosses, the men exclaimed: Mom called! Women also began to wonder: will they lay eggs? Thus, post-modern feminism came into being.
If the second generation of "modern feminism" emphasizes practice, the third generation of "post-modern feminism" pays more attention to philosophical thinking beyond the category of women, and socialism is more colorful.
Feminist faction
(A) the liberation of feminism
The main purpose of liberated feminism is to establish social justice, strive for equality of opportunities among families, implement family rule, and gain reasons for women's survival and development. To this end, we need to finally get out of the family, transcend social differences and achieve new liberation through humanitarian justice.
Susan Okin, a feminist political theorist liberated by the United States, pointed out in Justice, Genre and Family that there is still inequality between men and women in the kingdom of equality advertised by the United States. In fact, she wrote that inequality between people still exists in our society. As far as individual capital is concerned, the first inequality is that the wages of women working full-time (after some recent progress) are equivalent to 765,438+0% of those of men working full-time. Second, half of the poor and three-fifths of the chronically poor include families with dependent children and raised by single mothers. Third, the poverty rate of elderly women is almost twice that of elderly men. In politics, first of all, 2% of the members of the United States Senate are women. In the High Court, only one-ninth of the female judges in the United States High Court seem to be considered as sufficient female representatives, and in every congressional election, the number of men elected far exceeds the total number of women elected in the whole history of the country. In addition, under and among all these inequalities, people turn a blind eye to the unpaid housework and the responsibility of raising children in the family, which shows the inequality of distribution. So, in fact, men work for one day and women work for two days. Women have two jobs-one is to earn money outside, and the other is to work at home without any pay! . .
As we all know, liberated feminism struggles for social justice and equality. At the same time, it also actively advocates the struggle and resistance to social and family behavior.
Progressive feminism
Progressive feminism believes that social inequality leads to inequality between different classes. What oppresses women is patriarchy (patriarchy/patriarchy, male chauvinism): this is a system specially defined by power, domination, hierarchical organization and competition-a system that cannot be reformed, but it is only a system that has withered its roots. However, it not only makes paternalism a legal, political and inevitable economic structure; It is also a social and cultural organization. (especially families, churches and colleges). However, progressive feminism hopes to achieve other dialogues by transcending the differences and opposites caused by society. To achieve this step, we need to expose, struggle and resist patriarchy and the resulting oppression and separation of women.
As we all know, Andrew Dworkin, a famous American feminist who died recently, has greatly inspired the debate on love literature and censorship that has arisen in the United States since1980s. Dworkin proposed that obscene publications violated women's civil rights, advocated allowing single women to sue for the losses caused by obscene publications, and set up this new crime. In order to put the theory into practice, Dworkin and Catherine McKinnon, another famous feminist, drafted a "municipal government decree", which allowed victims of sexual behavior to sue the author of Dirty Articles, who was indirectly responsible for the crime. Dworkin pointed out that the original meaning of the word "porne" in ancient Greece was the meanest woman, and the female image in obscene publications was to equate women with women. She emphasized that obscene publications are a kind of power, which awakens men's deep instinct and points to women. Even though some obscene publications have no direct descriptive power, the ideology behind their characters is still a powerful expression of the concept of the male world. She called it the male truth. Her works, literary theories and speeches strongly oppose the description of love literature, trafficking and male hegemony. Her series of works, such as Description of Love Literature: Men's Possession of Women, have aroused widespread concern and are still controversial. Dworkin knows more about women's misfortune. She can speak her own words and reveal the secrets of male politics.
In this book, Catherine McKinnon's article Emotional Graphic Description, Civil Rights and Speech reveals that the essence of emotional graphic description is discrimination against women and a means to conquer women. As she pointed out, men are all hurt by male power. As a man, I have the consistency of masculinity. For men, it is based on their biology rather than his biology. But in any case, the harm of male power to men and the existence of men are not subordinate to the definition of female behavior. Looking at all the facts that women are abused, you will immediately see that women are defined as a person in society. Whether it is or not, she may be treated by men in these ways at any time, and it is insignificant. If something happens, it will happen. As feminists say, men are a form of power and women are a form of powerlessness. Therefore, the description of Yan characters has gone beyond its content: it is a hierarchical organization of desire, and it is the inequality of male power. It makes rule and/or obedience to rules: inequality is its core dynamic mechanism; Together with the truth of power, it constructs the illusion of rationality. Perhaps because of bourgeois culture, the victim's behavior must seem unreasonable. ..... In the vision described in these pictures and texts, what is forced is a form, a practice of political science and an unequal organization. Dirty, in this way, is a moral ideology, judging whether an ideology is good or bad. Emotional graphic description, on the contrary, is a political practice, a powerful and powerless practice. Mckinnon pointed out that graphic description allows other inequalities and tramples on civil rights and social justice.
