This document discusses different types of feminist literary criticism and feminist theories. It begins by defining feminist literary criticism as being concerned with women's roles as portrayed in texts and how women are constructed through literature. It then outlines three main feminist theories: liberal/moderate feminism focuses on cultural and psychological factors leading to women's oppression; radical feminism argues that male supremacy and the patriarchal family are the root causes; and socialist/Marxist feminism sees women's subordination as stemming from economic factors within capitalism. Examples of key thinkers from each theory are provided.

1. Feminist literary criticism

2. What is it?
• A concern with:
• Women's’ role in
society as portrayed
through texts
• Woman as a construct
through literature

3. • Definition:
• Unlike any other “isms” Feminism does not have
a theoretical conceptual base. The term
“Feminism” is derived from the Latin word.
• However a broad definition of feminism is “an
awareness of women’s oppression and
exploitation in society, at work and within the
family and conscious action by men and women
in changing the situation.

4. Evolution of the concept of feminism:
Feminism meant one thing in the 17th century and
meant something else in the 19 & 20th centuries. For
the former feminist, the struggle was fought for the
democratic rights of women, it included the Rights to
education & employment, right to own property, the
right to vote – the right to enter parliament. On the
whole they fought for legal reforms; the struggles were
essential outside home and family.

5. • Today the feminist have gone beyond mere reforms to end
discrimination. They work more towards their
emancipation. Feminism therefore now includes the
struggle against women’s subordination to the male within
the home, against their exploitation by the family, their
continuing low status at work & in burden in production
and reproduction.
• In essence the present day feminism is a struggle for the
achievement of women’s equality, dignity & freedom of
choice to control their life and bodies within and outside
home.

6. • Feminist consciousness arose in Asia during the early 20th century.
These voices demanded widow remarriage, ban on polygamy, and
ban of sati, purdah and demand for legal emancipation. In the
earliest agitator for women’s rights were men. Although women
today are becoming economically independent and are
educationally & occupationally mobile, we can still compare their
emotional world to that of Sita.
• A siege has been laid on women they have been captured by the
very institution which attempt to safeguard the life and interest
namely family, marriage, educational institution, employment
establishment, police outfits, legal machinery, etc.

7. • Whether it is child marriage, infanticide, feticide,
wife-battering, sati, widowhood, bigamy, polygamy,
sexual harassment (eve-teasing), physical torture,
mental cruelty, rape (by strangers, police, army,
paramilitary), dowry extortion, dowry murders. Pre-marital
and post-marital suicide – all these forms of
oppressions of Indian women manifest in the
decadent, capitalist, consumerist, corrupt, casteist,
communal, criminal and patriarchal society.

8. Theories of Feminism
Feminism
Socialist/Marxist
Radical
Liberal/Individual/
Moderate

9. • Social scientist and women activist both accept
that women are not biologically inferior and her
lower status to man is man-made. However their
approach to the cause of women’s liberation
differs. These approaches have resulted in the
formulation of different theories.
• They all maintain that the social inequalities
between man and women as creation of socio-cultural
tradition. These theories have inspired
several women liberal movement all over the
world.

11. Moderate or Liberal Feminism or Individual
Feminism:
• The inferior position of women according to
the supporters of this theory is due to cultural
and psychological factor. J.S. Mill one of the
earliest thinkers of this school championed
the cause of feminism. He was a liberal and
individualistic thinker. His book “Subjection of
Women” (1861) has become a landmark in the
History of women’s movement. According to
him the inferiority of women in the domains
of mental and intellectual production were
not natural but artificial.

13. • The Historical origin of Liberal feminism goes back to
the 18th century “The enlightenment period of western
Europe” – it was the age of reason. The thinkers of this
period touched upon the nature and the role of
women. An important aspect of liberal feminism was
individualism, by which it was meant that individual
possess the freedom to do what one wishes without
interference of others.
• Mary Wollstonecraft as a liberal thinker is well known for her ardent
support for women’s cause. Her work was known as “A Vindication
of the rights of women” (1791). Her basic idea is that “Women are
first and foremost human beings and not sexual beings” women are
rational creatures. They are capable of governing themselves by
reason.

14. MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT

15. Mary Wollstonecraft
• A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792)
• formed the basis of modern thoughts of equality
• Called for the right for women to
– Have an equal education
“How can a rational being be ennobled by anything that is not obtained
by its own exertions?”
– To be treated as equal partners not as ornamental wives
“Women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions
which men think it manly to pay to the sex, when, in fact, men are
insultingly supporting their own superiority”

16. • In “The feminine mystique” (1963) by Betty
Friedan one of the founders of the liberal
women’s movement in USA analyses the cause of
the traditional male, female division of labor. She
says if they are equal why one role fix for man
and other for women. Such fixation which is
social makes one superior or inferior.
• “Each suburban wife struggles with it alone. As she made the
beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate
peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub
Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night- she was
afraid to ask even of herself the silent question-- 'Is this all?”
― Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique

18. • Gandhi also took some of similar approach
towards women’s problems. He strongly
criticized excessive subordination of the wife
to the husband. He said that women should
enjoy equal status with man. Sex
discrimination keeps half the population
unproductive therefore women should be
brought out from the four walls of the house.

19. • The liberal feminism which flourished in 1960s did not
provide more insight into the roots of women’s inferior
status. However the feminist began to extend the concept
of equality beyond the earlier emphasis on formal equality
in the civil and political sphere. Liberal feminism argued for
equal rights for women but accepted the existing social
order as valid and advocated for the improvement of social
customs, institutions, and laws. Without altering the social
structure particularly in family. They also subscribed to the
hope and accumulation of reforms will transform society,
but radical restructuring is not necessary.

20. • Radical Feminism:
• Radical feminism is an offshoot of moderate
feminism. The radical feminist believes that the
women’s subjection is due to sexual aggression
by men.
• Male supremacy is the oldest, the most basic
form of domination, all other forms of
exploitation and oppression. (Racism, Capitalism,
Imperialism, etc) are extension of male
supremacy.
• Radical feminist also argued that the History of
the world was not the struggle of the classes but
it was a struggle between men and women.

21. RADICAL FEMINISM

22. • For radical feminist – The roots of
subordination lies in the biological family.
• Radical feminist main plea is not only the
removal of sex distinctions but the removal of
men in their life – sexual preferences, control
over one’s body, free sex experience and
collective child care are some of the action
programs outlined by the radical feminist.

23. • The radical feminist argue that women have always been
economically exploited for them marriage turns to be a
contract where by sex and service (house work) are
provided by women to men in return for support.
• The same thing happened in the feudal society where the
lord provided security to the slaves in return for their
services. Women and slaves are equivalent due to sexual
politics.

24. • Similarly virginity is held important and essential
for the female only.
• When a woman marries the custom requires her
to change the title from “miss” to “mrs’. All this
she has to do in order to proclaim her belonging
to a man – which implies that she has no
independent existence of her own.
• Her income is regarded as part of husband’s
income. Moreover when both partners earn it is a
wife who is expected to take care of the domestic
work such as cooking and housekeeping.

25. • In the west the radical feminism adopted novel
protest methods to draw the attention of the
male oppressors.
• In the 1970 an army of women marched through
the New York streets and placed what they
thought “freedom trash cans” at important
points. In this they threw their cosmetics and
false eyelashes.
• Through this they wanted to show that women
cannot be considered as sex objects. They also
shouted slogans “marriage if legalized rape”.

26. In India the Delhi University girls students formed a
society called “Power” – Progressive Organisation for
Women’s Equal Rights. The posters reading “we are not
chapathi making machines” were pasted on the walls of
the college.

28. • Among the radical feminist the very aggressive group formed
societies whose chief aim was not only liberation of women
but also the annihilation of men.
• Valarie Solanas was given 3 years imprisonment for shooting
men. She also started a society called SCUM (Society for
Cutting Up Men).
• Another such society was called WITCH (Women’s
International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell). In UK the
feminist picketed the Miss World contest and carried banners
displaying – “miss used, “miss conception” and “miss guided”.
• Man being the enemy of the radical feminist, they stood to
put an end to the subordination and they seem to be no place
for men in their life.

