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Introduction to Feminism, Topics: What Is Feminism?
Feminism is both an intellectual commitment and a political movement
that seeks justice for women and the end of sexism in all forms. However,
there are many different kinds of feminism. Feminists disagree about
what sexism consists in, and what exactly ought to be done about it; they
disagree about what it means to be a woman or a man and what social and
political implications gender has or should have. Nonetheless, motivated
by the quest for social justice, feminist inquiry provides a wide range
of perspectives on social, cultural, and political phenomena. Important
topics for feminist theory and politics include: the body, class and work,
disability, the family, globalization, human rights, popular culture, race
and racism, reproduction, science, the self, sex work, and sexuality. Extended
discussion of these topics is included in the sub-entries.
Feminism brings many things to philosophy including not
only a variety of particular moral and political claims, but ways
of asking and answering questions, critiques of mainstream philosophical
views and methods, and new topics of inquiry. Feminist contributions
to and interventions in mainstream philosophical debates are covered
in entries under "Feminism, interventions". Entries covered under the
rubric "Feminism, topics" concern philosophical issues that arise as feminists
articulate accounts of sexism, critique sexist social and cultural practices,
and develop alternative visions of a just world. In short, they
are philosophical topics that arise within feminism.
Although there are many different and sometimes conflicting
approaches to feminist philosophy, (see "Feminism, approaches to"),
it is instructive to begin by asking what, if anything, feminists
as a group are committed to. Considering some of the controversies
over what feminism is provides a springboard for seeing how feminist
commitments generate a host of philosophical topics, especially as
those commitments confront the world as we know it.
The term 'feminism' has many different uses and its meanings
are often contested. For example, some writers use the term 'feminism'
to refer to a historically specific political movement in the US and
Europe ; other writers use it to refer to the belief that there are injustices
against women, though there is no consensus on the exact list of these
injustices. My goal here will be to sketch some of the central uses
of the term that are most relevant to those interested in contemporary feminist
philosophy. For an overview of the history of feminist thought see: "Feminism,
history of". The references I provide below are only a small sample of
the work available on the topics in question; more complete bibliographies
are available at the specific topical entries and also at the end of this
entry.
In the mid-1800's the term 'feminism' was used to refer to "the
qualities of females" , and it was not until after the First International
Women's Conference in Paris in 1892 that the term, following the French
term féministe, was used regularly in English for a belief in
and advocacy of equal rights for women based on the idea of the equality
of the sexes. Some feminists trace the origins of the term "feminism"
in English as rooted in the movement in Europe and the US beginning
with the mobilization for suffrage during the late 19th and early 20th
century and refer to this movement as "First Wave" feminism. Those
who employ this history often depict feminist as waning between the two
world wars, to be "revived" in the late 1960's and early 1970's as what
they label "Second Wave" feminism. More recently, transformations of
feminism in the past decade have been referred to as "Third Wave" feminism.
However, other feminist scholars object to identifying feminism
with these particular moments of political activism, on the grounds
that doing so eclipses the fact that there has been resistance to male
domination that should be considered "feminist" throughout history and
across cultures: i.e., feminism is not confined to a few (White) women
in the West over the past century or so. Moreover, even considering
only relatively recent efforts to resist male domination in Europe and
the US, the emphasis on "First" and "Second" Wave feminism ignores the
ongoing resistance to male domination between the 1920's and 1960's and
the resistance outside mainstream politics, particularly by women of
color and working class women.
One might seek to solve these problems by emphasizing the political
ideas that the term was apparently coined to capture, viz., the commitment
to women's equal rights. This acknowledges that commitment to and
advocacy for women's rights has not been confined to the Women's Liberation
Movement in the West. But this too raises controversy, for it frames
feminism within a broadly Liberal approach to political and economic life.
Although most feminists would probably agree that there is some sense
of "rights" on which achieving equal rights for women is a necessary condition
for feminism to succeed, most would also argue that this would not be sufficient.
This is because women's oppression under male domination rarely if ever
consists solely in depriving women of political and legal "rights", but
also extends into the structure of our society and the content of our culture,
and permeates our consciousness (e.g.,Bartky 1990).
Given the controversies over the term "feminism" and the politics
of circumscribing the boundaries of a social movement, it is sometimes
tempting to think that there is little point in demanding a definition
of the term beyond a set of disjuncts that capture different instances.