Cultural feminism
Cultural feminism pays attention to equality and care for people, and this care is unique and individual for each individual; It is believed that men and women have formed different value systems through nature (ecology), education (socialization) or some combination of nature and education. According to this view, women pay more attention to creating and maintaining warm, intimate and caring relationships with others, while men are more keen to affirm their personal lives and control their own and others' destiny. Therefore, cultural feminists are opposed to seeing what they understand as men's pursuit of political power, group status and medical expertise. Cultural feminism has a mature vision, hoping to transform a competitive organizational relationship based on the interests of each individual at a higher level into an organizational relationship based on cooperation with the same goal. Feminism in most cultures is constantly asking questions until gender equality is truly realized: yes; 1, realizing a kind of humanistic care; 2. A unique and special person who needs this kind of care; 3. Because of social affiliation, it is not produced by one person from one angle, because one belongs to educational behavior and the other belongs to instrumental behavior; 4, get the reward of care, not just satisfied with seeing a person who cares about showing off and pursuing other plans; 5. It takes place within the framework of the practice and process of raising awareness.
Cultural feminism pays attention to women's care and moral care. Nell Notting pointed out that women usually define themselves as both human beings and the embodiment of caring for morality. When we turn from natural care to moral care, we will see that this definition mode has a deep psychological structure foundation. There are two kinds of compulsions in the expression here, which must be divided into active care and being cared for. It's all internal coercion. An observer clearly sees the choice, but I must regard it as dependent on the person who makes the choice. In our circles and chains, we are both bound and bound.
However, when based on the maternal thinking of cultural feminism, philosophers with feminist views-those with philosophical thinking and feminist maternal thinking-directly oppose this ideal of masculinity. Their task is to redefine the principles and build their priorities, so that thoughtful people will be able to sum up the feasibility of maid behavior, for example, nursing work, for the whole society. They think that work should be the basis of choice. The views of morality and epistemology have been implemented by women and created women. Although they reject dualism and respect differences, feminist views represent a truly reasonable order of human life.
Marxism and socialist feminism
Marxist/socialist feminism pays attention to such issues as "women: status, order or oppression". The main content of this Marxist feminist theory is to explore the root of female oppression from the perspective of the development history of human society. According to the exposition of Marxist classical theorists, its roots are roughly in three aspects. First, the emergence of private ownership of the means of production. Due to the emergence of private ownership, men have become the dual owners of land and women, which is the failure of women with world historical significance. Second, monogamous families in history made women in a subordinate position. Engels pointed out according to the achievements provided by anthropologist Morgan's book "Ancient Society" that monogamy was a transition from pairing marriage in history, which was only applicable to women, but not to men. Men can take women as concubines at will, while wives should strictly observe chastity. The husband is in a dominant position in the family, and the wife is only the head of the maid except for giving birth to children. It can be seen that the modern individual family is built on the open or hidden female family system. Thirdly, women's weak physical strength is also one of the root causes of their oppression. With the emergence of private ownership, women are excluded from social production and can only engage in family private labor. At this time, women's housework lost its past quality and became domestic servants.
