Feminist Criticism: A Brief Survey

Exploring Feminist Criticism in Literature

Roots of Feminist Criticism: A Response to Gender Bias in Literature

Feminist criticism is a literary theory that examines and evaluates literature through the lens of gender inequality and oppression. It aims to uncover and challenge the ways in which literature reinforces and perpetuates patriarchal power structures, while also highlighting and celebrating the voices and experiences of women.

Feminist criticism emerged as a significant movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, coinciding with the second wave of feminism. It grew out of the broader feminist movement's call for social, political, and cultural equality for women. Feminist critics argue that literature has traditionally been dominated by male perspectives, perpetuating stereotypes and marginalizing women's experiences.

Feminist Theory: Intersections and Influences from Modernity to the Present

Perhaps more than any other mode of criticism, feminist theory has cut across and drawn on multiple and contradictory traditions which by presenting what is arguably one of the most fundamental challenges to previous critical orthodoxies in its revolution of subjectively and the category of experience. Like Marxism, feminism is rooted in the political discourses of modernity. Not only Marxism, but also psycho-analysis of Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan and post structuralist views, especially deconstruction of Jacques Derrida are considered crucial in feminism. Read More Criticism Feminist criticism as a self aware and concerted approach to literature was not inaugurated until late in the 1900’s. Mary Wollstonecraft’s A vindication of the Rights of Women (1792), John Stuart Mill’s The subjection of women (1869) and Margaret Fuller’s Women in Nineteenth Century are such texts, which are indubitably the landmark in the history of feminist movement. Read More Criticism

Deconstructing Stereotypes: Examining Gender Roles and Representations in Literature

One of the key focuses of feminist criticism is the exploration of gender roles and representations in literature. It examines how women and men are portrayed, the language used to describe them, and the expectations placed upon them. Feminist critics analyze the ways in which female characters are often confined to traditional roles, such as the passive, submissive wife or the seductive femme fatale. They also critique the objectification of women and the portrayal of female characters as objects of male desire.

Intersectional Analysis: Unraveling the Complexity of Women's Experiences in Literature

Feminist critics also pay attention to the broader social and cultural contexts in which literature is produced. They examine how power dynamics, such as race, class, and sexuality, intersect with gender to shape women's experiences. Intersectionality, a concept coined by feminist scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw, emphasizes the interconnectedness of different forms of oppression and recognizes that women's experiences are diverse and multifaceted.

Pioneers of Feminist Criticism: Challenging Patriarchal Norms and Stereotypes

But what is most important to note that Virginia Woolf was an outstanding precursor of feminist criticism. In her fictions and essays, most notably in A Room of one’s Own, she attack the patriarchal bias which prohibited women’s creative possibility. A seminal text is indeed  Simonede Beuvior. The second Sex, which identifies women as cultural construct and reveals the fact that women are regarded as merely negative object or ‘other’, while men are defined as dominating subject. Similarly, Mary Ellaman’s Thinking doubt women – with which feminist criticism began in America shows the derogatory stereotypes of women in literature written by women. Another important text which attacks the sexual bias in Freud’s psycho analytical theory is Kote Millet’s sexual politics.

Empowering Women's Voices: Diverse Approaches in Feminist Literary Analysis

Feminist criticism seeks to challenge and subvert traditional patriarchal norms by reinterpreting and reimagining texts from a feminist perspective. It encourages the inclusion of marginalized voices and promotes the representation of women's stories, struggles, and achievements. By interrogating the gendered biases and assumptions present in literature, feminist critics aim to contribute to the broader goal of social change and gender equality.

It's important to note that feminist criticism is a diverse and evolving field with various approaches and perspectives. Different feminist critics may emphasize different aspects or theories within the framework of feminist literary analysis. Some notable feminist critics include Simone de Beauvoir, Virginia Woolf, Bell Hooks, Sandra Gilbert, and Adrienne Rich, among many others.

Exploring Gender Bias in Literature: Feminist Criticism's Evolving Perspectives

Although early second time feminist criticism drew extensively on de Beauviars works and on Kate Millet’s “sexual politics” and concentrated its analysis on the images of women represented in and constructed through cultural forms such as literature, it has been viewed by later feminist as often failing to offer an adequate analysis of the relationship between ideology and representation. 

But in spite of the difference in their points of view and procedures some assumptions and concerts are quite basic in this critical mode, western civilization is patriarchal. Read More Criticism Just as logo centricism emphasis the extent to which metaphysical assumption about the superiority of speech over writing are built into language itself, phantasmagorical implies that masculine biases are profoundly related to the structures of meta physics. Even the patriarchal ideology is dominant in those writings which we consider great literature. For example, Oedipus, Ulysses, Hamlet, Tom Jones, Captain Ahab – some well known male protagonists in some highly regarded literary works – embody masculine traits and ways of feeling and pursue masculine interests in masculine fields of action. As Simone de Beauvoir remarked, ‘one is not barn but rather becomes, a woman……’. While male is identified as active, dominative and rational feminine is identified as passive, submissive and emotional. If Kate Mallet attacks D. H. Lawrence, Henry Miller, Norman Mailer etc., by analyzing some selected passages of their works for degrading women as submissive sexual objects, most of feminists praise Chaucer, Shakespeare and G. B. Shaw who rise above sexual prejudice.

Exploring Feminist Literary Theories: Gynocriticism, Ecriture Feminine, and Semiotics

A great impetus is given to their critical approach when Flaine Showalter proposes gynocriticism which is mare self contained and experimental and which is concerned with developing and specifically female frame work for dealing with works written by men, and with feminine subject matters in literature written by woman and also with an attempt to specify the traits of a woman’s language. Read More Criticism Flaine showalter, however, led much emphasis on woman as a writer rather than woman as a reader. Elaine showalter’s A Literature of their Own: British women Novelist from Brontei to Lessing, Patricia Meyer spacks’s The Female Imagination Ellen, Moers’s Literary women, Sandra Gillert and Susan Gular’s The Madowomen in the Attic are some notable works in their made. To evade the dilemma, namely women’s language, Helene Cixous posits ecriture feminine (feminine writing) and Julia Kristeva posits a chora, or pre-linguistic signifying system that she labels ‘semiotics’.

Conclusion

Overall, feminist criticism provides a valuable framework for understanding and critiquing literature through a feminist lens, promoting gender equality, and challenging patriarchal norms and structures. Thus, feminist literary criticism was influenced by multiple literary theories and criticism and congregate them into an organic whole so as to expose objective reality. Read More Criticism As Elaine Showalter has observed, “English feminist criticism, essentially Marxist, stresses oppression, French feminist criticism, essentially psycho-analytic, stresses repression; American feminist Criticism, essentially textual, stresses expression”.        

Ardhendu De      

References

       The new feminist criticism : essays on women, literature, and theory : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive. (n.d.). Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/newfeministcriti0000unse