Academic attainment and feminism?

The Madwoman in the Attic helped to define the way in which women writers and their characters were constrained, by men, into roles of 'angel' or 'demon'. I think it's a great text for introducing fundamental feminist issues in the context of literary studies. And, like I said, I have recommended original criticism to students who are seeking more.

Yes, Dworkin 'reveals truths', but to the average undergraduate student, so does every critical approach - feminism, marxism, psychoanalysis, queer theory, poststructuralism.

I really don't think there's any need for equating 'no Dworkin' with 'not a feminist academic'. Liberal feminism is still feminism. I have also been known to discuss the francophone feminists. My role is to present students with the broadest range, and as much information as possible - not to privilege one approach over the other.

What I gain from this thread (and from this board, actually: it's why I joined) is a robust community in which the full range of feminist beliefs are discussed.

To answer the original question (although a bit late in the thread), I don't feel that for me there has been a link between academic achievement and feminism. Although I have postgraduate qualifications, I have never studied any feminism as part of any course.

I have read books on feminism when not studying, and they have had a huge impact on me (especially as a teenager, particularly Femininity by Brownmiller). The other main influence on me has been other women.

As part of formal education I have studied things that are specifically about women; issues such as diet, breast feeding, work patterns, gender inequality in child rearing and nutrition. None of this was taught from a feminist perspective, but the fact that it is taught at all is a consequence of feminism.

So I feel that rather than academic study making me more of a feminist, feminism has made me better at academic study, and more importantly, more supportive of other women.

on my undergrad lit course (a good 15 years ago) a lot of the discussion centred around actual inclusion in the canon - proliferation of dead white blokes etc and a visible (minority) presence of reclaimed (dead white) women. as well as colonial writing/ post colonial etc. a deliberate attempt to recognise the canon for what it is.

i actually don't have any issue with looking at dead white blokes in context. foucault, too. there's a huge difference between being introduced to a writer/ text and invited to engage intellectually, than being indoctrinated. universities who are engaging in indoctrination rather than giving students the tools to come up with their own opinions, rather than those of their lecturers (however successful that makes you in the returned essay department) aren't really doing their job imo. but that's coming from a lit background, rather than women's studies.

ime, students who take issue with the 'taught' theorists are often the ones who do better on the course than those who merely sop up wordage like sponges, and squeeze it all out for assignments.

I'd teach Millett if I ever did a course that included Lawrence (possible), or Miller (not bloody likely) or if I were to teach a course on theory.

As with the feminist theorists, in my experience Lacan, Derrida and Freud are all part of the postgraduate student experience, if the student wants to seek them out. Undergradsmight get a bit of Freud in the form of the uncanny but I would be very surprised if Lacan and Derrida are anything more than names in an introduction to critical theory to the average undergrad.

It's far from a feminist utopia but it's getting better.

For lots of reasons, Dittany, because of its concern with different forms of disempowerment, because of the way she reads connects the production of pornography to poverty, sexual abuse, abjection, the language she adopts for translating the visual into the verbal in those very direct and descriptive passages, the ways in which she calls into question cultural values, aeshetic judgements, the focus on an ethics of representation. But outside of the books, I was struck by an interview with her in which she was talking, I think about rage and despair and what her research and activism cost her as a woman. She was treated abysmally.

I don't think you're giving feminists a hard time. But it appears from this thead that the most likely place to find feminism is in the context of literary studies. So we're not paid to teach feminist ideology; we're paid to teach literary studies and literature. I don't teach Arthur Miller or DH Lawrence - in fact, I don't think either of them are taught anywhere in my department (the sum total of my exposure to either as a student was one hour spent on a Lawrence short story). So Millett has no direct use to me. Likewise the Marquis de Sade, or Dracula (if I taught Gothic Studies I could well use Dwokin but she simply isn't representative of the contemporary critical movement surrounding the Gothic. So I would mention that she'd be interesting to look at, suggest her book in the course pack, etc).

