"Waves" of Feminism

PART 5 OF 5

Dr Jeffreys wrote:

>> I have big problems will all this second and third wave stuff and don't
really accept it... I think this wave thing has to do with anti-feminism
very often.<<


First: In reviewing Dr. Jeffreys's response, she makes some very good points
regarding feminism in Australia, Europe and the U.K.  After all, one huge
difference between those countries and the U.S. is that the U.S. never went
as far with social welfare legislation in the 1930's, and then it reversed
and stopped all progress along those lines after 1945 while creation of a
"welfare state" became national policy across the rest of the industrialized
world after WWII.  Nevertheless, the explanation I present below will
explain why "wave theory" (good heavens!) helps explain the path of the U.S.
women's movement through the 20th Century.


Referring to waves, in the sense that it refers to some great crest of
feminism, is somewhat fallacious.  However, waves, to the extent that they
refer to substantial disconnects between generations of feminists, is a
legitimate concept.

  The great triumph of the First Wave was the Nineteenth Amendment, and
similar victories in the U.K. and other states, all around 1920.  After that
came a real struggle over "what to do for an encore."  In the U.S., NAWSA
(National American Women's Suffrage Association) formally renamed itself as
the League of Women Voters, and began fighting for things like "Mother's
Pensions" (the forerunner of AFDC and TANF), federal pre-natal care and
maximum hours laws for women.  The National Women's Party (NWP), under the
leadership of Alice Paul, focused solely on the "purely feminist" initiative
of the Equal Rights Amendment.  Other important national organizations, such
as the Women's Trade Union League, National Consumer's League, General
Federation of Women's Clubs, American Association of University Women,
National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs, and various
important women's peace organizations, all were rallying points for women an
d men concerned about issues of importance to women.  Furthermore, many
women went from the suffrage movement to the labor movement and the
anti-lynching/civil rights campaigns.  While the suffrage movement had to
end with the great victory, every campaign that involved large numbers of
women as late as 1965 could be traced directly to the radicalization of
American womanhood, circa 1910-1920.
  There was one disconnect--young women of privilege during the 1920's were
definitely more distracted by sex, partying, babies and domesticity.  The
figures who led in 1915, were largely the same women who led in 1925, and
even 1935, save for the result of death.  Indeed, Alice Paul was still
leading the tiny NWP, still focused solely on the ERA, in 1975!
  In the 1930's, the recruitment of many intelligent, educated and political
young women by the Communist Party and other Popular Front groups, followed
by the collapse of the Popular Front after 1939, and then the Red-baiting
days of McCarthyism, also guaranteed that connections between progressive
forces were very weak across those empty generations.
  After the war, contrary to popular myth (which, gentle reader, I'm sure
you've never believed), statistically speaking, women did not leave the
workplace after 1945.  What they did surrender were the jobs traditionally
held by men, and they ceased to enter the professions in the numbers they
had in the 1930's and 1940's, ending a trend traceable to 1890-1900.
Nevertheless, this created a sort of a disconnect--millions of women who
could have refilled the ranks of women concerned about "the woman question"
did not.  In fact, it was it this partial gap that Betty Friedan wrote "The
Feminine Mystique" (1963).

  The disconnect between the First and Second Wave really started, I think,
with the New Left's disconnect from the Old Left.  Many older, more
experienced women among those who started the Second Wave had burnished
their anger with male supremacy on patriarchal prejudices rife in both the
anti-Vietnam/counterculture movement and the civil rights/Black Power
movements.  Yet, since these younger women had become political in movements
that considered history "irrelevant," the Second Wave had no history, except
in the mythical sense of Susan B. Anthony, etc.
  At any event, the diversion of women from the women's movement and the
professions between 1920 and 1960 made it almost impossible for the First
and Second Wave to have ever connected.  The women of the First Wave then
alive were very old--and the Second Wave came out of one of the most
youth-conscious generations American women ever birthed.  In any event, one
positive result of not having a history was that the Second Wave could
embrace the ERA without the recriminations that dated back to the early
1920's over the women's "protective legislation."
  The 1920-1960 cooling period for the involvement of women in politics,
shaped the childhood of the women who launched the Second Wave while in
their 20's and sometimes 30's.  Given that women after 1920, particularly
privileged women, had an even smaller role in the professions and business
than the generation before it, it was natural for radical young women of the
late 1960s to believe they were starting from nothing.  So far as living
persons were concerned, they were.
  Continuing this "childhood theory," what should have been the American
"Second Wave," the generation that grew up after passage of the Nineteenth
Amendment, (which, the U.S. Supreme Court declared, made women equal to
men(!)), never materialized.  It was, in fact, the generation that birthed
the Baby Boom after 1945--the mothers of the many of the women who launched
the Second Wave.
  If the conditions in America during one's childhood shape the attitudes of
an American feminists, then it is natural for the generation that grew up in
the wake of the Second Wave to hold a markedly different feminism than their
mothers.  The Third Wave of female and male feminists is simply the group of
young people who grew up after the (relative) victories over things like
birth control, abortion, equal pay, and sexual harassment.  The Third Wave
also grew up after the relative victories in the Civil Rights movement.

