Feminist Perspective on the Family

9 Key excerpts on "Feminist Perspective on the Family"

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  The Neutered Mother, The Sexual Family and Other Twentieth Century Tragedies

  • Martha Albertson Fineman(Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  chapter 2 , I describe what I mean when I use the concept of “ideology.” I argue that ideology operates as an independent limitation on the use of law because dominant ideology is the conceptual or intellectual mechanism whereby “radical” ideas are tamed and made consistent with dominant power alignments in society. Of course, patriarchy is the most relevant ideological concept to explore in the context of a consideration of the family and motherhood and is specifically discussed in its role of dictating even reformist discourses.

  There has been some recent rethinking of the relationship between feminist theory and traditional legal paradigms such as equality. This rethinking has contributed to and been assisted by the evolution of complementary critical legal thought, loosely defined as “perspective scholarship,” which is discussed in chapter 2 . Perspective scholarship is the term applied to a body of scholarship that is built explicitly upon the assertion of relevant differences among people, whether they be found in race, class, sexual orientation, social situation, or gender.

  Chapter 2 concludes with an assessment of the failure of much of feminist legal theory to confront the family in general, and the institution of motherhood in particular, as serious and central to its overall project of considering law as implicated in women’s oppression. I assert that the family is typically considered as an afterthought (if at all) by feminist legal theorists whose attention remains focused on equality in the workplace and on issues surrounding sexuality and violence against women. When it is addressed, the family is considered more of an anomaly to be corrected than an institution so pivotal to the maintenance of societal structure and operation that it seems impervious to reform.

  In chapter 3

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  The Neutered Mother, The Sexual Family and Other Twentieth Century Tragedies

  • Martha Albertson Fineman(Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Of course, patriarchy is the most relevant ideological concept to explore in the context of a consideration of the family and motherhood and is specifically discussed in its role of dictating even reformist discourses. There has been some recent rethinking of the relationship between feminist theory and traditional legal paradigms such as equality. This re- thinking has contributed to and been assisted by the evolution of complemen- tary critical legal thought, loosely defined as “perspective scholarship,” which is discussed in chapter 2. Perspective scholarship is the term applied to a body of scholarship that is built explicitly upon the assertion of relevant differences among people, whether they be found in race, class, sexual orientation, social situation, or gender. Chapter 2 concludes with an assessment of the failure of much of feminist legal theory to confront the family in general, and the institution of motherhood in particular, as serious and central to its overall project of considering law as implicated in women’s oppression. I assert that the family is typically considered as an afterthought (if at all) by feminist legal theorists whose attention remains focused on equality in the workplace and on issues surrounding sexuality and violence against women. When it is addressed, the family is considered more of an anomaly to be corrected than an institution so pivotal to the maintenance of societal structure and operation that it seems impervious to reform. In chapter 3, building on what I see as the failure of feminist legal theory to take the family seriously, I explore the uneasy confrontation of legal feminists with notions of difference. This chapter traces the evolution of the feminist debates about differences and ultimately concludes that feminist theory that focuses on law must take the unequal position of women as a present given and must incorporate gendered differences as an explicit part of its analysis.

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  The Family

  • Liz Steel, Warren Kidd, Anne Brown(Authors)
  • 2012(Publication Date)
  • Bloomsbury Academic

    (Publisher)

  Gender conflict is seen as the fundamental feature of social life. Many feminist writers argue that women or ‘gender’ as objects of study and a category of analysis have all but been ignored in much sociological analysis. This has led to the claim that traditional sociology is ‘malestream’ – that it is ‘ by men, for men and about men ’, to use the definition by Abbott and Wallace (1997). In fact, were it not for feminist sociology, the present sociology of the family would be very differ-ent. The family as an object under the sociological gaze raises important theoretical and methodological questions for feminism. The family is seen as the core institution in the exercise of gender inequality and its continuation over time due to socialization. Equally, because of the private and ‘behind closed doors’ nature of all family life, the study of the family raises key questions for sociological methodology: how do we, as sociologists, go about making public that which by its very nature is private? In making the private (or ‘hidden’) family the object of public sociological research, feminism has attacked the ‘ ideology of the family ’ that exists in common-sense thought and at the heart of a great deal of functionalist and New Right ideas: that the fam-ily is a safe and private refuge for the individual – a natural place of contentment and harmony. The family and patriarchal social order The family is seen by feminists as a prime site of female oppression. Traditional femi-nist analysis of the family started with the realization that housework (‘domestic labour’) Conflict Theories of Families and Households 55 serves the interests of men. This idea was then applied to other aspects of family life: monogamous sexual relations within the family serve the interests of men; and the family, and marriage itself, are attempts by men to control, define and limit female sexuality and bodies.