Maybe politics departments, social science faculties, etc, can do better than literary studies. I don't know.

You've consistently ignored the parts where I point out that identifying the violent oppression of women by men is amply covered, in my experience. Yes, maybe not by Dworkin and Millett directly but I make sure that themes which they identified and brought to the fore of debate are covered. I believe that a life affirming experience can be gained from this. I have two hours to cover 'feminism'. Literary Studies is less patriarchal than fifty years ago. Women's thoughts, women's writings overwhelm literary studies: a positive gain brought about by feminism.

Sure, I teach Butler (well, she gets mentioned directly in a lecture and we consider a paraphrased chapter in an introduction to literary theory) - because she addresses non-heterosexual desire, drag, cross-dressing and gender roles. Plenty of literature plays with these themes and rightly, they have gained representation on literary courses; as such, so has the accompanying critical movement. It may not be life-affirming for all, but it bloody well is, and can be, affirming for those whose sexuality or gender perception doesn't 'fit' with norms. I make no apology for covering those issues.

I studied English Lit and I got sick of being 'taught' books written by men and analysing from a male perspective.

I discovered Kate Millett, by myself, by accident on coming across 'Sexual Politics' in second hand bookshop. That one book alone, taught me more about the world, than all the other books on my course put together.

There is no excuse for academia being so grovellingly patriarchal.

Beach, to be fair, there's a difference between feminism or women's studies, and English Lit. Might there be an excuse for not teaching criticism written in the 70s? Though you'd wish someone had written something equally good in 2010 or so, wouldn't you?!

Who on earth considers Kate Millett's writings 'unsophisticated' ?

She revolutionised feminist thinking.

As did Dworkin.

There is no excuse for not teaching these women in feminism/women studies, other than the fact that they are very incisive and thereby rock the boat and make things uncomfortable.

Shame on patriarchal academia....

I didn't suggest counselling, Dittany, that's not my place, but we did use the time to discuss why women would identify with the sadist or masochist and the question of how desire and fantasy might be culturally determined.

I think Dworkin is much more interesting as a theorist than Millett and imagine her work might come up again in relation to other things I teach and certainly if I were to teach a course on feminist theory.

Yes, Millett's work was revolutionary but there are other feminist critics who are more relevant in terms of what I teach. As VG says, there is a limited amount of time and space and a need to focus on those critics who work best with the material in question.

Not passive at all, Dittany. I judge feminist literary criticism, such as that written by Gilbert and Gubar, to be more suitable for the particular courses that I deliver to undergraduates. We can't cover everything - it is always a compromise. I believe that texts such as The Madwomen in the Attic bring core feminist issues of patriarchy, of violent oppression of women by men, and of the legal, medical, and socio-economic structures that arise as a result, to the attention of undergraduates, while having the advantage of being centred on women authors that almost every undergraduate will come across in the course of their studies.

Let's not forget that seminars and lectures are a fraction of the studying a student does - the vast majority of that is self-directed. A university is, after all, a place of independent research above all else. Dworkin, Millett, Brownmiller, Adrienne Rich, Carol Smith-Rosenberg, Gayle Rubin, Monique Wittig. All of these have been mentioned by me in the last year to students. I know my colleagues do likewise. It's out there for students to find: any student searching for patriarchy or sexual oppression, or the power balance of heteosexual relationships isn't going to have to look too hard to find any one of these names.

With regards to Greer, I get that 'freak' may well be an imposed label, but I have real issues with describing being gay or lesbian with not 'fitting' a gender role. You can be a man and gay; you can be a woman and a lesbian. Being a lesbian doesn't make you some wierd cross-gendered hybrid. And saying that it's not 'genetic' (though not treating like a pathology is a good point) comes dangerously close to calling non-straight desire a behaviour that can somehow be unlearned.

Did you say bone-headed? Interesting metaphor.

Can I slightly hijack and ask if anyone has successfully taught lit. using the radical feminist theory as as secondary text? If so, can you give any tips?