  For brevity, I omit any outline of specific differences between the Second
and Third Wave.  The factors I have listed should make that list obvious.

Hannah Miyamoto
UW-Green Bay
Green Bay, Wisconsin
UNITED STATES
hsmiyamoto    AT    msn.com

Kudos to Marge Piercy for being on target as usual--why the
infighting? The puppeteers at the top are delighted that we are fighting
each other and getting caught up and snagged in the strings while
patriarchy goes on as usual. Those who think things have changed and
there is gender equity today, as most of my young students do, are in for
a rude awakening when they hit the real job market, etc. -- but yes, there
are great strides made. And then I listen to NPR this morning about a
shame website that claims to be a news outlet informing its browsing
public (mostly fundamentalist) which women go to abortion clinics,
including their car license plate number and any other information they
can gather, including pictures, and I realize we have not moved a step
forward without stepping back as well. (And I wonder this zeal is not
spent on nailing johns and pimps...)
Anyway, I am only 53 to Ellen Moody's 55 but I have been a feminist for
most of my adult life, coming to it by reading newspapers and keeping my
eyes and ears open. It saddens me to think some of us have been so wrapped
up in academe as to miss the most amazing revolution of the twentieth
century! But then, there's still so much more to do that it is never late.

Liora Moriel
Comparative Literature Program
2107 Susquehanna Hall
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742-8825
lioram    AT    wam.umd.edu

Well, I said I would try not to rise to the bait of Linda's condescending
tone in her reply to me, but clearly--at least in emi's view--I didn't
succeed.  I think I always knew I would be seen as failing at this, if I
really laid my  thoughts out there and said things the way I needed to say
them. Sorry if we've come to place where "correcting the record," demanding
to be treated respectfully, defending lived experience and memory, and
trying to make oneself understood is "patronizing."

I DON'T think that Linda knows her history.  I also think that a lot of what
even self-identified feminist women THINK they know about the history of the
second wave is based on sources that have deliberately distorted and
caricatured that movement. But, my god, it was Linda who told ME I should go
and read Beauvoir, in a tone that implied that I must never even have heard
of her, and in a context that assumed that since I'm "second wave" I have to
in some sense be responsible for what Beauvoir said. What's that about?
Even if  Beauvoir is second-wave, which is debatable (I was born in
1950--isn't that about when the _Second Sex_ was first published?), it's
still not something that ever had much relevance to the WLM.  Linda seemed
not to understand that there are multiple variants of second wave feminism.
emi seemed not to understand that, either, in her Gloria Steinem reference
to which I replied in another post.  Is it "patronizing" to point this
out--or just telling?  Just because someone "nails" you on a point you've
missed or gotten wrong, doesn't mean that they've "patronized" you.  It is
NOT patronizing to offer corrections of facts that seem to have been
misconstrued.  The person who has been corrected can't be expected to like
being wrong, but she really has no complaint--except against herself, for
getting the facts wrong--or the recounting of the facts incompletely or
one-sidedly.

You know, what I have been most reminded of in the whole conversation about
the Jane book is what I saw happen in the radical WLM starting in about
1976-1977.  At that point, a whole crop of new women came in who wanted very
much to be a part of the movement, but who had no background in Anti-War or
Civil Rights--or feminist--organizing.  These new women went absolutely
ballistic if any one of us "old hands" ever tried to explain history, or
past experience, or context to them. When we did this, they accused us of
being condescending, patronizing, "pulling power trips," etc. Much turmoil
ensued. We "old hands" thought the new women didn't know shit about feminist
politics from the INSIDE of the movement.  Oh, they had a lot of ATTITUDES
about feminism, most of them picked up from the media and the culture, but
they didn't know their
radical politics--their Movement and their counter-culture stuff--because
they hadn't been there.  All their knowledge was "mainstream" and much of it
was liberal. But they sure didn't want US telling them that.  Our time now,
with this Third Wave stuff, is reminding me so much of then.  What I think
is going on with this has something to do with praxis:  as WS has
acknowledged from the start, you don't get good politics without a real,
broad-based social movement to keep the theorists "honest"--but also to
inclucate people in the understanding that coming to political understanding
and good, sensible political positions really is collective and really is a
STRUGGLE.  Losing the radical WLM got us the "po-mo turn" and now it has got
us "Third Wave."  The radicalism has been lost and silly, romantic,
individualistic, classist, liberal, anti-materialist, and/or purely
"academic" things have become "theory."  And people actually go around
calling NOW "radical"!