Reid claimed that the oppression of women originated from the establishment of private property system, which ended human identity. According to Marxists, the fundamental premise of women's real liberation should be the elimination of private ownership. Classical Marxist theorists also specially assume that in order to make it possible for women to enter the public sector, children will be raised by the state, and the state will provide child care centers, public canteens and medical facilities. The state has assumed the economic functions performed by the family, and the concept of the family has been abolished, thus ending the situation that the husband is bourgeois and the wife is equivalent to the proletariat. Engels pointed out in "Principles of Production" that under the * * * production system, without social intervention, the relationship between the two sides will become a private matter only related to the parties. This can be achieved because of the abolition of private ownership and the responsibility of society to educate children. Therefore, the two foundations of modern marriage, that is, the wife depends on her husband and the child depends on her parents, will also be eliminated. This is also an answer to the sad cry of the respectable bourgeoisie about the capitalist system of men and women wives. Monogamy is a unique phenomenon in bourgeois society, and now the sale is the full expression of this monogamy. Selling is based on private ownership, and it will disappear with the disappearance of private ownership. Therefore, the proletarian organization does not practice male wife system, on the contrary, she wants to destroy it. In addition, there is a very important content in Marxist theory, that is, attaching great importance to the important role of oppressed women in creating history and promoting great social changes. As Marx said, social progress can be accurately measured by women's social status. Lenin also said: judging from the experience of all liberation movements, the success or failure of the revolution depends on the degree of women's participation in the movement.
(E) Post-modern feminism
The struggle between post-modern feminism and post-feminism is to create female culture with female discourse, strive for and master female discourse right, and become the subject of discourse in female discourse practice. In the famous Breakthrough, Siksus reveals some dualistic separatism that shows male superiority and female inferiority, such as: positive/negative; Sun/moon; Civilization/nature; Day/night; Thought is always influenced by opposites; Oral/writing; High/low; Influenced by the dual dominant view. In Sikhs' view, all these dichotomies can find their enlightenment in the basic binary opposition-male/female-men are always associated with those who are positive, civilized, bright, noble or usually optimistic, while women are always associated with those who are negative, natural, dark, humble or usually pessimistic. In addition, the first term of the male/female dichotomy is separated or deviated from the second term. A man is private, and a woman is his other side. In this way, women exist in men's world in his terminology. For a man, a woman is his shadow, or she can't think and has no thoughts.
Postmodern feminism sees that women's liberation movement will also encounter special obstacles-if women allow them to fall into the trap of power and the competition of authority, if they are allowed to be defiled by paranoid male political operations, they will have nothing to say and do nothing as women. Feminists use deconstruction theory to enrich and develop feminist theory. In Time for Women, Kristeva uses time to provide a yardstick for the female subject, and divides the development of feminism into several generations, so as to explain the changes in the concept of female subject and the differences between feminist schools. Kristeva divides time into: the time of line history and another historical time (eternal time). She refers to historical time, not eternal time (pushing women to female idols). Kristeva's intergenerational concept is both temporal and spatial. Generation refers to the psychological space of body and desire, and each generation can coexist or even interweave with each other.
The sharpest criticism of post-modern feminism and post-modernism points to its depoliticization or post-politicization tendency, and the patriarchal relationship on the basis of industrialization has undergone many changes. There are many provisions in the employment contract, which restrict women's low wages, low income and few development opportunities. This is an example of male supremacy or male ideology, which is the material basis for the establishment of patriarchy. The combination of capital and patriarchy leads to absolute occupational segregation in employment, which leads to the wage difference between men and women-equal pay for equal work and women doing housework.
Postmodern feminism also pays attention to women's power. Any woman should have the same power as men, and own, manage and operate her own power. Realize the return of women from the edge to the center, and the change from absence to presence. The first question that feminist scholars need to explore in the postmodern context will be how to perfectly combine postmodernism's suspicion of grand historical narrative and deconstruction of essentialism with feminist social criticism. Feminist theory should also include the cultural characteristics of different societies, different times, different regions, different races and groups with different tendencies. Like Nancy. Fraser and Linda? Nicholson pointed out that when it comes to cross-cultural issues, its model should be comparative, not universalist; It should apply to changes and differences, not to' general laws'.
(VI) Eco-feminism Eco-feminism is a faction that undertakes the heavy responsibility of solving and managing the problem of globalization. Eco-feminism advocates the interaction between nature and culture. They saw the separation between the biological (animal) world and the social (human) world, the division between men and women, the cross-cultural connection between women and nature, reproduction, material and other things, and the cross-cultural connection between men and women's culture, production and form and our center. These are all part of the same old western concept, that is, the concept of belittling nature and women was considered legal or reasonable in the past. Therefore, in the article Feminism in Eco-environmental Protection: Power and Commitment, the author hopes to change this erroneous concept and bad habit that has been opposed to women for thousands of years. Eliminate words and deeds that ignore nature and women's rights, and abolish natural and other discrimination.