However, at the same time it can be both intellectually and politically
valuable to have a schematic framework that enables us to map at least
some of our points of agreement and disagreement. I'll begin here by
considering some of the basic elements of feminism as a political position.
For an overview of different philosophical approaches to feminism,
see "Feminism, approaches to".
In many of its forms, feminism seems to involve at least
two claims, one normative and the other descriptive. The normative
claim concerns how women ought (or ought not) to be viewed and treated
and draws on a background conception of justice or broad moral position;
the descriptive claim concerns how women are, as a matter of fact, viewed
and treated, alleging that they are not being treated in accordance with
the standards of justice or morality invoked in the normative claim. Together
the two claims provide reasons for working to change the way things are;
hence, feminism is not just an intellectual but also a political movement.
So, for example, a Liberal approach of the kind already mentioned
might define feminism (rather simplistically here) in terms of two claims:
i) (Normative) Men and women are entitled to equal rights
and respect.
ii) (Descriptive) Women are currently disadvantaged with respect
to rights and respect, compared with men.
On this account, that women and men ought to have equal rights
and respect is the normative claim; and that women are denied equal
rights and respect functions here as the descriptive claim. (Admittedly,
the claim that women are disadvantaged with respect to rights and respect
is not a "purely descriptive" claim since it plausibly involves an evaluative
component. However, my point here is simply that claims of this sort
concern what is the case not what ought to be the case.)
Disagreements within feminism can occur with respect to either
the descriptive or normative claim, e.g., feminists differ on what
would count as justice or injustice for women (what counts as "equality,"
"oppression," "disadvantage"?) , and what sorts of injustice women
in fact suffer (what aspects of women's current situation are harmful
or unjust?). Disagreements between feminists and non-feminists
can also occur with respect to both the normative and descriptive claims,
e.g., some non-feminists agree with feminists on the ways women ought
to be viewed and treated, but don't see any problem with the way things
currently are. Others disagree about the background moral or political
views.
In an effort to suggest a schematic account of feminism, Susan
James characterizes feminism as follows:
Feminism is grounded on the belief that women are oppressed
or disadvantaged by comparison with men, and that their oppression
is in some way illegitimate or unjustified. Under the umbrella of this
general characterization there are, however, many interpretations of
women and their oppression, so that it is a mistake to think of feminism
as a single philosophical doctrine, or as implying an agreed political
program. (James 2000, 576)
James seems here to be using the notions of "oppression" and
"disadvantage" as placeholders for more substantive accounts of injustice
(both normative and descriptive) over which feminists disagree.
Some might prefer to define feminism in terms of a normative
claim alone: feminists are those who believe that women are entitled
to equal rights, or equal respect, or…(fill in the blank with one's
preferred account of injustice), and one is not required to believe that
women are currently being treated unjustly. However, if we were to
adopt this terminological convention, it would be harder to identify some
of the interesting sources of disagreement both with and within feminism,
and the term 'feminism' would lose much of its potential to unite those
whose concerns and commitments extend beyond their moral beliefs to their
social interpretations and political affiliations. Feminists are not
simply those who are committed in principle to justice for women; feminists
take themselves to have reasons to bring about social change on women's
behalf.
Taking "feminism" to entail both normative and empirical commitments
also helps make sense of some uses of the term 'feminism' in recent
popular discourse. In everyday conversation it is not uncommon to find
both men and women prefixing a comment they might make about women with
the caveat, "I'm not a feminist, but…". Of course this qualification
might be (and is) used for various purposes, but one persistent usage seems
to follow the qualification with some claim that is hard to distinguish
from claims that feminists are wont to make. E.g., I'm not a feminist but
I believe that women should earn equal pay for equal work; or I'm not a feminist
but I'm delighted that first-rate women basketball players are finally
getting some recognition in the WNBA. If we see the identification "feminist"
as implicitly committing one to both a normative stance about how things
should be and an interpretation of current conditions, it is easy to imagine
someone being in the position of wanting to cancel his or her endorsement
of either the normative or the descriptive claim. So, e.g., one might
be willing to acknowledge that there are cases where women have been disadvantaged
without wanting to buy any broad moral theory that takes a stance on such
things (especially where it is unclear what that broad theory is). Or one
might be willing to acknowledge in a very general way that equality for women
is a good thing, without being committed to interpreting particular everyday
situations as unjust (especially if is unclear how far these interpretations
would have to extend). Feminists, however, at least according to popular
discourse, are ready to both adopt a broad account of what justice for
women would require and interpret everyday situations as unjust by the
standards of that account. Those who explicitly cancel their commitment
to feminism may then be happy to endorse some part of the view but are
unwilling to endorse what they find to be a problematic package.