On the point I was trying to make about transsexuals:  let's just agree to
fucking forget about it.  I've tried twice now to make myself understood,
and it's just clearly hopeless.  I'm satisfied that those who wanted to
understand the point and who read it from the structural perspective in
which I couched it have understood--and that those who wanted to reject the
point, and read it from the sentimental, individualistic, liberal
perspective taken by emi have not understood.  Most, probably, could not
give less of a damn.  I think I am becoming one of them.

In struggle (I guess),

Eileen Bresnahan
Colorado College
ebresnahan    AT    coloradocollege.edu

In a lengthy post beginning:

First: In reviewing Dr. Jeffreys's response, she makes some very good points
regarding feminism in Australia, Europe and the U.K.  After all, one huge
difference between those countries and the U.S. is that the U.S. never went
as far with social welfare legislation in the 1930's, and then it reversed
and stopped all progress along those lines after 1945 while creation of a
"welfare state" became national policy across the rest of the industrialized
world after WWII.  Nevertheless, the explanation I present below will
explain why "wave theory" (good heavens!) helps explain the path of the U.S.
women's movement through the 20th Century.

Hannah Miyamoto wrote:

  For brevity, I omit any outline of specific differences between the Second
and Third Wave.  The factors I have listed should make that list obvious.

To which I reply,

 Oh, no -- don't stop now.

What a great basis for in class discussion in intro WS classes you
have given us.  In classes like mine, where we cover a lot of basic
information in 10 weeks, something like this is very helpful.
Students see e-mail as somewhat more real than textbooks, however well
written.  Many of my students declare they love Sapiro's Women in
American Society, but when they read something not from a book, they
relate to it differently.  It seems more human and ,in some way, less
"factual" but more "true."  Labor history tends to be something
students aren't familiar with -- the same is true of American interest
in communism before WWII.  Hannah's references to those subjects adds
interest to Sapiro's discussion and relates well to the video called
"Step by Step" that I use to demonstrate this one of the many threads
joining together to create the great feminist upheaval in the 60s and
70s -- all there to be seen, but unseen until we look.  The more we
see of the past, the better we un!  derstand our own roles and how
important they are, especially important in less obviously active
times. One of my students said with satisfaction, "One thing about all
of this, there's enough work for all of us."

Marilyn Grotzky
Marilyn.Grotzky    AT    cudenver.edu
Auraria Library
Denver, CO 80214

Okay--I swear on a stack of _Sisterhood is Powerful_ that this is my
absolute last word on this issue--because Marge Piercy is right (as usual!)
that this is getting us nowhere.

emi writes:

"I made at least the following
three concrete criticisms of Eileen's treatment of transsexuality:
(1) engaging in ranking of oppressions; (2) making a "special
rights" argument by describing remedial policies as a privilege only
transsexuals have access to (when non-transsexuals don't need them
in the first place due to their cissexist privilege); and (3)
shifting of responsibilities from the dominant group to the
marginalized one. These are very serious issues that any feminist to
consider, and I do hope that she would respond and refute my
criticisms if she does not think she deserves them."

In response:

1) I did not rank oppressions; I didn't even mention oppression.  I merely
asked a structural question in relation what an earlier post alleged to be
the "subversive" power of "crossing gender boundaries."  The question was,
Why, if transsexuality (a crossing of gender boundaries, though far from the
only one) is so subversive of gender power, is the patriarchal State willing
to allow legal sex reassignment predicated only the willingness of the
person to perform the sex to which he/she seeks to be reassigned?

2) I did not make a "special privileges" argument, or in any way "complain"
that transsexuals can seek legal sex reassignment.  I offered a counter
example, to try to further establish the point I was trying to make:  The
State will not let me--feminine appearing--go down to the (whatever) bureau
and reassign MY sex, if I am not willing to perform the masculine.
Again--in the context of the allegation that gender boundary crossing is
"subversive"--why will the State do the one thing and not the other?  I was
arguing that it would be truly subversive to allow someone who refused to
perform the reassigned sex to nontheless have the their sex legally
reassigned.  The reason that the State WON'T let you do the latter is
beacuse it would, indeed, destabilize gender categories in a way that
transsexualism does not.  (It's really beside the point, but I also have to
note that I don't understand what emi means when she says I don't "need"
this.  How does she know that I don't?  What does it mean to "need"
something in this context?)

3)  This one really puzzles me.  I don't know what "responsibility" I tried
to shift to anyone in trying to make a point examining and challenging an
allegation that it is subversiveness of the gender binary to cross gender
boundaries in certain ways.  I was speaking theoretically and structurally,
without reference to individuals or their responsibility for anything.  I do
think that each of us is responsible for our personal choices, but that was
not at all part of the point I was trying to make.

Okay--that's it for me on this one.

Eileen

Since several people emailed me to inquire about the words
"cissexual" and "cissexism," I thought I'd make a public
clarification.

