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Original poster

What is the current wave of feminism called?

34 replies

SethStarkaddersMum · 19/04/2010 10:44

Sorry if this is a silly question!
There does seem to be a bit of a resurgence at the moment (one which is direly needed ) but the themes seem to have more in common with 2nd Wave than 3rd Wave.
Are we having a new wave or are we, like, the end of the 3rd Wave or what?!

I know it seems a bit silly to fuss about labels rather than the actual action itself but my brother was asking me the other day and I wasn't quite sure.

OP posts:
dittany · 19/04/2010 22:05

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Original poster
SethStarkaddersMum · 19/04/2010 20:26

Never read that one - not sure why not as I am very interested in sex.

Re the usefulness of thinking about waves, I am not sure if it works or not - I think what I was trying to get at was 'what is distinctive (if anything) about today's feminism?'

I hope some more people wander along to the thread because I would love to see if they agree about it all.

OP posts:
Molesworth · 19/04/2010 18:08

Mind you, if I had been exposed to 2nd wave feminist writings sooner I'm sure they would have helped me draw those same conclusions without all the obfuscatory language. But I'm only just starting to read them now.

Molesworth · 19/04/2010 17:57

Yes, v good point about exclusion and the obscurity of the prose!

I am waiting for dittany to arrive and beat me about the head for saying this, but reading Foucault's History of Sexuality (one of his more accessible books ) really did help me to understand why my instinct was telling me that, just because sex is apparently everywhere (eg 'raunch culture'), this is not a sign of freedom from oppression. Quite the opposite.

So it wasn't all bad

Original poster
SethStarkaddersMum · 19/04/2010 17:52

"But then what happened was that the attempt to theorize these differences and question the very category of gender (i.e. all the postmodern/poststructuralist stuff coming out of academia"

ah now that makes sense. I hadn't really understood what the connection was between the critique that said feminism had to deal with more than just the white middle class experience, and the poststructuralist stuff, which seemed to exclude certain groups even more by making it much more obscure and academic.

OP posts:
Molesworth · 19/04/2010 16:58

"I have a feeling 3rd wave gets a bit mixed up with post-feminism too. I feel like we are definitely reacting against that, which is why I was wondering if we were part of a 4th wave! However I don't feel that my feminism is that different from much of that of the 2nd wave."

Same here. Not sure how useful the idea of 'waves' is to feminism really. My (v basic and probably incomplete or even just plain wrong) understanding of the 3rd wave is that it emerged in reaction to the 2nd wave's perceived lack of recognition of the diversity of experiences within the category 'woman' (eg class, place, race, sexuality intersecting with gender). But then what happened was that the attempt to theorize these differences and question the very category of gender (i.e. all the postmodern/poststructuralist stuff coming out of academia) pulled the political rug out from under our feet leaving us no common ground from which to act. So now my impression is that that ground is being reclaimed. People are realising that throwing out those Enlightenment values left us incapable of action. So the 4th wave (if it can be called that) is, I guess, a return to the 2nd wave's emancipatory hopes but with a heightened awareness of issues of difference and diversity provided by the 3rd wave.

Original poster
SethStarkaddersMum · 19/04/2010 16:27

Deirdre - I don't know much about it and like all intellectual history parts of it are complicated, but as I understand it
-First Wave=everyone from Mary Wollstonecraft to the Suffragettes, mostly campaigning for huge important reforms like property rights and the vote
-Second Wave is the 60s/70s feminists, mostly; they critiqued culture and society more. Eg Betty Friedan.
-Third Wave is where it gets very intellectualised - there's the Black feminists and postcolonial feminists but also the French people like Irigaray who a lot of feminists don't necessarily agree with.

There must be 100s of people here who know more than me to feel free to qualify or indeed, rubbish my very vague summary, anyone!

I have a feeling 3rd wave gets a bit mixed up with post-feminism too. I feel like we are definitely reacting against that, which is why I was wondering if we were part of a 4th wave! However I don't feel that my feminism is that different from much of that of the 2nd wave.

Blackcurrants - interesting....

OP posts:
blackcurrants · 19/04/2010 15:25

Some people talk about a fourth wave (close in time to the 3rd wave but different because of the way it works - eg internet, or slightly different in focus, eg focus on intersections between gender and class, or gender and race, etc).
I dunno, really. I'm not sure we've got a consensus yet. Sometimes I call myself a "third Millennium Feminist" but only inside my head ;)

DeirdreB · 19/04/2010 13:05

What are the characteristics of the first ones and why is this one different - I'm interested to see where I fit?

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