The reading “Women” as the subject of feminism explores feminism boundaries and even what defines feminism or gender. First of all, it discusses the fact that gender intersects with racial, class, sexual, regional modalities of discursively constituted identities (Butler 1990). My takeaway from these two reading is whether categorizing women is appropriate or not. I think between the two readings we are trying to decipher if putting people into these groups are empowering, and if the language used to label these groups is causing problems. I believe the reading looks at whether women across cultures suffer and have suffered the same oppression. Although women have all been subject to male domination, some cultures have experienced oppression perhaps more severely than white North American women. Typically in the media at feminist rallies and such I find I see North American women, of Caucasian descent, not all, but a majority. Do women across the world have a bond simply for being oppressed? In a sense, yes, we have a bond as we belong to a powerful group, fighting for rights. Is it fair to have a universal feminism? The author is questioning whether there is a seamless category of women, or if across intersections of religion, race and eras have the struggles and opportunities greyed the lines a bit. The reading goes on further to attempt to define gender, again looking at grouping people, questioning whether or not it is a cultural construction. I will agree that sex is determined biologically, but gender can be categorized as constructed. When, where and how I believe is all over society, throughout one’s whole life. In society, whether people or cultures are intending to or not, how to behave, and what is gender appropriate is plastered everywhere. From a very young age, we see gender-specific toys and hobbies, meant for boys or girls. It’s nearly impossible as much as you try as a parent to raise a child in a gender-neutral way. The author explores various theories on gender and feminism, ones that jump out at me, Wittig seems to have a feminist take on gender, and almost political. She calls for the deconstruction of sex, in order for women to be a universal subject, implying a desire for gender equality.

 

The second reading by Joan Scott deciphers a court case with Sears and discrimination of sexes. I think she is attempting to analyze whether the language that we use construct our differences or inequalities. Again, looking at grouping people into men vs women and looking at the language used. The court case discusses fundamental differences between males and females, citing this as the reasoning for men having sales jobs (Scott 1988). Overall this reading looks at whether arguments can be made for differences in men and women, and whether using language such as these fundamental differences can attribute to the workplace inequality between sexes. These differences it speaks of are attempting to say that women cannot use aggressive sales techniques and can’t “schmooze” (Scott 1988). But the author also goes on to argue by seeing men and women as equal humans we lose the history of women, female experiences, and essentially the differences that make women powerful. This reading left me conflicted, as I agree with the latter portion, oppression through history have made women stronger, and I don’t wish to ignore this to ensure we are seen as equals. Yes, we are equal as humans, but differences go further than DNA. I think that by categorizing people into men and women we automatically consider them to have stereotypical behaviours according to their gender.

 

Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge, 1990

 

Scott, Joan. “Deconstructing equality versus difference: or the uses of poststructuralist theory for feminism”. Feminist Studies ,14, no. 1 (1988) : 33