"cis-" is a prefix for "on this side of" rooted in Latin.
Common words that use this prefix include:

> cislunar (situated between the earth and the moon)
> cisatlantic (situated on this side of the Atlantic Ocean)
> cismontane (situated on this side of the mountains)

There are also many scientific words that use the prefix "cis-"
in its second definition, which is "having a pair of identical
atoms or groups on the same side of a plane that passes through
two carbon atoms linked by a double bond." (all definitions are
taken from American Heritage Dictionary on my computer).

According to Donna Lynn Matthews, the term "cisgender" was first
coined by Carl Buijs, a transsexual man, in 1995 (source:
http://cydathria.com/ms_donna/tg_def.html ). "Cissexual" probably
came from that, in reference to "transgender" vs. "transsexual."
You might want to search for the terms "cissexual" and "cisgender"
on the web to find their actual usage.

I learned the words "cissexual," "cissexist," and "cisgender,"
from trans activists who wanted to turn the table and define
the words that describe non-transsexuals and non-transgenders
rather than always being defined and described by them. By using
the term "cissexual" and "cisgender," they de-centralize the
dominant group, exposing it as merely one possible alternative
rather than the "norm" against which trans people are defined.
I don't expect the word to come into common usage anytime soon,
but I felt it was an interesting concept - a feminist one, in
fact - which is why I am using it.

In Cisterhood (borrowing from J.N.),


Emi Koyama <emi    AT    eminism.org>

--
http://eminism.org/ * Putting the Emi back in Feminism since 1975.

>  Oh, no -- don't stop now.
> What a great basis for in class discussion in intro WS classes you have
> given us.  In classes like mine, where we cover a lot of basic information
> in 10 weeks, something like this is very helpful.


    In response to several requests that I complete my vest-pocket survey of
the three waves of American feminism, I have drafted with greater care this
essay.  I have tried to be as fair as possible to all sides, without
eviscerating my thesis.  This is 1600 words, and the first posting was 1000
words.
    If you desire to use the essay, kindly repair the typos, credit me as
listed below and drop me an e-mail.  Thanks, Hannah


Part Two:

    Before beginning, let me define my terms. I mean to compare Radical
Feminism, circa 1970-1990 to the feminism of radical women who came of age
after 1991. As the phrase "radical woman" could arguably describe women from
Phyllis Schlafly to Andrea Dworkin, along with Camille Paglia and Katie
Roiphe, clarification is in order.
    For purposes of discussion, the archetype Second Wave feminist is Robin
Morgan-author of the 1969 screed "Goodbye to All That." She is definitely a
model of the young women radicalized in the late 1960's who then took their
radicalism into the "women's liberation" movement.
    The archetype Third Wave feminist is, at least in spirit, Pat Califia.
Born in 1954, Califia was probably born too early to be truly Third Wave,
but he (I think that's correct today) has written and edited about 20 books
that foreshadow Third Wave perspectives such as Sapphistry (1983), Macho
Sluts (1988), Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism (1997) and Public
Sex: The Culture of Radical Sex (2000). For hir work in S/M, erotica,
transgenderism, bisexuality, and gay male sex fantasy, Califia is certainly
a major inspiration for the radical weirdness that is the Third Wave.

    The most important difference between Second and Third Wave women is the
men of their respective times. The radical fraction of the Second Wave was
formed in direct response to sexism in the radical male-dominated New Left.
Second Wave feminists were not merely expressing outrage against the male
supremacist capitalist "Establishment," but also their feelings of betrayal
from young revolutionary men they considered hypocrites for opposing the
oppression of every group except women.
    Given that the Second Wave started out from a "girls against boys"
perspective, that it focused on radical revolutionary change and did not
leap to immediate success, it was probably inevitable that it would come to
identify men as individual obstacles to the equality of women. In the "Early
Second Wave," true "man-haters" like Valerie Solanas were balanced by
radical women like Carolyn Heilbrun who distinguished male supremacy from
men themselves.  By the "Late Second Wave," starting in the late 1970's,
biological explanations for the cultural status of women were no longer
rejected but elaborated and adopted.  Separatism, promulgated even at the
price of dictating the relationships of individual women, was rife in the
women's movement.
    By comparison to the radical males who inspired the anger that launched
the radical Second Wave, the young men in the lives of Third Wave women grew
up in a world shaped by the Second Wave of feminism.  For instance, today's
young men have never seen an employment listing titled "Girl Wanted."  They
know that threatening to fire a women if she won't have sex with you is
illegal.  Thirty years ago, there was no such thing as "sexual harassment"
in the law, and abortion, out-of-wedlock pregnancy and condoms were
embarrassing subjects discussed only in hushed tones.  Today's young men are
not liberated "to a man," but the situation is definitely improved over that
of 30 years ago.