31. • Socialist or Marxist Feminism :
• Another approach to the status of women is
Historical materialism or Socialist feminism. All to
this approach the root cause of the lower status
of women lies in the family.
• The family is the result of the private property in
the means of production therefore complete
equality of women is possible when private
property in the means of production is abolished.
• The concept of private property brought a basic
change in the family.

32. • “Men are from Earth, women are from Earth.
Deal with it.”
― George Carlin

33. • In a capitalist society, family relations are reduced
to more money relations. Karl Marx and Engels
observed that by abolishing private means of
production the family system will be abolished
this is the only way in which the status of women
can be raised.
• Feminist within the socialist fold have been
struggling to come to grips with the reality of
gender oppression in society.
• According to socialist view power is derived from
sex and class and this is manifested materially
and ideologically in patriarchy and class relations.
The major task is to discover the
interdependence of class and patriarchy.

34. • It would be necessary to organize struggle
simultaneously against capitalism and patriarchy.
• Patriarchal system cannot vanish by nearly
abolishing private property.
• A struggle against patriarchal is a struggle against
the present structure of the family system
dominated by men.
• The liberation of women would not be complete
without a change in the patriarchal social system
and all the social values that go with them.

35. • The socialist feminist have also raised the whole
debate of domestic work. They argue that
women’s oppression is based on unpaid house
work.
• Child bearing, child care and house work are
material activities resulting in products.
• Like radical feminist the socialist feminist are not
anti-man. But they believe in collaborating with
men if the latter support their cause.
“Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere.
It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.”
― Gloria Steinem

36. • CONCLUSION
• These 3 main approaches have been used for
understanding women’s subordinate status and also for
evolving strategies to establish women’s equality.
• In India feminism and nationalism was closely inter-linked.
The women’s movement in India had none of
the man-women antagonism characteristic of women’s
movement of the west.
• In the Indian context the dominant approach has been
liberal feminism, moreover Indian women could not
come out of their homes to fight oppression because it
is the family that is a sole supportive institution. Hence
it is not possible for many women to leave the security
of the family.

37. • “A woman without a man is like a fish without
a bicycle.”
― Gloria Steinem

38. • Indian feminism is entirely different from
western feminism. Indian women in the
absence of economic independence have to
depend solely on the family.
• While in the west 50 to 5 % of the women are
employed and those who are unemployed get
benefits from social welfare schemes provided
by the state.
• Hence they have an alternative if they decide
to come out of oppressive family situations.

39. • Moreover the higher level of education of the women in the
west makes them more confident to struggle against social
odds while in Asia the high level of illiteracy, sheer struggle
for survival, make women extremely helpless to fight against
oppression with the family.
• This is one of the major reasons why Indian feminist had to
confine their struggle mainly to issues like rape, dowry,
murder, sexism in the media, etc.,
• The feminists seek the removal of all forms of inequality,
domination and oppression through the creation of a just,
social and economic order, in the home, nationally and
internationally.

41. Virginia Woolf
• A Room of One’s Own (1929)
– Women’s need for economic and social freedom
“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is
to write fiction”
“It would have been impossible, completely and entirely, for
any woman to have written the plays of Shakespeare in
the age of Shakespeare”
– Forego the traditional role as a mirror for man’s ability
"Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses
possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the
figure of a man at twice its natural size."

42. Simone de Beauvoir
– The Second Sex (1949)
– Woman as a social
construction
– No “natural” distinction
between the sexes
“one is not born, one
becomes a woman”

43. Woman as a construct
“If the definition provided for this concept [of the eternal
feminine] is contradicted by the behavior of flesh-and-blood
women, it is the latter who are wrong: we are told
not that Femininity is a false entity, but that the women
concerned are not feminine.”

45. • What does this
advert mean?
• What is the
underlying
suggestion?

