1. 1
Radical Feminism – an introduction
• Radical feminists see the problem as patriarchy – a whole system of male
power over women. Male rulers, male military, industrial, political and
religious establishments, male trade unions and the male-dominated left
are all a part of the patriarchy reinforcing – and reinforced by – the power
of individual men over women and children within their families.
Radical feminism and human nature
Sex roles and androgyny
• Early on in the development of radical feminism, the idea was that if the
problem was gender, then the goal of feminism must be androgyny
(unisex). The sex-role language of radical feminism suggests that human
beings are not necessarily constituted by society but instead are capable,
in principle, of withdrawing from society to redefine their own identity. This
conception of human nature is essentially that of liberalism.
• Contemporary radical feminists reject the goal of androgyny for the
following reason – because men oppress women, feminists must struggle
against men and so must acknowledge the need for separatism and a
polarisation of the sexes – the idea of androgyny obscures the need for
struggle and is simply a form of ‘cheap grace’.
Women’s biology as the problem
• If male privilege is universal, biology may provide the answer of why this is
so. According to Brownmiller, women’s original subordination is rooted in
the fact that human anatomy allows men the possibility of raping women,
while women cannot retaliate in kind.
• Relations of procreation, rather than production, constitute the base of
society. The primary class division is that between men and women.
Developments in technology now make it possible, for the first time, to
transform the biological basis of women’s subordination (i.e. reliable
contraception, legalised abortion, ‘test tube babies’, and so on). The
biologically determined sexual division of labour can now be eliminated.
Women’s biology as the solution
• Radical feminists have become increasingly reluctant to locate the cause of
women’s subordination in anything about women themselves, as this
blames the victim. Recent theorising has tended to see the fault as some
flaw in male biology. For some, the main problem with male biology is that
it isn’t female. Men lack the special life giving power that women possess in
virtue of their biological capacity to become mothers.
• Women’s special closeness with nature is believed to give women special
ways of knowing and conceiving the world. They reject what they see as
the excessive masculine reliance on reason, and instead emphasise
feeling, emotion and non-verbal communication. Women’s ways of
understanding the world contrast with ‘patriarchal’ ways of knowing.
One is not born a woman
• Radical feminists challenge the ‘naturalness’ of childbearing, of the female
body and even of the sex difference itself. Patriarchy has created ‘woman’
and ‘man’. Wittig argues that women do not constitute a ‘natural’ group;
instead the category of woman is an “artificial (social) fact”.

2. 2
• It is not just ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ but the very categories of ‘man’
and ‘woman’ that are fictions, caricatures, and cultural constructs. Thus, if
this view is correct, it makes no sense for feminists to fight for an ultimate
matriarchy or a separatist society, for these ideals would leave
unchallenged the patriarchal categories of sex.
• Wittig suggests that once the class ‘men’ disappears, women as a class will
disappear too, for there are no slaves without masters.
Radical feminism and sexual politics
• The focus is on a theory of, by and for women – based firmly in women’s
own experiences and perceptions, with no need to compromise with
existing political perspectives and agendas.
• The oppression of women is seen as the most fundamental and universal
form of domination, the aim being to understand and end this; here,
‘patriarchy’ is a key term.
• Women as a group have interests opposed to those of men; these interests
unite them in a common sisterhood than transcends the division of class or
race, and means that women should struggle together to achieve their own
liberation.
• Radical feminist analysis insists that male power is not confined to the
public worlds of politics and paid employment, but that it extends into
private life; this means that traditional concepts of power and politics are
challenged and extended to such ‘personal’ areas of life as the family and
sexuality, both of which are seen as instruments of patriarchal domination.
• Radical feminism is ‘woman-centred’, with the consciousness raising belief
that the ‘personal is political’. This has produced diverse approaches to
overcoming gender problems ranging from changing the role of women’s
reproductive anatomy to eco-feminism which celebrates motherhood as
giving rise to positive ‘womanly’ values of nurturing, co-operation and
peace.
Radical feminism and media studies
Two main strands of radical feminist research:
• Pornography – legalistic and theoretical arguments have been developed
regarding its perceived ‘negative’ effects, using primarily ‘laboratory
techniques’ to provide ‘proof’. Radical feminists have written much of the
literature on pornography, but it is primarily polemical, generally assuming
that pornography (and often erotica) is a direct cause of rape and other
sexual injustices against women. “Pornography is the theory, rape is the
practice”.
• Alternative women’s media – it is argued that a second realm of activity
should be encouraged, and indeed is necessary because of the patriarchal
nature of mainstream media which will never allow women to express
themselves fully.

3. 3
Although some descriptive historical and contemporary research has
covered the feminist press in general, including radical feminist
publications, little research has been done to assess systematically its
production processes, content, audiences and effects.
In literary and speech studies, there is considerable research and debate
on the existence of women’s language, a language separate from that of
men. Many speech studies have had limited success in substantiating
differences between men and women. Researchers have sought
differences in variables such as vocabulary, sentence length, enunciation,
pitch, and intonation.
There has also been much debate on the relative value of writing separate
histories of women’s literature and printing anthologies of prose and poetry
written exclusively by women.
Also, speech and language studies point to imaginative new research on
women’s gossip, humour, and story telling as verbal art. Several recent
studies have focused on the character of all-female conversation styles.
The studies are usually quantitative, in contrast to radical feminists’ critique
of these methods. These sorts of studies have now been replaced largely
by studies examining speech in specific social contexts.