In From Heroic Rationality to Comprehensive Rationality: The Feminist Challenge of Eco-environmental Protection, Kiel compares his heroic neo-Confucianism with comprehensive neo-Confucianism, and thinks that the former is male, masculine or sexist, while the latter is female, feminine or feminist. The practitioners of heroism are well-intentioned. After all, they want to save women/nature: stop women, animals and pollute the environment. With these rational tools, heroic rationalists put forward to protect women and nature with rationality, and they promised to decide which members of the ecosystem have (or do not have) interests and rights, and take care of those who have interests and rights.
However, as Kiel saw, heroism is part of the problem, not part of the solution. It's male, masculine and sexist. As a patriarchal culture, it came into being. She said that it needs to be replaced by this feminine, feminine or feminist philosophy, which looks at the ecosystem in an all-round way-using emotions to help diverse ecosystem members coordinate. Comprehensive Neo-Confucianism fills the gap left by Neo-Confucianism with senses and feelings.
(7) Feminism towards multi-alloy culture
From the trend of globalization, peace and development, feminism is to adjust the diversity and harmony of culture. On this basis, a brand-new multi-alloy brand-new cultural form is created, which not only shows women's cultural creativity, but also creates the theory and organizational form of women's development, and organically grasps the development and prospects of the whole mankind. Because, in the concept of patriarchy and male domination, a single thinking is often used to maintain a single individual rule, and extreme ways such as war and power are often used to solve problems. On the contrary, feminism adopts women's right to speak and discourse, integrates all kinds of cultural achievements, and condenses all kinds of creative achievements and strengths by means of peace talks, bringing new prospects for women's development and human development. In "We build a theory for you!" Feminist theory, the requirement of cultural imperialism and female voice, clearly illustrates this point. At the same time, it is also pointed out that some people regard women's words as cultural imperialism, which is wrong and has ulterior motives. Sisterhood: Women's political alliance shows a new way of combining women. Just like the male brotherhood in the period of social liberation, sisterhood has emerged in the west, becoming a new alliance for women and a spiritual home for women.
(8) Towards inclusive feminism.
Men tend to think that their attitude towards the feminist movement is half the sky and indifferent. In fact, men in the feminist movement have a great responsibility. On the one hand, supporting women's struggle against oppression and discrimination is a social, humane and just struggle against ignorance and evil forces. On the other hand, it is the main and basic social movement of the whole human development. People who can't participate in this kind of struggle are often backward or dragging their feet, ashamed of the progress of social civilization and ashamed of their own lives. At the same time, the goal of feminist theory and practice is not to deprive men of their power or knock them over and step on them in order to highlight the differences between women and men. On the contrary, female discourse will be used to transcend the opposition between men and women, realize the situation of cooperation and accommodation between men and women, and endow the future development of mankind with a cooperative, peaceful and harmonious way; Realize the cooperation and peaceful development among human cultures and countries.
In the future training of human beings, we don't think that we should clearly define and expand the individual characteristics of human beings, but hope to have so-called hermaphroditic/hermaphroditic individuals in the social and cultural sense, just like the realization of "Little X". At the same time, we should combine the Apollo spirit expressed and described in The Story of the Golden Globe with the Dionysian spirit.
Feminism in China
The western feminist thought encountered embarrassment in China in the 20th century, especially the misinterpretation or misunderstanding of the foreign word feminism, which led many female scholars to disagree with the feminist position. The reason behind this phenomenon lies in the heterogeneity of Chinese and western cultures. The encounter and collision between feminism and China's specific culture has produced some variations, from the initial progressive, female-led action to the moderate, male-led movement to liberate women through social and political means. The differences between feminism and feminism, women's liberation and women's liberation should not only be regarded as the change of discourse bias, but also have profound internal national cultural and psychological reasons.
Chinese feminism must rise rapidly, and women in China need to participate in feminist discourse practice, grow into discourse subjects, get opportunities for dialogue, and strive for the presence and keynote position of feminist liberation context. Generally speaking, the start and development of feminism in China is still a struggle for women's right to life and social equality and justice; Improve people-oriented humanitarianism and social civilization; Understand and expose many crises and serious problems that real women's homes are facing;