As my first read of 2024, I picked up Simone de Beauvoir's The
Second Sex, I had been wanting to read this after reading The Vindication of
the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft, which was a bit too old and I needed
to read something contemporary on the topic.
Once, I had come
across a question," Is the representation of women in politics less than
men, because women generally lack an interest in politics?". Do men have
an inherent interest in the "real world"?
How different
are women from men actually? What is it like being a woman? What is a woman?
Being a woman
is much more than being a female. One should not separate the female from the
female situation when forming any thoughts upon the woman.
The Second Sex
talks about this in expansive description and analysis. The book is divided
into two volumes:
1. Volume I:
Facts and Myths
2. Volume II:
Lived Experience
FACTS AND
MYTHS
The text begins with an examination of the biological explanations
and theories. Various biological clarifications have been put forward in the
past and remain popular and celebrated. These explanations have tried to
establish a hierarchical separation of the sexes where the definition of the female
has been confined to the female body and its reproductive nature.
Beauvoir Has attempted to find an answer for the placement of the
woman as the other. She seeks an existential explanation of the female as an
individual and as a subject.
Venturing into psychoanalysis, Beauvoir brings forth multiple
psychoanalytical explanations of the inferiority of the female sex. The absence
of the penis in the woman has often been taken as a very important factor in
defining the female inferiority complex. Is the possession of the phallus a
necessity for being a subject in the world?
“Psychoanalysts in particular define a man as a human being and a
woman as a female: Every time she acts like a human being, she is said to be
imitating the male.”
The book also delves into the historical account of the female
situation. Now this part of the book is one of my favorite parts. Beginning
from the ancient times where physical strength served as an important facet of
the human transcendence and the confinement of woman in her animal role, we
venture into the explanations of the different kinds of societies that are
matriarchy or patriarchy and the positions they have accorded to the female
sex. The book explains how the civilized society turns towards patriarchy and
accepts it.
“Thus, the triumph of patriarchy was neither an accident nor the
result of a violent revolution. From the origins of humanity, their biological
privilege enabled men to affirm themselves alone as sovereign subjects; they
never abdicated this privilege; they alienated part of their existence in
Nature and in Woman; but they won it back afterward; condemned to play the role
of the Other, woman was thus condemned to possess no more than precarious
power: slave or idol, she was never the one who chose her lot.”
Emancipation of the woman requires an understanding of the
developments that have confined her into immanence. A careful examination of
the laws and the differentiation between true and false emancipation is
required. Participation of women in the economy as workers, businesswomen and
professionals has not assured their freedom and affirmation of the female sex
as a subject in society. Beauvoir carefully examines the history, myths and
literature and seeks explanations for the contemporary situation of the woman.
LIVED EXPERIENCE
The second volume of the book is a spectacular dissection of the
female psyche.
Simone de Beauvoir explores the lived experiences of woman at the
various stages of her life beginning from the very early childhood where she
starts by remaining oblivious to her different position and her transformation
into the other. The woman perceives the world differently in all her different
stages and roles. Her consolation to herself, her resentment and her
resignation have been put forth accompanied by real life accounts of women from
different time periods. Reading this part of the text is reliving your childhood
and re-living your mother’s, your grandmother’s, your sister’s, and friends’ experiences
and understanding them as women and also, understanding yourself as a woman.
In the end moving towards liberation Simone de Beauvoir talks of
the independent woman. Work as Freedom is a very misunderstood situation, work
alone today does not ensure the emancipation of women. The woman still must fit
into a world where the rules and customs have been designed for the male sex. Beauvoir
emphasizes the disparities between male and female workers, the difficulties
and double standards involving women. The economic liberation of the female sex
has been understood as the most fundamental step in the emancipation of women,
however all the other aspects of her social situation including historical and
psychological need to be studied and considered.
I went into this book expecting an alignment of my thoughts on feminism,
but the book is suggested to anybody who wants to develop an understanding of
systematic oppression and the deep-rooted discriminations that exist in the
society.
That an oppressed group cannot be defined in a single-dimensional
manner and the more complex aspects of hierarchical arrangement of society must
be included while attempting to define the oppressed caste.
Overall , reading the book was an enlightening experience and it was definitely a good start for the year !
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