“One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.”

[lucylucky1977]

Can someone help me explain how this quote has been detached and has become bastardised in a simple way to my 12 year old dd? (And possibly Phillip Pullman needs to understand this too.)

Well you are born a female child , girl. You only become a woman when you grow up. When I was a child, around the time of your first period ( although I think that was to try and make the whole thing more palatable. )

I guess IMO the simple answer is that where "becoming a woman" used to refer to the process of growing from a girl to adulthood, it now also gets used to mean transitioning from male to female.

So, if you are forget that the latter version wasn't likely to have been in common use back then (if at all?) it appears that de Beauvoir is speaking about something that can include TW.

It's one of the problems of analysing older texts through a modern lens, you have to remember all the ways language has changed.

Simone de Beauvoir was talking about what is imposed on girls from childhood in order that they become socially acceptable adult women. In other words female socialisation and the restrictions of gender stereotypes. She goes into graphic detail also about female biology and the changes of puberty and menstruation.

I assume it's because reading a 700+ book - The Second Sex - is too much like hard work, even for Philip Pullman. I believe she uses the words 'human female' in the following sentence.

I often think she must be spinning in her grave
from wikipedia-
Sexuality, existentialist feminism and The Second Sex
The Second Sex, first published in 1949 in French as Le Deuxième Sexe, turns the existentialist mantra that existence precedes essence into a feminist one: "One is not born but becomes a woman" (French: "On ne naît pas femme, on le devient").[39] With this famous phrase, Beauvoir first articulated what has come to be known as the sex-gender distinction, that is, the distinction between biological sex and the social and historical construction of gender and its attendant stereotypes.[40] Beauvoir argues that "the fundamental source of women's oppression is its [femininity's] historical and social construction as the quintessential" Other.[4

Perhaps a clearer explanation would be:

One is not born, but rather becomes, feminine.

Agree with others - Beauvoir’s point is not at all about growing into your true self - it’s about what society does to you if you happen to be born in a female body. So boys and girls are not born inherently differently (except physically) with inherently different destinies as to what they will enjoy, be good at, etc, but growing up in a patriarchy forces girls into socialised female roles.

@JellySlice

Perhaps a clearer explanation would be:

One is not born, but rather becomes, feminine.

Yes, this.

Society moulds / forces/ instructs / cultures/ shits on that girl all the way to woman hood.

Is what it means.

It starts with the pink crap (fewer stem toys in pink) and ends with how women experience high levels of sexual harassment and discrimination. Obviously denied education in some areas.

Woman = adult female human.

One has to be born female to become a woman, an adult human female.
Being a woman is not a costume, an act, a feeling, a desire or need.
Being a woman is the biological consequence of being born female.

@peachescariad

Woman = adult female human.

True, though in context of the quote that's not what she's referring to with the word woman. There "woman" = all the expectations and socialised behaviours that the female sex are taught to perform from birth.

One becomes a woman by virtue of being a female. A girl experiences femalehood and the way in which society responds to her and the demands it makes of her shapes the woman.

Being a woman is the biological consequence of being born female.

In context of de Beauvoir's quote this isn't true, she's saying being a woman is a sociological consequence of being born female. It's not biological, or inevitable, or natural.

Unfortunately some people have understood that she didn't mean woman as a biological certainty, and instead meant it as a social construct. But then not understood that she meant the social construct existed directly as a result of being born female (and that it was a bad thing).

Indeed. You can't "become female" any more than you can become a raincloud or a pile of house bricks.

Anyone can be more "feminine" which is just an abstract social construct.

We're born human and then the patriarchy inflicts gender on us and we become 'women'.

@WellIWasInTheNeighbourhoo

We're born human and then the patriarchy inflicts gender on us and we become 'women'.

Yes this is how I've always read it. These are all great points to discuss with dd!

My dd says we are all born human but then media stereotypes tell us that as we are girls and women we are second class citizens.

She said it in French anyway, so as well as the past being a different country, the language is a different country.

Tell her that when something is quoted, it is very important to check the original context.

Otherwise people can run rings around you with quote-mining. You should be especially alert to it when someone quotes one line out of a massive book.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quoting_out_of_context

You used to see it a lot with cinema billboards.

For example, a poor newspaper review: "This star-studded cast and novel story concept seemed promising but it never delivers the goods, due to a disappointing script"

might become

Delivers the Goods - *The Daily Express

The "one is not born a woman, one becomes a woman" observation made by de Beauvoir, about 70 years ago, is about how children of one sex, the female sex, have patriarchy-approved roles imposed upon them from birth, while they also mature biologically and emotionally. She is not describing the transition from one sex, gender or gender role to another sex, gender or gender role.

About 500 years ago, Erasmus wrote "One is not born a man, one becomes a man" and similarly to de Beauvoir, he was not referring to transition from one sex, gender or gender role to another sex, gender or gender role.

Its worth remembering that for some years / decade the word "woman" was actually if not an insult, had negative connotations. That's why 70s feminists deliberately reclaimed the word woman, and had the Women's Liberation Movement.

And it was because by being born female society ie men, imposed on females the role of woman in relation to man.

So as said up thread, nothing to do with femininity, but the (lower) status of being a woman.

So as you grow up, or grew up in the past, society made you a woman.

Women's Liberation was to claim the right of females to say what being a woman was / is, ie it is about sex class and denying the right of the patriarchy to say what a woman can or cant be.

@DaisiesandButtercups

Simone de Beauvoir was talking about what is imposed on girls from childhood in order that they become socially acceptable adult women. In other words female socialisation and the restrictions of gender stereotypes. She goes into graphic detail also about female biology and the changes of puberty and menstruation.

Yes

@DaisiesandButtercups

Simone de Beauvoir was talking about what is imposed on girls from childhood in order that they become socially acceptable adult women. In other words female socialisation and the restrictions of gender stereotypes. She goes into graphic detail also about female biology and the changes of puberty and menstruation.

This is how I have always understood it.

If you’ll excuse me bringing the opposite sex into it, I also think most men will have a concept of the difference between boy and man that comes down heavily of societal expectations, rather than hair cuts and testosterone patches.

I also think most men will have a concept of the difference between boy and man that comes down heavily of societal expectations, rather than hair cuts and testosterone patches.

Yes, hence phrases like "man up", or the implication behind boys becoming the "man of the house"