The Implications Of Gender Divisions - 1763 Words

The Implications of Gender Divisions: A Critical Examination through a Postmodern Feminist Analysis Ashourina Hanna ID: 500495249 Dr. Amina Jamal SOC 475 24 November 2014 Word Count: 1766 Feminism addresses and recognizes the struggles often underwent by women of the past. Unfortunately, women’s historical struggles and lived experiences in the domestic sphere and private sectors of life have been erased from public awareness. Their realities often went unnoticed as they were not considered as ‘legitimate’ in contrast to those experiences of their male counterparts. In response to this, Gynocentric Feminists attempted to tackle these inequalities and have since then tried to reconstitute their own knowledge tailored†¦show more content†¦In her work, Butler examines earlier forms of feminism and their frequent use of social constructions of binary gender ideals. Butler maintains her argument that feminists in particular should abandon this idea of sharing this universal common gender identity (Seidman, 216). Butler is very critical of this perspective because she finds that it undermines the experiences of all women and generalizes them int o one cohesive experience. In this sense, feminism is essentially reinforcing binary gender ideals—by feminists identifying themselves solely as women they are only perpetuating social productions of gender that have been constructed through a male-dominated context. Although feminism is uniting women through this sense of sharing a common identity that distinguishes them from their male counter-part, it also however, misinterprets and generalizes the experiences of women while simultaneously excluding and discrediting other women. Evidently, according to Butler’s argument abiding by a unitary gender identity, rejects any other sexuality and regards them as deviant and improper to the norm. (Seidman, 217). It is often difficult to abandon such universal ideals especially because of how deeply and successfully they have integrated into modern day society. This idea of perceiving men and women as two distinctive and opposite types of