Developing Ideal Identities: Menstruation Education Pamphlets and the Performance of Woman (original) (raw)
Related papers
'Gender Ideology': Weak Concepts, Powerful Politics
This piece responds to articles in special issue on Anti-genderism in the journal (highly recommended!). My main polemical argument is that there is nothing to be optimistic about (as Eric Fassin suggests): anti-feminists today are appropriating many rhetorical tactics of the progressive left and the LGBT movements. But this is as much ground for optimism as the successful use of irony by the alt right movement in the US. The religious (as well as secular) populist right has learned to be ‘hip’; it is also good at rhetorical strategies and communication styles associated with post-modernism (parody, sampling, pastiche, irony, drag) and progressive social movements (positioning oneself as victim of ‘discrimina- tion’ and rebel against the status quo). They use these tools with the aim of dismantling liberal democracy, and not of engaging in its many debates. Hence, aspects of ‘gender ideology’ which appear as contradictions or intellectual weaknesses, are in fact enormously effective discursive manipulations. The crusade against gender was a prelude to authori- tarianism and continues to be its ally.
Gender Ideology: An Analysis of Its Disputed Meanings
Sociologia & Antropologia, 2020
In the last few years, a number of genealogical studies have been published about recent historical processes that enabled the emergence of the discourse on “gender ideology” as a “weapon in the culture war.” As some of these studies suggest, what is at stake is an alternative project of knowledge and truth production. Little or no attention, however, has been given to the meanings of gender ideology internal to feminist and gender theories. Rejecting the idea that gender ideology can be reduced to a straw man produced by a conservative agenda, I propose a brief history of ideas associated with the concept, foregrounding the work of sociologist Viola Klein, whose reflections on the sociology of knowledge represent one of the first academic investigations of gender ideology. In illustrating the plethora of meanings associated with the concept, I argue that they converge towards a radical negation of the anti-gender discourse of the global right.
Gender and Ideology: For a Marxist Critique of the Ideology of Gender
VIANA, Nildo. Gender and Ideology: For a Marxist Critique of the Ideology of Gender. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES, SOCIAL SCIENCES AND EDUCATION, v. 4, p. 1-7, 2017., 2017
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of gender ideology in a critical and Marxist perspective. Criticism of the gender ideology is now a must, as well as present their social roots and their relationship to a particular historical period. Based on the critical analysis of the work of Joan Scott and his inspiring sources, especially Bourdieu, it seeks to show the ideological roots of gender conception. The present paper aims to discuss the issue of gender ideology. We won't do an archeology of genre term, as some have done 1 ,nor will pursue its etymological roots, nor its past uses, but only its recent use and its ideological character. The critique of gender ideology is, nowadays, a necessity as well as present its social roots and its bond with a certain historical period. Before we begin, let's clarify what we mean by ideology, since this is a polysemic term. Here we use the Marxist conception of ideology 2 , according to which it is a systematization of false consciousness, that is, a illusory thinking system. Ideology is a systematic way of false consciousness produced by the ideologists.What we term as gender ideology is the conception that places the construct 3 "gender" as a fundamental term of the analysis of the issue of women and even of society as a whole. We won't present here the most diverse works that discuss and use the construct "gender".We will elect one of the most cited and influential works on this issue for analysis, although other references are made throughout this text. It is the text of the historian Joan Scott 4 , Gender: A Usefull Category of Historical Analysis. Joan Scott presents in her text an overview of different conceptions of feminist thought and of the use of the construct (which she denominated category) genre. The various concepts are presented descriptively, with superficial observations, and the author's point of view is presented peripherally, with a minimum contribution to the discussion around the issue that is proposed to treat.In fact, this defect to take long descriptions of feminist conceptions, consisting of all or almost all of the text, is quite common and is repeated in Scott's article. She states that the term gender in its most recent use occurred among American feminists, "who wanted to insist on the fundamentally social quality of distinctions based on sex". This use was aiming to reject biological determinism that would be implicit in the use of the terms "sex" and "sexual difference". The term gender would present a relational view and would present men and women in reciprocal terms, preventing the separate study of both. But the author points out that more important than that is that gender "was a term offered by those who claimed that women's scholarship would fundamentally transform disciplinary paradigms" 5. A new methodology and epistemology would be with the term gender, giving it meaning. However, this position did not come right away: For the most part, the attempts of historians to theorize about gender have remained within tradicional social scientific frameworks, using longstanding formulations that provide universal causal explanations. These theories have been limited at best because they tend to 1 Stolke, 2004.