    The second most important difference between the Second and Third Waves
is the overall political environment of each era.  If the archetype Second
Wave woman entered the women's movement radicalized by a youth culture while
believing that social revolution was imminent, the archetype Third Wave
radical never held such a misconception.  The cultural feminist idea of
creating "womyn's space" on "womyn's land' and withdrawing from the
male-dominated world was a logical way to preserve the dream of Revolution
within the shrinking horizons for Revolution in the late 1970's.  By
contrast, Third Wavers focus on creating change within actual restrictions
of space, money, technology and politics.
    One experience marking the Second Wave was the defeat of the ERA.  In
retrospect, feminists appear to have been very surprised by the backlash
against the amendment; increasing their disappointment that America was a
major obstacle to women's equality.  By comparison, having not witnessed the
ERA's defeat, Third Wave feminists avoided developing excessive optimism as
to the prospect for any social progress.  Instead, they can relish the
results of what feminism actually accomplished in regards to abortion, birth
control, sex discrimination, sexual harassment and domestic violence,
without bitter memories of past defeats.  However, having enjoyed the result
of these changes all their lives, complacency as to the continuation of
these changes can easily set in.  Moreover, a certain bitter cynicism can
definitely be felt throughout the Third Wave's culture--the Age of Aquarias
is not dawning, nor does anyone believe the mistakes of the past can be
overcome by creating a Lesbian Nation.  "Reality Bites!"

    A third, though related difference between the Second and Third Waves is
the status of women during the childhood of each group.  The Second Wave
grew up in a time in which limits upon the role of women were
extraordinarily strict.  While no woman actually wore pearls while mopping
her floors, through the mid-1960's, a "lady" never left her house without
the right dress, hat, (decorative) gloves, shoes, earrings, necklace and
makeup.  As Brownmiller explained in detail, all that feminine flummery made
it so much harder for a middle or upper class woman to hold an outside job
or engage in community activities.
    Consequently, Second Wave women were revolutionaries for what they did
NOT do as much as for what they did.  What eventually became the "lesbian
uniform" started out as an intelligent method of both gaining the physical
freedom to DO things, and flout patriarchal norms.
By contrast, the styles of the Third Wave were adopted in a starkly
different atmosphere.  Paradoxically, the piercings, tattoos, hair styles
and clothing sported by Third Wave women are far more dramatic than the
styles of Second Wave women, yet to the wearer, they are usually expressions
of individuality rather than group solidarity.  The recent appearance of the
"Seventies Revival" look makes very clear that even the things from the past
do not mean the same today.

    A fourth difference between the Third and Second Waves is that the Third
Wave has not found concepts like multicultural feminism challenging, but a
simple reflection of real life.  The Third Wave has grown up in a society
shaped not only by the successes of the women's movement, but the civil
rights movement.  Due to the civil rights movement, America is far more
culturally diverse today than it was in the 1950's and 60's during the youth
of Second Wave women.  Not only are suburban and comfortable urban
neighborhoods more culturally diverse, interracial marriage has gone from
being an absolute taboo to nearly commonplace.
    America is also much more receptive to multiculturalism than before.
For instance, American schools no longer teach, as they did in the 1950's,
that the nation's entire history was shaped by males of Western European
ancestry.  The movie "Gone With the Wind" is no longer considered an
accurate historical drama.  American schools, television show producers and
even advertisers are careful to not constantly reinforce racial and ethnic
stereotypes-unlike in the 1960's when the "Frito Bandito," and the Calgon
Chinese laundryman frolicked on American TV screens.
    Multiculturalist feminism, as it flowered by the early 1980's, was
deadly to the old order, particularly because it charged white feminists
with being beneficiaries of privileges like the women's movement charged
were enjoyed by men.  The Second Wave, after all, invented the term
"politically correct."  Multicultural feminism also challenged the Second
Wave because it demanded the replacement of existing principles of radical
feminism with new concepts compatible with the beliefs of women raised in
African-American and Hispanic families.  In particular, multicultural
feminism demanded the reevaluation of the place for children, motherhood,
fathers, female economic independence and extended families in the lives of
feminist women. In contrast to the Second Wave, these issues have hardly
come up in the Third Wave because its members grew up in an environment far
more culturally diverse than its Second Wave predecessor.

    Lastly, or to shorten an already long list, sex has much less political
importance to the Third Wave than to the Second.  The reason for the
importance of sex in Second Wave politics pre-dates, I believe, the Second
Wave and goes back to the New Left that the Second Wave reacted against.  In
the late 1960's, New Left groups turned from peaceful mass protest to using
violence exerted by increasingly regimented social groups.  In these
revolutionary "cells," sex became intermeshed with politics-groups
experimented with group sex, partner-swapping, mandatory homosexual sex and
even forced celibacy, all with the official goal of increasing the
cohesiveness of these increasingly tightly-knit and secretive groups.
    These late-1960's experiments created the atmosphere in which Lesbian
and Cultural Feminism began and eventually flourished.  Whether or not a
heterosexual woman having sex with a man is"sleeping with the enemy," the
very statement places immense political significance upon her personal
decision.  Such valuations are effectively equivalent to the forcible
manipulation of sexual relations engaged in by New Left cells during the
late 1960's.  Once the line between intimacy and politics was crossed, a
host of developments within the Second Wave followed: The "political
lesbian," lesbian-separatism, the cultural feminist definition of "correct"
lesbian style and intimacy, and eventually, the 1985-1995 battles over
bisexuality, sado-masochistic fantasy and even the "femme" revival.
    Since the Third Wave did not experience late 1960's radicalism, yet was
born of a generation large enough to form an independent culture, sex and
intimacy have never had the political importance that they have for the
Second Wave.  However, the zealotry of Second Wave feminists who do consider
sex and intimacy to be emblematic of one's commitment to feminism has made
conflict over this issue inevitable.

