... 7:42 PM Page 36 5 FEMINIST METHODOLOGIES AND EPISTEMOLOGY ANDREA DOUCET Carleton University, Canada NATASHA S. MAUTHNER University of Aberdeen, Scotland O ver the past 10 years of teaching courses on research methods and feminist approaches to methodologies and epistemologies, a recurring question from our students concerns the distinctiveness of feminist approaches to methods, methodologies, and epistemologies. This key question is posed in different ways: Is there a specifically feminist method? Are there feminist methodologies and epistemologies, or simply feminist approaches to these? Given diversity and debates in feminist theory, how can there be a consensus on what constitutes “feminist” methodologies and epistemologies? Answers to these questions are far from straightforward given the continually evolving nature of feminist reflections on the methodological and epistemological dimensions and dilemmas of research. This chapter on feminist methodologies and epistemologies attempts to address these questions by tracing historical developments in this area, by considering what may be unique about feminist epistemologies and feminist methodologies, by reviewing some of sociology’s key contributions to this area of scholarship and by highlighting some key emergent trends. The chapter begins with a brief overview of the theoretical and historical development of feminist epistemologies, followed by a similar overview of feminist methodologies. The final section...
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...1 Feminist Theory and Survey Research “The idea that there is only ‘one road’ to the feminist revolution, and only one type of ‘truly feminist’ research, is as limiting and as offensive as male-biased accounts of research that have gone before.” ~Liz Stanley and Sue Wise, 1983, p. 26. Introduction Over the past three decades, feminist methodologists have hammered home one point with surprising regularity: Feminist research takes a variety of legitimate forms; there is no “distinctive feminist method of research” (Harding, 1987; see also Chafetz, 2004a, 2004b; Fonow & Cook, 2005; Hawkesworth, 2006; Hesse-Biber, 2007; Risman, Sprague, & Howard, 1993; and Sprague, 2005). And yet, to this day, the relationship between feminist theory and quantitative social science research remains uneasy. Among feminist scholars, quantitative research is often seen as suspect for its association with positivism and its pretense of objectivity (among other things). At the same time, among quantitative researchers, feminist-identified work is often dismissed as “biased,” “activist,” or “substantively marginal.” While a number of scholars have recently published works outlining a “feminist” approach to social science research, these books have generally steered clear of quantitative survey research. Some authors of feminist 1 2— Feminist Measures in Survey Research methods texts limit their discussion of feminist survey research to a small section (e.g., Hesse-Biber, 2007; Reinharz, 1992;...
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...and what is the thinking of our varsity girl about feminism. Total 21 respondents were selected based on age class of 18-22. Feminism is a belief in the right of women to have political, social, and economic equality with men. It is a discourse that involves various movements, theories, and philosophies which are concerned with the issue of gender difference, advocate equality for women, and campaign for women’s rights and interests. According to some, the history of feminism can be divided into three waves. The first wave was in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the second was in the 1960s and 1970s and the third extends from the 1990s to the present. Feminist theory emerged from these feminist movements. It is manifest in a variety of disciplines such as feminist geography, feminist history and feminist literary criticism. Although feminism has emerged in nineteenth in the world, it is yet unknown to women of our country. The concept of feminism in Bangladesh has been rising since last 20th years and women got some equal right such as voting right, politics right, education right, job right, decision making right, child raring right etc. But, they got some right constitutionally, not practically yet. But, it is hopeful that we will be able to establish equal right within next 20th year. Key words: Equal rights, Secure Society, Establishing women...