As mentioned above, there is considerable debate within feminism
concerning the normative question: what would count as (full) justice
for women? What is the nature of the wrong that feminism seeks to address?
E.g., is the wrong that women have been deprived equal rights? Is
it that women have been denied equal respect for their differences? Is
it that women's experiences have been ignored and devalued? Is it all
of the above and more? What framework should we employ to identify and
address the issues? (See, e.g., Jaggar 1983; Young 1990a; Tuana and Tong
1995.) Feminist philosophers in particular have asked: Do the standard
philosophical accounts of justice and morality provide us adequate resources
to theorize male domination, or do we need distinctively feminist accounts?
(E.g., Okin 1979; Hoagland 1989; Okin 1989; Ruddick 1989; Benhabib 1992;
Hampton 1993; Held 1993; Tong 1993; Baier 1994; Moody-Adams 1997; Walker
1998; Kittay 1999; Robinson 1999).
Note, however, that by phrasing the task as one of identifying
the wrongs women suffer (and have suffered), there is an implicit suggestion
that women as a group can be usefully compared against men as a group
with respect to their standing or position in society; and this seems
to suggest that women as a group are treated in the same way, or that
they all suffer the same injustices, and men as a group all reap the same
advantages. But of course this is not the case, or at least not straightforwardly
so. As bell hooks so vividly pointed out, in 1963 when Betty Friedan urged
women to reconsider the role of housewife and demanded greater opportunities
for women to enter the workforce (Friedan 1963), Friedan was not speaking
for working class women or most women of color (hooks 1984, 1-4). Neither
was she speaking for lesbians. Women as a group experience many different
forms of injustice, and the sexism they encounter interacts in complex
ways with other systems of oppression. In contemporary terms, this is
known as the problem of intersectionality (Crenshaw 1991). This awareness
has led some theorists to adopt a different term. Earlier, during the
1860's-80's, the term 'womanism' had sometimes been used for such intellectual
and political commitments; more recently, Alice Walker has proposed that
a newly defined "womanism" provides a contemporary alternative to "feminism"
that better addresses the needs of Black women and women of color more
generally (Walker 1990).
To consider some of the different strategies for responding to
the phenomenon of intersectionality, let's return to the schematic claims
that women are oppressed and this oppression is wrong or unjust. Very
broadly, then, one might characterize the goal of feminism to be ending
the oppression of women. But if we also acknowledge that women are oppressed
not just by sexism, but in many ways, e.g., by classism , homophobia, racism,
ageism, ableism, etc., then it might seem that the goal of feminism is
to end all oppression that affects women. And some feminists have adopted
this interpretation, e.g., (Ware 1970), quoted in (Crow 2000, 1).
Note, however, that not all agree with such an expansive definition
of Feminism. One might agree that feminists ought to work to end all
forms of oppression--oppression is unjust and feminists, like everyone
else, have a moral obligation to fight injustice--without maintaining
that it is the mission of feminism to end all oppression. One might even
believe that in order to accomplish feminism's goals it is necessary
to combat racism and economic exploitation, but also think that there
is a narrower set of specifically feminist objectives. In other words,
opposing oppression in its many forms may be instrumental to, even a
necessary means to, feminism, but not intrinsic to it. E.g., bell hooks
argues:
Feminism, as liberation struggle, must exist apart from and
as a part of the larger struggle to eradicate domination in all its
forms. We must understand that patriarchal domination shares an ideological
foundation with racism and other forms of group oppression, and that there
is no hope that it can be eradicated while these systems remain intact.
