Essay on On Feminism and Postmodernism - 3282 Words

On Feminism and Postmodernism It seems fitting that the marriage of feminism and postmodernism is one fraught with both difference and argument. The fact that these disagreements occur within the realm of the intellectual undoubtedly puts a wry smile on the face of either party. While feminism and postmodernism share several characteristics, most notably the deconstruction of the masculinised western ideology, feminism chooses to place itself within the absolutism of the modernist movement. While feminism argues for the continuation of the subject/object dichotomy, aiming largely to reverse the feminine position of the latter to the former, postmodernism would have the modernist movement deconstructed in its entirety, including†¦show more content†¦To begin with, I will attempt to define both feminism and postmodernism. In its simplest form, feminism can be summarized as a movement from the point of, by, and for women (Moi, 1988:9). Extending this further, feminism aims to reverse the power directives of modernist metanarratives while remaining both historically and theoretically a modernist movement (Hekerman 1990:2). Feminism aims to subvert the traditional roles that masculine and feminine play within the modernist dichotomy of subject/object. Historically, women have been prescribed the category of the object. In regards to the masculine subject, this works to further weaken the agency of the object by labeling the object as other. In effect, it was this very labeling of the female as other that was the starting point for contemporary feminist theory (Mascia-Lees Sharpe, 2000:22). By labeling the female as other, the dominant patriarchal discourse of modernism retains its position as subject (2000:22). Feminism aims to reverse the power relations of such modernist binary arguments, allowing those labeled as other the chance to claim the title of subject (2000:23). Nevertheless, the fact remains that modernism is ultimately a patriarchal discourse, a discourse effective only in its entirety and is thus unable to be cropped to the liking of feminists (Hekman, 1990:6). As a result, by remainingShow MoreRelatedBolatito A. Lanre-Abbas, (2013) Feminism In The Postmodernist1173 Words   |  5 PagesBolatito A. Lanre-Abbas, (2013) Feminism in the Postmodernist Age. The Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies 28 (3): 355-368, Proquest, Accessed Dec. 27, 2016. Lanre-Abbas Bolatito sees how postmodern feminism and feminism are converging and she looks at how postmodernism is showing up. She explains the Enlightenment era as a time when reason lead to knowledge and this knowledge would lead to technological advances. 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