46. Men's contributions?
• Freidrich Engels
– The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State
(1884)

47. 1960s
• Focus lay in the images of women in literature
• A need to combat the authority of these
images

48. 1970s
• Focus developed to
explore the
“mechanisms of
patriarchy”
• Language, science
and social structures
that reproduced
inequality

49. 1980s
• Eclectic
development –
drawing on other
disciplines eg
– Marxism
– psychoanalysis
• Exploration of
female experience
• Rewriting of the
canon
(rediscovering
female writers)

50. What feminist critics do
• Rediscover texts written by women
• Revalue women’s experience
• Examine representations of women in literature
• Challenge the view of woman as “Other”
• Examine and challenge patriarchal roles
• Examine language as a tool of gender construction
• Discuss social versus biological difference
• Question the “death of the author”
• Question the neutrality of mainstream interpretation

51. Feminist terminology
• Patriarchy – in a society the male is the centre
of authority
– This is what is meant by a patriarchal society

52. Feminist terminology
• Hegemony – leadership; predominance.
– A hegemony is a dominant group or a system that
creates the rules we live by
• Gender – term used when distinguishing male
and female in a variety of disciplines

53. Identity and agency
• Words commonly employed when discussing
women and their rights:
• Agency: the capacity for a person to act in the
world, make decisions
– If you do not have the power to speak up for
yourself then you have no agency, or the capacity
to act for your own benefit

54. The “Other”
• The opposite of “the same”
• Used to exclude a group
• To subordinate those who do not fit in
• Gives justification for the dominance and
exploitation of “inferior” groups

55. Phallocentrism
• a doctrine or belief centred on the phallus,
especially a belief in the superiority of the
male sex.
– In other words we can say that a patriarchal
society is phallocentric
– In literature it is common to search for phallic
symbols – symbols of male dominance
– This overlaps with psychoanalytic Freudian theory

56. FIRST WAVE FEMINISM
• The “First Wave” of feminism began in the late 19th and early 20th
Century.
• Focused mainly on opening up various opportunities for women,
especially the right to vote (women’s suffrage) and property rights.
• Concerns of First wave Feminism:
Education, Employment, Reformation in Marriage laws and the
plight of intelligent middle class single women.
• British women fought against the idea of ‘Angel in the House’

57. First Wave Feminism (Cont..)
• In USA: First wave feminism (1848-1960) focused on right to
vote and right to practice birth control.
• July 13, 1848: USA, Elizabeth Cady Stanton organized the
Seneca Convention- to discuss about the social, civil and
religious condition and rights of woman.
• Issued ‘Declaration of sentiments’
• Key Thinkers of this phase: Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady
Stanton, Lucy Stone, Sojourner Truth.
• Major achievements: Voting rights, property rights and birth control

58. Second wave Feminism
• The “Second Wave” of feminism is typically seen as starting
in the 1960s and continuing into the 1990s .
• It was particularly connected to other social movements
occurring at the time, such as the anti-Vietnam protests and
the civil rights movement.
• The “new social movement” dedicated to raising
consciousness about sexism and patriarchy, legalizing
abortion and birth control, attaining equal rights in political
and economic realms, and gaining sexual liberation

59. Second Wave Feminism (cont..)
• Important books: The Second Sex and Betty Friedan’s The Feminine
Mystique (1963)
• The Second Wave of feminism, although it did stress such important
social and economic issues as equality in employment and sexual
harassment, was also driven by other, more theoretical interests, such as
the differences between men and women and the political consequences
of those differences. As in First Wave feminist thought, however, there
was still a prevailing belief that men and women were essentially
different, and that due to their nurturing and collaborative natures women
would be able to bring about a peaceful world.
• Major achievements: Sexual freedom, integration in the workplace and
into the political arena, equal funding

60. Third Wave Feminism
• shares many of the interests of the first two waves (such as the empowerment of
women,)
• also characterized by a desire of young women to find a voice of their own and
to include various diverse groups in the fold of feminist thought.
• Rebecca Walker, who coined the term “Third Wave,” is one of the most
prominent figures in this wave of feminism.
• includes various groups of women, including women of color; lesbian, bisexual,
and transgendered women; and low income women.
• often seen as a critique Second Wave feminism for either excluding or
overlooking these disempowered groups.
• Major concerns: sexual freedom, inclusion of women of color and women from
other cultures, including the issues of the 1st and the 2nd wave feminism.

61. Three phases according to Elaine Showalter
The history of women’s writing in the West is divided into
three phases according to Elaine Showalter:
• A feminine phase (1840-1880) :
in which women writers imitated the male writers in their
norms and artistic standards
• A feminist phase (1880-1920):
in which a different and often a separate position was
maintained.
• A female phase (1920 onwards):
which has a different female identity, style and content