S/he

Feminist criticism is concerned with “…the ways in which literature (and other cultural productions) reinforce or undermine the economic, political, social, and psychological oppression of women” (Tyson). This school of theory looks at how aspects of our culture are inherently patriarchal (male dominated) and “…this critique strives to expose the explicit and implicit misogyny in male writing about women” (Richter 1346). This misogyny, Tyson reminds us, can extend into diverse areas of our culture: “Perhaps the most chilling example…is found in the world of modern medicine, where drugs prescribed for both sexes often have been tested on male subjects only” (83).

Feminist criticism is also concerned with less obvious forms of marginalization such as the exclusion of women writers from the traditional literary canon: “…unless the critical or historical point of view is feminist, there is a tendency to under-represent the contribution of women writers” (Tyson 82-83).

Common Space in Feminist Theories

Though a number of different approaches exist in feminist criticism, there exist some areas of commonality. This list is excerpted from Tyson:

1. Women are oppressed by patriarchy economically, politically, socially, and psychologically; patriarchal ideology is the primary means by which they are kept so
2. In every domain where patriarchy reigns, woman is other: she is marginalized, defined only by her difference from male norms and values
3. All of western (Anglo-European) civilization is deeply rooted in patriarchal ideology, for example, in the biblical portrayal of Eve as the origin of sin and death in the world
4. While biology determines our sex (male or female), culture determines our gender (masculine or feminine)
5. All feminist activity, including feminist theory and literary criticism, has as its ultimate goal to change the world by prompting gender equality
6. Gender issues play a part in every aspect of human production and experience, including the production and experience of literature, whether we are consciously aware of these issues or not (91).

Feminist criticism has, in many ways, followed what some theorists call the three waves of feminism:

1. First Wave Feminism – late 1700s-early 1900’s: writers like Mary Wollstonecraft (A Vindication of the Rights of Women, 1792) highlight the inequalities between the sexes. Activists like Susan B. Anthony and Victoria Woodhull contribute to the women’s suffrage movement, which leads to National Universal Suffrage in 1920 with the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment
2. Second Wave Feminism – early 1960s-late 1970s: building on more equal working conditions necessary in America during World War II, movements such as the National Organization for Women (NOW), formed in 1966, cohere feminist political activism. Writers like Simone de Beauvoir (Le deuxième sexe, 1972) and Elaine Showalter established the groundwork for the dissemination of feminist theories dove-tailed with the American Civil Rights movement
3. Third Wave Feminism – early 1990s-present: resisting the perceived essentialist (over generalized, over simplified) ideologies and a white, heterosexual, middle class focus of second wave feminism, third wave feminism borrows from post-structural and contemporary gender and race theories (see below) to expand on marginalized populations’ experiences. Writers like Alice Walker work to “…reconcile it [feminism] with the concerns of the black community…[and] the survival and wholeness of her people, men and women both, and for the promotion of dialog and community as well as for the valorization of women and of all the varieties of work women perform” (Tyson 97).

Typical questions:

• How is the relationship between men and women portrayed?
• What are the power relationships between men and women (or characters assuming male/female roles)?
• How are male and female roles defined?
• What constitutes masculinity and femininity?
• How do characters embody these traits?
• Do characters take on traits from opposite genders? How so? How does this change others’ reactions to them?
• What does the work reveal about the operations (economically, politically, socially, or psychologically) of patriarchy?
• What does the work imply about the possibilities of sisterhood as a mode of resisting patriarchy?
• What does the work say about women’s creativity?
• What does the history of the work’s reception by the public and by the critics tell us about the operation of patriarchy?
• What role the work play in terms of women’s literary history and literary tradition? (Tyson)

Here is a list of scholars we encourage you to explore to further your understanding of this theory:

• Mary Wollstonecraft – A Vindication of the Rights of Women, 1792
• Simone de Beauvoir – Le deuxième sexe, 1972
• Julia Kristeva – About Chinese Women, 1977
• Elaine Showalter – A Literature of Their Own, 1977; “Toward a Feminist Poetics,” 1979
• Deborah E. McDowell – “New Directions for Black Feminist Criticism,” 1980
• Alice Walker – In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens, 1983
• Lillian S. Robinson – “Treason out Text: Feminist Challenges to the Literary Canon,” 1983
• Camile Paglia – Sexual Personae: The Androgyne in Literature and Art, 1990