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  Routledge Handbook of Families in Asia

  • Stella R. Quah(Author)
  • 2015(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Few suggests various ways scholars can embrace an explicit integration of critical race feminist and Black consciousness perspectives in family studies. Apart from critical race feminism, feminist-informed critical multiculturalism also represents another way that the feminist perspective intersects with the problems of racial, ethnic and cultural equity in the realm of family studies. Arguing along this line, McDowell and Fang (2007) identified a “multicultural movement” in family studies which has shifted from a posi-tion of “celebrating diversity” and understanding cultural differences toward a critical analysis of power relationships based on group membership (Falicov, 2003; Dilworth-Anderson et al., 2005; McDowell and Fang, 2007: 594). Since people from different cultural groups and social locations often hold highly diverse conceptualizations of family relationships, this requires femi-nist scholars – who are facing different or even competing theories of family life and family dynamics – to develop “the skills and sensibilities needed to respectfully enter and attempt to understand the life world of those who are culturally similar as well as culturally different from ourselves” (McDowell and Fang, 2007: 557). Echoing feminist-informed multiculturalism, Manohar (2008) examines how Indian/Patel women and men navigate dating in a Patel community in Florida. The study found that second generation Indian/Patel women and men both reject their parents’ perception of dating as non-Indian behavior and the American perception of dating as healthy fun. The author postulates that such dating patterns reflect the bicultural identities as Indian/Patel-Americans. Another study along the same vein traces the emergence of a patriarchy in Chinese immigrant working-class families in the San Francisco Bay area (Yu, 2009).

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  Feminism and Families

  • Hilde Lindemann Nelson(Author)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  It also represents another example of the prevailing feminist view that families, being neither all bad nor all good, need to be critiqued and reformed, rather than discarded. Family Resemblances The lines just drawn between liberal, Marxist, radical, socialist, and psy- choanalytic feminisms have become less distinct since about 1980. To some extent, this may be attributable to the growing salience of other crosscut- ting distinctions-such as that between feminists who accentuate similari- ties and those who accentuate differences between the sexes, or that between feminists who stress differences (for example, those of race, class, or religion) amongst women and those who stress what women have in common. Endorsing the initially radical slogan "the personal is political," most current feminists are convinced of the multiple interconnections be- tween women's status, roles within families, and their inequality and seg- regation in the workplace and the political realm, and between their socialization in gendered families and the psychological aspects of their oppression. Feminism has challenged the tendency to dichotomize public and private in at least three ways. First, as some earlier feminists were clearly aware, what happens in do- mestic and private life is not immune from the dynamic of power, which has often been seen as definitive of politics. Power within families- whether of husbands over wives or of parents over children-has often not been recognized as such, because it has been perceived as natural or be- nign. But the notion that power even in its crudest form, physical violence, is not a factor in family life is a myth that has been increasingly exposed during the last century and especially during the last two decades. Largely because of the efforts of feminists, violence and sexual abuse in the home

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  Domestic Violence in Diverse Contexts

  A Re-examination of Gender

  • Sarah Wendt, Lana Zannettino(Authors)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Taylor & Francis

    (Publisher)

  Feminists argue that many of the problems women face, including domestic violence, are caused by such social, cultural and political forces, hence the feminist mantra ‘the personal is political’ (McPhail et al., 2009). This phrase was used to explain and challenge the separation between the public (male) sphere of work and the private (female) sphere of home, and feminists used it to focus attention on the politics of power differentials between men and women that are inherent in everyday life (Swigonski & Raheim, 2011). Feminists argue that domestic violence demonstrates the problem of gender inequality and discrimination at its utmost severity, and it is ‘especially abhorrent in a relationship that should be, or allegedly is, intimate’ because intimate relationships are the most significant social context in a person’s life. Building on the ‘personal is political’ explanation of domestic violence, feminist theory has highlighted how gender inequality in this environment penetrates and threatens the deepest fabric of society, because accepting or not challenging violence against women in the family perpetuates the problem for generations to come (Winstok, 2011, p. 306). To be head of a nuclear family, or married within an extended family, carries considerable power and status for the male in the wider community (Hanmer, 2000).

  Family and patriarchy

  Feminist scholars have named the family and heterosexuality as central institutions in patriarchal society. The family is where the private struggles around patriarchal power relations are enacted, and hence where violence frequently features as a form of control of the powerless by the powerful (Radford & Stanko, 1996). The family embodies ideologies and practices that derive from patriarchy. Power and gender relations are built into the family and the marital relationship. For example, Horsfall (1991, p. 123) argues it is within the family in the first instance that the promise of masculinity is perceived by the boy, and parents live out power differentials between boys and girls. Feminist theorists have strongly argued that domestic violence is closely related to the historical development of the isolated nuclear family in a capitalist society, to division of the public–private domains, to constructions of ‘appropriate’ male and female family roles, and to positions of wives as legally and morally bound to husbands (Bograd, 1988). The public–private split has been a specific focus for feminist explanations of domestic violence because it emphasises gender difference (Horsfall, 1991, p. 18).