This knowledge should consistently inform the direction of feminist theory
and practice. (hooks 1989, 22)
On hooks' account, the defining characteristic that distinguishes
feminism from other liberation struggles is its concern with sexism:
Unlike many feminist comrades, I believe women and men must
share a common understanding--a basic knowledge of what feminism is--if
it is ever to be a powerful mass-based political movement. In Feminist
Theory: from margin to center, I suggest that defining feminism broadly
as "a movement to end sexism and sexist oppression" would enable us to
have a common political goal…Sharing a common goal does not imply that
women and men will not have radically divergent perspectives on how that
goal might be reached. (hooks 1989, 23)
Hooks' approach depends on the claim that sexism is a particular
form of oppression that can be distinguished from other forms, e.g., racism
and homophobia, even though it is currently (and virtually always) interlocked
with other forms of oppression. Feminism's objective is to end sexism,
though because of its relation to other forms of oppression, this will
require efforts to end other forms of oppression as well. For example,
feminists who themselves remain racists will not be able to fully appreciate
the broad impact of sexism on the lives of women of color.Furthermore because
sexist institutions are also, e.g., racist, classist and homophobic, dismantling
sexist institutions will require that we dismantle the other forms of
domination intertwined with them. Following hooks' lead, we might characterize
feminism schematically (allowing the schema to be filled in differently
by different accounts) as the view that women are subject to sexist oppression
and that this is wrong . This move shifts the burden of our inquiry from
a characterization of what feminism is to a characterization of what sexism,
or sexist oppression is.
As mentioned above, there are a variety of interpretations--feminist
and otherwise--of what exactly oppression consists in, but the leading
idea is that oppression consists in "an enclosing structure of forces and
barriers which tends to the immobilization and reduction of a group or
category of people (Frye 1983, 10-11). Not just any "enclosing structure"
is oppressive, however, for plausibly any process of socialization will
create a structure that both limits and enables all individuals who live
within it. In the case of oppression, however, the "enclosing structures"
in question are part of a broader system that asymmetrically and unjustly
disadvantages one group and benefits another. So, e.g., although sexism
restricts the opportunities available to—and so unquestionably harms--both
men and women (and considering some pairwise comparisons may even have
a greater negative impact on a man than a woman), overall, women as a group
unjustly suffer the greater harm. It is a crucial feature of contemporary
accounts, however, that one cannot assume that members of the privileged
group have intentionally designed or maintained the system for their benefit.
The oppressive structure may be the result of an historical process whose
originators are long gone, or it may be the unintended result of complex
cooperative strategies gone wrong.
Leaving aside (at least for the moment) further details in the
account of oppression, the question remains: What makes a particular
form of oppression sexist? If we just say that a form of oppression counts
as sexist oppression if it harms women, or even primarily harms women,
this is not enough to distinguish it from other forms of oppression.
Virtually all forms of oppression harm women, and arguably some besides
sexism harm women primarily (though not exclusively), e.g., body size oppression,
age oppression. Besides, as we've noted before, sexism is not only harmful
to women, but is harmful to all of us.
What makes a particular form of oppression sexist seems to be
not just that it harms women, but that someone is subject to this form
of oppression specifically because she is (or at least appears to be)
a woman. Racial oppression harms women, but racial oppression (by itself)
doesn't harm them because they are women, it harms them because they are
(or appear to be) members of a particular race. The suggestion that
sexist oppression consists in oppression to which one is subject by virtue
of being or appearing to be a woman provides us at least the beginnings
of an analytical tool for distinguishing subordinating structures that
happen to affect some or even all women from those that are more specifically
sexist. But problems and unclarities remain.
First, we need to explicate further what it means to be oppressed
"because you are a woman". E.g., is the idea that there is a particular
form of oppression that is specific to women? Is to be oppressed "as
a woman" to be oppressed in a particular way? Or can we be pluralists
about what sexist oppression consists in without fragmenting the notion
beyond usefulness?
Two strategies for explicating sexist oppression have proven to
be problematic. The first is to maintain that there is a form of oppression
common to all women. For example, one might interpret Catharine MacKinnon's
work as claiming that to be oppressed as a woman is to be viewed and treated
as sexually subordinate, where this claim is grounded in the (alleged)
universal fact of the eroticization of male dominance and female submission
(MacKinnon 1987; MacKinnon 1989). Although MacKinnon allows that sexual
subordination can happen in a myriad of ways, her account is monistic in
its attempt to unite the different forms of sexist oppression around a
single core account that makes sexual objectification the focus. Although
MacKinnon's work provides a powerful resource for analyzing women's subordination,
many have argued that it is too narrow, e.g., in some contexts (especially
in developing countries) sexist oppression seems to concern more the local
division of labor and economic exploitation. Although certainly sexual subordination
is a factor in sexist oppression, it requires us to fabricate implausible
explanations of social life to suppose that all divisions of labor that exploit
women (as women) stem from the "eroticization of dominance and submission".
Moreover, it isn't obvious that in order to make sense of sexist oppression
we need to seek a single form of oppression common to all women.