    This is a rough outline of the major flashpoints along the border
between the Second and Third Waves of feminists as they have existed since
about 1990. While there are many others, these are the ones that have
generated the most controversy and no small amount of discussion,
declamation and demonstration.

Hannah Miyamoto, J.D., B.S.
University of Wisconsin-Green Bay
Social Change and Development, Senior
hsmiyamoto    AT    msn.com
http://www.hannahmiyamoto.com/

Thanks Hanna for the post. One point of clarification. Pat Califia is now
Patrick Califia-Rice. In _No Mercy_ and elsewhere he explains the political
and personal aspects of this transition. You noted  he and I just add the
corrected last name. Again, thanks for your wonderful essay.
Best
Janni
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Janni Aragon
Department of Political Science
University of California Riverside
www.janniaragon.com
jaragon    AT    cox.net

Hannah wrote:

"The Second Wave
grew up in a time in which limits upon the role of women were
extraordinarily strict.  While no woman actually wore pearls while mopping
her floors, through the mid-1960's, a "lady" never left her house without
the right dress, hat, (decorative) gloves, shoes, earrings, necklace and
makeup."

While I sympathize with the difficulty of giving an accurate portrayal of a
complex reality in just a few words, Hannah's list of flashpoints cannot but
be simplistic and reductive.  The  above passage is one example: it is a
grossly exaggerated and  inaccurate stereotype--applying perhaps to a
limited number of women of a certain class, background, and social status.
Many of us who were adolescents  in the 1950s knew - even then - women who
were smart, ambitious, and  accomplished--and who didn't wear hats and
gloves! We also knew Bohemian and other unconventional women. Society was
never as neatly monolithic as Hannah's outline suggests.  There were always
cross-currents, conflicts, variations, transgressions, and all sorts of
other interesting things going on, just as there are today. Only a fantasy
version of the past  allows the sorts of generalizations Hannah offers.

DP

---------------------------------
daphne.patai    AT    spanport.umass.edu

Hi. Hannah M's post was not meant as the History of Feminism, but rather
offered as one snapshot. Many posted comments on and off list about how
helpful the list conversations are as teaching tools. I think (correct me if
I'm wrong HM) that this was meant as a "cleaner and slightly more" detailed
version of her initial post from a few days past.

Best regards~
Janni

PS. There is an interesting article in the latest issue of _Bitch_ "Turning
on the Girls" on pages 36-46, 90.  that refers to you (DP and others). There
is also an ad satire----"I can't Believe It's Not Feminism."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Janni Aragon
Department of Political Science
University of California Riverside
www.janniaragon.com
jaragon    AT    cox.net

Daphne wrote:

>Hannah wrote:
>
>"The Second Wave
>grew up in a time in which limits upon the role of women were
>extraordinarily strict.  While no woman actually wore pearls while mopping
>her floors, through the mid-1960's, a "lady" never left her house without
>the right dress, hat, (decorative) gloves, shoes, earrings, necklace and
>makeup."
>
>While I sympathize with the difficulty of giving an accurate portrayal of a
>complex reality in just a few words, Hannah's list of flashpoints cannot but
>be simplistic and reductive.  The  above passage is one example: it is a
>grossly exaggerated and  inaccurate stereotype--applying perhaps to a
>limited number of women of a certain class, background, and social status.
>[clip]

Isn't that the point Hannah was making with '"lady"'?

Margaret

--
Margaret Tarbet / oneko    AT    mindspring.com
--------------------------------------
Il felino pi· piccolo F un capolavoro.
--Leonardo da Vinci

Does anyone know who first used "third wave" to describe a form of feminism
different from "second wave"?  I've read many an article that argues that
women of color, like Barbara Smith, first used this term in the 1970s to
distinguish themselves and their issues/oppressions from those of the white
women dominating the movement, but I can't find the original source of this
term.

thanks for your help!

mary

Mary Celeste Kearney
Assistant Professor
Department of Radio-Television-Film
The University of Texas at Austin
Office: 512-475-8648
Fax:     512-471-4077

I doubt if it was coined in the 70's, since most people weren't even
using "Second Wave", at that point, to describe the activities,
usually called "the Women's Liberation Movement" or later, "the
Women's Movement."

 Jo-Ann Pilardi, Towson U.    jpilardi    AT    towson.edu

At this year's NWSA conference I attended the Third Wave focus group
(which combined with the bisexual+trans- focus group)
we talked about this label, Third Wave, among many other things

while the coining of the phrase "Third Wave" often gets credited to 90's
feminists (the authors of Manifesta, for instance)  indeed it was first
used in the 70's by women of color re: the feminist movement at that
time and the need to include the voices and concerns of non-white middle
class women

Emi Koyama, who headed the Third Wave focus group at NWSA is very
knowledgable on this subject...  her website is http://eminism.org/
and i have cc'd her in this email

but to put in my two cents, i feel that the way "Third Wave" is
colloquially being used now is more of a way to say hey, backlash,
Reagan, whatever -feminismS (plural) and feminist/womanist activism is
still happening and it has always been happening, it is alive and
growing and changing as a movement (although perhaps not as quickly as
it should) and it is of course connected to a powerful history (not just
feminist but all civil rights movements)


=heart=
 sady


Sarah Avery Sullivan
Staff
Graduate Consortium in Women's Studies
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
10 Garden Street
Cambridge, MA   02138
617-496-3022
gcws    AT    radcliffe.edu

I believe it was Rebecca Walker who first used the term. Third Wave.

Christine Smith
Department of Psychology
Minnesota State University Moorhead
Moorhead, MN  56563

Despite many people's belief that "third wave" was not used until recently,
I've found references which suggest otherwise.

For example, Lauren Kessler's book THE DISSIDENT PRESS (1984) labels 1970s'
feminism "third wave," post-civil war-to-19th Amendment feminism "second
wave," and pre-civil war "first wave."  I've seen other feminist histories
that label as "first wave" those feminists of the late 18th/early 19th
century woman's movement, which most wave taxonomies either ignore or lump
in with the later suffragist movement.

Just more food for thought about the waves!

Best,

mary


Mary Celeste Kearney
Assistant Professor
Department of Radio-Television-Film
The University of Texas at Austin
Office: 512-475-8648
Fax:    512-471-4077

It goes back even further than that when Simone de Beauvoir used in 1949 in
"The Second Sex" in which she explores Marxist, Freudian and Hegelian themes to
uncover the sources of the definition of women as the 'Other' of Man
(www.marxists.org/glossary/events/w/o.htm).

Sandra Basgall

Mary Celeste Kearney wrote:

> Despite many people's belief that "third wave" was not used until recently,
> I've found references which suggest otherwise.

In response to Sandra Basgall: Sandra, unless I misunderstand your
comment: wasn't the original question about the label, "third wave,"
and not the issues it addresses? Beauvoir didn't use the label "the
third wave" in THE SECOND SEX (pub. 1949). In fact, she didn't know
about the Second Wave at that point, since it hadn't happened. Thanks
to her efforts, and those of many others, the Second Wave happened. In
her title, "Second" refers to women as the unimportant sex, i.e.,
"second" to men; it's not the same "second" as in "the second wave."

 Jo-Ann Pilardi, Towson U.  jpilardi    AT    towson.edu

dear colleagues and friends.

I'm writing to let you know that a collection of papers from last
summer's conference on Third Wave Feminism, held at the University of
Exeter in England, has now been published as a special issue of the
_Journal of International WomenÆs Studies_ edited by Stacy Gillis and
Rebecca Munford. Full content is available free of charge on the web at

http://www.bridgew.edu/depts/artscnce/jiws/April03/index.htm

The collection includes articles by Colleen Denney, Karen Dias, Daphne
Grace, Agnieszka Graff, Ashleigh Harris, E. Ann Kaplan, Winnie Woodhull,
Marysia Zalewski, and yrs truly, on topics ranging from pro-anorexia
websites to the state of feminist politics in Poland to post-modern
geographies of the harem to the future of women's studies.  My own
contribution, a backward glance at 1970s feminist fiction,  reflects my
reading of third wave/ second wave debates on this listerv over the last
several yearsà so please accept my thanks (and excuse this ad).

best,
Meryl Altman
Depauw University
maltman  AT  depauw.edu

Hi all -

The definition of third wave feminism is forthcoming
this summer in a new encyclopedia edition,
_Encyclopedia of American Social Movements_ - if
anyone wants it (it's a good length article - 3500
words), let me know, I wrote it (shameless plug!)

But, here's some sources, by no means exhaustive.
Sarah L. Rasmusson
----------------------
Budgeon, Shelley. (2001). Emergent Feminist(?)
Identities: Young Women and the Practice of
Micropolitics. European Journal of Women's Studies,
Volume 08 Issue 1, February

Bulbeck, Chilla. (2001). Feminism by Any Other Name?
Skirting the Generation Debate. Outskirts: Feminisms
Along the edge, Vol. 8, May
[ http://mmc.arts.uwa.edu.au/chloe/outskirts/article3.html ]
Accessed 13 June. (2001).

