CULTURAL FEMINISM VERSUS POST STRUCTURALISM: THE IDENTITY

CRISIS IN FEMINIST THEORY- LINDA ALCOFF

- “No matter where we turn-to historical documents, philosophical construc tions, social
scientific statistics, introspection, or daily practices the mediation of female bodies into
constructions of woman is dom inated by misogynist discourse. For feminists, who must
transcend this discourse, it appears we have nowhere to turn.” (p.406).
- “Despite the variety of ways in which man has construed her essential characteristics, she is
always the Object, a conglomeration of attributes to be predicted and controlled along with
other natural phenomena. The place of the free-willed subject who can transcend nature's
mandates is re served exclusively for men.” (p.406).
- As novas pensadoras do feminismo têm preferido estudos propostos por mulheres, por
considerarem distorcida a imagem dada por homens: “Cultural feminists have not challenged
the defining of woman but only that definition given by men.” (407).
- Há um segundo grupo que tem rejeitado a possibilidade de definir a mulher.
- “Each response has serious limitations, and it is becoming increasingly obvious that
transcending these limitations while retaining the theoretical framework from which they
emerge is impossible.” (p.407).
- “For cultural feminists, the enemy of women is not merely a social system or economic insti
tution or set of backward beliefs but masculinity itself and in some cases male biology.” (p.408)

- Mary Dale e Adrienne Rich romperam com a tendência à androginia e a minimização das
diferenças de gênero que eram populares entre as feministas no início dos anos 70 e
argumentaram em favor da feminilidade.
- “Thus Rich argues that we should not reject the importance of female biology simply because
patriarchy has used it to subjugate us.” (p.409).
- Há estudos que afirma existir uma certa raiva e inveja contra mulheres por conta da fonte de
energia vital provinda dela: é a mulher que gera e que pare.

- Outra feminista, Alice Ecohls prefere o nome “feminismo cultural” para definir essa tendência
porque equivale à “liberação das mulheres com o desenvolvimento e preservação”. Valoriza os
traços femininos e preserva as diferenças de gênero.
- Mesmo que o feminismo cultural seja produto de feministas brancas, ele não é homogêneo.
- A autora discorda de alguns pós-estruturalistas, como Lacan, Foucault e Derrida, por não
considerarem a ação do indivíduo, por apenas considerarem o indivíduo no social, em que essas
forças e poderes do meio social agem: “My disagreement occurs, however, when they seem
totally to erase any room for maneuver by the individual within a social discourse or set of
institutions. It is that totalization of history's imprint that I reject. In their defense of a total
construction of the subject, post-structuralists deny the subject's ability to reflect on the social
discourse and challenge its determinations.” (p.417).
- “The relation be tween women as historical subjects and the notion of woman as it is produced
by hegemonic discourses is neither a direct relation of identity, a one-to-one correspondence,
nor a relation of simple im plication. Like all other relations expressed in language, it is an
arbitrary and symbolic one, that is to say, culturally set up.” (p.422).
- “Thus Lauretis asserts that the way out of the totalizing imprint of history and discourse is
through our "political, theoretical analyzing practice." This should not be taken to imply that
only intellectual articles in academic journals represent a free space or ground for maneuver
but, rather, that all women can (and do) think about, criticize, and alter discourse and, thus, that
subjectivity can be reconstructed through the process of reflective practice.” (p.425)
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