A second problematic strategy has been to consider as paradigms
those who are oppressed only as women, with the thought that complex
cases bringing in additional forms of oppression will obscure what is
distinctive of sexist oppression. This strategy would have us focus in
the U.S. on White, wealthy, young, beautiful, able-bodied, heterosexual
women to determine what oppression, if any, they suffer, with the hope
of finding sexism in its "purest" form, unmixed with racism or homophobia,
etc. (See Spelman 1988, 52-54). This approach is not only flawed in its
exclusion of all but the most elite women in its paradigm, but it assumes
that privilege in other areas does not affect the phenomenon under consideration.
As Elizabeth Spelman makes the point:
…no woman is subject to any form of oppression simply because
she is a woman; which forms of oppression she is subject to depend on
what "kind" of woman she is. In a world in which a woman might be subject
to racism, classism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, if she is not so subject
it is because of her race, class, religion, sexual orientation. So it can
never be the case that the treatment of a woman has only to do with her
gender and nothing to do with her class or race. (Spelman 1988, 52-3)
Recent accounts of oppression are designed to allow that oppression
takes many forms, and refuse to identify one form as more basic or fundamental
than the rest. For example, Iris Young describes five "faces" of oppression:
exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism,
and systematic violence (Young 1990c, Ch. 2). Plausibly others should be
added to the list. Sexist or racist oppression, for example, will manifest
itself in different ways in different contexts, e.g., in some contexts
through systematic violence, in other contexts through economic exploitation.
Acknowledging this does not go quite far enough, however, for monistic
theorists such as MacKinnon could grant this much. Pluralist accounts of
sexist oppression must also allow that there isn't an over-arching explanation
of sexist oppression that applies to all its forms: in some cases it may
be that women's oppression as women is due to the eroticization of male
dominance, but in other cases it may be better explained by women's reproductive
value in establishing kinship structures (Rubin 1975), or by the shifting
demands of globalization within an ethnically stratified workplace. In
other words, pluralists resist the temptation to "grand social theory,"
"overarching metanarratives," "monocausal explanations," to allow that
the explanation of sexism in a particular historical context will rely
on economic, political, legal, and cultural factors that are specific to
that context which would prevent the account from being generalized to all
instances of sexism (Fraser and Nicholson 1990). It is still compatible
with pluralist methods to seek out patterns in women's social positions and
structural explanations within and across social contexts, but in doing so
we must be highly sensitive to historical and cultural variation.
However, if we pursue a pluralist strategy in understanding sexist
oppression, what unifies all the instances as instances of sexism? After
all, we cannot assume that the oppression in question takes the same form
in different contexts, and we cannot assume that there is an underlying
explanation of the different ways it manifests itself. So can we even
speak of there being a unified set of cases--something we can call "sexist
oppression"--at all?
Some feminists would urge us to recognize that there isn't a systematic
way to unify the different instances of sexism, and correspondingly, there
is no systematic unity in what counts as feminism: instead we should see
the basis for feminist unity in coalition building (Reagon 1983). Different
groups work to combat different forms of oppression; some groups take
oppression against women (as women) as a primary concern. If there is
a basis for cooperation between some subset of these groups in a given
context, then finding that basis is an accomplishment, but should not be
taken for granted.
An alternative, however, would be to grant that in practice unity
among feminists cannot be taken for granted, but to begin with a theoretical
common-ground among feminist views that does not assume that sexism appears
in the same form or for the same reasons in all contexts. We saw above
that one promising strategy for distinguishing sexism from racism, classism,
and other forms of injustice is to focus on the idea that if an individual
is suffering sexist oppression, then an important part of the explanation
why she is subject to the injustice is that she is or appears to be a
woman. This includes cases in which women as a group are explicitly
targeted by a policy or a practice, but also includes cases where the policy
or practice affects women due to a history of sexism, even if they are
not explicitly targeted. For example, if women are deprived an education
and so are, on the whole, illiterate. And if under these circumstances
only those who are literate are entitled to vote. Then we can say that
women as a group are being disenfranchised and that this is a form of
sexist oppression because part of the explanation of why women cannot
vote is that they are women, and women are deprived an education. The
commonality among the cases is to be found in the role of gender in the
explanation of the injustice rather than the specific form the injustice
takes. Building on this we could unify a broad range of feminist views
by seeing them as committed to the (very abstract) claims that:
i) (Descriptive claim) Women, and those who appear to
be women, are subjected to wrongs and/or injustice at least in part
because they are or appear to be women.
ii) (Normative claim) The wrongs/injustices in question in (i)
ought not to occur and should be stopped when and where they do.