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...eventually gets married, and shows his true understanding of what women really want. This suggests that, for his time, Chaucer has progressive feminist views. The Wife of Bath’s Tale displays these feminist values through three major events in the tale. The knight’s sentencing, was a major event in The Wife of Bath’s Tale, and in which, a female was in a high place of power, which displays progressive views towards woman in power. King Arthur lets his queen decide what punishment to give to the knight. The king normally made this decision, but the queen requested to make the decision and “ceaselessly, he [King Arthur] gave the queen the case.”(72) This willingness to let his wife make decisions shows feminist intention from Chaucer. The question asked to the knight: “What is the thing that women most desire?” (81) is a feminist one, for it’s a question not asked too often in that time. The decision of the king to allow his wife to decide, and the penalty decided upon by the queen, both allude to the feminism in The Wife of Bath’s Tale. When the knight meets the old hag, he swears his life to her – trusting his life to her answer to the question asked by the queen, showing feminism by trusting his life to a woman. It is because of this, and the answer the knight gave, that Chaucer was a feminist. In this tale the old hag agrees to answer the question for the knight, in turn the old hag asks him to do whatever she pleases. He thinks of his options, then replies “I agree” (189) which...
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...Foundation Course 1 Human Rights, Gender & Environment Understanding Patriarchy Suranjita Ray• Subordination of women to men is prevalent in large parts of the world. We come across experiences where women are not only treated as subordinate to men but are also subject to discriminations, humiliations, exploitations, oppressions, control and violence. Women experience discrimination and unequal treatment in terms of basic right to food, health care, education, employment, control over productive resources, decision-making and livelihood not because of their biological differences or sex, which is natural but because of their gender differences which is a social construct. “Sex is considered a fact - one is born with either male or female genitalia. Gender is considered a social construction - it grants meaning to the fact of sex. Conversely, it could be said that only after specific meanings came to be attached to the sexes, did sex differences become pertinent” (Geetha, 2002: 10). Gender based discriminations and exploitations are widespread and the socio-culturally defined characteristics, aptitudes, abilities, desires, personality traits, roles, responsibilities and behavioral patterns of men and women contribute to the inequalities and hierarchies in society. Gender differences are man made and they get legitimised in a patriarchal society. This paper attempts to link the theoretical dimensions of patriarchy with its empirical experiences to engage in the ongoing...
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...Sanja Knezevic English 400 Dr. Robert Budde October 8th, 2009 The Definition of Feminist Theory The question of femininity and womanhood in literature has been a large topic for discussion and debate throughout history. Feminism is a body of social theory that tends to be provoked by the beliefs and experiences of women, some who feel that they have been misrepresented by the male gender. Feminist theory moreover tends to center on gender politics such as sexual objectification, stereotyping and female coercion and aims to recognize the nature of gender inequality. There are a number of topics that are discussed within feminist theory such as; examining the representation of women in male and female literature, exploring whether there is a solely “female language” and whether is available to men and questioning whether men and women are biologically different or “socially constructed” as different. Another large topic of discussion within feminist theory is the question of “What is a Woman?” Although the question may seem simple enough, it has brought forth many different literary works that have answered that question in a number of ways. A specific work that comes to mind when contemplating this question is The Second Sex written by Simone de Beauvoir. She wrote this book in an attempt to write about herself, and beginning with the fact that she is a woman, she then felt it necessary to define what a woman was, which then became the intent of the...
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...In many cultures throughout the world women are patronized and viewed as the weaker sex. Women are commonly perceived as being unfit for any forms of higher education and because of societal pressure and expectations retreat to a life of raising children and cooking meals for their husbands. Our society’s stereotypical views about women’s suffrage, educational expectations and athletic abilities have all advanced over the years. In many aspects of our society, women are now expected to compete with their male counterparts. Currently, it is not uncommon to hear of a women CEO or Vice President in businesses or even a women politician. Women have now emerged from laundry rooms and kitchens across the country and changed the demographics of the American workforce. However women are yet to take the medical workplace by storm and redefine the preconceived notions society upholds about leaders in medical professions. Many women may be happy assisting a male doctor but the growing number of female doctors illustrates the point that women want the power and control that their male counterparts currently maintain. Western female thought through the centuries has identified the relationship between patriarchy and gender as crucial to the women’s subordinate position. For two hundred years, patriarchy precluded women from having a legal or political identity and the legislation and attitudes supporting this provided the model for slavery. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries...