A Review of 'Ideology and the Cultural Production of Gender' by Michele Barrett
2018
Since its inception, Marxism has had its impact on many disciplines ranging from Geography to Sociology. Though Marx never addressed himself as specialist in many subjects of social sciences, it is the academia which has brought him into these areas. The academia sympathising him has been instrumental in doing this. Even after having a polymath like personality, Marx along with Engels or without Engels restricts himself to Political Economy only. In this political economy, smooth functioning depends upon the elements of it. These include population, trust, governance, fragmentation of society and governance. When we consider the sociological aspects of political economy, the law of understanding social sciences makes our areas of search very clear. Population, Governance and Social Institutions are designated areas of study. The essay reviewed in this paper talks about gender, ideology and the cultural production of gender. It is written in the perspective of cultural studies, a branch of sociology studying cultural analysis of politics, theory and empiricism through ideology, class structures, ethnicity, cultural hegemony, sexual orientation and gender.
The Right-Wing Myth of "Gender Ideology"
The Right-Wing Myth of “Gender Ideology”, 2022
In March of 2022, signed into law the controversial "Parental Rights in Education" bill-informally known as the "Don't Say Gay Bill." The bill specifically prohibits "classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity…in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards". If violated, parents can sue for injunctive relief and may be entitled to damages. The law will take effect on July 1, 2022, and is hailed by Republican leaders as a measure to "reinforce fundamental right of parents to make decisions regarding upbringing & control of their children." In defense of the bill, DeSantis claimed "Elementary school kids should not have woke gender ideology injected into the curriculum. That is inappropriate, that's not what we want in our school system" (CBS News Miami, 2022). Former US President and Republic heavy weight Donald Trump vocalized his support at the 2022 Faith and Freedom Coalition's annual conference, stating "Pushing woke gender ideology, woke gender ideology, think of it, on young people is nothing less than child abuse. No teacher should be allowed to teach transgender to our children without parents' consent" (in Rupar, 2022). As ‘gender ideology’ discourse takes hold in the U.S., we must remember that this is not simply a political strategy wielded to gain media attention nor a merely populist tactic to garner votes. Anti-genderism and its ‘gender ideology’ rhetoric ultimately serves to “delegitimise feminist and LGBTQ studies and struggles and to reaffirm that sexual norms transcend historical and political arrangements” (2016, p. 187). In their attempt to assert epistemological and ontological control over the meanings of sex, gender, and sexuality, anti-gender camps try to not only shore up an existing social order or the status quo ante, but also to endorse an imagined future rooted in exclusions and repression, whereby women’s rights would exist only in a space of victimization and subordination, and LGBTQ+ communities – particularly trans individuals – would remain invisible.
Critically Evaluate the Claim That Gender is Performative
This essay will outline the key components of Judith Butler's theorisation of gender as performative. In doing so, I will critically evaluate these in terms of their validity and applicability. As an extension of this, I will also consider her suggestion of drag as a potentially subversive act which reveals the performative nature of gender. To appropriately inform my argument, I will draw on a multitude of scholars from various disciplines, arguing that while Butler's theory can be considered a foundational tool in terms of examining gender formation, parts of her understanding of gender as performative are fundamentally problematic-namely her complete dissolution of a prediscursive subject and her suggestions of just how we are to create "gender trouble" effectively.
PREFACE In the 20 th and 21 st centuries the woman as a rhetorician and the feminine as a re-definable value in social, cultural contexts has again came into prominence: the process of modernization has brought potential for the (re)interpretation of cultural-historical frameworks, opening new paths for the discipline of rhetoric as well as the analysis of the elements of social structures, gender roles and the values of masculine – feminine dimensions. My research in the specific field of feminine rhetoric attempts to examine the innovative notion of how women use the rhetorical elements to create alternative ways of (rhetorical) appearance and how social and gender outcomes are produced by rhetoric. In this study, I wish to analyze the appearance of rhetorical components in different political speeches by male and female orators by outlining the main components of the investigation in advance, offering the reader a fresh viewpoint. My primary aim is to find and articulate the specific feminine and masculine traits of speech-writing and the characteristics of rhetorical argumentation through a close examination of selected texts. The study has two main parts: first a summary of the theoretical background based on rhetorical and social contexts; secondly the presentation of a research project based on a recent survey. The goal of this examination is to investigate whether feminine principles can be detected by examining the selected textual elements and if so, how we can create a rhetorical vocabulary which could serve as a background to the differentiation of feminine and masculine types of oral speeches, arguments and rhetorical skills. In short, the core of this research is the analysis not only of visual, but also of rhetorical elements and the appearance of forms of cultural processing in rhetorical, historical and cultural frames. First of all, let me outline the key components of my paper, which will characterize Feminine Rhetoric as a discipline. I have three main foci: investigations conducted in the past, observations made in the present, and predictions about the future: