Critical Realism Underpins The Ontological Definition Of Body Politics

Louise Halfe’s “Body Politics” challenges the qualities and behaviour of the idealized feminine woman by contrasting the stereotypical “city woman” with a more masculine “real woman.” The poem’s speaker describes her mother’s opinion of what it means to be a real woman, which is seen through “Mama said.” Throughout the poem, the speaker uses vivid imagery to create a stark contrast between the idealized feminine “city woman” and a “real woman” who does not conform to the feminine gender norm. To begin with, the title of the poem itself can be viewed as an obvious critique of the feminine ideal. By definition a body politic is a group of people “considered as a collective unit” (Merriam-Webster). This is significant because in Butler’s theory, she emphasizes that a person’s gender can vary depending on a given situation, and therefore women cannot be grouped together and defined exclusively by their feminine qualities. Instead, she argues that women should be viewed as individuals capable of possessing both masculine and feminine behaviour. This belief relates directly to the poem’s title, as Halfe is clearly making a statement on the manner in which patriarchal societies expect women to conform to a singular feminine ideal. Moreover, it illustrates how women’s bodies become a political site for the masculinist culture to impose feminine gender on. With consideration to the title’s reference to a homogeneous group of women, it is interesting that stanzas two through four all

When people hear the term the personal is political, they do not grasp it the same way feminists did during a time of repression towards women. Most feminists understood the concept and accepted it whole-heartedly, as with the term they believed that it could bring about social change. If this ideal could become widespread, if not only feminists but others as well could recognize that the person is political, then the way people thought about women’s gender roles could change and with that bring equality.

The readings for this week consisted of summaries in Applerouth and Edles (2016), excerpts from Discipline and Punish by Michael Foucault (1975), “Social Space and the Genesis of Groups” by Pierre Bourdieu (1982), “Outline of a Sociological Theory of Art Perception” also by Bourdieu (1968) and Orientalism by Edward Said (1978), as well as the article “Towards an ‘optics of power’: technologies of surveillance and discipline and case-loading midwifery practice in New Zealand” by Deborah Davis and Kim Walker (2013). All of these readings center on “Poststructuralism”, which Applerouth and Edles (2016) describe as being a response to “Structuralism” (Applerouth & Edles, 2016, pg. 644). Applerouth and Edles (2016) state that “From the perspective

Subjection is a process that operates in society, and according to sociologist Michel Foucault, can be applied to a multiplicity of discourses. Foucault explains that the beginning of the nineteenth century marked the age of sexual repression and censorship, which became a time of subjection through exerting disciplinary control over a docile population. In his The Introduction to the History of Sexuality, Foucault explains how the scientification of sex came about. Specifically, it was an attempt to obtain a uniform truth about sex. However, there is no truth to it, but rather it is merely a vehicle for social control. Foucault distinguishes the discourses of sexuality from the science of

The divide between the public and the private spheres has much to do with the formation of the categories of ‘man’ and ‘woman’. It is these spheres that have long determined the status of both and it is no suspense that the public has been

I explore how the state controlled the voices, diets, and bodies of various women directly correlated to issues of gender, and how some of these women have resisted political hegemonic processes. As political hegemony allows a state to employ its power over a variety of people, the essays in this textbook aid in understanding the interconnectedness of the British and Canadian state with gender in how it controls its

According to role theory, people follow unwritten social and cultural rules and norms as they behave ‘‘in ways that are different and predictable depending on their respective social identities and the situations they find themselves in’’ (Biddle, 1986, p. 68). Gender identity and gender roles are a significant part of everyday life and, according to Goffman, are actually constituted through social interaction (1976). Gender shapes how people make sense of themselves and their social relationships. However, as Wood notes, ‘‘What gender means depends heavily on cultural values and practices; a culture’s definitions of masculinity and femininity shape expectations about how individual men and women should communicate; and how individuals communicate establishes gender that, in turn, influences cultural views’’ (Wood, 2009, p. 20). Gender display, as a continuous communication loop, is defined by society and expressed by individuals as they interact while shaping evolving societal expectations regarding gender. In contemporary media and culture, women’s and men’s social desirability and gender have often been defined in terms of their bodies. For women, this has often involved comparing themselves to and even replicating the ‘‘thin ideal’’ (presented in modern mass media despite the looming specter of anorexia and bulimia), altering their bodies

The manifestation of being “trapped in the wrong body” is a well-documented component of the transgender narrative that summarizes the psychosocial stress of the experiences of many transgender people (e.g., Mason-Schrock 1996; Prosser, 1998). ‘Wrong body’ is employed accordingly to elucidate how an individual’s biological sex and body do not match his or her gender identity, a “person’s basic sense of being male, female, or of indeterminate sex” (American Psychological Association [APA], 2009, p. 28). Recently in the ABC (a well-recognized American broadcasting company) prime-time television special, American hero of the 1976 Summer Olympics, Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn) shared to Diane Sawyer, an established American news reporter, that s/he was living in the wrong body (April 24, 2015). However, this wrong body personification and associated negative outcomes are not limited to sex and gender. Such experiences can depict other individuals whose identity or sense of self does not match his or her physical body in several additional ways. For example, soon after the Jenner story broke (June of 2015), Rachel Dolezal- civil rights activist and former president of the Spokane (Washington) chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP)- revealed to a reporter from the popular United States television network NBC that she was also born in the wrong body, similar to Jenner, but as “Black” woman in “White” body (Stahlman, 2015). Whereas the

In patriarchal capitalist society, the dominance of male perspectives on the female body is often presented through the image of the slender body as a form of empowerment through a masculine point of view. For instance, Marx’s interpretation of this type of subjective patriarchal view defines how women are controlled through more masculine identity. For instance, the

For the past decades, feminists are constantly debating the conventional views, prevailing views and roles of sex and gender in today’s society. As a result, we often think of sex as biological and gender as social, which are terms that are often used interchangeable and are socially or culturally constructed. In other words, the terms male and female are referred to as sex categories, while masculine and feminine are considered gender categories. “Over time, sex tended to be understood as the base and gender as the superstructure” (Oyěwùmí, 2005, 12).

Although theory may have a reputation for being disconnected from reality, it is grounded in everyday thinking that helps us plan and understand the actions we take in our everyday social lives (Sears, 2010, pp. 16-17). Accordingly, theories like poststructuralism attempt to explain these aspects of human society. In this paper, after explaining the origins and major tenets of poststructuralism, I will argue that a poststructural lens is most conducive to a critical analysis of the causes and effects of oppression. I will demonstrate this by discussing how discourses produce and maintain power relations, how the effects of these oppressive relations are channeled through a complex network of power, and how deconstruction offers pathways for challenging oppression.

Living in an imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, the binary acts as an organizing principle where gender becomes a touchpoint for otherness. The gendered double standard constructs the feminine to be subservient to the masculine where women are often objectified as symbols of status to enhance a man’s social standing. The female gender is constructed to socialize women into subordination. Our culture promotes men and women to become obsessed with evaluating the appearance of the female body. These evaluations of our bodies catalyze sexism in the female mind where discourses of comparison and judgment drain our spiritual energy.

Author, Anna Akbari, believes that ‘Power Dressing’ could be analysed through symbolic interactions of power relations that operates in the

In recent years, masculinity has been said to be in crisis. This situation entails that men are the new disadvantaged, with mental health issues and suicide rates of men increasing while those of women are decreasing, and are becoming increasingly unable to cope with life in general as shown by CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) (Telegraph Men 2014). Wiegman (2013, p. 32) supports this point, suggesting that through the lens of Hollywood and academics, masculinity has been “newly marked and newly in crisis”, and argues that masculinity in crisis is caused by both social movements and the forced sustainment of nationalist manhood. The former point can be said to be feminism with second wave feminism in particular (Horrocks 1994a) and the latter can be said to prove that masculinity in crisis is a paradox (Horrocks 1994b, p. 25) With this context in mind, this essay will briefly outline the distinctions between gender and sexuality using cathexis, analyse and discuss a newspaper article by the Telegraph, argue that masculinity in crisis is a paradox that is caused by discourses in masculinity such as the hierarchy of hegemonic, marginalised and subordinated masculinities as shown in Connell’s hegemonic masculinity model and the tensions that arise as a result.

The topic that I am proposing is looking at how Foucaldian notions of power work with the feminist ideology in molding the argument of women’s subjugation within society as a body. Looking at how women are subjugated allows the opportunity to discuss the process of subjugation in the first place in the context of how this form of power is exercised; essentially asking: what are the tools used in order to mold the body? The tool that I would like to discuss by using Foucault’s work as my primary reference is the idea of stereotyping, and how this eminent image of a minority is forced upon the body to pre-render notions of thought and perception about not only oneself but how others perceive the stereotypical image. This false perception is part of a larger picture that’s related to the notion of the production of truth and knowledge, since stereotypes essentially create a set of ‘patterns’ so to speak, that people rely on and use to predict circumstances and behaviors of the subjugated body.