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...Feminist Family Theory Feminist family theory has its roots in the feminist movement. Feminism can be defined as the search for rights, opportunities, and identities women believe they deserve (Thomas 2000). Feminism in the United States might be said to have begun with the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony fought for the right to vote, a battle that was not won until ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920. Often we see that several extreme philosophies are presented, and after a time, a middle ground is reached that incorporates elements of each philosophy but is not as extreme as any individual one. This is also the case with feminism. By the 1980s, the distinctions among the feminist branches melted away. Feminists focused on issues related to women’s second-class status in society and in families, reproductive rights, discrimination faced in the workplace, and how a gendered society affects the socialization of women. In the 1960s, one of the dominant theories of the family was structural functionalism. Structural functionalists proposed that roles in families should be divided in a “natural” way, generally based on sex. They proposed that families functioned best when men did the instrumental tasks of earning money and providing for basic needs, and women did expressive tasks of caretaking for family members. In 1972, sociologist Jessie Bernard wrote The Future of Marriage, in which she contradicted...
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...public and private sphere and the women¡¦s movement that sprung up during the 1960s began to argue that women were oppressed by patriarchal structures. Equal status for women of all races, classes, sexualities and abilities - in the 21st century these feminist claims for equality are generally accepted as reasonable principles in western society; yet the contradiction between this principle of equality and the demonstrable inequalities between the sexes that still exist exposes the continuing dominance of male privilege and values throughout society (patriarchy). This essay seeks to move beyond the irrepressible evidence for gender inequality and the division of labour. Rather, it poses the question of gender inequality as it manifests itself as an effect of patriarchy drawing from a theoretical body of work which has been developed so recently that it would have been impossible to write this essay thirty years ago. Feminist Theory and Patriarchy Although ¡§¡K patriarchy is arguably the oldest example of a forced or exploitative division of social activities¡¨ and clearly existed before it was ever examined by sociologists, the features of patriarchy had been accepted as natural (biological) in substance. It was not until feminists in...
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...In Search of Her: A Postcolonial/ Feminist Enquiry into the Identity of Indian Woman Kochurani Abraham “The home was the principal site for expressing the spiritual quality of the nation’s culture and women must take the main responsibility of protecting and nurturing this quality. No matter what the changes in the external conditions of life for women, they must not lose their essentially spiritual (ie feminine) virtues; they must not, in other words, become essentially westernized.” - Partha Chatterjee, “The Nationalist Resolution of the Women’s Question”* “What was gradually and carefully constituted, brick by brick, in the interaction between colonialism and nationalism is now so deeply embedded in the consciousness of the middle classes that ideas about the past have assumed the status of revealed truths…It has led to a narrow and limiting circle in which the image of Indian womanhood has become, both a shackle and a rhetorical device that nevertheless functions as a historical truth.” - Uma Chakravarti “Whatever happened to the Vedic Dasi?: Orientalism, Nationalism and a Script for the Past.”* Who/where is the Indian woman? Since this conference focuses on the theme “Identity, Difference and...
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...In nineteenth-century Russia, the woman question emerged as a prevalent topic for debate. It questioned women’s gender roles within society. The increase in women’s agency within the public sphere during the eighteenth century, brought on by Peter the Great’s reforms, changes in property laws, salon culture, and charity, engendered the woman question in the nineteenth century and influenced responses to it. Four responses to the woman question emerged: the feminist response, the nihilist response, the radical response, and the reactionary right response. Each of these responses reacted to or built upon preceding responses, each broadening the scope of the next. The feminists drew on eighteenth-century charity to shape its response that women’s...
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...feminism, many gender researchers and feminist scholars distinguished between the notion of sex, defined as biological differences between male and female, and ‘sex roles,’ referring to certain behaviors and characteristics attributed to each sex that was a social construction. The resulting media research centered on images of women in the media (much less emphasis was placed on men) in order to draw attention to inequities in their portrayal in relation to men (in quantitative terms as well as in terms of the use of stereotypes). Since the 1970s, however, the scope of social constructionism has greatly expanded in feminist theory. Some suggest that the distinction between the biological and the social has, as a result, eroded to such an extent that it is no longer possible to understand the difference, while others question the need for this distinction. For instance, in queer and transgender theory and feminist cultural studies, theorists have sought to make strange the ‘sex/gender’ distinction. The key argument made is that biology is no less a cultural construct than gender socialization into masculinity and femininity. While the point is that biology, like gender, is thought to be socially constructed, that does not mean that there is no such thing as biology. While it is notoriously difficult if not impossible to identify exactly what is driven by biology or by culture, identity scholars insist that this is not the central question that needs to be asked. Instead, identity...