Carlip, Hillary. (1995). Girlpower. New York: Warner
Books.

Driscoll, Catherine. (1999). Girl Culture, Revenge and
Global Capitalism: Cybergirls, Riot Grrls, Spice
Girls. Australian Feminist Studies, Volume 14 Number
29, April.

Else-Mitchell, Rosalind and Flutter, Naomi. (eds).
(1998). Talking up: Young Women's Take on Feminism.
Melbourne: Spinifex

Findlen, Barbara ed. (1995). Listen Up: Voices of the
Next Generation. Seattle: Seal Press.

Garrison, Ednie Kaeh. (2000). U.S. Feminism - Grrrl
Style! Youth (Sub)Cultures and the Technologies of the
Third Wave. Feminist Studies. 26(1), Spring.

Harris, Anita. (2001). Not Waving or Drowning: Young
Women, Feminism, and the Limits of the Next Wave
Debate. Outskirts: Feminisms Along the edge, Vol. 8,
May
[ http://mmc.arts.uwa.edu.au/chloe/outskirts/article4.html ]
Accessed 13 June. (2001).

Harris, Anita. (2001). Revisiting Bedroom Culture: New
Spaces for Young WomenÆs Politics. Hecate. 27(1).

Heywood, L. and Drake, J. (eds). (1997). Third Wave
Agenda: Being Feminist, Doing Feminism, Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press.

Hogeland, Lisa Marie. (1994). Fear of Feminism: Why
Young Women Get the Willies. Ms, November/December,
pp. 18-21

Jensen, Michelle. (2000). Riding the Third Wave. The
Nation, December 11, pp. 24-32.

Kamen, Paula. (1991). Feminist Fatale: Voices From the
Twentysomething Generation Explore the Future of the
Women's Movement. New York: Donald I. Fine.

Kamen, Paula. (2000). Her Way: Young Women Remake the
Sexual Revolution. New York University Press.

Karp, Marcelle and Debbie Stoller. (eds). (1999). The
Bust Guide to the New Girl Order. New York: Penguin.

Long, Jane. (2001). A Certain Kind of Modern
Feminism: Memory, Feminist Futures and Generational
Cleavage in Historical Perspective. Outskirts:
Feminisms Along the edge, Vol. 8, May
[ http://mmc.arts.uwa.edu.au/chloe/outskirts/article2.html ]
Accessed 13 June. (2001).

Murphy, Kylie. (2001). I'm Sorry - I'm Not Really
Sorry: Courtney Love and Notions of Authenticity.
Hecate. 27(1).

O'Barr, Jean and Mary Wyer. (eds). (1992). Engaging
Feminisms: Students Speak Up & Speak Out.
Charlottesville & London: University Press of
Virginia.

Richards, Amy and Baumgardner, Jennifer. (2000).
Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future,
Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.

Sharpe, S. (2001). Going For It: Young Women Face the
Future. Feminism & Psychology. 11(2), pp. 177û181.

Taormino, Tristan and Karen Green. (eds). (1997). A
Girl's Guide to Taking Over the World : Writings from
the Girl Zine Revolution. St. Martin's Press.

Trioli, Virginia. (1996). The Times they are
Confusing: The Price of Being a Feminist in the
Nineties. Chapter 2 (pp. 48-70) in Generation f: Sex,
Power & the Young Feminist, Port Melbourne: Minerva

Walker, Rebecca. (ed). (1995). To Be Real: Telling the
Truth and Changing the Face of Feminism. New York:
Anchor Books.

Whelehan, Imelda. (2000). Girl Power?. Chapter 2 in
Overloaded: Popular Culture and the Future of
Feminism. London: Women's Press

Zita, Jacquelyn N. (ed.). (1997). Hypatia, Special
Issue: Third Wave Feminisms, 12(3), Summer.

Andrea O'Reilly wrote:

> This year I want to include 3rd wave feminism which is not in the
> Tong book. I would appreciate any recommendations for articles on this
> topic.

This is a good time to announce that Catching a Wave:  Reclaiming Feminism
for the 21st Century (eds. Rory Dicker and Alison Piepmeier, Northeastern
UP), is now available.  Catching a Wave is an edited collection of essays on
feminism today--both exploring and critiquing the third wave.  The
contributors are activists as well as academics, and they wrote their pieces
to be theoretically savvy but also accessible to WS students.  The
introduction might meet your needs, Andrea, as it argues the continuing need
for feminism today and reviews what the third wave is and what that term has
meant in its decade of existence.

The book is organized in five sections that mirror the stages of
consciousness-raising:  it walks readers through why we still need feminism,
how one comes to identify as feminist, where feminism is today, how it's
being challenged and changed, and how some feminists are "doing" feminism
through activism.  More information (including the table of contents and
list of contributors) is available at
www.vanderbilt.edu/AnS/english/piepmeier/catching.html

Best,
Alison

Alison Piepmeier, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer, Women's Studies Program
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, TN  37235