Feminism

A well known social figure once said "In my heart, I think a woman has two choices: either she's a feminist or a masochist." This person was Gloria Steinem. Gloria Steinem, born on March 25th 1934, is a US journalist and has been a spokeswoman for women's rights for many years. Steinem is a feminist. Steinem is regarded as a 'mother' figure to many young women who recognize the role she played in changing the outcome of their lives. Steinem is a feminist. To be a feminist is to be involved with, or associated to feminist theory, movement or belief. Curthoys (1988) describes feminism as a social theory and political movement primarily informed and motivated by the experience of women. While generally providing a critique of social relations, many proponents of feminism also focus on analyzing gender inequality and the promotion of women's rights, interests, and issues. Feminists and feminism itself has been an issue for many years, originating in the early 1860s, not only in Australia, but in all areas of the world where there are women crying out to be heard. In this essay I will explore the three waves of feminism throughout history: the Liberal Feminists of the 1860s, the traditional "bra-burners" of the 1960-1980s and the third wave, from the 1980s to the present day. Through this exploration, I will define what it means to be a feminist, the kinds of social changes feminists set out to achieve, and finally, various achievements that have been made by feminist activists. I will then end the essay with a brief overlook of some of the issues concerning feminists today.

Defining feminism can come as quite a tumultuous task, as it is essentially what each person makes of it - in general, it is a movement working to ensure that each woman involved in it can make informed choices about their lives regardless of what choice they make. Feminism is about changing society, not the actual person - it's about structural change, not individual change, but perhaps a consequence of the structural change will be that more people can feel like they can be themselves. The history of feminism reaches far back before the 18th century, but the seeds of the feminist movement were planted during the latter portion of that century. According to Jacob (2001), feminist thought began during The Enlightenment with such thinkers as Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and the Marquis de Condorcet championing women's education. The first scientific society for women was founded in Middleberg, a city in the south of the Dutch republic, in 1785 (Freedman: 2002). Journals for women which focused on issues like science became popular during this period as well. Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) is one of the first works that can unambiguously be called feminist, although by modern standards her comparison of women to the nobility, the elite of society, coddled, fragile, and in danger of intellectual and moral sloth, does not sound like a feminist argument. Wollstonecraft believed that both sexes contributed to this situation and took it for granted that women had considerable power over men. Her book challenged 'respectable' notions of womanhood and gallantry in pre-industrial UK.

Feminism is not a single ideology. Over-time several sub-types of Feminist ideology have developed. As mentioned earlier, there are three "waves" of feminism. Early feminists and primary feminist movements are often called the first-wave feminists, and feminists after about 1960 the second-wave feminists. More recently, new generations of feminists have started third-wave feminism. (Pritchard Hughes: 1997) the first wave, also known as Liberal Feminism, began in the 1860s and was mainly made up of suffragettes. The suffragettes were all about recognising women in their own right; ie, the right to vote. They fought for equal rights among women and men in education and the work force, as well as in citizenship for women. The suffragettes also fought hard to combat conservatism, where a women's position was biologically determined: ie sex roles, nurturers.

The second wave of feminism refers to a period of feminism thought that originated around the 1960s and was mainly concerned with independence and greater political action to improve women's rights. The second wave feminism was most concerned with items such as economic equality between the genders and addressing the rights of female minorities rather than absolute rights such as suffrage, as the first wave had (Orme: 1998). One phenomenon included the recognition of lesbian women within the movement. Lesbians had an ambiguous relationship with other, generally heterosexual-oriented feminist groups. (Smith: 2000) Many feminists did not want to be associated with lesbians because of the stereotypes of "mannish" lesbians that predominated at the time. As a result, many feminist groups felt betrayed and rejected straight women, claiming that heterosexual sexual relationships automatically subordinated women, and that the only true independence could come in lesbian relationships. Second wave feminists were concerned with gaining full social and economic equality, having already gained almost full legal equality in many western nations. One of the main fields of interest to these women was in gaining the right to contraception and birth control, which were almost universally restricted until the 1960s (Curthoys: 1988). With the development of the birth control pill feminists hoped to make it as available as possible. Many hoped that this would free women from the perceived burden of mothering children they did not want; they felt that control of reproduction was necessary for full economic independence from men. Access to abortion was also widely demanded, but this was much more difficult to secure because of the deep societal divisions that existed over the issue (Curthoys: 1988). To this day, abortion remains controversial in many parts of the world.

The second wave is most commonly linked with the radical feminist movement. Weeks (2003) describes radical feminism as a branch of feminism that views women's oppression as a fundamental element in human society and seeks to challenge that standard by broadly rejecting standard gender roles. The "radical" in radical feminism is used as an adjective meaning "the root", and therefore implying that radical feminists seek the "root cause" of women's oppression. The traditional radical feminist standpoint may be expressed as viewing the division in all societies as that between men and women and stating that men are the oppressors of women (Weeks: 2003).

The third wave, and perhaps the most "unknown" wave, of feminism began in the 1890s and is still at full speed presently. Third-wave