I have so far been using the term ‘oppression’ loosely to cover
whatever form of wrong or injustice is at issue. Continuing with this
intentional openness in the exact nature of the wrong, the question still
remains what it means to say that women are subjected to injustice because
they are women. To address this question, it may help to consider a familiar
ambiguity in the notion "because": are we concerned here with causal explanations
or justifications? On one hand, the claim that someone is oppressed because
she is a woman suggests that the best (causal) explanation of the subordination
in question will make reference to her sex: e.g., Paula is subject to
sexist oppression on the job because the best explanation of why she makes
$1.00 less an hour for doing comparable work as Paul makes reference to
her sex (possibly in addition to her race or other social classifications).
On the other hand, the claim that someone is oppressed because she is
a woman suggests that the rationale or basis for the oppressive structures
requires that one be sensitive to someone's sex in determining how they
should be viewed and treated, i.e., that the justification for someone's
being subject to the structures in question depends on a representation
of them as sexed male or female. E.g., Paula is subject to sexist oppression
on the job because the pay scale for her job classification is justified
within a framework that distinguishes and devalues women's work compared
with men's.
Note, however, that in both sorts of cases the fact that one is
or appears to be a woman need not be the only factor relevant in explaining
the injustice. It might be, for example, that one stands out in a group
because of one’s race, or one’s class, or one’s sexuality, and because
one stands out one becomes a target for injustice. But if the injustice
takes a form that, e.g., is regarded as especially apt for a woman, then
the injustice should be understood intersectionally, i.e., as a response
to an intersectional category. For example, the practice of raping Bosnian
women was an intersectional injustice: it targeted them both because they
were Bosnian and because they were women.
Of course, these two understandings of being oppressed because
you are a woman are not incompatible; in fact they typically support
one another. Because human actions are often best explained by the framework
employed for justifying them, one's sex may play a large role in determining
how one is treated because the background understandings for what's appropriate
treatment draw invidious distinctions between the sexes. In other words,
the causal mechanism for sexism often passes through problematic representations
of women and gender roles.
In each of the cases of being oppressed as a woman mentioned above,
Paula suffers injustice, but a crucial factor in explaining the injustice
is that Paula is a member of a particular group, viz., women (or females).
This, I think, is crucial in understanding why sexism (and racism,
and other --isms) are most often understood as kinds of oppression.
Oppression is injustice that, first and foremost, concerns groups;
individuals are oppressed just in case they are subjected to injustice
because of their group membership. On this view, to claim that women
as women suffer injustice is to claim that women are oppressed.
Where does this leave us? 'Feminism' is an umbrella term for range
of views about injustices against women. There are disagreements among
feminists about the nature of justice in general and the nature of sexism,
in particular, the specific kinds of injustice or wrong women suffer;
and the group who should be the primary focus of feminist efforts. Nonetheless,
feminists are committed to bringing about social change to end injustice
against women, in particular, injustice against women as women.
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[under construction]
[under construction]
Resources listed below have been chosen to provide only a springboard
into the huge amount of feminist material available on the web. The
emphasis here is on general resources useful for doing research in feminist
philosophy or interdisciplinary feminist theory, e.g., the links connect
to biliographies and meta-sites, and resources concerning inclusion, exclusion,
and feminist diversity. The list is incomplete and will be regularly
revised and expanded. Further resources on topics in feminism such
as popular culture, reproductive rights, sex work, are available within each
sub-entry on that topic.
- General
- Feminism and Class
- Marxist, Socialist, and Materialist Feminisms
- MatFem (Information page, discussion group)
- Feminist Economics
- Feminism and Human Rights, Global Feminism
- Feminism and Race/Ethnicity
- African-American/Black Feminisms and Womanism
- Asian-American and Asian Feminisms
- Chicana/Latina Feminisms
- American Indian, Native, Indigenous Feminisms
- Feminism, Sex, and Sexuality
Affirmative
Action | Communitarianism
| Contractarianism
| Egalitarianism
| Equality |
Exploitation
| Feminist
Epistemology and Philosophy of Science | Feminist Ethics
| Feminist
History of Philosophy | Feminist Perspectives
on the Self | Globalization
| Homosexuality
| Identity Politics
| Justice,
distributive | Justice, as a virtue
| Legal Rights
| Liberalism
| Mill, Harriet
Taylor | Mill, John
Stuart