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  Gender

  Sociological Perspectives

  • Linda L. Lindsey(Author)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  To a large extent, early work on the family continues to inform sociological thinking on gender. The next sections overview the major sociological (theoretical) perspectives highlighting expla-nations for the gender–family connection. Functionalism Dating to the early-nineteenth century, at the advent of sociology as an academic discipline in Europe and the U.S., functionalism rapidly became sociology’s most influential theoreti-cal perspective. Also known as “structural functionalism,” it is a macro sociological perspec-tive based on the premise that society is made up of interdependent parts, each of which The Sociology of Gender 9 contributes to the functioning of the broader society. A change in one part leads to a change in every other part. Functionalists seek to identify these parts (structure) and determine how each contributes to meeting basic social needs. Social stability—balance and equilib-rium—are enhanced when parts work together effectively and efficiently. In the face of social change where accepted norms are disrupted, internal mechanisms—such as measures of social control—are mobilized to restore equilibrium. Both social control and stability are enhanced when people share similar beliefs and values. Functionalists highlight this value consensus as a key factor in maintaining or reestablishing social stability. When values shift too quickly normlessness can follow and social stability is threatened. Preview These central ideas in functionalism set the stage for understanding how sociological theory frames gender and gender roles in marriage and the family. The central ideas of the theories that follow do the same. Functionalists focus on the family as the critical institution to instill values to children about the “proper place” of men and women in society. When children in all families learn and accept these values, society functions smoothly and any dire effects of social change will be minimized.

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  Praeger Guide to the Psychology of Gender

  • Michele A. Paludi(Author)
  • 2004(Publication Date)
  • Praeger

    (Publisher)

  But the family itself may be a relevant context, for while it is influenced by its sur- rounding culture, the family can also develop its own culture (Dodd & Bald- win, 2002). The family is a privileged context of ideological reproduction, in which we learn social roles and gender roles (Reis, 1985; Schutzenberger, 1997). The family has to be contextualized, and observed through the lens of gender issues, so that one can capture the full picture of beliefs and myths and, from this picture, develop strategies for change. Since its origin, the term "family" has demarcated an association with tra- ditional forms of family organization. The Latin word famulus designates the "things and belongings of someone," mostly related to a man's belongings, which include his wife and children (Camilo Osorio, 1997). Such a defini- tion ignores the balance in the gender relationships and guarantees the man's sense of ownership toward the family (Koller, 1999). Until recently, all fam- ily members used the man's family name, and he was legally considered the family provider and the guardian of all. This picture of male hegemony has prevailed since the days of the patriarchal structures in Latin America. Such configuration reproduced the norms of masculine power and ownership, which were dictated by the masculine, and allowed by the feminine, through generations. Most Latin American countries, as well as other cultures, re- produce this picture (Goodrich et al., 1988). However, this situation is changing, as experts in women's rights are fram- 54 Praeger Guide to the Psychology of Gender ing violence against women as human rights for fair conditions to protect women. Jones (1994) claims that different people should not be treated as equal, but as equivalent. Oppression based on gender, and based on ethnic- ity and social class as well, permeates diverse societies.

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  Women, Gender, and World Politics

  Perspectives, Policies, and Prospects

  • Peter R. Beckman(Author)
  • 1994(Publication Date)
  • Praeger

    (Publisher)

  By virtue of her being oppressed, according to this view, a woman's "feminine perspective" pro- vides her with a less distorted and more truthful account of the world than a man's "masculine perspective" can. Such a claim is tenuous at best, and directly contradicts the Radical feminist observation that theory is always for someone and represents some interests, whether they be gender interests, class interests, or race interests. More importantly, the idea of a "feminine perspective" contrasts "woman" as nurturing, virtuous, and natural with "man" as aggressive, power seeking, and arrogant. This suggests that these differences are essen- tial, fundamental, and unchanging. Such an essentialist view not only can- not be sustained empirically, ignoring as it does important differences amongst women (and amongst men), but it is dangerously apolitical. 16 As Lynne Segal writes: "A feminism which . . . insists upon the essential dif- ferences between women's and men's inner being, between women's and men's natural urges and experience of the world, leaves little or no scope for transforming the relations between men and women." 17 A biologically determined relationship between women and men fixes those relation- ships firmly across time, place, and culture. Feminist politics in this con- text becomes a concerted effort to limit the damage inevitably done, to make the best of a bad world, and to hope that the more peaceful norms of "woman" may one day inform the practices of international decision makers. Other Radical feminists claim no biological determinism and argue in- stead that social practices such as mothering produce fundamental differ- ences between women and men. They also universalize those practices, cre- ating yet again an essentialist vision of feminine and masculine characteristics. One single activity such as mothering, by this view, pro- duces the same characteristics in women and men across time, place, cul- ture, class, race, and sexual orientation.

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