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...Professor Lena Valencia Research Paper Draft 1 The Religious Feminist There is undeniable doubt that there is a sense of inequality towards women in terms of religion. The purpose of this research paper is to discover and understand feminist views on religion, as well as define the term “religious feminist.” In my findings, I have yet to conclude whether being a feminist and being a full devote, faithful follower to a religion can coexist. Although, when researching on the topic of “religion and feminism,” sites such as religionandfeminism.com are full of commentators and scholars who believe otherwise: that there can be such a thing as the religious feminist. However, it seems as though equality within religion is a never-ending battle. Author of Bad Feminist: Take One/ Take Two, Roxanne Gay, describes her favorite definition of feminism as “just women who don’t want to be treated like shit.” (303). Like others, Gay feels as if she falls short of what a true feminist is. The online dictionary describes a feminist as one who advocates social, political, legal, and economic rights for women equal to those of men. So what does it mean when one claims to be a “bad” feminist? Gay goes on in her excerpt about how some feminist public speakers often contradict themselves when advocating the ideal feminist. Does being a religious feminist mean you are a contradictory? In Kristin Aune’s Why Feminists Are Less Religious, she tries to examine the possibility of feminism...
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...Nicole Encalada Professor: Rachel Bellande Language and Literature A February 25, 2015 Written Task 2, Part 4: Literature – Critical Study: Stone Mattress Prescribed question chosen: How could the text be read and interpreted differently by two different readers? Title of the text for analysis: Stone Mattress Part of the course to which the task refers: Part 4: Literature – Critical Study Outline of the essay: I - INTRODUCTION - Any text can be read and interpreted differently depending of its different readers, since everyone has a different way of seeing and understanding things depending on our ideologies, context etc. * Overview of the short story. * Explanation of the main audience; feminists given the strong feminist ideology. * Description of the two readers; feminists (II) and non-feminists (III). II – FEMINISTS * Description of feminism * Explanation of the feminist’s interpretation of the short story. * How certain actions in the story can be interpreted specifically. * Effect of the story on feminist readers. III – NON-FEMINISTS * Description of non-feminists and what do they support. * Explanation of the non-feminist’s interpretation of the short story. * Meaning of the short story for this reader. IV – CONCLUSION – Any text can be interpreted differently and there are no rules when you read. Not everyone thinks alike and there are different opinions. We can’t judge a story or even a person given our own...
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...PURDAH _____________________________________________________________________ Using Imtiaz Dharker’s collection Purdah, this essay will attempt to question the understanding or imagining of religious and cultural structures in reference to their effects—intellectual, emotional and spiritual— Islamic women. The first part of the essay will delve intodifferent viewpoints concerning feminism and Islam. The second shall attempt to juxtapose the opinions of traditional Islamic religious fundamentalists and those of social activists. There are a variety of themes which bring out these opinions via the help of Dharker’s collection. These themes lead us to question these opinions which may or may not hold true. [EDIT] _____________________________________________________________________ 1 Fundamentally, “the word ‘Purdah’ is used as a title for the set of injunctions which constitute the most important part of the Islamic system of community life. (Al-Ash’ari, 19) Purdah is the result of the “feudal ruler’s concept of izzat(honour-here used in the sense of inviolable feminine chastity)” This concept of izzat and its protection by men itself implied male superiority. It’s essential message was that woman needed to be protected and that man was her protector” (Asghar Ali Engineer,6) Hence, the men put ‘their’ women in Purdah and in doing so emphasized their dominance over women. In order for women to protect their...
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