1. Feminisms 1. women's positions in patriarchal society and discourses
2. history of feminist movement & writings
3. Feminisms and Gender Studies: Radical Feminism, French Feminism, Post-Feminism, Lesbian Feminism, Taiwanese Feminisms

2. Gender difference
1. Are men and women born different? Or taught to be different?
2. How do women challenge patriarchy?
essential difference
reversing the hierarchy or separation
constructed difference
challenging or blurring
the boundaries

3. Gender/Sex/Sexuality
male
female
gender
masculine
feminine
sexuality
heterosexual
homosexual

4. Gender/Sex/Sexuality
Gender: social construction of “femininity” and “masculinity”
Sex: biological differences between “female” and “male” --Does it determine everything?
Sexuality: differences in the choice of sexual identity, sexual partner, sexual behavior. -- “homosexual” and “heterosexual” –fixed by nature, by culture, by choice, or fluid and constructed by social environments?

5. Central Issues in Contemporary Feminisms
A. 60’s -70’s -- Women’s Studies: Women’s
1) biological: body (lesbianism;anti-pornography mov)
2) social and psychological: experience and social position (last week)
3) linguistic: writing (last & this week)
B. 80’s – Gender Studies
1) cultural 1) gender difference & 2) gender constructions (this week)
2) biological-psychological 本 質 建 構

6. Different feminist positions in the Essentialism - Constructivism continuum
Liberalism: equality between men and women in the public sphere
Radical feminism: freeing women’s bodies from patriarchal constraints and oppression
French feminism: write from the body, feminist writings not limited to women.
Post-Feminism: gender as a corporeal style, an "act“ (Judith Butler)

7. French: Feminine ecriture
Biology feminine writing
Against the psychoanalysts’ emphasis on Oedipus complex and the Father.
Against the fixity of male writing and systems of thoughts (e.g. linear logic)
Cixous: phallogocentrism
writing from the body; write in white ink; in the Realm of the Gift vs. the Realm of the Proper (property-- appropriate--the fear of castration)

8. Feminine Writing: an example 夏宇 〈在陣雨之間〉
我正孤獨通過自己行星上的曠野我正
孤獨通過自己行星上的曠野我正孤獨
通過自己行星上的曠野我正孤獨通過
自己行星上的曠野我正孤獨通過自己
行星上的曠野我正孤獨通過自己行星
上的曠野
正孤獨
我正孤獨通過

9. Irigaray: This Sex Which is not one
autoeroticism; plural sexuality;
an alternate discourse that is multiple, fluid, and heterogeneous,
feminine style: 1) mimicry; 2) "self-touching" and "self-affection" – autoeroticism in writing

10. Irigaray: Mimicry + Parody e.g.
Sylvia Sleigh, The Turkish Bath, 1973

11. Kristeva: the semiotic
the feminine as the silence of the unconscious that precedes discourse;
its utterance is a flow or rhythm instead of an ordered statement;
expression is fluid like the free-floating sea of a womb or the milk of the breast.
E.g. Georgia O'Keeffe and Judy Chicago

12. Kristeva: the semiotic e.g. 1
Black Iris III,
1926

13. Kristeva: the semiotic e.g. 2
Cunt as Temple, Tomb,
Cave or Flower, 1974
Judy Chicago

14. Feminist Literary strategies
Separatism: critique of patriarchy, focus only on women’s writings (gynocriticism), lesbianism
Empower female characters(Granny W); Celebrating femininity, and feminine writing
Revising tradition: e.g. fairy tales;
Open accusation; social activism, (e.g. Kruger
Mimicry; Parody; conscious use of dual language (e.g. Cindy Sherman)
Compromise: domestication of female desire

15. Issues raised by Radical Feminists
Critiquing Patriarchy: e.g. Kate Millet, Marilyn French (p. 175, 176)
Pornography: (pp. 193-, 199, 200)
Gender re-definition: Androgyny, Separatism (p. 185; 186)
Gender roles: Motherhood as constraint?
Bad sex? Good sex? (p. 207)
Does our body determine our sexuality and does our sexuality determine everything else in our lives? (p. 218)